| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:00:21.33 | Steven Woodside | All right, good evening everyone and welcome to the Sausalito City Council meeting for Tuesday May 20th 2025. We are returning from closed session. So City Clerk, will you please call roll. |
| 00:00:37.98 | Walfred Solorzano | Council member Blalstein. She is not here yet. |
| 00:00:42.08 | Steven Woodside | She expects to arrive between 7.30 and 8 p.m. |
| 00:00:42.10 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 00:00:45.46 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Hoffman. |
| 00:00:46.67 | Steven Woodside | Here. |
| 00:00:47.75 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Sobieski. Vice Mayor Woodside. Here. Mayor Cox. |
| 00:00:52.88 | Steven Woodside | Here, we'll have the Pledge of Allegiance. |
| 00:01:00.41 | Judy Weder | I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. and to the republic for which it stands. |
| 00:01:07.60 | Bonnie McGregor | one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. |
| 00:01:07.97 | Unknown | undergar. |
| 00:01:08.97 | Unknown | you Indivisible with liberty. |
| 00:01:12.22 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:01:15.39 | Steven Woodside | There are no closed session announcements, although I would like to remark that I recused myself from item... C3 due to the proximity of my residence to the property subject to negotiation. All right, we will move on to special presentations and mayor's announcements. And we'll start off with a budget presentation from our community services department. |
| 00:01:52.32 | Steven Woodside | Welcome. Director of Atali, very nice to see you. |
| 00:01:56.59 | Brian Vitale | Thank you. Pleasure to see you. Congratulations. |
| 00:01:58.27 | Steven Woodside | Congratulations on a fabulous spring fling at Marinship Park on Saturday. |
| 00:02:02.12 | Brian Vitale | Oh, thank you. Yes, thank you so much. It was a lot of work. The Chamber of Commerce and lots of volunteers did lots of great work for it. It was mostly them. They just had a few of our materials for it, but happy that people came for it and enjoyed the wonderful day. I'll get started. I know that we have a busy day today. So good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council, City staff, members of the public. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to present here tonight. Part of our overarching objective for combining parks and recreation, library services and communications is to align with our city's five-year strategic plan. We're strengthening our community identity, goal B, and enhancing our fiscal responsibility, goal C. We want to build long lasting relationships, provide safe gathering places, support wellness and health, facilitate inclusive community programs and events, and promote lifelong learners. By creating a community services department, we're streamlining our organization processes and working towards our objective, which is to strengthen our civic engagement. Together we can enhance local participation and create a stronger, more connected community. Next slide, please. Here we have our organizational chart for community services. Our community services director will be in charge of three departments. The city librarian will be in charge of the library. And there are four full-time staff, including the acting city librarian, with six part-time staff and four subs. For recreation, there are four... full-time staff, including the acting community services director with a rec admin that splits time 50-50 between HR and recreation and a new marketing and communications coordinator position. Next slide. All right, I'd like to turn it over to our acting city librarian Jeffrey Jackson, who's going to discuss our library services. |
| 00:04:00.99 | Steven Woodside | Good evening and welcome. Thank you. I don't know if you've spoken to this council before. I have not. Welcome. It's great to see you here. |
| 00:04:09.63 | Jeffrey Jackson | Good evening, mayor, vice mayor, city manager, council members, friends, colleagues, and members of the public. Even its funding to libraries is being cut at the federal and state level, and our existence is challenged by those who would deny Americans the freedom to read. Sausalito, I'm happy to say, is – Sausalito's library is thriving. Thank you. 65,000 people a year walk through the doors of Sausalito's living room as the library has been affectionately dubbed by our patrons. To them and to the countless others we reach remotely through online services, outreach, and partnering with schools, businesses, and community organizations, we provide the following and more seven days a week. access to information. Google a question and get a thousand answers. Ask a librarian and get the correct answer. Libraries are at the front lines of the war against misinformation. We promote literacy. Our children's librarian, Reva Pollard, does our storytimes herself, including Second Saturday's Family Storytime and Art in the Library. In addition to her master's degree in library and information science, she also has a master's in children's literature. We're lucky to have her. We serve as a community hub over 5000 people attended our programs last year. Digital inclusion to ensure everyone has equitable access to online resources, computers, and Wi-Fi. Okay. If you're homebound, for example, you don't have to come to the library to check out and stream a movie or listen to an e-audiobook. educational support by providing learning materials and partnering with the school district. You can sign up for a live tutor online or learn a new language through the Mango app. preservation of knowledge and culture through our carefully curated collections. For example, our local interest collection not only contains books about Sausalito, but also by Sausalito authors. We encourage creativity and innovation from providing museum passes to co-sponsoring the Evening of Poetry event at Sausalito Women's Club. We support job seekers and entrepreneurs from helping people fill out and submit job applications to leadership workshops and a program series on launching a new business. We provide health and well-being resources. We had an elderly lady come in who had a dental issue Medicare didn't cover. She wanted to know what resources were available to her, and we helped her out. We provide safe and inclusive spaces. The library is free and everyone is welcome no matter who you are, what you look like, or what you believe. We are supported by a library board of trustees who reviews the administration of library operations, makes recommendations to the city librarian and helps establish library policies. It also serves as liaison between the library. and the community and between the library and city council. the Friends of Sausalito Library through donations and book sales pays for things like children's programming, and furniture for the children's room. And the Library Foundation provides a permanent revenue source to enhance the library's programs, materials, and environments, such as the remodel in 2013 and purchasing our new meeting pod. Next slide, please. The library is blessed with a really terrific team. Together in the last six months, we have accomplished the following. New and improved programming for children, teens, and adults. New and improved collections, such as our horror and weird tale collection, the best in Northern California. and our music CD and LP collections. We have a new media listening station and new furniture for the children's room, both courtesy of the Friends of the Sausalito Library. A new book return in the city hall parking lot paid for by the library improvement fund a Pika Books program for those hard to find books, a new leisure periodical collection. You may also have noticed improved selection of magazines out in the hall. New material selection policy in response to the California Freedom to Read Act last year. We have streamlined and simplified our policies, procedures, and workflows, nuts and bolts stuff I won't get into here. with the aid of library staff. Next slide, please. Is there any? Nope. Um, I'll just sum up here with the aid of library staff, the friends of the library and the library foundation efforts are already underway to accomplish the following long term goals to keep Sausalito informed and inspired. Reposition, remove books to accommodate fire sprinklers. That is... 70% completed. walk in tech help the summer provided by a local high school student. It's his first job. A new projector and sound system this summer paid for by a donation administered by the Friends of Sausalito Library. It will make library events so much easier and more professional. We're getting a new Zoom Room Study Pod this summer paid for by a grant from the Library Foundation. First Friday's adult programming series starts this summer. We'd like to resolve some serious storage issues. If we end up building a storage closet, it can be paid for by the foundation or the library improvement fund. We'd like to refinish the wooden furniture, which we've had since 1979. Maybe get some. new armchairs, coffee table, table and floor lamps, new carpet and paint. These are the kinds of things the library foundation is happy to pay for. And ADA compliance, my understanding is that funds have been earmarked for this. It chiefly has to do with the width of the aisles and the stacks. Thank you very much. |
| 00:10:11.70 | Brian Vitale | Right, next slide, please. Jeffrey's been wonderful to work with. I've been working with him for the past nine or so months. He's been an integral part of our library since 1998. So he's been here, he's been around, he's been able to see lots of different renditions and changes take place. And with him at the helm, he's given me great insights into our library, into the culture behind libraries, and have really opened my eyes to the wonderfulness of what our staff and the library have done for this community. So thank you, Jeffrey. I appreciate you. So we're going to talk about parks and recreation services. First, we're going to talk about programs and activities. We host a wide variety of programs catering to all age groups. They vary from enrichment classes, such as bridge or writing series, to fitness programs like yoga and strength training, birthday parties, summer camps, tennis, ping pong clinics, bocce, and volleyball leagues, and a whole bunch more. There's a mixture of paid programming and free programming. It's offered throughout the year, and in the last 60 days, over 600 people have registered for some type of programming on our registration software. In fiscal year 2025, we've generated approximately $334,000 in revenue. For facility rental management, we manage programs and rentals for all of our parks and community rooms, which in 2025 has brought in approximately $90,745 in rental fees so far. These rentals include the MLK gym, the parks, the large mixed-use fields, tennis, pickleball courts, basketball courts, Marinship Field, Dunphy Park Gazebo, Gabrielson Park, the exercise room, downstairs, edgewater room, and the game room. Our three park landscapers and two maintenance staff work hard to keep these spaces looking good for our renters, visitors, and community members who utilize these amenities daily. Next, we have our special events and community events. Our small team of four downstairs in the rec office manages and hosts 27 special events throughout the year. Most of them are free for the community and visitors to attend, while some like the Chili Cook-Off, Jazz & Blues, or Toast-O-Sauce Lido have paid components that allow others to further participate, like sponsoring a table or sampling food or drinks. We rely on sponsorship from community partners and nonprofits, which help offset our costs. And in turn, the money gets reinvested back into Sausalito through community projects or donations. In fiscal year 25, we've generated approximately $207,000 in revenue. Additionally, we approve upwards of 12 community special events per year. These fees are nominal bringing in somewhere around 2500 annually, but the city and community events bring in somewhere between 25 and 30,000 attendees in total. So that's 37 ish events with about 30,000 people that come into town. We have a memorial bench program and film permit and banner program. Our memorial bench program is very popular. A lot of people want to honor their family members and Sausalito community members by memorializing them with a bench, a plaque, or a tree. The space gives them a place to reflect, rest, and grow. The revenue generated is about $12,000 this year, and we expect that to grow in 2026. We paused our program to update our pricing with our new fee study and currently have a wait list of eight to 10 people looking for space in the ferry landing, Tracy Way, Yitakchi, and other parks and public spaces. For film permits, we get a handful throughout the year, mostly promotional videos or pictures of people wanting to do some brand stuff. And then once in a while, we'll get a larger production in town for a week plus that'll bring us 10 to 20 thousand dollars hopefully not causing too much trouble for residents around town we have lots of community partners we partner with a variety of non-profits businesses restaurants local artisans we proudly collaborate with trisha smith from the sausalito village and the cars program cars is celebrating 10 years of supporting seniors with free, workshops, and a whole bunch more. We also partner closely with Sybil Boutier from Age-Friendly Sausalito on a variety of projects. As their fiscal agent, we've been hosting their Tai Chi for fall prevention via Zoom and in person for the last five years. This program is fully funded through Title III grants and supported by Marin County HHS. Age Friendly has been awarded $21,948 in fiscal year 24-25 and approximately $95,000 in the last five years. They've hosted 608 hours of valuable programming to 384 participants that are improving their balance, mobility, reducing pain and arthritis, and avoiding dangerous falls. Thank you. valuable programming to 384 participants that are improving their balance, mobility, reducing pain and arthritis, and avoiding dangerous falls. Sybil's also secured Breathe RESPA grants from 2020 to 2025, enabling inclusive senior field trips to the Edgewater seniors and other senior groups. They've gone to Angel Island, Samuel B. Taylor Park, and they've taken 22 trips and had 361 people head out to them. Our rec department also helps fund these trips by providing meals, transportation, or other services four times a year. We work with our neighbors in the 94965 neighborhoods in Marin City. We work with Play Marin, the Performing Stars, Marin City Art and Culture, and Marin City Community Services District. We partner on programming, provide free event space, and strengthen our community ties by supporting each other when we can. The city also sponsors Marin City's Juneteenth event. This will be our third year sponsoring it at $5,000. All of these efforts with our local partners and businesses, local nonprofits, and committed community members keep Sausalito's traditions alive and foster a thriving and connected community. Lastly, we have our boards and commissions. Our Parks and Rec Commission does a great job at supporting our community while approving high-impact applications, creating subcommittees to assist with pricing or fee structures, identifying park impacts, and starting the process with Sausalito Beautiful on being park liaisons. Additionally, I sit on the SCA board as a liaison. I've been working with SCA on utilizing our city days. So far, we've hosted the winter market, the opera, and a few others. And we plan to host more as we navigate through our event season. Next slide, please. So our 2025 accomplishments and 2026 goals for our accomplishments, Marin Park has reopened. The courts are back and opened and secured 24 hours a day. The court membership program that we have has 190 members topping out at 200 and has generated $26,000 in revenue so far. Depending on annual memberships each year, we can generate about $30,000 in annual sales. And there's also opportunity for lessons, leagues and tournaments, which would generate an additional 10 to 15,000 annually. Our goal is to always be mindful of our key card holders and create a balanced approach with programming and, uh, our members, uh, We've provided over 250 free programs to the public with a focus on inclusive, age-friendly, and intergenerational programming. We've reached $600,000 in generated revenue for the first time. We've provided services to over 70,000 people, and we refurbished the gazebo this year. For 2026, our goal is to resurface the MLK gym floor, which has not been done in 25 plus years, not longer than I've been alive, but. You know, close. And that's going to be happening this September. We're increasing our inclusive programming. We're increasing our partnerships with a variety of community partners. And we are considering purchasing Playland Sausalito, which has been an integral part of Sausalito for the last 15 or so years. They host toddler, children, family, and preteen programming. We feel like it's a good time to grow our programming, and this will add minimal overhead costs and focus on long-term growth. This is part of City Manager's Care Program, and it's something that I would be happy to discuss more in the future. There is a, in your packet, there should be something with little tidbits on the programming over the last few years and how we could see it grow and add staff to add other areas of growth as well. All right, next slide, please. So we're going to take a look at the recreation budget here. You can see we have a comparison of our year over year from 2019, 2023, 2024, and 2025 for months 1 through 11. I added 2019 in there in the blue on the bottom. So you can get a picture of what things were like pre-COVID and what they're looking like now. I did the same thing on the bottom with the revenue. So you could see our year over year revenue pre-COVID times and then in the last three years. |
| 00:19:17.99 | Brian Vitale | So year over year, we've increased our expenses, but that's only because we've increased our revenues. We're looking good in 2025 and are hitting our targets while staying economical in our purchasing. We're 1% away from hitting our revenue goals, which will be an increase of $100,000 from fiscal year 24 to 25. So I talked about that blue line of our pre-COVID numbers. For expenses, we're right on track. And for revenue, we've grown our recorded income by over $200,000 in that six-year period. We're on target to reduce our spending by $30,000 this year, while exceeding our revenue budget by $40,000 this year. for budget reduction strategies. Most costs are reflective of revenue generated or services provided. If we cut costs in a department that generated revenue to offset... Excuse me, if we cut costs in the department that generated revenue, it'll offset our financial costs and any reduction would impact services offered in our overall revenue growth. Next slide please. Next, we have our library services budget. I did the same thing with this. The last three years of expenses with a 2019 budget in there. We're looking at a break-even budget for this year. So the library's budget has held strong and has been consistent over the last five years. No significant changes will be made in 2026. And the goal is to be able to look at the Friends of the Library, the Foundation, and the Trust to offset any capital improvements or added programs that would extend the library's offerings. In our budget reduction strategies, there's little bits and pieces that you'd be able to take away from material costs, which could be supplemented by... different friends programs or the foundation programs, but fees of books and fees of materials are always increasing year over year. So any reduction in those would be a reduction to our collection or our catalog and are just things to be thinking about over time with what services we provide with the library. If you looked at a return on involvement for the library, getting 65,000 people in that library at $950,000, it's $15 per person to be able to go into that library. So that woman that didn't have her insurance came in, it cost the city 15 bucks to be able to give her some really great resources to be able to help her out. And that statistic, thank you city manager for that return on involvement there. I think it's something that really holds true to the library services and the amount of people that are able to come in there day after day and year after year. Next slide please. So that's it for us. We're happy to answer any questions about Recreation, library, communications. Thank you for your time. I appreciate it. |
| 00:22:20.12 | Steven Woodside | Thank you so much. Thank you for the great. Presentation. I do want to comment on the presentation on the library. We give a lot of praise to Brian because every time there's an event in town, we're all so pleased with how successful it is and how much we pull the community out. But I also wanted to acknowledge the librarian because I have started spending some of my afternoons and evenings in the library when I'm in between meetings here at City Hall. And so I have really experienced firsthand the level of service that your librarians give to those most in need. One of your librarians has come up to me several times to describe a challenge for an unhoused individual who visits the library all the time. And it is so great and gratifying to see how caring our employees are for our residents. And so I just wanted to give a special shout out and acknowledgement to you and your staff for that level of service that you provide to our community. |
| 00:23:23.58 | Jeffrey Jackson | Thank you, Mayor Cox. THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 00:23:25.35 | Steven Woodside | in. |
| 00:23:25.62 | Jeffrey Jackson | Thank you. |
| 00:23:26.38 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 00:23:26.90 | Ian Sobieski | I don't know if this is for Mr. Jackson or you, Brian. It's a question about the library. So the budget, the expenses is roughly $900,000. What I didn't see on that slide as opposed to others is I know there's revenue from book fines and grants and whatnot. How much does that add up to? |
| 00:23:48.74 | Jeffrey Jackson | none of the marin libraries charge um fees anymore we only charge for a book if it's um um lost or damaged and needs to be replaced and that um covers the exact cost of the item okay thank you um The friends of the library typically pays for, you know, and all of our children's programming. We ask for specific grants when it comes to things that we want to accomplish that we don't have the budget set aside for. So an example of some of those would be $3,000 to update our Spanish language materials collection for adults. furniture for the children's room. Let's see, the media listening station was paid for by them. So as the need comes up and we look at the budget and say, well, we don't have anything set aside for that. That's when we go to the friends and write a grant for that. Where the foundation comes in is typically for more capital improvement related things like new paint or carpet. They're paying for a meeting pod, it's like a miniature room that you can go into and it's soundproof. And we get asked all the time for, um, like, for example, by job seekers, you have an interview coming up. and they want to... a place where they can have privacy and really, Right now, all we can do is say, well, you're welcome to sit in the hallway. It's pretty busy out there, but there is free wifi. But this would provide them a place to do a job interview in privacy and not disturb other library patrons. The cost of that meeting pot is $13,000. |
| 00:25:50.32 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, so do I understand correctly then that the numbers we saw, the roughly $900,000, that's the expenses of the library and then special things like the children's thing, the pod, other kinds of special expenses are paid for off budget by some of these, by the library foundation. |
| 00:26:08.12 | Jeffrey Jackson | That's correct. I could mention also the book drop in the parking lot was $7,500. And that came from the Library Improvement Fund. Okay. |
| 00:26:08.14 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 00:26:17.22 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 00:26:17.39 | Jeffrey Jackson | Great. Thank you. |
| 00:26:17.98 | Ian Sobieski | sir and then i have a question for you brian uh first off just truly echoing congratulations this is very exciting i just want to emphasize that yeah you grew uh revenue 15 your expenses went up 15 but your revenue went up 50 so 200k extra in revenue 200k extra in expenses every dollar of expense was matched by a dollar of revenue so you're doing literally more with exactly the same expense to the city. So true kudos to that achievement. And I want to make sure that was underlined and seen. Just one question, for example, you said that there are charges on park fees. We got a last minute letter that was pretty rough, and I just wanted to ask you a question about Fourth of July last year. There was a company that did a demonstration of some kind in Dunphy Park. Can you tell us what that company was and how it came and what it paid the city? Thank you. |
| 00:27:09.67 | Brian Vitale | Sure, absolutely. You know, we get, we have our fee schedule, where we have a variety of different charges that we can charge groups. And on that schedule, the maximum for sponsorship that we had was $10,000. And in that, structure, we looked at the group. I can't think of what their pivotal was their name. They were an aeronautics company that wanted to fly a drone and be able to have an opportunity to present this new technology. And we saw it as a great opportunity to be able to promote a new brand while doing something fun and generating some revenue to offset the cost of the fireworks, which cost about $40,000 each year. With that maximum of the sponsorship funds that we could get, we saw that that was what we were able to to capitalize on based on what our fees schedule said. So that's why we charged that price for that particular group coming out. |
| 00:28:24.79 | Ian Sobieski | So for something like that, is the city council involved? Was any city council member involved? Or is that a decision you make as a staff member or |
| 00:28:31.34 | Brian Vitale | There was no council members that were, or there was no council approval on that per se. I did talk with some individual members along with Parks and Rec Commission members, but usually sponsorship were things that I discussed with city manager during our meetings and how we can move forward in a way that doesn't really disrupt our public, but is able to generate things for the city and kind of create new fun things that make people, you know, ooh and ah during a Fourth of July celebration. |
| 00:29:06.37 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you very much. |
| 00:29:08.97 | Melissa Blaustein | I'll try to be quick, but with respect to the library, I know the federal government has made some cuts to some obscure institutes that help fund local libraries. Are any of those cuts having an effect here? |
| 00:29:21.14 | Jeffrey Jackson | I'm sorry. |
| 00:29:26.12 | Jeffrey Jackson | Not to Sausalito Library. The state of California receives about $15 million from the federal government. And then the state library distributes those funds in the form of grants to all the public libraries at the state. So we don't apply for those directly. But the Marinnet consortium that we are a member of, they get some of those grants Thank you. There is, I think, the scenic internet provider that provides the internet for the... public computers that the library has. That's not the same Internet that City Hall has, but it's its own thing. That's an example of one of those things that's subsidized by you know, higher up agencies. Okay? |
| 00:30:18.45 | Melissa Blaustein | I'm sorry. |
| 00:30:18.58 | Jeffrey Jackson | So we don't expect to really feel much pain from it, fortunately. But... Rural libraries might suffer significant hardships when their entire programming budget goes away. They don't have any way to recover that |
| 00:30:40.94 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. And then to Director Vitale quickly, one special event that you were able to resurrect recently, as of last Sunday, you didn't mention, that's the farmer's market. So what's your role in relation to things like the farmer's market, in particular, this farmer's market? |
| 00:30:59.91 | Brian Vitale | Yeah, absolutely. So the farmer's market is a third party vendor of ours. They are contracted with us. It's a certified organic farmer's market. And this was something that for the in the five years that I've been working here, people have wanted to be able to get the farmer's market back. Carly Bartlett, our recreation supervisor, somebody reached out to her last year saying, hey, I want to do a farmer's market. And we worked to try and figure out where the best location for it would be without impacting the community. And we worked with that vendor to provide that farmer's market. We paid for those fees to operate. We went through some of the trainings to make sure that we were following all the directives of the county and of the state and of agriculture. And after a year of that, that person didn't want to operate it anymore. We opened it up to taking it in-house and having a part-time staff member run it. We had some bids from some of the vendors that worked at that market, gathered a couple other people that hosted other farmers markets, and presented us with an idea for them to take it over. After hearing their proposal, after doing the interviews, it made sense for us to go with that third-party operator so that we would be able to work with them to collaborate on the market, set the guidelines for what we see fit for our market, looked at previous leases or guidelines from the 2000 to 2009 farmer's market that took place on Tracy Way, and are looking to grow the market to potentially move it into the Tracy way downtown area. Potentially have some evening markets that could be down there. And we're working on with working on with them to expand and to grow as a small community market and as something that they feel is an integral part of the community to be able to go out and shop on a weekly basis. |
| 00:33:08.38 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:33:11.90 | Jill Hoffman | I'm just, thank you, and great job, by the way. I'm curious, you know, I get not just feedback from the city, obviously, who love the events, but also from the broader community. And the feedback is that people are amazed that the Parks and Rec run these huge events that we have here. And it's not the Chamber of Commerce for something else. And they're amazed that it's our Parks and Rec that run our 4th of July. They're amazed that it's the Parks and Rec that run our sip and stroll or whatever it is we call it. And these huge community events and not some other group here in town. So kudos to you. I mean, honest to God, it's amazing. And the Friday night Jazz by the Bay is our Parks and Rec department not some other vendor down here so you know and these are institutions we take it for granted but you know other other communities and towns are amazed that we can pull it off so here's my question so what what's the what's the origin of the these revenue increases that you're seeing these big revenue increases that you're generating through Parks and Rec I'm just curious if you can define it |
| 00:34:20.64 | Brian Vitale | Yeah, absolutely. It's little bits here and there. It's not one main cash cow that comes in. We've added an offset revenue costs with after-school tennis programs, HRT utilizing our tennis courts two hours a day by providing high-performance tennis that has a higher price point. Those two hours, while it could be not great for a few community members to be able to come out. It generates somewhere near $40,000 to $50,000 of annual revenue for us. Playland generates probably about $35,000, $40,000 in annual revenue. Their summer camp programs, our rentals have gone up in some areas. Dunphy Park rentals after the revitalization of that park has gone up by about $15,000 a year. MLK field, their rentals have gone up by about 15, $20,000 in the year. MLK gym has gone down a little bit, but those are all offset different costs. Some sponsorship and other types of events that, um, also generate more revenue. Chili Cook-Off used to generate about $10,000 in revenue. We really marketed it hard for the last few years, tried to get more vendors to come out. Now it's generating about $30,000 a year with sponsorship for Toast of Sausalito that brought in about $25,000 of revenue in the year. So we're trying to work with different groups, trying to take the little bits from all the different areas that we work in. And, you know, recreation is kind of a volatile business. Some years it's going to be higher, some years it's going to be lower. But as long as we kind of maintain our service, each year we try to get better and better on the things that we provide and the things that we offer. So, an example, Chili Cook-Off, you add a hot pepper eating contest. It adds a little bit of variety or someone say spice to the, uh, sorry, sorry. Uh, um, adds a little spice to the event. Um, you know, you, you add a adult Easter egg hunt that takes an event that, uh, used to, it used to be $3,000 to host that event. Uh, now it's bringing in $3,000. So that's a $3,000 to host that event. Now it's bringing in $3,000. So that's a $6,000 difference in that event there. So it's little things like that that we try to work on. I always try to look at it from an entrepreneurial standpoint and from a community standpoint of what people would enjoy to do. what they're getting the best bang for their buck and really trying to make it community focused, our recreation leagues, different things like that. So I would attribute it to, to that mostly. |
| 00:37:02.18 | Jill Hoffman | Thanks. I wrecked the |
| 00:37:03.14 | Brian Vitale | Yeah. And our rec department is very different than every other rec department in the types of events and types of things that we host. I haven't worked in this type of rec department before, but I really enjoy it. And I know our staff do too. So. |
| 00:37:17.94 | Jill Hoffman | Thanks. Thanks for your job and your team, too. Are any of the rest of them here? |
| 00:37:21.61 | Brian Vitale | They are not, no. |
| 00:37:22.41 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, they're home because they work all the time. |
| 00:37:23.19 | Brian Vitale | They're home. |
| 00:37:23.56 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Yes. |
| 00:37:25.40 | Jill Hoffman | THANK YOU. |
| 00:37:25.49 | Steven Woodside | Brian, your enthusiasm and your department members' enthusiasm really shows through. So thanks for a great presentation and keep up the great work. |
| 00:37:33.92 | Brian Vitale | Thank you so much. Have a great night. |
| 00:37:36.79 | Steven Woodside | Okay, and with that, we will welcome our Director of Human Resources, Kathy Nikita, for her budget presentation. |
| 00:37:47.42 | Kathy Nikita | Well, following Messrs. Vitaly and Jackson is a very tall order. But good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council Members, City Manager, City Clerk. residents and other members of the public here. So human resources is not a public-facing job. So really, I am here to help all of the people who help all of you. So if you could go to my first slide, please, after the end. So here's a model that I've come across and I really love. We train people well enough so that they can leave and they can go anywhere but we try to treat them well enough so that they don't want to that's not always something that uh that is achievable but it's always a goal of mine personally so who are we and what do we do so the hr office is part of administration so we don't have have our own budget. We are part of the administration of the city. We are staffed by myself, a full-time HR manager. Next slide, please. Thank you. And a half-time admin aide, which I share with Director Vitale. She works mornings in HR and afternoons in recreation. So that keeps her quite hopping. We serve the city's full-time staff of 70-plus full-time employees, 40-plus part-time employees, then we have seasonal, temporary, and on-call employees. And that's what we're here to do, is to take care of what they need done so that they can take care of everyone else. We're here to support the staff who provide those critical services to the residents of our city. Police Department, the library, public works, finance, recreation, community development, and all of us in administration, I'm here. to support them. So you might not see me, but if you're an employee, you've probably seen me, and I hope it hasn't been for anything too unpleasant. So what are our key functions? So, of course, we try to recruit to find the best people for our workforce, and we administer benefits for those people to take care of them. We work in risk management, hand in hand with finance. Human resources is all about risk management. Try to keep people trained with their skills, keep them up to date. I work with workers' compensation strategies to try to keep them safe. I do payroll and finance support. I have a background in payroll and finance before coming here, and so it's been a natural synergy, but it's probably a lot more than some people think. You think, oh, HR's over there and payroll's over here, but we work closely together. I do onboarding, and I do, when we're bringing a new employee in, we do job descriptions, do labor relations. We prepare the pay plans that you'll see on our website and contracts memorandum memoranda of understanding the mous that we have with our various groups but really when it comes down to it at this last line are the things that i think are the most important for for what i do i try to support our people i try try to inspire, encourage, nudge, cheerlead, advise, and listen to them. I'm not a counselor, but I counsel people when we need it. I'm not a coach, but sometimes I have to be a coach. I have to act like a coach. And I don't mean act like in a... any way other than to say sometimes that's what I have to do, and that's what I enjoy doing. These are the parts of the job that aren't on a job description normally, and for human resources, my door downstairs is usually mostly open, except when there's Zumba across the hall, because then I might need to concentrate a little more and not get carried away by their rhythms. But I try to keep it open because employees need a place to go to talk about a lot of things, and whether it's their benefits or not, but it's really being available for people. And as a matter of fact, you know, I try to do things for our staff, but I get back in return. I have staff members who this afternoon, I got an unexpected moment of zen from one of our staff members who I had a worried look on my face. And they gave me some really great zen advice, and I appreciated that. And that's what I think Sausalito and our workforce is all about. So the employees that my office serves is we have the Service Employees International Union. Next slide, please. Sorry. Our SEIU group, we have 31 positions, and they cover public works, library, CDD, recreation, and admin. We have the Sausalito Police Association. That group has 23 authorized positions. Two of those are frozen, so we have 21 active positions. And we have the non-represented employees, and there are 25 positions in that group. And they encompass administration, finance, and city and police management. And then we have our groups of seasonal on-call and temporary employees. And HR is there for all of them. So some of our goals, next slide please, sorry. Thanks, Maria. Some of our goals for the next fiscal year are continue our recruitment efforts. That seems like the obvious one, right? We want to keep filling vacancies as they arise. And vacancies aren't always the result of something negative going on. Sometimes it's, you know, people retire or people move. So it's a certain amount of vacancies that's a normal part of doing business. And we just recently, I wanted to mention Thank you. it's a certain amount of vacancies that's a normal part of doing business. And we just recently, I wanted to mention, we just recently took part in an online recruitment meeting through Civic Match. There's a Civic Match database that we found out about through the National League of Cities. And there are a lot of federal employees, as most people know, a lot of federal employees who are leaving the federal workforce. And so Civic Match has come up with a database of matching people with the skills that they are bringing from Washington and trying to get them into local governments, local and state governments. So we did a, there were about 10 employers and about 80 job seekers that we met online a few weeks ago, and it was pretty great. And so we've got access to that database now so we can keep developing those relationships and finding the best people. We want to retain, we don't want to just bring people in. We want to try to retain the ones who want to keep growing, and we try to provide them great benefits and give them opportunities to grow in their careers. One of my goals is to improve and streamline our internal processes, and I won't go too far into that, but that's always a goal, and less paper, which will lead into our next presentation as well. And my goal always is to provide a supportive atmosphere for our employees. Next slide, please. I really do believe that nothing is more important, nothing that we do here is more important than hiring and developing good people. Again, the public may not see what we do here in HR, but I try to be here for all of our employees because our employees want to be here for the city of Sausalito. And so I'm going to keep supporting them. And Cindy Jane and I, she's our halftime admin aide. So we are here for the employees, and we're here for you. And if you have any questions, I'm happy to do my best to answer them. |
| 00:45:51.21 | Steven Woodside | Thank you so much. Thank you for everything that you do for all of our employees. the city manager told some third graders i think that we had 75 so now you're saying 79 tonight so i i am pretty close um I have no questions. Any questions from anyone? Very straightforward. Thank you so much. Sure. Very much appreciate it. |
| 00:46:12.36 | Kathy Nikita | so much. Sure. Thank you. |
| 00:46:16.36 | Steven Woodside | All right. we are... Thank you for the question. Let's get through this presentation. Go ahead. Welcome to our city clerk, Walford Solorzano. |
| 00:46:33.06 | Walfred Solorzano | Hi, good evening, Mayor, City Council, Public, and Shawna and Piper and Willow. They're watching at home. So next slide, please. So we're going to go over the functions of the city clerk, the responsibilities and services. So what does the city clerk do? So the city clerk is kind of the guardian of the democratic process at the local level. We're responsible for elections. We're responsible for the city records. And we're responsible for legislative transparency. So that kind of, you know, it includes the Brown Act, Public Reforms Act. Whereas we act as the process arm for the local government. While the city council does set the policy and the city manager works as the chief executive officer, the city clerk, with the help of the city attorney, they ensure that everything is done and transparent, that everything is transparent and everything is done legally. One of the clerk, the clerk's roles, they are the election officials. So we oversee the local elections, ballot measures, initiatives and recalls. So when we receive, like, for example, we receive initiative from the public. They come over to us. We do a prima fiche account. send them over to the county to make sure if they have enough signatures. When people apply to run for office like we did last year, they come over to the city clerk's office. We provide them the paperwork. We provide them any legal, sorry, any assistance as legally allowed to help them fill out the items. And then we process the elections and we outsource the actual election with the county. But at the end of the day, we're the city clerk's office is the one that certifies everything. We're also the compliance officer. The city clerk ensures adherence to laws regulating open meetings, as I mentioned, with the Brown Act. We're also with campaign finance. So you'll hear form 700s, form 4 60s. And what I like to tell people about form for 60s, because people always like to say, Oh, elected officials are in there for money. I like the officials get this elected officials get that |
| 00:48:38.11 | Unknown | . |
| 00:48:39.29 | Walfred Solorzano | If you go on to any city website or if you go on to like the secretary of state, For 60s, especially for the public watching at home, That's where you can see where the money goes in and out. So you can see who contributes money to elected officials and you can see where that money goes to elected officials. That's why it's important. That's why it's an important piece. And that's why you've seen in the news with like some presidents and dealing with FPC issues because all of that transparency matters because we wanna see like, who's giving a certain elected official money and maybe how does that affect, you know, their decision making into everything. And so the city clerk's office at the local level, that's what we provide and we use our vendor net file for that. We also answer, okay, we also, and we're also the records manager. We manage public records. We answer PRAs, and we preserve council minutes, resolutions, ordinances, and agendas. So we're the big records keeper, kind of like the historian, but really more, we're not really telling the story. The story is being told and everything that's in there, but we're there to to preserve everything and then we're also kind of the municipal officers so we kind of you'll probably see in uh two meetings from now you'll see me administer alts to new police officers or the police officers getting promotions uh i manage the city seal and we also uh get all the summonses and city claims and then you know whatever we need to do we pass it over and work with this the city attorney and city manager's office for that And so kind of rounding everything up, why the city clerk matters. And I think I mentioned earlier about checks and balances. We ensure that the officials and public and this agency operates within the law. Again, we've heard We've heard over here complaints by certain members of the public saying, oh, we're not complying to Brown Act, we're not complying to Transparency. If we weren't, we wouldn't be having the meeting. And that's part of the city clerk's job with the assistance of the city attorney and then sometimes advice from council who we have municipal lawyers with in the council. And so they help us with the checks and balances. And again, with transparency, we provided public access to public information to citizens. And we helped create some of that oversight and trust. and then kind of like a final thought with as far as the responsibility there's got to be a strong relationship between the city council, the city manager, city attorney's office, and the city clerk. It's essential for like a balanced, effective governance. And, you know, again, with the city clerk's office, we're not just here for meetings and helping the city council, but we're also kind of the records keeper. We help with compliance and we're a critical part in democracy. So next slide, please. So just kind of some numbers. So PRA requests that we've gotten this year is about 61. We had 112 last year, which was we were averaging before that. We're averaging about 70, 75. What ended up happening is when I came into office, I added next request, which makes it a lot easier to provide requests and also keeping track of everything. So that number kind of blew up once we got that because it made it easier. The number of staff we have myself and we have Noeli Gonzalez. She is the deputy city clerk at Manaid. We conducted one election last year, got a couple of complaints from Jeffrey Chase. But otherwise it was a good election. And records. I'll start touching about records because that's kind of the biggest thing right now. Our city started back in 1893. And so we have records that go back there. We used to use this system called DocuWare. What I found with DocuWare, it was... it wasn't a very good system. It was very difficult to search for things. It was very difficult to manage, and it was really outdated. What I did a couple of years ago when I came in, we started migrating all our stuff that we had digitized over into Laserfish. Laserfish is like the number one electronic repository in California, and ECS is our provider. And so we started making a project. We started migrating everything. And so a lot of our spare time is doing a quality control of the records and it shifted over because we're checking records. We're talking about minutes, resolutions, and ordinances and then agendas from 1893. So if we can move to the next slide. So as we segue into this, we're going to talk about the firehouse. The city council has identified the firehouse on Spencer as something that we want to clear out to possibly make it a functioning firehouse for firefighters. In order to kind of comply with the city's retention schedule, we need to clear the firehouse because we have a lot of records out there. So we need to index and scan, and that's all going to cost a lot of money. I have experience from power cities that I've done this, and it's a really long project, but it can be done if we spend a little bit of money outsourcing some of it. because in-house, the only people that we really have, we would have to rely on. project, but it can be done if we spend a little bit of money outsourcing some of it because in house, the only people that we really have, we would have to rely on on on interns, and right now we have one intern. He went from Public Works with us, and so right now he's identifying and helping index records. So we'll go to the next one. So, We went up there with ECS, we went with Community Economic Development Department to go check out some of the stuff. And then again, Sanjay, who was the intern working with Public Works, went to go see what's over there. And we identified there's about a million pages that possibly need to be scanned. We have about 1,400 maps. Maps are very expensive to scan because they come in different sizes. And there's a lot of detail on these maps. And so what we're going to be asking in the CIP is we're going to ask for about J. 300,000 dollars to clear all this it shouldn't cost more than $300,000 because we're hoping, as we identify an index, a lot of this stuff a lot of it can be destroyed. J. Because there's some things out there that aren't part of the retention schedule and legally don't do not need to be on there so that's kind of the overhead and then next slide please. So kind of the process, how is this process? What are we gonna do? So the first phase, we're basically gonna assess everything. So right now what we did is We pulled everything out of the closet, pulled out all the mess. And now we're in the process of stacking the whole mess. So that's kind of where we're at. The second phase is we're gonna come and we're gonna ask council to pass the CIP and ask for money so we can put it in the budget. Third part of the phase is we're gonna come back. We're gonna come back with a resolution and we're gonna ask, we're gonna work with ECS making a contract and we're gonna Thank you. We're going to come back and ask for money, hopefully, like in July to go do this. And so, and it'll be an agenda item. if you want to have more discussion. And then we can start getting the work done. So as we start stacking things, there's going to be things that need to be destroyed. There's going to be items that need to be scanned and returned, and there's items that can be scanned, and then the physical items can be destroyed. With all of this, we use our retention schedule to make sure that we're compliant with the city, with everything that we do. And anything that gets destroyed has to get signed off by the department head the city attorney, and the city clerk. So we're just not like, grabbing a piece of paper and be like, okay, it's trash. No, no, we have to index it. We have to log what's in there. And then we have to take it for signature because the department Department had say something with Public Works. And they're saying, why are we getting rid of these maps? And it's like, oh, my mistake. And then as a city clerk, I go over and see that we're compliant with government code and we're compliant with our retention schedule to see if it's okay. And then the city attorney oversees and then he signs himself too. So there's really good checks and balances of this. And then ultimately we're hoping we're going to get another intern that's going to help with the indexing. The indexing gets pretty rigorous. And from my experience, it takes about three or four hours to go through one box index, clean out, do a lot of things because before it gets sent out to scanning. So hopefully we get a lot of it done and the idea is that maybe sometime by early next year we can clear out the place of records and they're getting scanned and hopefully they come back and we can have everything into our repository. So that's Next slide. I think that's all we have right now. Thank you. If you have any questions about, yeah, I'm here. |
| 00:57:18.63 | Steven Woodside | Thank you, City Clerk. Thank you for this overview of this really important project. A big challenge that I personally have seen is the... You know, our various department heads don't always know what we have because, like I'll say, hey, back in 2012 we did XYZ and they're like, well, you know, they didn't know that because they weren't here in 2012. So I think that this project with an accurate indexing system will really be a tool for department heads, both existing but also incoming, to better understand the resources available when it comes to institutional knowledge and records of prior actions. So thank you so much. Any other comments? |
| 00:58:06.47 | Ian Sobieski | I would just love to speak to Sharna, Piper, and Willow and say your dad is treasured here. And he was supposed to take your mom out for their 10th anniversary. And instead, in honoring another parent who had a child's birthday, one of his colleagues, he came here and spent the day here. So that colleague could be with his kids. So that's the kind of dad you have. So congratulations. |
| 00:58:34.06 | Melissa Blaustein | You mentioned the maps, the 1,400 maps or something like that, and I know out in the hallways here we have a few historic maps that are beautiful, and I'm sure there's a great interest on the part of historians to maybe take a look at that maps before they are simply digitized or otherwise stored. |
| 00:58:52.10 | Walfred Solorzano | Well, the maps, most of these maps, they're not going to be, they're going to get digitized, but they don't get tossed. Most of them have to be stored permanently. And ideally, they, you know, we need to find kind of a location because you want to store these in a place where it's fireproof. And you file fireproof cabinets, they kind of have cement inside and they're pretty big. So we need another location. Eventually, that's something that we can get at later on where we actually store these maps. Same thing with other documents that kind of deal with real property. A lot of them have to be stored in fireproof maps, fireproof areas. Good. That's good to know. Thank you. |
| 00:59:31.93 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:59:33.89 | Walfred Solorzano | you |
| 00:59:33.90 | Jill Hoffman | All right. Thank you. Oh, go ahead. Thank you for this presentation and taking on the project. I know it's a big one. |
| 00:59:37.84 | Walfred Solorzano | All right. Thank you, Sonti. |
| 00:59:44.77 | Steven Woodside | All right, and I will note for the record that Councilmember Blaustein has arrived. Welcome. Okay, we're now going to move on. Oh, I actually am going to open up our three special presentations for public comment. I know David Lay had a comment If anybody else has a comment, please. Approach the podium. |
| 01:00:06.64 | David Lay | Yeah. I had a comment on the library. Um, At home as a kid, we had a really good globe. And most homes don't have... have a globe and we need one in our library and the globe should be a scientific globe not necessarily political although you can have country borders but a scientific globe has ocean currents uh prevailing winds uh it shows color code for a depth of ocean it shows color codes for um the type of geology over land and stuff where it's desert and on. And the modern ones have raised places where there's mountains. And it's really very instructional and it starts very early. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:00:58.16 | Steven Woodside | And I see Director Vitale is still here, so he'll take your recommendation under advisement. |
| 01:01:04.69 | Zach Montseese | Council members, Mayor Cox, thank you for having me. My name is Zach Montseese. I'm a new resident of Sausalito. Thank you for having me, residents. |
| 01:01:12.10 | Steven Woodside | Oh, I think you're here for communications. Yeah. Yeah, so I'm about to get to that. So just hold on one moment, because I invited him to come for communications. Is there any other comment on our special presentations? |
| 01:01:24.37 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, we have a Babette McDougall. |
| 01:01:25.85 | Steven Woodside | Okay. |
| 01:01:29.55 | Babette McDougall | Hi, good evening. Thank you for inviting me to speak. So I want to just make one comment, first of all, to Walford. Thank you so much for reinforcing the need to uphold and observe our democratic institutions. And you are indeed the city clerk, and the city clerk's office is responsible for all of that. So thanks for reminding us of that. I'm also reminded, thanks to Brian's presentation, and I want to say, Hats off to Brian. Brian has done a really good job just by virtue of his own personality, which is very engaging, of bringing back the fun to Sausalito. So I think a lot of us are really glad that Brian is doing the job he's doing. And I'd like to see this community services division And Curious to see how it grows and thrives over time. I'm glad to see the library being singled out for what it is, a library. Because here we are, the guardians of the First Amendment. First and foremost, through the library and also through our Department of Communication, how we professionally communicate with our publics very much represents the First Amendment as we speak to our constituents and other audiences. So with that in mind, I just want to say I did submit a letter asking for some clarification. I want to thank Mr. Sobieski for guiding the conversation. A lot of those questions that he raised were in my letter. So thank you for that. And the other thing I'd like to point out is that honoring and upholding the traditions of Sausalito is really what this town is about. And so far, we've had some wonderful programs that have become engaged, like the Taste of Sausalito and some of these other wonderful programs. So I really think that there's generally a really good momentum afoot here for bringing back the flavor of this town, which is highly volunteer driven. So I want to thank you for acknowledging the character, the authentic character of Sausalito. And with that, I yield back the balance of time. Thank you. |
| 01:03:17.45 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 01:03:18.05 | Walfred Solorzano | We have Sandra Bushmaker. |
| 01:03:21.60 | Sandra Bushmaker | Good evening, council and staff. Thank you very much for the presentations. I really enjoyed them. And Brian, I particularly want to give your department kudos for all the activities that you've done in our town and kind of kept our spirits up during some difficult times. I would like to hear a little bit more since we're going through a city reorganization about this marketing and communications coordinator. Maybe not tonight, but at another time, I'd like to see a description of this person's job and what your expectations are of this particular person. With regard to the city clerk's job, it is indeed a vital role here in Sausalito. And I'm very happy to hear about the organization of the documents up at the Spencer Firehouse. I am sure you will find my 30 some pages of minutes that we had during during my tenure. It was quite a job to approve the minutes back then. So I'm sure you'll love to go through them. The present council members will love to go through those. of long pages of minutes. And of course the HR department is extremely important We did not have that during my time, and I'm really pleased to see. that we have such a strong HR department. Thank you. |
| 01:04:41.09 | Walfred Solorzano | All right, next speaker, Sybil Boutilleri. |
| 01:04:48.99 | Unknown | Um, Thank you, City Council members, Mayor. I just want to say how amazing all of these presentations were tonight. I just think the city did such a fantastic job. But I really want to call out Brian because it's just amazing to me what he and Carly and and Candace are able to do a three person office has just been incredible in terms of the production of big events and day to day coordination of their office. People don't know this, but years ago I was public relations director for San Francisco's Rec and Park Department, so I know something about how they operate. He does. as much as, you know, that whole office did, I have to say, he and his small crew. So, and on top of that, because I do work with him now in terms of the, some of the age family programs, I want to say that throughout, despite being so busy and turning out so much activity and production for City and making it such a fun place to live. Always civil, pleasant, helpful. And the whole staff is. And it's a pleasure to work with them. And I just wanted to mention that aspect. Because I don't think that's been brought up. And it's really important. And of course, that's true for the other employees that spoke today, the staff that spoke today. But this is a lot of personal experience. |
| 01:06:52.94 | Walfred Solorzano | OK, no more further public speakers. |
| 01:06:54.53 | Steven Woodside | All right, thank you all. We will now turn to communications. This is the time for the City Council to hear from citizens regarding matters within the jurisdiction of the City Council that are not on the agenda, except in very limited situations. State law precludes the Council from taking action on or engaging in discussions concerning items that are not on the agenda. And so now I'll welcome Zach back up to the mic. Thank you. so much and welcome and welcome to Sausalito. Thank you so much. So as I said before- Can you just pull the mic up? So there you go. Thank you. |
| 01:07:25.49 | Zach Montseese | As I said before, my family, my 18-month-old daughter, and my wife, Alexis, dog Winslow, all just moved into the lovely city of Sausalito. During that time, I was also starting an aquatics program. One of the key components that I think is just truly important that both the residents of San Francisco and Sausalito need to recognize is underserved communities are massively underserved when it comes to aquatics and water safety. And then beyond that, taking a very holistic approach to athletes that want to go and excel in the sport later on, we've kind of developed a number of pillars with regards to the things that Northern California does best, like leveraging our technology to really improve outcomes for athletes. And what's the other thing that Northern California does best? It's our natural environment. So getting outdoors, getting into the waves at Fort Cronkite, the beach at Shoemaker, leveraging all of those things, because that ties us to our natural resources, our natural beauty, and actually gives us a passion for that. And to that end, I do have a background in commercial real estate and building pools is something that is near and dear to my heart. If you look up and down the coast of Barcelona or the Italian Riviera, something that we're compared to quite often. We don't have much when it comes to that. Pools near the beach or near marinas where the Coast Guard, sailors, children needing to learn to swim have that sort of access. I've dug through hundreds of sites and what we're seeing right now is you'll get a stack full of CEQA documents for every time you try to attempt to build a pool. And I'd love to have a pool built around here by the time my daughter is playing in high school. So that's my hope. Thank you so much for your time and appreciate it all. Take care. |
| 01:09:27.55 | Steven Woodside | Thank you so much. Thank you for coming here to share your vision with us. Thank you. All right, next is David Lay. |
| 01:09:42.13 | David Lay | Oh, last time I was here, I started with, um, uh one two three three is the important one and uh that's new stuff and that's what um zoe lofkin is fighting about she's got her hands full out there and you could give her some support i'm sure anything i say we'll probably go in the wastebasket Um, But the budget that made the last part of this chart is really satellites looking at the radiation from the water. And all of a sudden, we know what we're looking at, where the warming is going. And it turns out it's not warming all the ocean really deep. And that means it's going to go a lot faster. And we're in trouble because of the way the ocean is acting there. That's what causes our weather is the ocean. Um, Thank you. You can look at the other charts here and see Next time I'm gonna talk a lot more about net zero. There's a huge understanding in the public about where net zero is and what that really is. That's not zero CO2 in the atmosphere. That's net increase of CO2 in the atmospheres. And that's a big difference. And we'll talk some more about that. the new sheets I just added there, one is about what's going on with aid around the world that's being cut. That's going to be a big cause of a lot more. population movement across the globe. And of course, our population in the globe is increasing This is going to get much stronger and be a much more difficult time at our borders and Mexico's borders and European borders is going to be very hard. Was that three minutes? |
| 01:11:45.13 | Steven Woodside | Yes, thank you so much. By the way, I'll note for the record that Mr. Lay left paperwork on the dais for each of the council members to support the comments he just made. I'm going to pass a copy over to the city clerk to record. Thank you. |
| 01:11:58.75 | Walfred Solorzano | THE FAMILY. |
| 01:11:58.93 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:11:58.97 | Walfred Solorzano | MEETING. |
| 01:11:59.03 | Steven Woodside | THANK YOU. And next we'll call Charles Melton. |
| 01:12:08.42 | Charles Melton | Bye. |
| 01:12:09.35 | Charles Melton | Good evening, City Council. Thank you for the opportunity to provide comments tonight in person. I'm here to speak briefly on an item not on the agenda, which is to ask the Sausalito City Council at an upcoming meeting to adopt a resolution to fly the pride flag here at City Hall starting on June 1st for the month of June. This request is complimentary to a letter that was sent to City Council and City Manager last month. our city has flown the pride flag here at city hall uh since our first pride celebration in the city uh two years ago and I'm respectfully asking that that tradition of flying the pride flag continue. The pride flag is relevant and pertinent to our city and to our community for many reasons. First, it increases the visibility of our LGBTQ plus community and provides representation for individuals who may feel marginalized or unseen. This includes visibility for residents, business owners, public servants, and our community who live and work in our great city. The pride flag also represents hope, safety, and belonging for the LGBTQ plus individuals, especially during times of adversity or in facing discrimination. Flying the flag also demonstrates a commitment to creating a safe and inclusive community where all people feel seen, valued, and respected. Lastly, the pride flag is rooted in LGBTQ plus history, which is rich and vibrant here in Sausalito. Our city for many years has been home to shipbuilders, to military officials who made Sausalito a place of safety during the war, to local artisans and business owners. Our city has reminders of our past history, including a hand symbol etched in a local restaurant to serve as a memory of one of the many LGBTQ plus establishments that once called our city home. Sausalito has a rich and story to LGBTQ plus history. And through raising the pride flag, we can honor our past while also building our future. And just like the actions the city council is taking tonight to recognize our local community, including Jewish Heritage Month and San Francisco Zoo and Garden. I'm respectfully asking that our city once again fly the pride flag starting June 1st. I'd also like to take a moment to invite the city council, our city staff and the community to join us in our pride celebration June 20th, 21st and 22nd. Thank you. |
| 01:14:14.10 | Walfred Solorzano | you |
| 01:14:14.12 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. City clerk. Any other public, any other communications? Yes. |
| 01:14:19.99 | Walfred Solorzano | We have Lauret Rogers. |
| 01:14:27.42 | Walfred Solorzano | You can unmute, please. |
| 01:14:29.07 | Lauret Rogers | Hi, this is Lorette Rogers. I just had a quick process question. Although a pool in Sausalito sounds awfully good. I just have to say that. But I was just curious, Is there a way to see people who are speaking on Zoom Is that something that you've done in the past or that could be done or is it Is it too hard? I just, I would love to see who's speaking, even if they're. via zoom. That's all. Thanks. |
| 01:14:56.68 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. I will pass that request along to the city clerk. It's not new. We can promote people to panelists. We're not going to discuss it this evening, but I'd just like to make note of the request. Any other communications? |
| 01:15:10.43 | Walfred Solorzano | I've seen none. |
| 01:15:11.38 | Steven Woodside | All right. We will close communications and move on to our consent calendar. Yeah. matters listed under the consent calendar are considered routine and non-controversial, require no discussion, are expected to have unanimous council support, and may be enacted by the council in one motion in the form listed below. The items on our consent calendar for this evening are 3A, adopt the meeting minutes of April 15 and May 6, 2025. 3B, Jewish Heritage Month proclamation. 3B, Jewish Heritage Month proclamation. 3C San Francisco Zoo and Garden Proclamation 3D, receive and file the Treasurer's Report for fiscal year 2025, quarter three. 3E waiver of second reading and adoption of ordinance number 05-2025, an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Sausalito amending chapter 10.44 section 10.44.010 and section 10.44.190 of title 10 of the Sausalito Municipal Code. 3F, receive and file the shoreline adaptation plan update. 3G, authorize the city manager to execute the first contract amendment with WRT Consulting to provide additional planning services for the shoreline adaptation in the amount of $40,000 supported by the sea level rise planning grant. 3H, authorize staff to proceed with soliciting for construction bids for the Bridgeway Safety Improvement Project, Napa to Johnson Street Project, and 3i, authorize the city manager to enter into an agreement with Marin City Sausalito FC for lease of property at Martin Luther King Park, 610 Coloma Street, beginning at $700 per month. um, I will start off by noting that I will recuse myself from item 3i due to the proximity of my residence to the property in question. I am also going to propose some textual changes to 3e, which if adopted by us will require that tonight be our first reading and that the second reading will be postponed. to our next meeting, which will still be the day before any Planning Commission action dependent on this ordinance change. Any other |
| 01:17:36.20 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:17:37.13 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:17:37.16 | Melissa Blaustein | I don't want to pull an item. I just wanted to thank the council for including and acknowledging Jewish heritage month and, and having that proclamation there as many other communities have as a, Jewish women, it's really important that we acknowledge our history and heritage, and it just meant a lot to see the proclamation there. So thank you for including it in the agenda. |
| 01:17:55.59 | Steven Woodside | So I'll just remind us again that our barometer for what we include and do not include, Vice Mayor, is the federal, you can help me. |
| 01:18:05.09 | Melissa Blaustein | Well, we want to make sure that we do include there, I think, about nine that are nationally recognized heritage months, this being one of them. And we want to make sure that as we look ahead at the other months that we get ahead of the months as this time we're kind of in the middle of the month. But that's that's something that we're desiring to do on an ongoing basis. |
| 01:18:29.05 | Jill Hoffman | Any other items to, Mayor, on item 3E, the textual change, do we need to remove that this |
| 01:18:36.39 | Steven Woodside | No, I'm going to call it out and... |
| 01:18:38.35 | Sergio Rudin | Mayor, I actually do recommend that you remove item 3E if you're going to make dextral changes. |
| 01:18:44.69 | Steven Woodside | All right. I'm going to remove three E and I'm going to |
| 01:18:59.43 | Steven Woodside | All right, it's going to become the new 5D. |
| 01:19:04.82 | Ian Sobieski | Mayor, I think some people are here to comment on that. I don't expect it to be on consent. Could we hear it first? |
| 01:19:09.03 | Steven Woodside | If anyone is here to comment on item 3E, would you please raise your hand? All right, so then I'm going to move it to item 5A. All right, unless there are any other questions or comments, I'm gonna open it up to public comment on our consent agenda, excluding item 5.2. Thank you. E three E. |
| 01:19:37.55 | Unknown | I haven't seen that in the... |
| 01:19:37.68 | Walfred Solorzano | I don't have any sheets. Yeah, so I'll call Lorette Rogers again. What? Actually no, hand back down. Okay, hand back up. Lorette Rogers. |
| 01:19:47.84 | Lauret Rogers | I'm sorry, I'm confused about, I would wait, I would like to comment on the residential uses and commercial districts. |
| 01:19:54.96 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, we will be hearing that at item 5A. |
| 01:19:57.53 | Lauret Rogers | Thank you. I appreciate it. |
| 01:19:59.30 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:19:59.31 | Lauret Rogers | Thank you. |
| 01:19:59.74 | Walfred Solorzano | All right, Babette McDougall. |
| 01:20:03.41 | Steven Woodside | Wait, which one? Thank you. formula retail is going to be the new 5B. Okay, anyone else? |
| 01:20:11.95 | Walfred Solorzano | Babette McDougall? |
| 01:20:15.52 | Babette McDougall | So I just, you guys are moving so fast that you don't invite comment on all these little segments and it's a bit hard. So to keep up when you're not in the room. So I apologize if I'm not able to keep pace with you, but I'm glad that you are moving. IV off the consent and we will debate it publicly. You have to realize the sensitivity, having this especially coupled with the other formula retail, These things combined at a time when the whole city is under review for intense housing density. I mean, come on, of course it's a It's a time bomb for heaven's sakes. It's a really hot topic issue. That's all I want to say. Thank you. |
| 01:21:00.06 | Walfred Solorzano | All right. Next speaker is Judy Wedder. |
| 01:21:08.87 | Judy Weder | Thank you, Mayor and Councilmembers. Thank you also for removing 3E from the consent calendar. It, It sounds like it's now going, I'm still not clear where it's going in the business, if it's going to be combined with 5A, No, there is a new |
| 01:21:27.89 | Steven Woodside | No, there is a 25A. So you'll have an opportunity to comment on that at that time. |
| 01:21:30.24 | Judy Weder | Okay. Okay, thank you. |
| 01:21:34.54 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. All right, no further public comment. |
| 01:21:38.93 | Steven Woodside | Okay, with that, I will entertain a motion to approve consent items 3A through 3D and 3F through 3H. |
| 01:21:53.85 | Melissa Blaustein | So moved. |
| 01:21:56.34 | Steven Woodside | Second. City Clerk, will you call the roll? |
| 01:22:00.71 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Blostein. |
| 01:22:02.50 | Steven Woodside | Yes. |
| 01:22:02.76 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Hoffman. Yes. Councilmember Sobieski. Vice Mayor Woodside. Yes. Mayor Cox. |
| 01:22:05.34 | Steven Woodside | Yes. |
| 01:22:12.17 | Steven Woodside | Yes, I'll entertain a motion to approve consent item 3, aye. So moved. |
| 01:22:18.74 | Walfred Solorzano | So moved. |
| 01:22:19.80 | Steven Woodside | Second, city clerk. So. |
| 01:22:19.90 | Walfred Solorzano | I'll second that. Officially, who's a mover? |
| 01:22:24.93 | Melissa Blaustein | I moved and vice mayor have seconded. Right. Okay. |
| 01:22:25.57 | Walfred Solorzano | Yeah. Councilmember Blastin. Thank you. |
| 01:22:29.52 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. |
| 01:22:29.54 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes. Thank you. Councilmember Hoffman. Yes. Councilmember Sobieski. Vice Mayor Woodside. Yes. |
| 01:22:31.41 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. |
| 01:22:37.03 | Steven Woodside | Cox recuse. Okay, that both of those motions pass 5-0 for the first one, 4-1 for the second. Okay, we will now move on to business items. The first business item will be item 3E. Community Development Director Phipps, is there a presentation on the 3E? |
| 01:23:06.64 | Brandon Phipps | Excuse me. I don't have the agenda in front of me. Are you referring to these? |
| 01:23:09.50 | Steven Woodside | It was 3E. It's now 5A. Understood. This is the. |
| 01:23:11.86 | Brandon Phipps | If there's not, it's fine. There is no presentation attached to the agenda, but there is a staff report. |
| 01:23:14.14 | Steven Woodside | There's not... OKAY. Yes. So I removed this item in order to address significant public comment that we received regarding the breadth of the item. And so what I'm proposing to do this evening is to remove the revisions to section 10.44.190 c2 which is the um changes to um to the affordability standards for So it was the it's entitled the new title is requirements for affordable units and so I'm proposing to remove those changes so that we can further discuss them at a later time with careful community feedback. I'm also seeking to remove. Section 10.44.190 D. A three. which has to do with the modification to residential and affordable housing requirements and specifically the |
| 01:24:28.05 | Steven Woodside | one of the exceptions to the... project to propose projects within existing buildings or structures um c a3 uh is the language that allows when the planning commission finds based on substantial evidence that the conversion of existing space to residential uses is physically or financially and feasible. I believe that provision is covered elsewhere in our ordinance and is unnecessary and I want to narrow the circumstances under which we allow a second floor commercial. |
| 01:25:12.60 | Melissa Blaustein | Mayor Cox, could you share your screen or something so we can just show exactly which piece of the code? I'm trying to pull it up, but I know members of the public definitely don't have this in front of them, for example. I'd like a better understanding of what the proposed changes are. I didn't mean to jump ahead of you, Councilmember Hoffman. I see you wanted to. |
| 01:25:24.98 | Jill Hoffman | I'm sorry. |
| 01:25:25.04 | Steven Woodside | I think you did not behave. |
| 01:25:27.55 | Melissa Blaustein | I am not in the Zoom |
| 01:25:28.97 | Steven Woodside | It's gonna take me, I have it. |
| 01:25:30.79 | Sergio Rudin | And Mayor, I will try to accomplish that request. Alright. |
| 01:25:34.05 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. |
| 01:25:34.08 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:25:34.16 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 01:25:34.20 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:25:34.22 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. I can also direct. No, let's have the city attorney do that. |
| 01:25:42.70 | Steven Woodside | All right, any questions on the proposed revisions? |
| 01:25:48.04 | Sergio Rudin | And Mayor, I would recommend that we take public comments. |
| 01:25:49.59 | Steven Woodside | We'll pause for a moment to see what they are. |
| 01:25:56.22 | Steven Woodside | So I will remind the council that section... 10.44.190 C2 is the revision. that garnered the most debate at our last meeting and raised the most concern in the public comments that we received. |
| 01:26:15.59 | Sergio Rudin | City Clerk, I do need you to enable screen sharing for me. in order to- |
| 01:26:21.72 | Steven Woodside | Can you allow him to screenshot |
| 01:26:28.16 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 01:26:28.30 | Steven Woodside | HEADS. |
| 01:26:28.54 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. I guess, yeah, I'm surprised by this. I didn't know this was going to get changed, so. I... |
| 01:26:35.15 | Steven Woodside | Because our housing element is under review, and because there's community feedback and concern that we would be reducing... housing stock by this, I am proposing that we bifurcate these changes and undertake consideration of this change at a later date. |
| 01:26:53.38 | Ian Sobieski | I understand. However, I also understand You know, this was discussed at the last meeting. And the point is that our restriction in the commercial district is inadvertently apparently in conflict with state law, that it creates a more restrictive environment for that zone than currently exists in residential zones. So just to say that again, in residential zones, we have a waiver of the affordability requirement for fewer than five units. And in the commercial zone, we currently do not have such a waiver. So the, requirement for affordable units is higher in the commercial zone than even in our residential zones. I understand that. unintended consequences, it's actually unconstitutional. Because if you only have room, in your commercial building to build one unit then this ordinance as written requires you to have 100% affordable units. And that the state has said is an impediment to housing. The paradox of this rule is that it actually reduces the amount of housing available. So after the last meeting, I guess this gentleman didn't know it was a first reading, but a gentleman who owns a commercial property, sent me an email, which now I wish I had encouraged him to send to the public record. I didn't think this was going to get switched to the last second, but I'll read it out loud. excellent job getting the affordable requirement changed. This will increase housing supply. I'm now going to use it to get my back structure upgraded to be rentable. I had been holding other plans for that, but until something changed. So this lack of action is literally going to deprive the city of Sausalito of housing. Whereas... going ahead with this change. doesn't remove any housing stock because anyone who wants to build residential on the second floor in the commercial district can do so. Nothing changes. The only thing that changes is the requirement to do so. And I posit to my colleagues in the community that that requirement is actually decreasing the amount of housing. |
| 01:28:54.20 | Steven Woodside | City Attorney, did you want to comment on the constitutionality of the existing ordinance? |
| 01:29:03.21 | Sergio Rudin | So I will say that we don't know for certain that HCD would find this existing affordability requirement to be a a constraint, but it certainly is a valid concern. that I believe is shared by both the city attorney's office and by staff. Additionally, I do think that in terms of the constitutionality of the affordability requirement, There is no clear case law that would say that it is obviously unconstitutional. And there is, you know, some allowed usage of that property regardless, because again, they're allowed for, the property is still allowed to have commercial uses on the first floor. So I think there would be arguments in defense of this ordinance. But certainly, I think the policy arguments that have been articulated by the council member are well noted. |
| 01:29:55.02 | Steven Woodside | So all I'm suggesting is that we bifurcate consideration of the revisions to this ordinance so as not to even remotely jeopardize receipt of the certification of our existing Revised amended housing element from HCD. So I'd like to just go ahead and put it on a future agenda item in July, but I would until we have An approved housing element adopted. I'm trying to reduce risk Thank you. |
| 01:30:25.56 | Ian Sobieski | I just a question for my colleague raised her hand. So when I. |
| 01:30:27.40 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. Yeah, so you can finish your question, and then we'll turn to Council Member Hart. |
| 01:30:31.00 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. So Sergio or just I'm getting caught flat-footed on this one, but if we have a commercial interest you know, we just had an editorial in the IJ that was entitled Sausalito turns the tide for downtown businesses and in there it talked about development of commercial properties we know we for instance have talked about having boutique hotels in town if we I proceed just as the mayor outlined by removing this affordability change, would a hotel be able to expand? Let's say if the Inn above Tides wanted to expand or some other hotel wanted to come into town and be on the second floor, would that hotel be able to proceed or does this affordability requirement preclude that. |
| 01:31:16.51 | Sergio Rudin | So I think the affordability requirement could potentially be problematic unless the project as proposed fits into one of these exemptions set forth in subdivision D. So if the project does not include a physical expansion to existing buildings or structures exceeding a thousand square feet, or the proposed project involves historic structure and a certificate of appropriateness issued for the project is given pursuant to the municipal code. That project is exempt from the requirement to have residential units at all on the second floor. So it would not be subject to the requirement to provide at least a minimum of one affordable unit. |
| 01:31:54.97 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, thank you very much. All right, Councilmember Hoffman. |
| 01:31:59.14 | Jill Hoffman | So, and that's why I feel like that would, these would be. This is time for questions. Then we're gonna hear public comment. Then you can make comment. If Council Member Sobieski didn't give a five minutes soliloquy. So I'm responding to that. Okay. |
| 01:32:04.55 | Steven Woodside | This is time for the a comment then you can make comment. |
| 01:32:13.11 | Steven Woodside | I'm good. |
| 01:32:13.60 | Charles Melton | Thank you. |
| 01:32:14.44 | Jill Hoffman | Well, no, you did. And so I'm responding to his comments. |
| 01:32:18.19 | Steven Woodside | So I'm going to ask you not to respond to his comments. He made his comments in order to frame his question. |
| 01:32:23.91 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, well, let me ask you to make some comments to frame my question to our city attorney based on our conversation this morning. |
| 01:32:24.53 | Steven Woodside | ASKED. |
| 01:32:29.75 | Jill Hoffman | And so... So. Part of the issues that I talked to our CDD staff, and let me frame my question to our CDD staff, it's true that we received this quite broad change in our ordinance, it's not at the request of the city council at a time when we're trying to certify our housing element without an inventory of our housing stock, our residential housing stock on our second story, correct, CDD director? |
| 01:33:05.40 | Brandon Phipps | That is correct. |
| 01:33:06.55 | Jill Hoffman | And there's no inventory of how this quite substantial change to the the A voluntary plan by the city council back in 2011, as the mayor explained at our last hearing on this subject, to address affordable housing. So this was a plan by the city council to increase affordable housing stock, a voluntary plan by the city council to increase our housing stock, but there was no inclusion of the inventory of what housing stock was produced. What? Housing stock has been produced. produced as part of that plan in the past 14 years. Correct CDD director? |
| 01:33:53.99 | Brandon Phipps | i can't speak to that |
| 01:33:55.64 | Jill Hoffman | Well, okay. Well, I can tell you that we have received units, and there have been... units produced And so we haven't had any lawsuits pursuant to that. |
| 01:34:05.77 | Steven Woodside | Can you confine this to questions and please reserve your comments? |
| 01:34:08.21 | Jill Hoffman | Please reserve your comments in our city attorney. or the CDD director, we haven't had any lawsuits in the past 14 years pursuant to this voluntary strategy that we have came up with in 14 years ago correct city attorney |
| 01:34:22.34 | Sergio Rudin | I'm not aware of any litigation either historical or threatened with respect to this, this particular section, other than with respect to one project that came up. of which the council is aware. |
| 01:34:38.62 | Jill Hoffman | So no lawsuits. Thank you. It's actually produced affordable housing stock We're in the middle of a housing |
| 01:34:44.73 | Steven Woodside | Is this a question? |
| 01:34:46.13 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 01:34:46.64 | Steven Woodside | I really would like to not... |
| 01:34:48.58 | Jill Hoffman | I would like for not to be, you didn't interrupt. Councilmember Sobieski during his long questions, his long |
| 01:34:52.12 | Charles Melton | because |
| 01:34:55.97 | Jill Hoffman | you know, comments leading up to his questions i would like the same courtesy mayor i would I think that's fair to ask. So I'm- |
| 01:35:04.96 | Steven Woodside | I am making these proposed revisions in deference to you and residents over this. |
| 01:35:12.39 | Jill Hoffman | I would say in deference to our city and getting our housing element passed, we absolutely should narrow this down if that's what we want to do tonight. And I support that. So I think But in light of the comments council member Sobieski made, I think it needs to be clear to the public what we're doing up here tonight. So, okay. |
| 01:35:36.18 | Steven Woodside | Okay, any other questions? All right, I'm going to... |
| 01:35:41.46 | Ian Sobieski | Is it possible to buy for it? I'm not sure how it works. You're the municipal attorney. So you're taking out a section on affordability and we're leaving in the sections on the exemptions and all that other stuff. |
| 01:35:52.77 | Steven Woodside | with the exception of one phrase in the exemptions. |
| 01:35:55.59 | Ian Sobieski | So the section on affordability, can it be also just split out and propose that we take a vote on that as a separate matter here today? So basically creating two first readings instead of one? |
| 01:36:07.69 | Steven Woodside | The whole purpose, well, no, because we're changing the ordinance. I think that's a question for the city attorney. If we excise it and take two separate votes, it defeats the purpose of excising it, which is to reduce risk with HCD. |
| 01:36:24.04 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, and any changes to the ordinance that are not, Correction of typographical errors requires that the council reintroduce this as a first reading this evening. So you'll have to come back for adoption at another meeting. |
| 01:36:38.18 | Ian Sobieski | I guess I do have a question for you city attorney. I mean, you, you came up with this and your ongoing effort to fix our code and make it decrease risk to the city. So this around the affordability to the mayor's point, in your opinion, does it actually increase our risk vis-a-vis HCD and our housing elements? |
| 01:36:58.97 | Sergio Rudin | So in terms of the exemption of developments of small projects, um, one of the reasons why this language was originally suggested was, um, In consultation with staff, there is a concern about it being a a constraint on the development of housing and also just being a constraint on development more generally. The proposed language does align the requirements in the code sections for commercial districts to mirror the affordability requirements in the residential districts. So that was the purpose of this particular provision. I won't. I would anticipate that HCD would not have a problem with the proposed language, but we have not had any direct discussions with HCD on this subject. We don't know that for certain. |
| 01:37:51.33 | Ian Sobieski | would the path forward be that this go back to the planning commission would come back to us mayor this. affordability changed aligned with the city attorney's recommendation. |
| 01:37:59.92 | Steven Woodside | I'll defer to the city attorney, if we remove I think because the Planning Commission already considered it, that it doesn't have to go back to them, city attorney, but what's your view? |
| 01:38:10.91 | Sergio Rudin | Correct. I think the Planning Commission has seen this exact language. It's already presently in the municipal code. So they've had an opportunity to consider and study it. You are effectively rejecting one of their recommendations, which you are entitled to do. So I don't think that it necessarily, it's, It's not an issue that wasn't presented to the Planning Commission for study and recommendation, and therefore I think you can move forward with making these proposed amendments. |
| 01:38:37.94 | Steven Woodside | And again, my proposal is that we remove this this evening and give direction to staff to bring it back to us with the additional data requested by Council Member Hoffman and the community so we can... So you bring it back sometime this summer? Yes, absolutely. |
| 01:38:56.20 | Melissa Blaustein | Just a question, would it be possible to tonight continue to a date certain or would you rather |
| 01:39:04.27 | Steven Woodside | Because a portion of this ordinance affects other pending projects, I'd rather not continue it. All right. |
| 01:39:10.26 | Bonnie McGregor | All right. |
| 01:39:11.14 | Steven Woodside | So I understand. Yeah. All right, with that, I'm going to open this up to public comment. Anybody in the chambers? Thank you. |
| 01:39:19.13 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:39:20.64 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. Adrienne Britton, welcome. is one of the first people here this evening and has been patiently waiting |
| 01:39:31.23 | Adrian Brinton | I came because the room was quite warm and I wanted a bit of a sauna before the- |
| 01:39:34.71 | Steven Woodside | You thought it would be cooler here. |
| 01:39:37.02 | Adrian Brinton | Thank you for taking my comment. I don't disagree with the idea to split these two things apart. I think it made them very confusing. I think the reason that I would give would be slightly different. You know, the priority here is to keep moving forward to get our restaurant open. Thank you. 715 Bridgeway. And I saw in the public comments that were submitted, concerns about, you know, we're moving too fast, we're going to change the character of the town, things are really going to go in a bad direction if we make these changes. I have a hard time imagining city government moving too fast. These documents have been in the public domain for some time. They have been very difficult to understand, but we have had time to read them and understand them, even as myself as a citizen and not a lawyer. The changes are necessary. And every day we delay the restaurant is a day. that the owner is paying his mortgage, he's paying his insurance, he's losing the opportunity costs of not being open, and it's weakening the opening stand of the business that he's trying to open. So really hope that we can keep this on track, get it back to the planning commission, keep it moving forward, get our vacant storefront filled. And I think we're on track for that. And I'll cross my fingers and hope that we move as fast as possible to get that done. Thank you very much. |
| 01:40:51.47 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Sharna Brockett. |
| 01:40:56.57 | Steven Woodside | I don't have any more speaker cards from the chamber. So if there's anyone else in the chambers to speak on this, please fill out a speaker card. |
| 01:41:03.71 | Sharna Brockett | So I'm Sharna Brockett, a resident. I just want to point out that You know, I think a lot of people don't know what's going on here. Well, it took me a while to figure it out, too. But a lot of what's going on here is we're cleaning up our code so that our historic building, the Wells Fargo building, can be turned into a fabulous restaurant and boutique hotel. And if we can't get this across the finish line, then we're really lost. And I know we're going to get across the finish line. But this is such a gift to our town. And I'm so grateful that we're doing all the right things. So thank you for your leadership in trying to get this cleared up. But we need to simplify our code, and this is one of the things that is blocking potentially if we don't clean it up. I do think it's better, I mean, I think it was confusing with the housing part in it, but I do have a few comments about that. as it reads right now, basically the affordable housing from what I understand in the commercial or the housing is that you, if you're a property owner and have a commercial building and you have a second unit, or a second floor... that if you wanted to build housing, you would have to have one unit be affordable. So if you were to build one unit of housing, it would have to be affordable. If you built two units, one of those would have to be affordable, and so on and so on. That's a very strict requirement. And I just want to point out that it sounds really good. I want more affordable housing. It's just not realistic. A property owner or developer is not going to spend is not going to develop housing. So in effect, what happens is that This law that we have actually stops the building of housing. And so it's really not working and it and and all housing is good housing. And I found this quote that I thought was really good from this woman, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, the solution to the housing crisis is more housing. It's not just affordable housing. It's all types of housing. When you build market rate housing, you create vacancies that ripple through the rest of the housing market. So I think it's important to mention that. Thank you so much. Thank you. |
| 01:43:07.01 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:43:07.37 | Sharna Brockett | Brian Powers. |
| 01:43:08.40 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:43:14.79 | Brian Powers | Hi, Brian Powers. My wife and I are recent residents in Sausalito. Thanks for all the work you guys do. This is our first city council meeting ever. Don't have anything prepared. Just want to say in response that Sausalito has an incredible shortage of housing. The idea that a law in 2011 was successful is not accurate. I mean, there's been so little increase in any housing, let alone affordable. So I would just, it seems like this is just a procedural block to blocks, something that's a no-brainer. Seems to be very little risk to anything related to the housing element. So I really hope this is just a speed bump and that this gets passed so that we can have more housing, just a small step toward that. Thank you. |
| 01:44:04.07 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. City Clerk. |
| 01:44:06.40 | Brian Powers | Lauret Rogers. |
| 01:44:07.36 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 01:44:09.40 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:44:09.42 | Lauret Rogers | It's time, Lorette. Hi, okay, it's Lorette. Yeah, I appreciate the mayor giving more time to this and more consideration. It just seems like there needs to be a fuller analysis of how these changes would affect Sausalito's inventory of residential space and particularly affordable housing. I mean, has that been enumerated where we can actually see what the potential is and what the possibilities are to see what it would do? And as the mayor mentioned, You know, both Mike and I are worried about how this could affect the adopted housing element, which hasn't been certified yet. It just seemed to run counter to all the work you guys have been doing. So we're glad you're going to wait and get more information, maybe get an idea of what the quantity and what the effects will be on affordable housing possibilities and residential space. So yes, thank you. Hope that you study the ramifications of these proposed changes and that we get to assess and decide this together. Is this the best move for future Sausalito? Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:45:23.58 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 01:45:23.94 | Lauret Rogers | Thank you. |
| 01:45:25.78 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Babette McDougal. |
| 01:45:30.62 | Babette McDougall | I thank you so much for including me. So first of all, we have to realize that there is this implication of a precedent. That could well be said here. It isn't really just about that one location that we all call the old Wells Fargo building. there are broader implications for what could happen elsewhere in the community. So whether we know it or not, going forward, there is a ripple effect. one that we may or may not anticipate now. So I also feel that I just wanna echo everyone's comments. And I want to thank the mayor for slowing this one down because there is this potential for a collision. And after all, the best way to avoid a collision is to create a little bit more open space. That's what the FAA is figuring out. So I don't think we can go wrong here. And I want to thank you all for just keeping your eye on this because this is a delicate process. We've invested a huge amount of resources, not just money, but other human capital and other assets. And I think citizens of Sausalito would like to see us get through this housing element. It's a mess. It's a disaster from the beginning. And it's, you know, sort of an invitation to fail. And there are so many challenges being thrown at us to encourage the failure. That's why I want to encourage us all to try to get together on this. And moving slower is one way to get together on this. Everybody can do a high kick if we slow it down. Right, Mayor? Thank you. I yield back my time. |
| 01:46:54.07 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Linda Foch. |
| 01:46:59.50 | Unknown | This ordinance is pretty much a mess. I'd like to remind the Council that there's been a voted upon and approved resolution that clarifies that ordinance 102 to does not apply to the CC district, yet you have thrown that in under the guise of doing something with affordability for for housing units and that really doesn't apply in this ordinance. So I think it really needs to be cleaned up and brought back to another meeting at a later date. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:47:33.25 | Joel Carr | Thank you. |
| 01:47:34.41 | Walfred Solorzano | Our next speaker, Joe Carr. |
| 01:47:40.14 | Joel Carr | Yes. Good evening. Madam Mayor, City Council, thank you for taking my comments. I'm an architect and proud homeowner in Sausalito. I love our town, but we have a serious housing problem. And the problem is that most everybody speaking and every other person in the city who objects to new housing. hasn't taken economics 101, in college, the fact is that you restrict the number of housing units and you make it more expensive. If you add new units, you make it less expensive. And the notion that a rising tide floats all boats is what you have to consider and what was just said previous to me about the fact that more high-end units and market rate units are going to help vacate lower end units, which then become more accessible to people of less means. So I'd like I have to say that I think that we need to stop stopping these things. We need to stop being obstructive and let these ordinances go through. so that we have more housing. That's the bottom line, just more housing. Thank you. |
| 01:49:10.74 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 01:49:11.48 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Kieran Culligan. |
| 01:49:13.47 | Kieran Culligan | Thank you. |
| 01:49:18.16 | Kieran Culligan | Hi there, Kieran Culligan, Sausalito resident. I just wanna acknowledge persistence. There's a lot of projects in Sausalito that have never happened, never even made it to the Planning Commission, never made it to city council, because it was clear that it was just dead on arrival. Too much regulation, Essentially, just as Joel just described, it just grinds everything to its halt. But we have a developer here who has created something, a concept that looks pretty awesome. We have a city staff that has worked on identifying ways that our code is outdated and ways to fix it so that positive projects like this can happen. And I'm hoping that we can now finish the deal and show that we can do better than we have historically. When it comes to affordable housing, I read through this. I didn't get it all at first, and I actually reached out to someone who thinks about affordable housing day in and day out. It's their job. When I brought this topic of what we have today and what's changing, does this hurt housing stock? They laughed. This is completely normal, what's being proposed here as an evolution. The existing language restricts housing. Anyone who's kind of claiming otherwise, and in many cases, these are the same folks who oppose other housing projects, like it's kind of laughable how the story changes depending on the situation. So I hope that we can move forward, that people who are putting in time and energy and ideas and effort, we can help bring positive evolutions to actually see them come to light instead of having things grind on. So hopefully tonight, if not very soon, let's see this come to fruition. Thanks. |
| 01:51:04.56 | Walfred Solorzano | Yeah. Next speaker is Bonnie McGregor. |
| 01:51:11.85 | Walfred Solorzano | He's unmuted. |
| 01:51:16.54 | Bonnie McGregor | Hi there, this is Bonnie McGregor. Thank you. |
| 01:51:20.49 | Unknown | Hello. Welcome, Bonnie, we can hear you. Hello? Yes, we hear you. Please proceed. I'm not signed in or something. No, we hear you, Bonnie. Can you hear us? I hear no feedback. |
| 01:51:36.17 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:51:36.18 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:51:36.20 | Steven Woodside | Okay, Walfred, can you try and text her or something? |
| 01:51:39.15 | Walfred Solorzano | I don't know her phone number. |
| 01:51:41.38 | Steven Woodside | No, in the chat. |
| 01:51:43.03 | Bonnie McGregor | You can solve the problem. |
| 01:51:43.10 | Steven Woodside | I know. |
| 01:51:44.96 | Bonnie McGregor | Um, I'm not sure that what I've got to say is pertinent to this particular issue or not. I'm getting more and more confused the more I hear. I have not read this thing that is on the screen. As a matter of fact, I can hardly see it. But I do have a couple of comments to make about things. And I did write a letter tonight, and I don't know whether what you're talking about at the moment is pertinent to the letter or not. But one of my comments I have that I've not written down is this. I have trouble understanding when what is two things. One is what is considered to be affordable housing. And the other one is Who determines when a town is full or the cup runneth over? I, you know, we do not want to look like Manhattan or Chicago or some other large monstrosity of a town. That's why we live in a little town. And anybody that drives around town anymore, the traffic is god-awful almost 24-7. I'm out at various different times during every day of the week. And the traffic is almost gridlock most of the time. And when there is an accident on 101 going north, let's say it's 3.30 in the afternoon. It backs up all the way down past sailors. So how much more, where's the end? Where's enough? Who makes those determinations? If this is a time for me to read my letter that I wrote referring to 5A, which apparently has been changed. Is this the change? Or are we still talking about the same thing that was broadcast to be 5A? |
| 01:53:19.29 | Steven Woodside | No, formula retail is now the new 5B. |
| 01:53:27.20 | Bonnie McGregor | Okay, so that comes up next, correct? Thank you. |
| 01:53:31.44 | Steven Woodside | Yes. |
| 01:53:31.91 | Bonnie McGregor | Thanks. |
| 01:53:31.96 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:53:33.19 | Bonnie McGregor | Okay, well, it's... Thank you. with all the commentary in this one, very interesting, but I think we got a long way to go before we come to a resolution. |
| 01:53:42.48 | Walfred Solorzano | All right, next speaker is Eric McFarland. |
| 01:53:48.47 | Unknown | Hi there. Good evening. Hope you can hear me. I'm a little bit ill prepared as my first attendance of a city council meeting. I'm a resident. I'm a renter here. We moved from Mill Valley where we lived for 15 years to sort of realize a dream of living in Sausalito. And we are kind of challenged in trying to find a place to live. We have honed in on the heels of learning a little bit about the ordinance, the affordable housing ordinance changes, and we are an escrow to buy a property. on Caledonia Street that currently has an upper level that's vacant. And our vision is to be able to purchase the building and occupy the upper level as a residence. And so my expectation, um, attending tonight after hearing the news of the ordinance changes, what that was that this was going to be discussed and pushed forward. And this is a real life example of a situation where I have the potential ability to create an additional unit. This would be something for myself and therefore free up the space that I live in now for another resident in the community. But by punting this further or by dismissing it, it limits that ability. It also paralyzes the person that owns the building from being able to potentially sell it to us to realize this path forward. Um, I just, you know, I don't necessarily follow how this is. It sounds like there's two things happening at once and I probably need to dive deeper. I don't know how this relates to the development of a boutique hotel or a restaurant. That seems like a different matter. But I am just a real life kind of in the live sort of live moment case study of somebody trying to actually create a housing unit, one additional housing unit for an existing resident. And this feels like a tremendous impediment to being able to realize that path forward. Thank you for letting me speak. |
| 01:55:46.07 | Walfred Solorzano | All right, next speaker is Sandra Bushmaker. |
| 01:55:51.77 | Sandra Bushmaker | Good evening, counsel. I think your first priority is to get the amended housing element adopted and certified. I think that's where you need to go, number one. Number two is this ordinance as I understood the comments tonight, arises from the Wells Fargo building, and all these changes are being made to accommodate that. Now I have Read this, I find it very confusing and I would support a continuance of this entire matter and clarify what this is, what these changes are really doing and in an executive summary that the public can clearly understand. And I also contest the and disagree that more market rate housing is going to create more affordable housing. That's just not going to happen in my opinion. And I saw no data to support that when we went through the housing element cycle for the sixth cycle to get our approved. housing element. In fact, some of that Um, Those assumptions were challenged. in Sacramento and there was no data to support that allegation. Thank you. |
| 01:57:03.42 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Judy Weder. |
| 01:57:10.95 | Judy Weder | Thank you, Mayor and Council. I appreciate that this is being moved to the summer and more study. We do need to understand how these changes to the ordinance will affect more than just one project. And we need to make sure that we're enabling smart growth. So thank you for slowing this down. Thank you. |
| 01:57:33.65 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker, Scott Thornburg. |
| 01:57:38.79 | Scott Thornburg | Good evening, Council. I gotta be honest, I'm really frustrated with this one. It really seems to me like the anti-housing NIMBYs in Sausalito will really use just about anything to stop housing from being built, even good intentions. Over-regulation is exactly how we got to the place we are now. And it's really frustrating to me that as a person that is renting in this town and giving hours and hours of my life to volunteer in this community, that it is really difficult for me to find a home. It's also really difficult for me to watch friends and community leaders be forced out of this community, be forced out of their homes because they don't have other housing options available to them in Sausalito because we do not have enough housing. Someone mentioned economics earlier. I would encourage you to go back and look at the definition of what we're talking about here. It is truly basic supply and demand. There is not enough supply, so demand goes up and so do the prices. If we want, to solve this problem, we have to free up pave the way for more housing in Sausalito. This is not gonna do that. This is just going to inhibit additional housing and it's good intentions, but this is not the path. And I would just encourage you to not let policy get in the way of progress when it comes to our housing and our community and the lives of residents. Thank you. |
| 01:59:10.93 | Walfred Solorzano | We have no further public comment on Zoom. |
| 01:59:14.17 | Steven Woodside | I'll call Charles Melton. |
| 01:59:22.07 | Charles Melton | Thank you. I want to first apologize for submitting my form late. The room was heating up and so was I. especially on this topic about housing. I'm a SOS leader resident who faces housing uncertainty. It's a constant thing I battle. I do not own a home in Sausalito. the decision makers here in this room, How many of you own your home? How many of you are thinking about those who do not own homes, who contribute to our community every single day? That's really what's at stake here. As we're talking about this, about affordable housing, we absolutely need this. It's a complicated issue. It's a multi-prong issue. We hear about traffic. Traffic is often caused by individuals commuting in long distances, plaguing our streets and parking lots so they can work here because they can't afford a house because there isn't a housing supply. We've heard how this ordinance or when it was adopted created housing downtown I've yet to see any facts behind that. How many housing units did it actually create? How many projects did it actually stall? what will be done with this ordinance and this bifurcated process to actually move progress forward to enable more housing. That is the core question here for this tonight. I appreciate that the city council is being very Consider it. and considering input from the community. That is powerful. Thank you for listening to us. But I also appreciate you I also ask you to move forward. The government moves slow. I recognize the process. I appreciate the process. But let's not stop progress by asking more questions or throwing roadblocks in the way or bifurcating processes or saying that our housing element won't get approved when yet there's no actual evidence from HCD, according to our city attorney, that that's going to happen. Let's make progress together and address these issues. Let's remove the gridlock that exists in our code. So that way, Sausalito, our community. our business owners, our residents can address some of the issues that we've heard tonight. We've heard about individuals not able to put in housing where they currently are. That's a problem. Let's break through that gridlock together. Thank you. |
| 02:01:21.71 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. All right, with that, I'll close public comment and bring it up here for discussion. I do want to just clarify a couple of things to lead off. We adopted a housing element two years ago that required us to build 724 new units of housing in the next, or to identify the development potential for 724 new units of housing over the next six years. We have already... We already have on the books 189 of those 724 units. And so we are not ignoring the need for housing. We are moving smartly forward with new housing. The city itself is working hard to sponsor housing development on city-owned property. And you will see some ballot initiatives later this year to facilitate the city's ability to do that. And that will be hopefully affordable senior housing, 50 units. And so the city is not ignoring or unaware of the city and the city. Um, the community interest in increasing the stock of affordable housing. That being said, we were criticized earlier tonight for not being transparent with all of our processes. I have been immersed in housing law since 2010, and I have difficulty understanding how all of our various ordinances interrelate with one another. And so I understand the frustration of the community. And when I received a lot of community feedback, expressing concern, not fully understanding the implications, wanting more data, I wanted to be respectful of that community feedback without holding up. important aspects of this ordinance altogether. And that is why I am simply proposing a bifurcation of this ordinance and a slight pause on a portion of it to ensure that we have adequately communicated with HCD and that our public better understands and can weigh in on the proposed revisions to this ordinance. I voted in favor of it two weeks ago, but it's not just up to me. We are here to serve the residents. And so when folks are concerned about the implications of changes to our ordinance, I think it's important to air those out. And so that's the reason I've proposed the bifurcation. It will be up to the Council tonight to make that decision, having heard Um, all of the public comment. I'm gonna go ahead and make a motion that we, at. bifurcate this ordinance and that tonight be the first reading of the revised ordinance and that we bring it back for a second reading in two weeks and the proposals that I'm making are to eliminate the revisions to Section 10.44.190 C2, which are on the screen in highlight and red. and that we eliminate the new... phrase in section 10.44.190D. A three. that says the Planning Commission finds, based on substantial evidence, that the conversion of existing space to residential uses is physically or financially infeasible. And so those are my two proposed revisions. That's my motion. Oh, and give direction to staff to return to us in... in july with a um proposed uh ordinance to address the section that i've removed this evening |
| 02:05:24.14 | Brandon Phipps | May I ask a quick clarifying question, Mayor? |
| 02:05:26.55 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, let me see if I have a second. Second. Yes. |
| 02:05:31.12 | Brandon Phipps | clarifying question. I heard you say bring this back in two weeks. I note that we have a council meeting next week on the 27th. Just want to clarify, would you like this to be brought before council on the meeting at the 22nd or the meeting in two weeks? |
| 02:05:43.49 | Sergio Rudin | So unfortunately, it's not possible to adopt an ordinance at a special meeting. This does need to come back at a regular meeting. |
| 02:05:51.00 | Brandon Phipps | So I'm hearing two weeks. Thank you. |
| 02:05:53.21 | Sergio Rudin | and the |
| 02:05:53.30 | Steven Woodside | THANK YOU. |
| 02:05:53.35 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 02:05:53.50 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:05:53.55 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 02:05:53.62 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:05:57.10 | Steven Woodside | who I know others have comments. or not if we, if we, |
| 02:06:05.78 | Ian Sobieski | I really appreciate what you're trying to do, Mayor. If there were three votes, just proceed with this resolution. I'd vote for it as is tonight because I have two data points. The gentleman who spoke in who wants to turn it upstairs residential and this fellow who emailed me. I actually think it creates housing stock out of the box. But there are three votes. I respect what you're trying to do. And I will vote for it if there isn't an alternative that has a majority. |
| 02:06:06.11 | Steven Woodside | I really like that. |
| 02:06:29.95 | Steven Woodside | So the reason I made the first motion is so someone could make an alternate motion, which will be voted on first. |
| 02:06:38.69 | Ian Sobieski | then I'll make the motion to approve the second reading as is. |
| 02:06:40.84 | Steven Woodside | reading as is. And is there a second to that motion? |
| 02:06:49.96 | Melissa Blaustein | I mean, |
| 02:06:52.14 | Melissa Blaustein | One of the problems with the Brown Act is that we can't talk to each other until we come up here and we try to sort this out. And we're looking at each other because I'll second the motion. |
| 02:07:01.91 | Sandra Bushmaker | Thank you. |
| 02:07:02.03 | Melissa Blaustein | I, |
| 02:07:05.76 | Steven Woodside | Okay, I think we've already talked this to death. |
| 02:07:08.83 | Melissa Blaustein | I haven't said anything at all. So to be fair. Okay. I haven't had an opportunity to weigh in because as, as you're aware, I had the same concerns with regards to affordable housing at our last meeting. And I put significant emphasis on ensuring that staff was taking steps to consider ordinances that would protect existing affordability and existing affordable renters. Since this item came up again, I've been thinking a lot about what is it isn't feasible with regards to how do we encourage building more housing, because that's what we inevitably really want and need to do. different to consider because any changes to something that's designed to encourage affordability, it's difficult for me to vote for. At the same time, given that we have data points advancing it saying essentially I would build something upstairs that and I would create more affordable units makes me think differently about it. So given that we did talk about this substantially last time, I I'm inclined to to continue to move it forward to the best of our ability this evening. I'd like to hear what the vice mayor has to say so we can come up with I always like to come to some sort of shared consensus. I don't know if that's going to be possible, but I just feel like we need a little bit more time to talk about it amongst ourselves because I'm not necessarily. Decided at this point. |
| 02:08:31.97 | Melissa Blaustein | I'm convinced that the four members of the planning commission who all voted for this knew what they were doing. The city attorney knows what they're doing. Staff knows what they're doing. I think these changes are going to benefit in the long run affordable housing. I think the limitation in the existing code that requires it for five units or less is a block, is a bar. We heard a case study by one of the speakers tonight who would like to go forward but can't because of the change that we may not make tonight unless we move forward. I am persuaded at times that we want to make sure that HCD approves our amended housing element. I am perhaps more confident than some people that they're going to do that, and they're going to do that soon. And that's the reason why I'm not inclined to delay. I think as I look back at the history of many things that have happened in this town, often delay becomes the deadliest form of denial. And in this case really shouldn't delay this is not just because of one proposal that illustrated some of the problems we face it's because that illustration got staff and others and the city attorney to think about what else in our code is a bar to actually providing in small numbers, in isolated places, in places that we know historically have included housing. If you go back in history far enough, a lot of the second floors in this town were all kinds of housing, including hotels, dormitory-style housing, et cetera. And take a history walk, and they'll point them out to you. Our second floor hotels are right in the historic district, for example. So I don't think this is going to destroy the notion that our existing residences on the second floor are all going to be somehow converted to hotels, which I think is one of the fears. I'm just saying all that because that's how I see it. I think that's how the Planning Commission has seen it. The one member who did not vote simply did not vote. And I like the revisions. So I'm willing to go forward now. We've heard from people. I've read all the letters. I know there are concerns. I think they are concerns that will be overcome with time if we make these changes. And I think there are probably gonna be more changes we're gonna have to make going forward to actually provide affordable housing in this community. And the mayor has alluded to some that we will be voting on later this summer. So that's where I'm coming from. So I'm willing to move forward now because I think I don't want to see any more delay. This has been debated and debated and debated by good people. I know there are different points of view, but I'll vote yes. |
| 02:09:23.19 | Charles Melton | And, |
| 02:10:22.99 | Charles Melton | Yeah. |
| 02:11:25.87 | Melissa Blaustein | So on the subject of the delay then, could I ask that we might I was just a follow up. I just would like if I were to vote on it, I would want to know that we were immediately going to agendize a conversation about affordability and protection of existing affordable units in the context of these changes. So we would have to do something in our code to further protect affordability for me to feel |
| 02:11:48.48 | Melissa Blaustein | I'm certainly open to that. |
| 02:11:54.57 | Jill Hoffman | I think, to your point, Vice Mayor, I think I would be more inclined to support moving forward if we had had a comprehensive discussion of this in the past, and if we had all the data that was provided that we would normally have had we had a comprehensive discussion of this in the past. In other words, if this had been part of the housing element discussion as we had moved in the past two years or three years that we've been discussing this. So had this been rolled up as a discussion, and if these had been part of our inventory numbers, if this had come forward with the challenges of this program that was introduced 14 years ago, and I'm talking specifically about how do we provide more housing for, this was a, and I'm just talking about the calculation of the inventory, right? The opportunity sites for affordable housing, right? So I'm talking about that calculation. If you add new units above the second floor, that you have to have a certain calculation of affordable units. That was a specific program in reaction to a housing element in 2011. So that was a program that Sausalito came up with. if we had decided as part of our program this round hey let's do away with that we want to try a different program great um then that's part of our strategy we're pivoting to something else this is not something that was part of that strategy um so we would be looking at how many sites did we have how many sites are we going to lose um you know how many you know what was the impact i know for a fact that in the past 60 days, we've gotten one more site at one of the projects that's been going on that was required. And so we got one more affordable site. So to say that this strategy hasn't come up with more affordable units in town over the past 14 years, is not true. And so we, as a council, should be afforded that. And you can't sit up on this council and say that I support affordable housing and throw this strategy out at a time or trying to look at every bit of affordable stock in town and not acknowledge that and do it in a vacuum without even having staff provide this information. A short. A short delay of two weeks and asking staff to come back and say, we want to have this information and we want to make a reasoned approach with the numbers, I think is, you know, it's reasonable. The fellow that called in that wants to do a unit, absolutely he should do that. He's not going to get his unit done in two weeks. And I would ask him to reach out to staff. They're amazingly adept at coming up with ways. If you're an owner and you want to do an owner move in, I'm pretty sure you can probably do that, and we can figure out a way to do that. So we need to have an inventory of second-story units before we make our, across all four of our financial districts. Let me just say, too, you know, this, I have, my concern about this is in the commercial central district, the way this is written, this gives wide latitude to the planning commission to eliminate residential on the second floor. We will lose many residential units across the central district, the way this is written, in a way that DA3 clause is written It is a pretty broad an easy hurdle to get over. to eliminate your second floor residential units. so if you're talking about maintaining second floor residential units That is something that we need to look at very, very closely. And again, what's the inventory of second floor residential units across Sausalito, those units are going to shift from affordable to high end market rate, Those people that came and talked to us during that in-the-pocket that were living in those affordable units, we're going to lose those units. And so, again, if you're talking about we care about affordable units, you need to actually have your actions – follow up with your rhetoric up here on the council. And that's what this vote is about. And so we need to, I think, the the first motion that the mayor made that should be our vote tonight there's no downside a couple of weeks to get this information up here and make a reasoned approach harms no one um i can't see why we wouldn't follow that as a council |
| 02:16:52.77 | Melissa Blaustein | Can I ask a question of Steph? Oh, please. No, no, go ahead. I'll ask after. Just, Director Phipps, have we had any applications to build residential in the downtown or Caledonia in your tenure as Community Development Director? And have any of those included in affordable units? |
| 02:16:59.49 | Unknown | I'll ask you after. |
| 02:17:15.62 | Brandon Phipps | Thank you for the question. I'm pleased to state that we actually did recently approve a housing project off of Bridgeway that locates directly adjacent and as a part of the Caledonia zoning district. So that's one project that we're aware of. However, that project locates on a housing element opportunity site. We're excited to be initiating the building permit review process once applicant submits. |
| 02:17:42.30 | Melissa Blaustein | is that going to be? |
| 02:17:43.28 | Brandon Phipps | That's going to be a four-unit development. |
| 02:17:45.03 | Melissa Blaustein | And so one of the four units will be affordable? Correct. |
| 02:17:47.51 | Brandon Phipps | Correct. Correct. As related to development in the Central Commercial District, in my experience in CDD in the last two and a half years, there has been very limited development discussion and very limited development proposal as related to affordable housing. |
| 02:18:07.50 | Steven Woodside | Okay, again, I voted in favor of this ordinance two weeks ago. I brought it back to... in deference to significant public feedback. We heard significant public feedback this evening and so that was what was most important to me. And so now that everyone's had an opportunity to comment, I'm going to call the question. This will be on Council Member Sobieski's motion. City Clerk, will you call the roll? |
| 02:18:40.22 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Blaustein. |
| 02:18:42.83 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:18:42.85 | Jill Hoffman | THEIR OWNERS. |
| 02:18:44.23 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Hoffman. |
| 02:18:46.73 | Jill Hoffman | No. |
| 02:18:48.26 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Sobieski. |
| 02:18:49.65 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 02:18:49.68 | Walfred Solorzano | you |
| 02:18:49.72 | Walfred Solorzano | Vice Mayor Woodside? Yes. |
| 02:18:52.21 | Walfred Solorzano | Merrick Cox. |
| 02:18:56.96 | Steven Woodside | I know. |
| 02:18:57.65 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:18:57.77 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:18:57.80 | Melissa Blaustein | you |
| 02:18:57.87 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:18:58.04 | Melissa Blaustein | You just completely floored me. I just, if I could for a minute, I just, if we are going to do a full analysis of all our affordable units, then I don't think it's a problem to stop and examine our affordability. I want to see this move forward. I absolutely want to see it move forward. I am deeply concerned about affordability across the board based on what everyone has said. And I don't think that necessarily waiting to assess affordability because affordability is so critically important to me in the context of this is going to be necessarily problematic, but I need to know, I'd assume that we're going to hear it in two weeks. If we're not, I'm going to have a problem |
| 02:19:34.28 | Steven Woodside | Mayor, you called the question. What we're hearing in two weeks is only... is only a second reading. We're not going to hear... C2 until July. I'm clear. |
| 02:19:48.59 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. I mean, you, |
| 02:19:49.84 | Steven Woodside | Okay, no. |
| 02:19:52.56 | Jill Hoffman | Next motion, please. Wow. |
| 02:19:57.77 | Steven Woodside | that. |
| 02:19:58.67 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Blosting? |
| 02:20:01.13 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. you |
| 02:20:01.86 | Ian Sobieski | This is my motion. Just a point of order because I do see some consternation here. A person who's voting with the motion can ask for reconsideration and |
| 02:20:01.98 | Steven Woodside | is my. |
| 02:20:12.32 | Ian Sobieski | I think, under parliamentary rules. So I see my colleague. No, the only person that can ask for |
| 02:20:15.05 | Jill Hoffman | No, the only person that can ask for reconsideration is the person that voted in favor of the motion. |
| 02:20:21.91 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 02:20:21.94 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:20:21.97 | Ian Sobieski | That's that way I'm pointing that out just for my council members. |
| 02:20:23.54 | Jill Hoffman | just for my couch. No, of the person, of the prevailing |
| 02:20:28.42 | Ian Sobieski | that prevailed on the motion. Someone who voted with the prevailing can ask for a reconsideration. |
| 02:20:28.66 | Jill Hoffman | prevailed on the But what prevailed, your emotion did not carry. I'm not making an emotion. I'm your motion did not carry. |
| 02:20:37.19 | Ian Sobieski | I'm just praying to you. |
| 02:20:38.93 | Jill Hoffman | But I could still say your motion did not carry. |
| 02:20:39.30 | Steven Woodside | Well, but I... |
| 02:20:42.31 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:20:42.32 | Steven Woodside | Okay, before I call the question on my motion, I'll hear from Councilmember Blaustein. |
| 02:20:42.98 | Melissa Blaustein | Bye. |
| 02:20:43.03 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 02:20:43.08 | Melissa Blaustein | THE FAMILY. |
| 02:20:47.86 | Melissa Blaustein | I mean, based on your feedback, I'm, I'm inclined to change my vote, but I would, I don't, |
| 02:20:55.79 | Sergio Rudin | And if both motions fail, we could consider alternative motions. |
| 02:20:59.65 | Melissa Blaustein | OK, so then I would. |
| 02:21:01.76 | Steven Woodside | Okay. So. |
| 02:21:02.78 | Melissa Blaustein | Maybe we should discuss a motion with direct action with regards to assessing our affordability that moves this forward anyway, because my biggest concern is an assessment of our affordability index. And I believe we can push this forward if we do that, but I want to really have it demonstrated somehow in the motion. |
| 02:21:15.72 | Steven Woodside | All right, so I'm going to call the question on my motion. If my motion fails, I'll entertain an alternative motion. |
| 02:21:21.74 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Blasting. |
| 02:21:22.96 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. |
| 02:21:23.84 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 02:21:23.87 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Hoffman. Thank you. |
| 02:21:25.19 | Steven Woodside | Yes. |
| 02:21:25.32 | Walfred Solorzano | . Thank you. Councilmember Sobieski? No. Councilmember, sorry, Vice Mayor Woodside? No. And Mayor Cox? |
| 02:21:32.59 | Steven Woodside | Yes, that motion does not carry. I'll entertain an alternative motion. Council Member Blaustein. |
| 02:21:39.65 | Melissa Blaustein | I would like to motion to approve the ordinance, but also have some language, and I would welcome the municipal attorney's help with language directed specifically with regards to assessing inventory of our affordability, as suggested by Councilmember Hoffman in the context of this ordinance. |
| 02:21:55.54 | Steven Woodside | So are you moving approval of the second reading and adoption of this ordinance as it exists and then making a separate motion to come back with an affordability assessment? |
| 02:22:09.80 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:22:09.82 | Steven Woodside | Yes. |
| 02:22:09.91 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:22:10.02 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:22:11.81 | Ian Sobieski | second. |
| 02:22:12.89 | Unknown | Is that clear, city attorney? |
| 02:22:14.66 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. So in terms of an, you're looking, you're, Motion is to waive the second reading adopt the ordinance as in the agenda packet directing staff to provide a. affordability assessment of our existing unit stock and any other information you would like included, council member? |
| 02:22:32.87 | Jill Hoffman | I'm sorry, I don't understand what you mean by affordability stock, an assessment of affordability stock. |
| 02:22:37.48 | Melissa Blaustein | All of the issues that you outlined with regards to what's happening on our second floors, how many affordable units do we have, how many market units have they created, inventory overseas? |
| 02:22:46.67 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:22:46.69 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:22:46.73 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:22:46.74 | Steven Woodside | How is that in any way? I'm going to wait. Oh, there is a second. So... |
| 02:22:48.50 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:22:48.51 | Jill Hoffman | We're going Go ahead. Okay, how is that in any way going to cure... the issues with the way this ordinance is written that allows broad latitude of the Planning Commission to basically |
| 02:23:03.99 | Paul Geffner | uh, |
| 02:23:04.66 | Jill Hoffman | gut all of these second floor residential in the central commercial district that's the problem with this ordinance that and that's the issue with the Why? Why the? you know, why we narrow it down, first of all, to do the inventory. of the housing stock so that we could look at it. And second of all, to do the inventory of. how the strategy from 2011 and the requirements before we gutted that in the context of our current housing element. |
| 02:23:36.84 | Melissa Blaustein | Because if we see an issue in result of that affordability index, we can do what we just did tonight and reassess and make a change if we need to. So it allows us to move forward with the new information as requested. And then if we want to make the change, because we see that actually something was or wasn't working as we adapt. Typically, we could do the same thing. |
| 02:23:54.14 | Jill Hoffman | And what are you going to say to the people Over at site 84 when we're going to we're asking them to approve changes to 1128 to absorb all of this new Housing that we're now getting because of the changes in this ordinance |
| 02:24:09.16 | Steven Woodside | So council member Hoffman, rather than cross talk, I invite you to make any comments that you might have. |
| 02:24:13.94 | Jill Hoffman | Well, these are the impacts that we're now imposing on other parts of town because you're changing the- You set the clock, please. |
| 02:24:19.27 | Steven Woodside | the clock please. |
| 02:24:19.98 | Sharna Brockett | Thank you. |
| 02:24:22.25 | Jill Hoffman | So either you agree and you want to protect housing and affordability units in Sausalito or you don't, Councilman Blaustein. Thank you. |
| 02:24:29.93 | Steven Woodside | Please. refrain from crosstalk please uh confine your comments i don't comments on the pending motion okay do not specifically address other council members in a derogatory manner |
| 02:24:37.65 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Do not. in a derogatory manner. I'm trying to understand her her reasoning on this So last reasoning is. Mayor, I would like to just actually have council member Blouse. |
| 02:24:46.66 | Melissa Blaustein | Bye. |
| 02:24:46.67 | Steven Woodside | reasoning is that |
| 02:24:52.50 | Steven Woodside | I'm not gonna have her respond to you. I'm gonna ask you to make comments and she can make comments. I'm not gonna have an adversarial dialogue. |
| 02:24:58.25 | Jill Hoffman | I'm asking somebody to explain to me how this is going to address the problems with this ordinance that have been raised by many people who have contacted me, they contacted you, about this ordinance that we're passing here. Apparently we're going to pass tonight at your behest. |
| 02:25:23.75 | Steven Woodside | So I wanted us to slow down. There weren't the votes to slow us down. So we are going to adopt this ordinance this evening. However, we are going to reconsider the very important issues that you raised this evening in the very near future. That's the motion made by Councilmember Blaustein. Call the question. Yes, I'll call the question. City Clerk, did you want to call the roll? |
| 02:25:50.24 | Walfred Solorzano | Sorry, Councilmember |
| 02:25:52.03 | Walfred Solorzano | Blasting yes Councilmember Hoffman no Councilmember so we ask you yes Vice Mayor what's I yes and Mary Cox |
| 02:25:52.76 | Steven Woodside | Yes. |
| 02:25:53.08 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 02:25:55.25 | Steven Woodside | No. |
| 02:26:00.87 | Steven Woodside | Yes. Community and Economic Development Director, at our next agenda setting meeting, would you kindly advise when this will be ready to bring back to the council? Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. |
| 02:26:12.94 | Brandon Phipps | Thank you. |
| 02:26:14.59 | Steven Woodside | All right, I apologize for the length of the discussion on this item. It was important to me for transparency and public participation purposes that we fully vet this item. because this has taken up a good portion of our Karen Hollweg, Time this evening, I am going to ask that we postpone the hearing on item five C launch a local employee parking program for caledonia businesses any objection. We will take public comment, but we just won't hear it this evening because we still have Formula Retail and our budget to hear. |
| 02:26:53.76 | Melissa Blaustein | I just know there are folks that came to speak on that. |
| 02:26:57.79 | Ian Sobieski | given that they just are making public comment, do you think you could hear their comment so they could leave if they're not interested in staying, uh, |
| 02:27:04.59 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 02:27:05.05 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 02:27:05.30 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:27:05.40 | Ian Sobieski | out so they could go ahead and do it. Just public comment on the employee parking and then |
| 02:27:06.15 | Melissa Blaustein | Go ahead and do that. |
| 02:27:09.10 | Ian Sobieski | and then they know it'll be continued so they don't have to stick around. |
| 02:27:12.44 | Steven Woodside | Sure. Okay, we're going to take public comment on what is on our agenda as item 5C. the employee parking program. But please know that we will be bringing this back for full consideration today. hopefully at our June 3rd meeting. |
| 02:27:32.88 | Steven Woodside | And apologies for those of you who came to comment on this item. All right, my first card is from, I can't read it, Paul Gedner. |
| 02:27:52.25 | Brian Powers | I. |
| 02:27:52.64 | Paul Geffner | Thank you. First, I would like to thank my wife, the lovely Lisa, who came to rescue me tonight. But I'm one of the owners of driver's market. And like many small businesses, my associate down the street, Yoshi from Sushi Rod, we're all struggling with the idea that we have employees that can't afford to live here and can't afford to park here. So we're creating this log jam in the city that that we need to address and it's only going to get worse because I think as everybody knows here, They're going to eliminate the corner green zones, which will eliminate another 20 parking spots and increase more pressure on the parking facilities here. So I had a suggestion that I'd like to put out, which is I went to see lot five, which is across the street from drivers. And on the on the high end of lot five, there's a concrete platform that has 22 spots. And I would like to suggest that that space be dedicated to employee parking and that we, all the businesses, can make proposals to the city council to say, like, for us, we would be willing to pay $100 a month and try to get three spots. So $300 a month for three spots that would be designated. I like simple solutions for complex problems. And to me, this would be a simple solution. All the businesses would apply to the city council and ask for request spaces that are available um Contingent with what their needs are. In our case, we think if we had three employee parking spaces that would relieve an enormous amount of stress on our employees. We as a business are willing to pay for it. That's my suggestion. |
| 02:29:57.88 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. I think I'm not wearing my glasses, but I think I see in the back Wayne Kwan and Brandon Rogers. Are you two taking notes on this to convey to the chief? Thank you so much. Okay, wonderful. All right, next I will call Yoshitomei. Welcome, Yoshi. |
| 02:30:20.88 | Yoshitomei | Thank you, Mayor and the City Council members. The housing element, we talk about how difficult living in South Korea, a lot of employees work for me. Most of them are half, at least half of them, they have a two job, to meet and. And I would say 20% of them are carpooling to go home together and take a public bus to come to work. And then even we talk about this five hours a day is very difficult for a lot of employees. And now we have been more sea permit has been expanded. along the hillside of Caledonia Street and the city hall area nearby, everything around here, everything C permit, come to Silicon Valley and we cannot park here. What's happening to Saucerino? My position is I'm hesitant to speak how I speak. I do not want to create war against my neighbor. I will lose it. And yet the bigger picture is we have to make Sarsero is a better place to work. We have to give them affordability, how we can come to Sarsero. If Sarsero is creating a free employee parking lot, a lot of people come to Sarsero. Parking lot 5, I would suggest to make a much bigger parking lot, very affordable employee parking. Then more people come to work such a little. So a lot of Caladonis Street particularly, it's a residential commercial zone. It's very difficult to see what works for business and the residents. I really, this is the opportunity to look at what we can do socially. People parking on a Caledonia street, It isn't just my employees. I have 16 spaces behind the hillside. And across the street, I did sub-release another six spaces. And yet, we need to have more easier for employees to come to work in SASRIO. Please look at those situations. Thank you. |
| 02:32:20.81 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you, Yoshi. Adrienne Brinton. |
| 02:32:30.62 | Adrian Brinton | Hi, thank you for taking my comment again. So I've thought a lot about parking and have involved myself in a lot of other parking issues. This one is particularly interesting to me. You know, when we think about our businesses and we think about the employee parking, you know, our businesses are really a part of the fabric of our community. And sometimes we tend to think of. The businesses and the kind of people that run them, they're not residents, they don't vote. But the reality is they are part of our community and the employees are part of that fabric. that make the town work. Our businesses provide 45%, I think, of our taxes. And they're really, really important. At the same time with parking, we provide very, very generous parking benefits to residents. We provide $60 a year parking permits for effectively private parking in our residential streets. We provide a parking card program that's very generous. I looked at the meter receipts. We had meter receipts of about $170,000 last year on residential parking cards. Probably not $170,000 in revenue because if we took those away, not as many people would go downtown. We don't want that. We don't want to take that away. But we're probably subsidizing that to the tune of $100,000 a year. At the same time, we're bringing in 100 and something thousand from our employees for their parking and they're paying five, six, $7 a day. Uh, and they don't earn very much money. That's a significant cost for people that are working in the town. And I think by thinking about our employees a little bit differently and thinking about them more as part of our fabric and on, you know, maybe not a completely similar level to residents, but I think we're a little bit out of balance there that if we think about this employee parking program more as providing a service to people who are part of the fabric of our community, maybe we can figure out how to be a little more generous with it and help our businesses attract and retain people that helps them generate more taxes, helps me pay less taxes. Thank you for taking my comment. |
| 02:34:30.16 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Okay, Vicki Nichols, if anyone else wants to speak, would you kindly fill out a speaker card? |
| 02:34:35.66 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 02:34:36.93 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:34:36.94 | Vicki Nichols | I will fill one out. Sorry. Thank you. I wasn't going to speak. Vicki Nichols, I just recently moved off of Caledonia Street after 43 years living there. Yoshi and I were on a committee... I don't even know how many years ago, trying to talk and solve the employee parking issue. Paul's idea, I think, has some merit. that, Concrete is probably the old parking pad for the police trailers, it sounds like. Um, But I would say that one thing that's not been taken into consideration, Yoshi mentioned it, it is a residential commercial parking area. Those residents, many of them were built without garages. So without the employee parking, the parking is already maxed out. I did a survey years ago going through conditional use permits for the whole street. Conditioned parking for the businesses. There's not enough parking there wasn't then. It's going to be horrible when you lose the green spot. So if you can shift even the number that they're asking for off of Caledonia Street, I think that would be something to look at. I don't think you need to keep squeezing the residents. There's no other place to park. There's no garages for these residents. Thank you. Thank you. All right. City Clerk. |
| 02:35:50.35 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 02:35:51.95 | Walfred Solorzano | We have Babette McDougall. |
| 02:35:56.65 | Babette McDougall | Hi, I'm Bebette McDougall, Sausalito resident. So I definitely want to weigh in on the parking situation because we residents, play a role in that on a day in and day out basis. And I have to say that The people who work for the businesses down around Caledonia in particular that park up in my neighborhood, they're always very polite, thoughtful people. If they say they're going to be back in less than two hours to move their car, they mean it and they do it. So it's a very unfortunate situation. It impacts parking for the residents. It impacts housing. all the way down the line. So I don't know why we can't get together and have an employee parking area. It's so long overdue and we have so much neglected area that could be deployed. And I imagine eventually, thanks to Wayne, it's all going to pencil out. And that's what matters is that it pencils out in an equitable way. But I agree with Yoshi. People have to want to work here. Otherwise, we're not going to have quality people. that helps to reinforce this quality of life that we're so attached to. Thank you very much. |
| 02:37:02.19 | Walfred Solorzano | No further public comment? Thank you. |
| 02:37:03.64 | Steven Woodside | All right. Thank you, everybody, for your public comment. I know that the police department has already made an effort to put together a program that addresses many of your comments, and I am hopeful that they will take into consideration the comments that they've heard this evening and further refine that proposal that they will bring back to us, hopefully, on June 3rd. |
| 02:37:31.58 | Steven Woodside | All right. With that, I'm going to move on to business item 5A, waiver of second reading and adoption of ordinance number 032025, an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Sausalito, amending our formula retail ordinance. And once again... um, All right, we have brought this back. for public, as a business item, in light of the numerous public comments that we've received since we first considered this on first reading. and welcome senior planner, Matthew Mandich. |
| 02:38:07.41 | Matthew Mandich | Thank you, Mayor. I just have a brief presentation here just for edification of the public and just as a brief reminder to counsel on this item. So I'll try not to take too long, and hopefully we can just get right to the discussion. Next slide, Prilly. Please. Thank you so yes, as that title was stated, this is technically the waiver of the second reading and adoption ordinance that was the request, however, I have a feeling we're going to hear some comments that might sense a different direction tonight so next slide please. So just going to give a little background on the current formula retail ordinance, discuss some of the issues that staff and city attorney have identified, some of the proposed changes that were approved by the council, and then potentially some new directions we could take. So the current ordinance was adopted in 2003 and amended in 2007. Currently requires a conditional use permit to establish formula retail use within the city. This has both conditional use permit findings and additional special specific findings required that are rather subjective. This also requires a CUP for expansion of a formula retail establishment if it's for 500 square feet or more. Definition of formula retail as it currently stands does not clearly define how many locations or standardized elements constitute a formula retail business. It's very vague in the code right now. It also limits formula retail to the central commercial, the central shopping and or commercial shopping and the commercial neighborhood zoning districts. Next slide, please. So here's just a map showing where formula retail is currently allowed in the city and the CC, CN and CS. Next slide, please. So the problem that's been identified by staff and by our city attorney in particular is the requirement for the CUP. The CUP technically must run with the land and cannot be establishment specific. As a permit, it must be able to transfer to subsequent purchasers. So something like a restaurant use, cafe use, retail use can run with the land. However, something like a specific establishment, McDonald's, a CUP cannot be tied to that. So it's kind of a situation of the use versus the user. And right now the CUP is being tied to the user when it should be tied to the use. Again, as I mentioned, there are some additional subjective findings that are required for this conditional use permit. And there's also some case law that has shown that CUPs are not exactly the best way to be governing these types of uses, in particular the Malibu case, which lost in court. Formula retail is also not clearly defined in the code. As I've already said, the current definition is very vague, and it could be applied to pretty much all businesses in the city with the logo, sign, or trademark. So really looking to clean up that definition. Current ordinance also can increase risk to the city. Violates recent court rulings, as just discussed with with Malibu again too vague to enforce and could also be understood in its current state to discriminate against interstate commerce through the commerce clause. Next slide please. So the proposed changes that were presented to the council on first reading included the removal of the CUP requirement, adoption of a formula retail zoning clearance, which would be similar to an OUP or an occupational use permit. Formula retail zoning clearances would be allocated by zoning district with a certain cap for each zoning district, and they would be approved administratively by the planning department. However, as we'll see, that was one of the amendments amendments that the council made we also clearly defined formula retail in these new proposed changes the definition that we set in this ordinance was businesses with six or more locations worldwide would qualify as a formula retail establishment and that they along with that they also had to have two standardized elements as defined in the code existing formula retail in the city would receive zoning clearances and that's something we can talk about a little bit more if the definition were to change but they would also receive zoning clearances that would count against the cap for that district. Certain uses are also going to be exempt from formula retail such as grocery stores, pharmacy, banks, medical, real estate, service station, movie theaters, and couriers. One of the other proposed changes was to include the commercial waterfront as a new zoning district, which would allow formula retail uses. And we also wanted to, of course, amend table 10.241, which governs our commercial uses to make this change to eliminate the CUP. We also added a prohibition of fast food drive-throughs in our special requirements section. Next slide, please. |
| 02:42:22.02 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 02:42:22.25 | Matthew Mandich | Thank you. So the city council approved this ordinance on April 1st by a four to one vote. They made a couple of modifications. Some of them were just to the text, which you can see above there. But the two big changes were that instead of the planning department or the community development director and or his or her designee, it would be the planning commission that would issue the formula retail zoning clearance. If the formula retail use comply with the following requirements, which are the table there, they also asked us to modify this table to specifically break out CN1 and CN2 into two separate zoning districts. The recommendation of the planning commission was to include those as one. So that's what we brought forward. But City Council asked us to revise that. So that's been done so that those modifications were approved on April 1st. Next slide, please. This is just a breakdown of our existing formula retail and the CC we have three again, these are based on the current definition we brought forward, which was based on six so if that definition were to change some of these existing. Formula retail establishments would no longer be considered formula retail so just something to keep in mind for the Council so that's just a breakdown there of what we have three in the CC one in the CM one in the CN two and none in the other districts next slide please. So here is the formula retail zoning clearance table. In the central commercial, we proposed six. We have three existing, so a future capacity of three. CM1, three, one existing, future capacity of two. CN2, two was the proposed limit, one existing, and one future. CW also was a new ad, so it has none, and the CS is Molly Stones, which is an exempt grocery store. So if you can see that down there at the bottom, the proposed limit would be 14 formula retail establishments. We currently have five. So the ordinance that was approved allows for an additional future capacity of nine. Next slide, please. So potential alternatives. Obviously, there was definitely some concern from the public, from the council, despite the approval. So we've examined a couple of different things that we would propose that could be changes. And we're very open to feedback from council on any of these and additional changes, too. But these are just a couple that we thought might help with some of the concerns we've heard. One would be to disallow all formula retail in the Central Commercial Zoning District. So just remove that district from an allowed district, just like the CR is currently not allowed. We could redefine formula retail by setting a higher bar for what qualifies as formula retail. Right now we have it at 6. We could change that to 10, 20, 50, 100. That just depends on what we want to set the bar as for what amount of businesses establishments count for formula retail, how many locations. Another thing we could do is lower the cap numbers. So, for example, we had six in the CC. If the CC were to stay, we could lower that to four or three or something like that. And then we also have the option, if we do some of these changes and move some of the caps around, maybe eliminate the CC, we could also include the CR. And I know that that's's not included now and never has been but could help fill some of those difficult vacant spaces specifically 101 caledonia and potentially make up for some of the losses if we do change the cc or the cap numbers so these are just some potential alternatives that staff is presenting and we're very open to hear council's feedback uh next slide please so So recommendation, we could either wave the second reading and adopt the ordinance or the Council could provide direction to staff on how to alter the language in the ordinance to more align with Council and community preference. That concludes my presentation. Happy to take any questions. Thank you. |
| 02:45:51.00 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Any questions? Yes. Thank you. |
| 02:45:53.40 | Ian Sobieski | Hi, Matt. |
| 02:45:53.73 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 02:45:53.80 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. So you said that I think this is the crux that I was wondering about too, and I think members of community are too. The current process where a CUP is required, you said is the problematic part |
| 02:46:06.07 | Matthew Mandich | Yes, that's the issue. Yes. Right now, the CEP requirement is one of the main problems with the ordinance that city attorneys identified. |
| 02:46:12.62 | Ian Sobieski | So that's our current, that's what the city attorney identified. Maybe he'll want to chime in on it. If, if this, if someone. If that way, I understand some cities have been sued under that. I think last meeting there was a discussion about Malibu being sued. If the city loses a suit. and that is that the court, like they did in Malibu, finds a CUP, like they did in Malibu, is not valid, then we're on the hook for attorney's fees, and the person that sues, like McDonald's, let's say if they sued, could force their way in. The verdict would be we have to pay McDonald's lawyers' fees, and we have to let McDonald's in. So I think the motivation is to fix the ordinance to better protect us from that kind of risk. Is that fair to say? |
| 02:46:53.77 | Matthew Mandich | Oh yeah, I'll defer to the state attorney on that as he has jumped on. |
| 02:46:56.41 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, no, I do think that the possibility of attorney's fees is a risk with respect to you know, someone challenging an ordinance and winning. Yes. |
| 02:47:07.61 | Ian Sobieski | And then, and so that's the motivation for this. And then once we're fixing it, the question is how to fix it. And I think none of us want, you know, the golden arches or dollar store here, but, uh, you're looking for feedback. And so I guess we'll give you that when we're when we're in the discussion point, but basically there are two things we can do. It's, define what formula retail is and the proposal six, but you're suggesting it could be some other number like 50 or 100. Uh, and And if it was 100, that would exclude Starbucks, because that's a chain with thousands, but would allow something like Blue Bottle that has 50 locations. Is that... if Blue Bottle would be considered not formula retail, Starbucks would be considered formula retail. Is that? |
| 02:47:52.62 | Matthew Mandich | That's correct, yes. |
| 02:47:52.87 | Ian Sobieski | All right. |
| 02:47:54.66 | Matthew Mandich | That's what would define formula retail would be the number of locations. |
| 02:47:55.06 | Ian Sobieski | That's what we're doing. defining what formula retail is and then and then setting a limit on the number of formula retail. |
| 02:48:03.49 | Matthew Mandich | A zoning district. |
| 02:48:04.38 | Ian Sobieski | and allow. Apparently in town we have to potentially allow some number of formula retail to stay straight with the law, but we could limit it to as soon as one, let's say. Uh, |
| 02:48:16.51 | Matthew Mandich | I believe that's correct, but I'll let the city attorney clarify that. |
| 02:48:16.65 | Ian Sobieski | So, |
| 02:48:21.10 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah. So, you know, I'm not aware of any jurisdiction that has tried to entirely ban formula retail, and I do think that it would be potentially concerning to enact a wholesale ban in the city. So I've been... |
| 02:48:34.97 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, but we could limit it to say one. or two. |
| 02:48:38.80 | Sergio Rudin | Some reasonable number, yes. Thank you. |
| 02:48:41.59 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 02:48:41.64 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah. |
| 02:48:41.72 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. And then could we limit it in the area of town, say, could we define formula retail at 100 and but prohibit it in the historic district and allow a cap of one or two formula retail, somewhere along Bridgeway, like in the Molly Stones area or, Something like that. |
| 02:49:04.05 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, I think that probably is within the city's zoning power to decide, yes. |
| 02:49:08.15 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, thank you very much. |
| 02:49:10.85 | Steven Woodside | Other questions? And then I'm going to open it up to public comment. Yes. |
| 02:49:17.80 | Jill Hoffman | So just a couple of questions. To be clear, the Malibu case that we seem to be relying on The Malibu case didn't say that you couldn't have a CUP. They just said the way that the CUP that the Malibu ordinance the way it was written, their CUP was. not written correctly or actually that it was unenforceable, correct? |
| 02:49:52.26 | Sergio Rudin | So the concern in what the court held in Malibu was that a CUP – process cannot be used to regulate who the applicant is. And there was expressed concern that that was what Malibu is trying to do in the way that it had structured its CUP process and subjecting only formula retail establishments to CUP requirements. |
| 02:50:09.76 | Charles Melton | Thank you. |
| 02:50:09.91 | Jill Hoffman | And... |
| 02:50:09.95 | Charles Melton | Yeah. |
| 02:50:14.22 | Jill Hoffman | So, You can have a CUP. San Francisco has a CUP, correct, process for formula retail? |
| 02:50:22.64 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. And one of the key things there is that their CUP process is a little Um, let's just say it's very unique. Um, In terms of the way that they have structured theirs and that they do have a CUP process for formula retail, but once it is granted, it does run with the land. So any subsequent formula retail business that chooses to buy out that location can establish without further review. |
| 02:50:50.41 | Jill Hoffman | And Healdsburg also, the town of Healdsburg also has a CUP process. |
| 02:50:56.89 | Sergio Rudin | I believe they have... Their ordinance when I reviewed it was also very strange and unique. They have a CUP process only in one zoning district, and they have an approval by right in other zoning districts. |
| 02:51:11.79 | Jill Hoffman | So, I think, You've seen some of the public feedback. Part of the consternation of this draft ordinance is that we've done away with the discretionary CEP process. Correct? |
| 02:51:27.30 | Sergio Rudin | I understand that is some public feedback we've received. Um, |
| 02:51:37.66 | Jill Hoffman | Um, |
| 02:51:39.13 | Sergio Rudin | And to be perfectly blunt, I would not necessarily recommend the city council continue to have a CUP process in light of recent court decisions. |
| 02:51:51.85 | Jill Hoffman | I'm curious, where did the recommendation come from to eliminate formula retail from the commercial central districts? |
| 02:52:02.70 | Matthew Mandich | That was a potential alternative that staff presented to the Council this evening that's not something that. You, you can, or cannot act on that. It was just one of the alternatives we were presenting. |
| 02:52:12.54 | Jill Hoffman | And what's the benefit for that? |
| 02:52:14.72 | Matthew Mandich | Well, it would disallow formula retail establishments in the CC entirely and force them to locate in other commercial zoning districts. |
| 02:52:21.99 | Jill Hoffman | And so those impacts would fall on those other commercial districts. |
| 02:52:26.23 | Matthew Mandich | Yeah, that's one way to look at it, I suppose. |
| 02:52:29.05 | Jill Hoffman | And the benefit would be that the central commercial wouldn't have those impacts, but that the commercial neighborhoods that would absorb those impacts. |
| 02:52:36.98 | Matthew Mandich | I mean, impacts is a tough word to define here. I mean, maybe a little more specific. I don't know what you mean by that. |
| 02:52:45.15 | Jill Hoffman | What's the reason that you would eliminate formula retail from the commercial center district? |
| 02:52:51.19 | Matthew Mandich | Well, that's up for you guys to decide. It's just an alternative potential. |
| 02:52:55.10 | Jill Hoffman | What prompted it to be part of your presentation? |
| 02:52:57.50 | Matthew Mandich | Um, well, we heard that there was a lot of concern about the character of the central historic district, um, and you know, a potential that. business like a McDonald's or Burger King could locate on the waterfront. And there was concern about that. So we suggested potentially eliminating that district. |
| 02:53:13.19 | Jill Hoffman | And so the converse being that other parts of town would be delighted to have a McDonald's or Burger King located in their part of town? |
| 02:53:19.45 | Matthew Mandich | We didn't receive a lot of public comment about other parts of the town. So that's why we focused on the central commercial. |
| 02:53:26.15 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks. And my |
| 02:53:29.31 | Sergio Rudin | My recommendation is if the Council does wish to entertain that rather than entirely remove it from the Central commercial, because I understand we do have some existing. formula retail uses, I would recommend that you lower the cap to match the existing number of uses. |
| 02:53:43.23 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you, city attorney. |
| 02:53:44.07 | Matthew Mandich | I also had a quick question about that city attorney about the number of so right now we have it said it's six that currently defines several businesses that have below, let's say 50 or 100 so those would no longer be formula retail if that definition were to change. I just want to put that. Yes. |
| 02:54:00.02 | Sergio Rudin | Yes, so I would recommend the council to the extent that the council wants to modify the definition. modify that first and then give further direction to staff and we can provide some feedback on the appropriate cap. or, |
| 02:54:13.35 | Melissa Blaustein | I have a procedural question, but it relates to the, I think you had four bullet point alternatives. I'm wondering if that could be put back up so I get my question straight. |
| 02:54:13.37 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah. |
| 02:54:35.10 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. So if, for example, we were to give you direction on items or bullet point two and three, if we were to, say, raise the number of such that a greater number of relatively small, but nonetheless, several locations, but not a huge number. If we were to give direction to redefine quote formula retail with a higher cap, and at the same time, lower the total number allowed Would that have to go back to the Planning Commission? |
| 02:55:16.14 | Matthew Mandich | I believe so, but I'll let the city attorney respond. Okay, that's my question. |
| 02:55:19.74 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:55:20.38 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, I think... |
| 02:55:27.84 | Sergio Rudin | I do believe that the number... of allowed establishments were debated at the planning commission. Um, And perhaps our. CD director can also weigh in on this issue. in terms of the staff presentations, but The safest course of action, obviously, is to take things back to the Planning Commission. There is never, other than some slight delay, there's never an issue with taking proposed revisions to the Planning Commission. But, Assuming that the Planning Commission weighed in on both the appropriate number of retail establishments, be considered formula retail and the caps, I don't think that this would necessarily need to go back. We would just need to review the tape of that meeting to ensure that's the case. |
| 02:56:19.69 | Brandon Phipps | And I can just state for the record, appreciate the prompt, Attorney Rudin. I believe that the commission, in a general sense, discussed both of the things that Vice Mayor just pointed to. We generally discussed how we would define formula retail and in what number. So that was, it started as a more amorphous concept of open to any potential number. However, staff did bring a recommendation forward. Same with the CAP. |
| 02:56:47.98 | Sergio Rudin | I think under those circumstances, it probably would just be safer to take the ordinance back to the planning commission. |
| 02:56:48.16 | Steven Woodside | I think, |
| 02:56:54.95 | Steven Woodside | And if, for example, we decided to ban all formula retail for, if we were to redefine formula retail as being The number of locations is 50. or fewer, and then ban all formula retail in town except for one identified location as discussed earlier that's something that would need to go back to the planning commission right |
| 02:57:18.84 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. Yeah, I think that that is a substantial enough revision and you know, is significantly further from the proposed regulatory structure before you that it would be appropriate to get the recommendation of the Planning Commission. |
| 02:57:32.85 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay, if there are no... Okay. |
| 02:57:34.48 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. I mean, I'm kidding. I had my hand up earlier, so. Yeah, that's okay. Thank you. Hi, I think this might more be for our city attorney, but in researching formula retail across California and the Bay Area, did you have a chance to look at, I know we discussed Malibu at length, but Arcata, Ojai, Sebastopol, and Palo Alto all have CUPs for their formula retail. Did you have any chance to take a look at any other ones? |
| 02:58:02.16 | Sergio Rudin | So I have not done a hundred and something city survey of all of the formula retail regulations. |
| 02:58:09.45 | Melissa Blaustein | I did it. Stay wild. |
| 02:58:10.17 | Sergio Rudin | statewide. |
| 02:58:10.83 | Melissa Blaustein | So I would recommend. |
| 02:58:12.79 | Sergio Rudin | But I would suspect that a number of jurisdictions are like Sausalito in a position where they have not revisited or reviewed their formula retail regulations since the, I believe it was a 2019 decision in the city of Malibu case. |
| 02:58:27.39 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah, well, interestingly, so Fastable has the CUPE process and they define formula retail as 25 businesses or less. So I just wanted to see if we had some of that context because there's a number of different potential paths that we could take. But we do have available to us as the mayor mentioned, if we were to say define formula retail as 50 or fewer businesses to outlaw formula retail outright. correct. |
| 02:58:56.01 | Sergio Rudin | Sorry, I missed your question because I was looking up Sebastopol's ordinance. Yeah. |
| 02:59:01.46 | Melissa Blaustein | Oh, great. Let me know what you find out. I was just reiterating to confirm that it would be possible for us to have the CUP and also ban formula retail outright if we were to define formula retail as 50 or fewer. |
| 02:59:15.46 | Steven Woodside | Well, ban fifth formula retail over 50 units. |
| 02:59:19.13 | Melissa Blaustein | Right. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. Great. Thank you. I just wanted to, I did look at some of the other ordinances and it does seem that they have higher numbers. So, |
| 02:59:20.09 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:59:27.41 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, I would not recommend a wholesale citywide ban on all formula retail, because I do think that that potentially does create some litigation risk for the city. under the donor and commerce clause in particular, but I do think that it is within the city council's power to establish some numerical limits and reasonable location requirements for these businesses. |
| 02:59:50.90 | Ian Sobieski | Yeah, I think that's a key learning that, an outright ban is zero is a problem, but a pretty aggressive limit. is defensible is what you're saying. |
| 03:00:01.89 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, that would be, I think, an ordinance I would feel comfortable defending in litigation. |
| 03:00:09.16 | Steven Woodside | Thank you, city attorney. If there are no further questions, I'm gonna open it up to public comment. I have no speaker cards on this so far. |
| 03:00:15.12 | Matthew Mandich | Thank you, council members. |
| 03:00:19.24 | Steven Woodside | Okay, Vicki Nichols. |
| 03:00:25.75 | Unknown | But, |
| 03:00:26.14 | Vicki Nichols | I actually wrote out some comments on my phone in the parking lot, and my phone's dead, so I'll just try to remember what I was going to say. I think I would like to see the consideration of in the CC, the historic district. We've got a new business improvement district. We've got people really trying to work on that. I don't want to see McDonald's down there. And if you have this open, you're going to have a heck of a time saying no to McDonald's or no to anybody else. And they will sue you, and they should if it's allowed. I think the, isn't it true that if you only, if you reduce the number that are allowed there, say you've got three, you're going to grandfather those, you don't shift then six, which was potentially being considered to another area. No one else has to absorb it because you're not allowing it in that area, it would seem. So I appreciate you looking at this. I am concerned about the waterfront, the same issue when we were doing the thing with Pete's. down in the CW and the big Bruhaha and Barbachi got in there. But that could have been any formula retail down there too, unrelated to any water. consideration. So I think you have to look at every business, but it sounds like your cutoff number handles that. So good thinking it through. Thanks. Thanks. Sharna Brockett. |
| 03:01:55.14 | Sharna Brockett | Thanks so much. You know, I'm really excited with all the improvements we're seeing downtown, in particular, thanks to our planning staff and the PVID and our council members. So thank you. But there's a lot more work to do. And unfortunately, we're still overcoming a reputation that South Saludo has that we're a very hard place to do business with and to open a business, and that's starting to change, but again, we have a lot more work to do. We still have 17 open storefronts. And so let's do, let's take the next step to fill them and really show the community, the business community that we are open for business. Um, I, for one, when I, you know, I love to go downtown and shop as much as I can, but to be honest, I often go to mill Valley or to go, go to Larkspur landing. or go up to Petaluma and go shopping, because I find that there's more stores that I enjoy. And a lot of them are small chains. For example, some of the chains that we love, like in Larkspur Landing or in Tiburon, are, for example, Malibu Farm. It was started in Malibu, and there's seven locations. And right now, they would probably have a hard time starting here. Marine Layer, a clothing store, casual clothing store, started in San Francisco, 45 locations. I would love to have a Marine Layer here, but... They're right in there with formula retail. Credo Beauty, another great chain started in San Francisco, 15 stores. I think a lot of my friends, a lot of people, a lot of tourists, a lot of people from Mill Valley would come here to shop as well. So you get the idea. I think it's time to open this up. Let's be creative. Let's welcome these small business chains. They're still very much small businesses, but they would just add so much to our community, and I think we would all be very grateful for them to start here. Thank you so much. Thank you. |
| 03:03:51.76 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:03:51.77 | Sharna Brockett | Meryl? |
| 03:03:52.26 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:03:59.71 | Unknown | evening. I think what Sharna just said is quite true. It's quite, you know, we We need to make it more available to get the permits to do what it is to do to get a business going in this town. Just look at Sartage. It's been trying to be open forever. they just can't get open for some reason. I don't know what it is. Permits. the health department, but it seems like it's harder to do here. That's what we hear from anywhere else. if moving this along by getting some people who are experienced and already going and let's do it, but let's, as a town, simplify the process, make it easier, make it better, but still retaining our, our, um, control. Is that the word that I want to say? We you know, you can't just be anybody. You can't just do everything, but, but we can just do it better. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 03:05:07.04 | Steven Woodside | Yoshi Tomei. |
| 03:05:15.53 | Yoshitomei | Hi again. I had my failed business in San Francisco on Market Street and then I tried to sell the restaurant. I could not sell. Castle Merchant Discs had 12 franchise, whatever those rules are. People can afford to buy restaurant, much bigger operation. I could not sell. That's one. And the two, my next door empty hurting me. I don't like to see an empty store next to me, how long? So please, please fix ASAP. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 03:05:51.96 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:05:55.23 | Steven Woodside | And I'm just going to, for the record, that's in the CC district, right, Brandon? |
| 03:06:04.24 | Brandon Phipps | Yoshi's business, I believe, is in the CR district. |
| 03:06:07.25 | Steven Woodside | CR. All right. Brian Powers. |
| 03:06:18.11 | Brian Powers | Hi, thank you. So vacancies don't help anyone. They don't create jobs. They don't create tax revenue. They don't create fun or meaningful experiences. They don't create anything positive. All it does is send people on the 101 North or into San Francisco. And then it just creates more traffic and we lose a lot of that positivity. I mean, if people want to shop at a store that has 7,500 other locations, I don't see any reason to stop them. If those businesses aren't serving the community, they'll fail and more local ones, smaller ones will thrive as well. But the real thing is just how do we not have so many vacancies in the community? Uh, it just seems like it'll make it a much better experience and stop having everybody have to go north and peak traffic. Thanks. |
| 03:07:16.33 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Adrienne Brinton. |
| 03:07:26.32 | Adrian Brinton | Thank you again for taking my comment. I feel like I've been up here quite a lot tonight, so I'll try to be quick. I just wanted to talk a little bit about the economics of opening a business, especially in regards to some of our larger empty storefronts. You know, with our current restrictions, we're really looking for those individual, unique, one location businesses. When you think about going into a large storefront like the old movie theater, it's very hard to open a business. It's very expensive. And when we limit it and try to find that, you know, individual, unique business that can open there, it's really risky. And I think that may have something to do with why some of the larger empty storefronts are staying empty by opening to these slightly larger regional chains, up to 50. We looked at a lot of them. There's a lot of great businesses in that area. And they can come in and afford to actually invest in some of those larger storefronts. They have more financial resources to get it up and running, and they have more financial resources to make it work. So I think, again, opening this up a little bit. I think it doesn't harm our character. It actually enhances it. to get it up and running and they have more financial resources to make it work. So I think, you know, again, opening this up a little bit, I think it doesn't harm our character. It actually enhances it. It could bring in businesses that really help and also maybe fill some of those large, really hard to fill storefronts that we've been suffering with for some time. Thank you. |
| 03:08:35.34 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you, Paul Geffner. |
| 03:08:43.39 | Paul Geffner | I would like to just reiterate what's been said. We have some businesses that have been empty for five, 10 years that are key locations. And it really hurts the city. Like The movie theater, obviously, next to Sushi Ron. Starbucks, how long has that been gone for? Like if Starbucks was turned into a blue bottle, that would be a tremendous help to this city because we need something like that for all the tourists to come in, have a cheap place to eat or drink, but still has a level of sophistication that refers to Sausalito. We need some creativity here. And I agree that we shouldn't limit it by the amount of, uh, Um, stores these places have, but more a conditional use process that sees how they fit in with the city. |
| 03:09:35.08 | Walfred Solorzano | THANK YOU. |
| 03:09:35.27 | Paul Geffner | you. |
| 03:09:36.38 | Walfred Solorzano | City Clerk. |
| 03:09:38.47 | Walfred Solorzano | We have the bet McDougal. |
| 03:09:43.60 | Babette McDougall | Thank you. So this formula retail thing... Just like the last, you know, end run Really, going in the defiance of your constituent will is really not a good thing for you all to do. But as you've pointed out rightly, people can exercise their opinion with their vote. So here we are. Listen, what I'm hearing from you guys right now is that there is no authority invested in a resident to say, hold the phone. And we already have watched this year alone, right in your council chambers, neighbors fighting over one parking spot. Because one guy just doesn't want to use two spots in his garage. So, I mean, really, we already know we're at the limits of capacity here. We already know that we're overbuilt. And every time you bring in a formula retail, yes, they can be very sexy, but it creates impacts. And I don't see the presentation from the city dealing with traffic impacts. I don't see any question about how do we assume this legacy status once a formerly retail, always a formula retail, bypass future consideration. Hey, that could be horrible. I mean, you're inviting, you don't know what you're inviting with this. This is out of your league, probably. I don't know what to think about this. But I just can't believe the short-sightedness. Yes, there are empty storefronts. There used to be a community in Sausalito that thrived. We used to have our own pharmacy downtown. But you know, times change. So does that mean we just grab every, you know, Lululemon and Harry because we want to fill an empty storefront? No, you need to be thoughtful about what works for the community, which is why investing in authority opinion among the residents who will be most directly impacted matters. Thank you very much. Thank you. |
| 03:11:29.46 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:11:30.42 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Karen Culligan. |
| 03:11:31.97 | Kieran Culligan | Thank you. Hi there, Kieran Culligan, Saw Sue to Resident. I also do not want a McDonald's, an Arby's, a Blockbuster, Circuit City, or whatever interesting boogeymen we're worried about. But honestly, the biggest risk of entry for these things is keeping what we have today because of the legal opening that exists. We're torturing businesses and ourselves. Phil's couldn't even put names on their cups because of the conditions that were put on Equator had to change their name. Lapperts was listed in the presentation. I didn't realize this one until tonight. If they didn't already exist in Sausalito and wanted to move in, they would have to jump through all sorts of hoops to maybe eventually, with a bunch of restrictions, open an ice cream shop. We don't even know about all the people that have never even considered Sausalito because of what we've put in place. Councilmember Blaustein mentioned Palo Alto. I just looked it up on Google Maps, and the first thing that popped up for me was Serena and Lily. a cherished local company based here, Hey, 17 locations. They would equally have to jump through a TBD number of hoops if they wanted to open something in town. What we have today is broken. The suggestions are improvements that create new opportunity that still prevent the downside that people are worried about. So I look forward to having something better in place. Thanks. Thank you. |
| 03:12:54.76 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Lauret. |
| 03:12:56.42 | Kieran Culligan | Rodgers? |
| 03:12:56.97 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:12:56.99 | Kieran Culligan | Thank you. |
| 03:12:59.93 | Lauret Rogers | Hi, Lorette Rogers. Please don't eliminate residential input from the formula retail permit process. And, um, Please spread the formula retail throughout the city and the CC and the CR. We live in the CN, the Spring Valley area of Sausalito and have lived here continuously for 100 years. Our family helped build the Golden Gate Bridge and Bridgeway and other roads, Sausalito sewer plant, the stairs through town, as well as homes. So we've been part of the building of Sausalito for a century, part of decisions and developments. Shouldn't we have a say in what formula retail businesses will now be located near our homes? Have you ever been awakened by beep? We have a delivery truck coming early in the morning. And guess what? It really could be worth it. We love Sausalito businesses every week. We eat in town, we buy in town. We're glad they're here and understand they're a trade-off. More convenience, new community members, tax revenue, great. But, you know, it can also in the wrong place have unwanted traffic congestion, garbage and parking problems. So all we're asking is, can't we have a say? Can we please be at the table and ensure that each neighborhood retains its character and has great new businesses that fit? Thank you. |
| 03:14:27.37 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Sandra Bushmaker. |
| 03:14:30.95 | Sandra Bushmaker | Hello again. A couple of things I wanted to talk about. I remember when the retail ordinance or formula retail ordinance passed, there was a lot of passion in town about not having the town turn into something it isn't historically and isn't about. the small-town maritime character that we've all grown to love here in town. So what I'm hearing is that there is a way to do a CUP process. in other communities, we might want to look at that to allow the community to have some input. And that was the thing that the original ordinance, when it passed, Um, raise the most hackles is that the citizens did not have a say, so they made their voice known in that way. What I'm hearing is that we could develop our own unique CUP process that doesn't violate Malibu decision or violate any other decisions that would allow the public to have input on whether or not to approve a specific formula retail application in their area. I cannot remember whether the marine ship contains CW areas, zoning areas or not. But if it does, I have grave concerns that putting formula retail in the marineship is going to really impact the working waterfront and the ability to carry on business in that area. But basically, I think the important thing is and you've heard this from more than me tonight, is that the citizens of Sausalito have a right and have a desire to have input into formula retail presentations in Sausalito. Thank you. |
| 03:16:20.74 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Bonnie McGregor. |
| 03:16:29.78 | Bonnie McGregor | I guess I was muted. Hi, good evening again. I'm going to just pretty much read the letter that I wrote because I think more people would might be interested in it. As a longtime resident, I urge you to vote in favor of updating the current formula retail rules. The current regulations are excessively restrictive, stifling the potential for diverse and vibrant businesses in our downtown area. By allowing smaller chains, specifically those under 50, locations can significantly enhance our downtown business environment by attracting a wider range of interesting retailers attracted to attracted to residents and visitors alike. A glance at a recent commercial history illustrates an example of sidestepping those regulations when Starbucks was established on Princess Street. It closed. In my opinion, that was due to their planning and product. Prior to this, the city turned down Pete's coffee, and I believe Pete's would still be here. And Pete has far fewer units than Starbucks does like it or not. Also, the visitor volume is affected by a visitor volume in San Francisco. And as we know, that's been down since 2020. We're all still the whole world is trying to recover from the pandemic. So that's another reason we've got so many empty stores. And who wants to risk starting something and especially turn around and see a lot of empty stores? Times and shopping trends have um, change since the current regulations were established. So, leader needs to be amenable to these changes to remain viable. Revising the current, Regulations by more target approach, such as defining a formula retail as a business of 50 or fewer locations will change will offer stronger legal standing while protecting South Dakota's unique character. Adopting these changes will demonstrate a commitment to revitalizing our downtown area and fostering a more dynamic and prosperous community. It's time to take the safe of ashes and modernize our formula retail rules to reflect today's needs and aspirations of Saucelia Red. |
| 03:18:33.12 | Walfred Solorzano | Next speaker is Judy Weder. |
| 03:18:38.44 | Judy Weder | Thank you again. I'm concerned that is written, as other people have mentioned that the ordinance COB, Elaine McLaughlin, And dates right now administrative approval by staff and approval by the planning Commission and removes any ability for the community to weigh in on the top businesses in any of our commercial neighborhoods, especially input from those who live in. or near the commercial neighborhoods along Bridgeway. Retail is still down everywhere. not just here. And this is the time to get it right. Thank you. |
| 03:19:14.69 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Next speaker is Jacqueline Armikas. Right. |
| 03:19:23.33 | Charles Melton | Hi, I'm unmuted. Can you hear me? |
| 03:19:26.99 | Unknown | We hear you. |
| 03:19:28.24 | Charles Melton | Okay. Thank you. Um, City Council. Mayor Cox. Um, So I'd like to comment on revising the formula retail. Um, I believe at this time we should not update the formula retail. As a resident and business owner in Sausalito for close to 25 years. I ask that you do not rise a revised this formula at this time. The surrounding business owners, property owners, and residents must have input into how many chain stores should be approved near their businesses, homes, and commercial buildings. Using a number like fewer than 50 locations to be used in updating the formula or changing the current ordinance, which allows six locations is clearly arbitrary and supporting the premise that this change will bring about a new renaissance. and approval of a local economy at the same time filling empty storefronts, Where are the studies that prove this premise? There have been chain stores in the past, for example, Serena and Lily just closed. Starbucks was a failure. And there was recently a store that closed on Bridgeway near Barrel House, a women's clothing store, which lasted a year. That was a chain. Um, So where are the studies to prove this premise? I'm not sure. Now, I believe that Over the last 30 years, I've seen retail businesses And restaurants fail repeatedly in the same locations on Caledonia as well as Bridgeway. and Let's see. find out exactly why there are business failures and empty storefronts. in these areas, I believe resolving this formula does not address this issue. Thank you. |
| 03:21:23.73 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Joel Carr. |
| 03:21:29.30 | Joel Carr | Yes, hello. Thank you for taking my comments. Um, I have some friends who call Sausalito the town of t-shirts, candles and fudge. The reason they say that is that The kinds of stores that can locate here are the ones that have maybe a couple of outlets on Union Street, a couple of outlets at the Fisherman's Wharf, and they want to open here, and they're already at their limit. Six locations is unbelievably onerous, and I think that if we raise the number outlets that these stores are allowed to have It could be any number 30, 40, 50, whatever it is. I think that there's a lot of evidence that anything under 50, of course, we don't want McDonald's or any of the huge national retailers. But I think there's lots of evidence that there are great, great stores that would really fit with the character of our town. And I would like to see the number revised. Thank you. |
| 03:22:48.71 | Walfred Solorzano | No further public speakers. Thank you. |
| 03:22:50.23 | Walfred Solorzano | David Lay. |
| 03:22:56.61 | David Lay | Thank you very much. I lived in Vermont for about 12 years around 1970, and it was a four-season tourist trap, and everybody loved it. And every place you went, it was a one. I'll have to use some places here because you know them. Places like Phyllis's, you don't get a hamburger like that anywhere else. It's a bomb. Um, The only multiple place formula was the liquor store. State liquor store was the only way he could buy booze. But everything else was the one and everybody loved it. Combs Sugar House, we sell combs here, right? But that's a one. It comes out of the trees right there. I used to live half a mile away. Um, Everybody, and we had four ski areas right there. And they were all just the one and they were all different. people like that. And even the locals did, me. Sphinx. |
| 03:23:56.78 | Steven Woodside | Thanks. With that, I'm going to close public comment, bring it up here for discussion, and I'm going to lead off with a motion, but let me make a couple of comments to explain my motion. So, you know, again, as with all difficult issues, we run the risk of analysis paralysis. This has been an issue in Sausalito for as long as I can remember. We considered putting a pizza where we now have a pizza place. And we said no because it was formula retail. We considered putting Subway in the 7-Eleven shopping center. And we said no because it would be an overconcentration of formula retail. So this is something that the city has struggled with for a long time. I want to clarify in response to one of the public comments that the ordinance that is before us for second reading this evening already takes the review of a potential formula retail establishment away from the city staff and puts it in front of the planning commission. So the public would have opportunity for feedback. However, It does not include a CUP process, and that is because under the Malibu case, a CUP is only appropriate for land use decisions. And so the reason San Francisco is able to get away with a CUP is that once a formula retail establishment is approved on a site, that use then runs with the land. And the risk with that is if you adopt a formula retail for a six-establishment coffee shop, That formula retail now runs with the land, which means a Starbucks could easily come in with no further public feedback whatsoever. because it runs with the land. So although you have initial Feedback pursuant to the CUP process, you're abdicating all future feedback. If you bring in a mom and pop hamburger shop that can later turn into a McDonald's and you have nothing to say about it, because it runs with the land. And so that's the challenge of attempting to continue to use a CUP process. Our old model of brick and mortar storefronts is no longer feasible for many mom and pop shops. They have been replaced with the convenience of Amazon and Walmart and Target and all kinds of similar mail order services. And so we cannot stay entrenched in the past. We have to do something to try to continue to revitalize our commercial areas. And so Thank you. I'm going to make the following proposal with respect to the alternatives identified by city staff and city staff. Thank you for revisiting this issue in response to public comment to enable us to, um, you know, attempt to address some of the concerns that were raised. I, we cannot, if we adopt, so I'm about to make a motion. If we, if, And I didn't see a clock. I'm sorry. I didn't see a clock, so I wasn't watching it. So maybe we can see a clock in the future so we can be aware of our time. Okay. If you'll indulge me for a motion, fellow council members. Okay. I... um, Recommend we disallow additional formula retail in the CC zoning district. We can't take action on this tonight. Because it has to the planning commission if we change so I'm making a motion to give. Direction to staff. that we disallow additional formula retail in the CC zoning district that we redefine formula retail by setting a higher bar. From six to 50 and I chose 50 because blue bottle, for example, has 47 and there are a number of other somewhat local establishments that i'm sure other Council members could expand upon that are under 50. That we. allow formula we allow up to three formula retail in the CR zoning district that's next to Yoshi's um shop so that perhaps at the old theater building, we could have a formula retail. And the reason for this is that Formula retail up to 50 units. have the wherewithal to go through our still somewhat challenging commercial planning process and to withstand fluctuations in tourism. tourism and other challenges. And finally, that we ban all formula retail over 50 that for a step for businesses that have over 50 establishments throughout town, with the exception of one site, that site TBD by a working group of the city council comprised of Ian Sobieski and Jill Hoffman. And the reason for that is to avoid getting sideways with the dormant commerce clause. That is my motion. |
| 03:29:18.05 | Melissa Blaustein | I'll second it. |
| 03:29:21.21 | Steven Woodside | And it's now open for discussion. |
| 03:29:23.69 | Ian Sobieski | So, Mayor, bravo on that summary, and happy to work with my colleague, Jill, on that. This is going back to the Planning Commission, so just a process question. They would, of course, opine on their own about whether they like this and make suggestions, and the public would be part of this discussion. When this comes back for a first reading at some future date, there's more discussion. We can change some of the numbers you just suggested, right? Okay, so you're nodding. Absolutely correct. |
| 03:29:51.72 | Steven Woodside | Absolutely correct, and I embrace that additional process. We're not in a hurry, but it is an important process |
| 03:29:59.02 | Ian Sobieski | we undertake. So you're just setting a marker with this direction? Correct. And it's going to be, because I point out a couple of things for everyone's knowledge. We talked about 50. I've been saying 50. and I use this blue bottle example also because there are 46 locations, but those 46 locations are in California. Nationwide, there are 99 blue bottles. So I'd actually say the number should be 50 California locations. Thank you. |
| 03:30:19.81 | Steven Woodside | I accept that friendly amendment. |
| 03:30:19.98 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. Okay. |
| 03:30:22.11 | Steven Woodside | And- |
| 03:30:22.48 | Ian Sobieski | I WANT TO MAKE A LOOK AT THE |
| 03:30:22.61 | Steven Woodside | I second the amendment. |
| 03:30:23.68 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 03:30:24.07 | Melissa Blaustein | No problem. I agree. |
| 03:30:24.98 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. And then I consider our neighbor Ms. Bushmaker's comment about the marine ship. I can't help but note that West Marine used to be in the marine ship. There are 250 West Marine locations. So I don't know how to get them in because you don't want to have a blanket. But I would love a little direction to staff to think about that question. How could we get a few things like West Marine, is it possible? If it's not, then it's not. But if it is, I'd love some ideas on that from the Planning Commission or others. |
| 03:30:54.71 | Steven Woodside | So my motion allows at least one over 50. |
| 03:30:57.83 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 03:30:57.92 | Steven Woodside | you And that's up to you and Councilmember Hoffman to discuss that. |
| 03:31:01.63 | Ian Sobieski | So Sam. I support. |
| 03:31:03.27 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:31:03.42 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 03:31:04.13 | Steven Woodside | Any other comments? |
| 03:31:05.85 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah, I really appreciate all of the thought that went into this, especially researching deeply what types of business we want to have in our community, because I think the problem that we've come up against time and again is encouraging. new businesses to open. We hear frequently about the 17 storefronts in our downtown, and I really feel like Changing the definition will change the direction of that trend, and I'm really excited about it. One thing that I'd like to propose, though, just given concern about all of the existing mom-and-pop businesses that we do have, and I don't know if this is a future agenda item or direction to staff, but it would be nice if we could consider legacy business protections. I know the City of San Francisco has a legacy business legislation, And I would like to have us take a look at perhaps some sort of legacy business program for those small businesses that would be competing with, because the rent that those larger businesses will be able to pay is going to be much more competitive. |
| 03:32:00.24 | Steven Woodside | So I believe that's already built into our ordinance is the protection of businesses that of formula retail that we already have in place. And I'm seeing the community development. That's correct. |
| 03:32:11.46 | Unknown | Yes, that's correct, Mary. |
| 03:32:12.59 | Melissa Blaustein | Talking about formula retail, though, I'm talking about if you consider, for example, a company in Healdsburg, Fairety opened, and I imagine they're paying 10x the rent that the neighboring mom and pop shop next door is. And I don't want to see our mom and pop shops get priced out potentially by new businesses coming in. So legacy business legislation would allow us to create some protections for those older businesses that have been in town a long time. For example, for a while, Smitty's was for sale. We would never want to see our little hardware store leave Water Street. So just if we could add that on perhaps as a future agenda item, but I would like us to take a deep dive on legacy business protections in addition to the protections of existing formula retail. |
| 03:32:51.33 | Ian Sobieski | I would love to second that thought. The notion I think that the council members speaking to is there are a bunch of other tools like fee waivers, help with employee parking, any kind of ways the city could bend over backwards to support incumbent businesses in town that might be struggling or that, you know, just seniority has its benefits. They've been here a long time. We should support our local businesses that are here with any kind of extra service that we're allowed to under the law. So I think the council members... |
| 03:32:51.91 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 03:33:19.31 | Ian Sobieski | asking for direction to study some of those and come back with recommendations. |
| 03:33:22.40 | Steven Woodside | So I'm adding this to our future agenda items list. |
| 03:33:24.56 | Melissa Blaustein | Could it be part of the motion or is it just going to be future agenda items? Is there any way to consider protections or direction to staff at least? I know. |
| 03:33:34.65 | Jill Hoffman | I think that would be, those would be two separate things, because it would be in ways contrasting with, contrasting with the effort to bring in a larger operator. Because if you bring in a larger operator, for all the reasons that people just talked about, they have more resources by definition. |
| 03:33:57.01 | Steven Woodside | Because it's not confined to formula retail, it's a different ordinance, I believe. But I am adding it to future agenda items list. Other comments? |
| 03:34:07.56 | Melissa Blaustein | I'm going to support the motion, obviously, but I just want to thank you, Mayor, for explaining the law. It's complicated, but you explained it well. Ironically, the conditional use permit process opens discretion, but because the approval runs with the land, it ultimately opens the door much wider to big formula businesses that would be an unintended consequence and that's one reason why i'm supporting the motion i thank the city attorney for being clear you've read the case carefully and i and i rely on your advice and then with respect to the the fundamentals i really like the idea of both raising the number so that we are not so confined. And so there's a little bit of an expansion there at the same time, it appears we're going to substantially reduce the number of places where the big box or the big formula retail could possibly locate and I think that's a great compromise view I hope the planning Commission sees it the same way or very similarly and we can move on this as quickly as possible, thank you. |
| 03:35:16.92 | Steven Woodside | Council Member Hoffman. |
| 03:35:17.64 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. I, given, you know, my review of the case and the fact that San Francisco, Healdsburg, Sebastopol, other towns have the CEP process and the proximity of the commercial districts to housing, I mean, like right across the street or literally right next door, you know, I'm not giving up on the CEP process or community input yet. And my direction would be, Thank you. you know, further review through this process, if we're looking at this, to figure out how we can have community input and community direction on how we can, We can drive what we want, how we can cultivate businesses to come in, right? And not stop them, but also right now it's a race to the permit window, right? Because if we've only got, I'm looking at the list, right? So we've got in the CN1 district, we've got three proposed. We've got one existing. There's only two. so the first two people to the window that's it you're done so you're at capacity so it doesn't matter if you want serena lily if you you've got these grandiose ideas about who you want to come in it doesn't matter you've got a whoever gets there first that's it they're there and now you're at capacity and you're not going to be able to have any more in there. So you have to have community input and the people that live there are the people that know and have lived there and understand what the impacts are going to be. So Thank you. I, you know, I fundamentally disagree that we as citizens and residents and actually business people who live and operate in those districts, as Yoshi pointed out, you ought to be able to understand and know who's going to be operating next door to you. and you ought to be able to have input on who's going to be operating, you know, who's going to be your neighbor business and how they're going to affect your own business. And they should be complimentary and not competing with you to affect your own business. And they should be complimentary and not competing with you or taking business from you or negatively impacting your business. And there should be a way for you to weigh in on that. in a way that can be complimentary. We've got to be able to figure that out. And it may not be, and I agree, you know, the CUP, it is a risk, and maybe there is some other way that we can do this. And there's got to be, and some other town has got to probably crack this nut. You know, the two, it's funny, the two examples that you gave, right? Okay, so we didn't get a Pete's. We have a Pete's, actually. It's down at Molly Stone's, interestingly. But, you know, we didn't get a Pete's, but we had a pretty great barbache. That's pretty awesome. So that kind of worked out okay. We didn't get a Subway, a 7-Eleven, but we have sandwiches inside Subway. And the impacts, frankly, that would have come from Subway at that location probably would have been problematic. So anyway, that's my thoughts. |
| 03:38:22.59 | Steven Woodside | Thanks. I'm going to go ahead and call the question. City Clerk. |
| 03:38:26.74 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Council member Blasin. Yes. Council member Hoffman. Yes. Council member Sobieski. Yes. Vice mayor Woodside. Yes. Mayor Cox. |
| 03:38:32.51 | Steven Woodside | Yes. Yes. |
| 03:38:38.30 | Steven Woodside | Yes, I am so happy to have a 5-0 on that. It really concerned me when we were split the last time we decided this. So thank you, everyone, for your feedback and your indulgence as we revisited this important item. |
| 03:38:52.22 | Brandon Phipps | Mayor, apologies. |
| 03:38:53.05 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, I'm going to call a five-minute, just go ahead, city manager. |
| 03:38:55.18 | Brandon Phipps | No. |
| 03:38:57.07 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Oh, I thought you somebody started to say something on. Oh, Brandon. |
| 03:39:00.66 | Brandon Phipps | I'm hoping that you will indulge me just one moment more. I was hoping that you would restate the motion before you voted on it, because I believe that I had a clarification question in connection with the initial motion. |
| 03:39:13.05 | Steven Woodside | I'll restate it, but you're killing me. |
| 03:39:14.38 | Brandon Phipps | you're killing. |
| 03:39:16.10 | Steven Woodside | Okay, we're going to disallow additional formula retail in the Central Commercial Zoning District, other than already existing. We're going to redefine formula retail by setting a higher bar uh, changing the number of locations that qualify as a business for formula retail from six to 50. In California. allow formula retail in this up to three formula retail in the CR zoning district that makes up for the diminution of the CC district and addresses the concerns raised by Yoshitomi ban all formula retail over 50 units. throughout town with the exception of one site TBD by a working group comprised of council members Sobieski and Hoffman. |
| 03:40:09.58 | Brandon Phipps | Very good. So I think that my clarification is still there based on the recent motion. You directed staff to amend the formula retail section to allow three formula retail in the CR. But then you followed that by saying ban formula retail everywhere in the city. I think what I and my clarification is. |
| 03:40:27.11 | Steven Woodside | No. over 50 units. |
| 03:40:30.67 | Brandon Phipps | So my clarification is all we're doing is changing the definition of formula retail. Yeah. The CR will be able to avail themselves of that in all cases. So we won't need to take action to do that. Thank you for the clarification. All right. |
| 03:40:35.11 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. |
| 03:40:42.00 | Jill Hoffman | All right. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Mayor. I've got to change my vote to no. I misunderstood. I thought that I thought that I'm sorry, I misunderstood. I thought that we were saying that we were allowing formula retail in the CC. So I'm sorry. |
| 03:40:56.88 | Steven Woodside | are. |
| 03:40:57.88 | Jill Hoffman | It's three. We're keeping the three. We're keeping three, but yeah. In the CC? In the CC. We're still having the CC? Yes. Okay. Okay. All right. Then I'm... So we're still... |
| 03:41:04.42 | Steven Woodside | Yes. So we're still 5-0. |
| 03:41:07.02 | Brandon Phipps | But I'll clarify that by saying when we change the definition of formula retail, what counts as formula retail also changes. |
| 03:41:07.33 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 03:41:07.34 | Steven Woodside | I'm not sure. |
| 03:41:07.51 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:41:13.10 | Steven Woodside | That's right. So there may be additional allowed in the CC. Yeah. Yeah. |
| 03:41:20.60 | Brandon Phipps | But if our definition of formula retail is 50, technically any business under 50 would not be considered formula retail. |
| 03:41:23.42 | Steven Woodside | BUSINESS. That's right. |
| 03:41:27.68 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:41:27.69 | Steven Woodside | Okay. |
| 03:41:27.90 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:41:27.93 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:41:27.96 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:41:29.16 | Steven Woodside | We're going to take a five minute break for personal convenience. Thank you, everybody. |
| 03:41:40.16 | Steven Woodside | I'm And we are going to undertake a second review of the draft fiscal year 2025-2026 capital improvement program. I WANT TO TALK ABOUT THE I think I'm inviting our Public Works Director Kevin McGowan, although I know that we have other staff members here to support him. |
| 03:42:01.59 | Chris Zapata | Mayor, it's going to be the city manager to start. Okay. Thank you very much, and thank you for your time and patience this evening. Thank members of the public that are still with us. Mr. McGowan will help me. And Mr. Nava is here as well tonight |
| 03:42:16.60 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, I'm not hearing your microphone, City Manager. And I also want to thank... |
| 03:42:19.21 | Chris Zapata | on the on the phone. |
| 03:42:20.11 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 03:42:20.58 | Steven Woodside | Chief Barnes and chief Tubbs for being here to help us as we consider the future of the Spencer firehouse |
| 03:42:30.40 | Chris Zapata | Better? |
| 03:42:31.80 | Steven Woodside | Yes, better. Thank you. |
| 03:42:33.50 | Chris Zapata | . |
| 03:42:33.56 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:42:33.62 | Chris Zapata | you know, |
| 03:42:33.67 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:42:33.86 | Chris Zapata | All right. Well, thank you again, Mayor and Council members of the public who are with us now. Mr. McGowan is here to provide information, as is Mr. Nava, who have worked very hard on this item. But I will lead it off. This is a very, very, very important council priority that we're talking about. As you recall, last month we brought forward a six-year capital improvement plan, which was the whole kid and caboodle. Tonight we're talking about two years of the six-year capital improvement plan. And so I want to make the case real clearly. What is infrastructure in the city? It is investment. It's investment in our streets. It's investment in our American with Disabilities Act compliance, in our buildings, in our parking lots, in our storm drains, in our sidewalks, our stairs, and resiliency. Next slide, please. Why would you make investment in infrastructure because of community needs, resident safety, resident property values, business support, resiliency goals, livability and recreation? Next slide, please. |
| 03:43:44.41 | Chris Zapata | So before 2021, the city of Sausalito did quite a bit with the infrastructure beginning with the new police station and a new fire station built around 2010. followed up by investments in parks in 2015, followed up by the creation and passage of Measure O, which is money for infrastructure. So fast forward to 2021, my first year on the job here, and it was important that we understand the scale of need. We provided information to the community, the council that suggested if you... completed all of the needs in the city, you were well over $100 million in need. So the first thing the council did was secure the extension of Measure O by extending and expanding Measure L, which creates about $3 million a year now for infrastructure investment. The second thing that the council did after that was to make sure that there were adequate reserves in our general fund so that if there was an emergency that there would in fact not be zero in our bank account the city council adopted a policy of 25 percent formally so on a 20 million dollar general fund that means for any emergency economic contingency budget problem there's five million dollars set aside there for that particular purpose. Again, to help with infrastructure, you approved as a city council two new project manager positions, which are important in order to get the work done. And then you directed us to do a number of studies that involve looking at facilities, looking at our landslide task force recommendations, and others, which I'll get to later. And tonight, we are making a budget request and staffing request to carry out and meet council and community priorities. Next slide, please. So before you say yes to what staff is recommending, I think it's really important to understand your finances. And the one thing that I want to be very, very clear about is Sausalito has one-time money an amount of about $20 million as we speak for infrastructure investment. At the end of next year, 25-26, it'll be closer to $25 million. So that's important for you all to know. The money comes from reoccurring sources such as gas tax, county funds, business enterprise funds, parking funds, property lease funds, titling funds. In addition, there is a semi-reoccurring pot of money, which is Measure L, which has a 10-year lifespan. We're two years into it. And again, that generates about $2.8 to $3 million per year. So the estimated funds available, again, are about $20 million today. That includes unassigned fund balance. It does not include the $5 million you've set aside for emergencies. It does not include the $6 million you have set aside for pensions and post-employment benefits. So, again, you have a significant amount of money to do a project and program year. What we're looking for in the budget that we're bringing forward in two weeks is that there be a set-aside of money to complete this year's capital improvement program, which is about ten million dollars and then to meet the new priorities of the City Council of another six million dollars so the total amount that you'd be looking to authorize when we bring forward a budget in two weeks in a draft form and finally adopted in final form on June the 17th is about 16 million dollars. Next slide please. So the question I would ask as well is, you've got money, so have you done your due diligence? And the council has directed various steps so that that, in fact, happens. We have a pavement management assessment that gets done. We did a facility study. There's been a hillside study. There's an ongoing storm drain study. And we're involved in the Climate Tech Resiliency and Sustainability Study and Program. Next slide, please. So if you have money and you've done your due diligence and you have policy direction for a capital improvement program this year and next year, you need staffing. And so what we see is a very aggressive catch-up program that has been augmented by two new project managers but needs additional staffing resources to actually complete a program that is as aggressive as we are proposing in the next two years. And so what we are saying is, in addition to the money you set aside for the capital improvement projects themselves, there needs to be a separate set aside of about $400,000 that can be placed into that fund so that we can hire contract project managers, not one, but two. And those would be limited duration positions based on, you know, how we progress in the plan and the completion of projects. But that's essential. It's akin to a python eating a rhinoceros. You know, we can't swallow all those projects without the capacity of staff. So thank you for indulging me on that request. Next slide, Maria. So again, we would take tonight's comments, and if you agree that this is what you want to do, we would integrate that into our next budget. I'm missing a slide. I went too far. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Next one. Yeah. It's my fault. I jumped on my paper. Yeah. Stay there. Right there is where I need you to be. We'd integrate it into the 25-26 budget. We're not asking you to tell us how much to spend and what specific project to schedule and et cetera. We would come back with fine tuning of those specific projects that Kevin's gonna talk about. Some of them may be upsized, some of them may be downsized. Some of them may be delayed, some of them may be advanced. But the idea of taking and putting aside $15 million for capital improvements is what we're looking for. And then obviously, since there are more needs than money, there needs to be more discussion about how we improve our funding resources to actually continue to make a dent in the community infrastructure needs. And this includes certain things that we've surfaced with the city council at the finance committee level, such as a private placement. There have been conversations about setting up community facilities districts. So there's partnerships with the city and people that benefit. And those are the next steps. But tonight we want to talk about this coming year and the funding we need, the staffing we need. And Kevin's going to cover that in a little more detail than I. Thank you. |
| 03:50:44.79 | Kevin McGowan | All right, next slide, please. |
| 03:50:45.99 | Steven Woodside | I'm gonna actually beg your indulgence to ask a couple of questions before we move on to the next section. So city manager, you mentioned a number of, resources of this total one-time money that you've identified. Does that include the Tidelands Fund? |
| 03:51:08.75 | Chris Zapata | Yes, Mayor. It includes the Thailand's Fund, Measure L Funds, gas tax funds, county grant funds, MLK funds, parking revenues. It's the gamut of resources that you have. |
| 03:51:26.38 | Steven Woodside | And I would like to confirm as we move forward with allocating how monies are spent to confirm that we are confining our use of the Tidelands funds to water-related activities and public use of the shoreline as mandated by the, as trustees of the state's public transportation. |
| 03:51:52.03 | Chris Zapata | trust lands? Absolutely, Mayor. Matter of fact, the Vice Mayor asked that question today, and so we got the specifics on how to use Tidal Ends funds, and we've been, you know, aware, but we'll give you assurances that we will not, you know, use funds in a way that they're not legally allowed for, whether it's grant funds, whether it's Tidal Ends, whether it's sewer funds. The other funds are various variations of a general fund where you could use them on different things as you saw fit. But those restricted funds that are legally restricted, we understand what those are, and tidal ends is one of them. |
| 03:52:31.40 | Steven Woodside | And then this is probably a question for our next meeting as we start to consider the budget. But I wanted to confirm as a follow-on to our initial comments on the proposed CIP plan that we are... in allocating our money's on hand, we are undertaking a process to ensure that we have allocated adequate funds for projects already in process, and that moving forward, Thank you. And that moving forward, as the city council approves a project, we remove those monies from the general fund to ensure that they are allocated to the project for which they were approved. So that there's never a question that projects we have approved, the monies have been encumbered and won't inadvertently be spent on something else. |
| 03:53:39.55 | Chris Zapata | Thank you for that question and Mr. Nav. I will address it as it should be addressed. |
| 03:53:44.29 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:53:44.30 | Unknown | Thank you. The plan is to actually make an appropriation process. |
| 03:53:49.62 | Ian Sobieski | Can you give me the microphone? Yeah. |
| 03:53:49.70 | Unknown | Thank you. The plan is to actually make an appropriation from the source of funds into the CIP. Once those decisions have been made so that the new budget will literally move the monies from these funds into the CIP fund while they will reside until the project is completed. So that the council never has to worry about whether the project was fully funded or the levels of fund because those amounts will appear in the CIP moving into the future and will no longer appear in the source funds. |
| 03:54:19.07 | Steven Woodside | And I wouldn't dare try to micromanage the manner in which staff carries out its process, or maybe I would. But other cities that I advise, as soon as a project is approved, there is a sub project created within the CIP fund or within the general fund so that the monies within those funds are specifically earmarked for specific projects. Is that something you would consider as an additional safeguard to ensure that? you know, money set aside for Southview Park are spent on Southview Park. And if we exceed it, we go back to Measure L or the general fund, we don't spend other monies within the CIP. |
| 03:55:05.96 | Unknown | Yeah, so part of the process will be to do a reconciliation of project funding sources at the end of each year. If the project is short of money, then you would seek a reallocation or an additional appropriation to fully fund that project. If a project is completed and there are surplus funds, then the public works director would be able to assign those monies or recommend them for a future project or to supplement an additional project. But since the decision has been made to use it for capital improvements, those monies will remain in the CIP until the council decides to move them back out. |
| 03:55:42.36 | Steven Woodside | Thank you, and thank you for indulging my questions while they refresh in my mind. |
| 03:55:46.53 | Steven Woodside | And any other? Go ahead. |
| 03:55:48.23 | Melissa Blaustein | Just for the city manager, and this is sort of a big global question at this point. You mentioned in your presentation that when you get to the general fund, we will still have the 25% reserve. Are you confident that you're going to be able to put together a balanced budget on the operation side within the next couple weeks if we were to approve your recommendations here? |
| 03:56:13.72 | Chris Zapata | Absolutely, Vice Mayor. So we're working toward a draft budget that involves looking at our revenues and our expenses for the coming year, you know, with some variables, whether it's insurance or pensions or labor costs or utility costs, all that's being worked on right now. And I can say with confidence that that $7 million in unassigned funds, there is not going to be a need to balance the budget this year with that money. What we're asking is for you to take some of that $7 million and inject it into the capital improvement program so that, you know, maybe you cut it in half, but you have the $5 million plus potentially $4 million in unassigned general fund fund balance. So your practical retainage in your general fund is not 25%. It's closer to 50%. |
| 03:57:11.46 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay. And then just with respect to your recommendation, obviously, you're not recommending that we spend down to the last dime. You're holding some back. And I assume that if during the year something came up that we didn't anticipate now or that we needed to move additional money for some reason, that we could at that point make an appropriation or revisit it. In other words, we're not wedded to only these dollars if something were to come up that we could, at that point, make an appropriation or revisit it. In other words, we're not wedded to only these dollars if something were to come up that we either hadn't thought through or we wanted to add to the list during the year. |
| 03:57:46.39 | Chris Zapata | Yes, and you may want to consider a more aggressive street program, a more aggressive stair program. And if you wanted to add some of the unassigned fund balance in the general fund to that, you could. Or if you wanted to delay a project or move a project into another year and use that money, those are all council decisions that can be made by the council. And at the same time, at the midyear, you will have an opportunity to look at your budget to see where you're tracking, whether it's capital improvement-wise or other areas of the budget, and see where you really stand. But there is, as I said two years ago, it's really a question of how much you want to set aside to save for emergencies. You've done that. It's really documenting and making sure how much you have in unassigned fund balances for the general fund. And it's really sure about what are the amounts of money that are available in the specific, you know, what you call business enterprise funds like parking, like MLK, like Old City Hall, like Tidelands. Or Tidelands is actually a real restricted fund. So we are doing all that for you so you don't have to worry about it. If you wanted to do a more aggressive program, you could theoretically spend $25 million this year. I wouldn't advise that. I don't know that we have the work, the staff to do that. I don't know that you want to, you know, not keep some of your powder dry for emergencies or other projects you may want to see down the road. So we're only asking for 15 million of a potential $25 million available pot of money. |
| 03:59:19.85 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 03:59:24.23 | Steven Woodside | Welcome, Director McGowan. |
| 03:59:26.66 | Kevin McGowan | David Lundgren- Hello again good evening next slide please there we go. David Lundgren- I do have some short slides and it's late, so I apologize, but here we go, so the capital improvement program is a fluid document then with costs changing as individual projects are developed. The CIP is utilized to develop a list of possible improvements and estimates, which estimates the amount of funding needed to support those projects. The CIP also prioritizes the improvements with the intent of providing recommendations to the council for allocation of funding in conjunction with the annual budget. Sausalito's five year capital improvement program is updated annually and is included with the annual budget, as you all know. Next please. Nope, too far. There we go. On April 15th, staff presented the draft capital improvement program to the council. Council was thankful for staff's work, but had some questions related to the next year's CIP. Parking lot one reconstruction is included in the active projects and staff has solicited for designers to move forward with that project already. Staff has included projects related to the fire station number two and the bridgeway pedestrian crossings in the next fiscal year as well. In addition, based on the. Council's direction from the strategic planning session in January. Staff is recommending an additional allocation of $1 million for next year's paving project. Since April's council meeting, staff from Public Works and the Finance Department have worked together to examine the funding, the fund centers for the CIP to match up projects that can utilize specific funding sources such as the Tideland funds. You've mentioned that before. Also, staff utilized recent estimates from the Bridgeway Improvement Project from Napa to Johnson Street and determined that the cost for resurfacing Bridgeway from the southern city limits to Napa Street is approximately $6.7 million, compared to a micro-seal project, which is $5.1 million. This is noted in the staff report as well. Staff does not recommend a full resurfacing approach at this point in time on the fact that this will significantly impact other capital projects. Next slide. |
| 04:01:35.13 | Charles Melton | Thank you. |
| 04:02:14.91 | Kevin McGowan | Right. The city's finance department has been diligently examining city accounts to determine the amounts available for the capital improvement projects the next fiscal year. At this time staff estimates approximately 25 million is available for capital projects, which is shown on attachment six in your documentation next slide. |
| 04:02:40.57 | Kevin McGowan | The result of the strategic planning session in January 2025, the Council noted several priorities. Many of these priorities have been or are currently being addressed by staff. For example, the city has finished the facility assessment study and has included many of the prioritized projects from that study in the current CIP. Storm drain assessment is underway and staff recommends including an allocation of $450,000 in anticipation of utilizing these funds in the next fiscal year to address the deficiencies known in that study. Staff is working to complete the shoreline adaptation plan and are starting a sea level rise facility assessment as well. I'm not sure if I categorize that right, but Katie's not here, and so we'll go with that. The CIP includes an analysis and possibly repairs to the existing stairway systems, which... Which parallels Bridgeway from Napa Street. This is a old stairway system that has basically failed. Other stair systems in the city are shown in the CIP, but being addressed in future fiscal years. Other projects such as the geologic monitoring plan, sidewalk program, and further improvements associated with ADA transition plan are included in the CIP. Next slide. The city is currently working on more than 20 active projects. Some of these projects are moving to the construction phase and will require allocations of funding to complete. A total of $10.7 million is estimated to be needed to address these projects. important projects such as the bridge bridgeway improvement project from Napa to Johnson street are ready to bid or will be in the next week or so and we intend to get that out to bid as soon as possible with construction happening later in the summer next slide Staff initially recommended addressing nine new projects in the next fiscal year. Based on council's comments on April 15th, An additional nine projects have been added to the CIP itself. Staff estimates that an additional 5.6 million will be needed to support these projects. One of these projects, Coloma Street Pedestrian Improvement Project, has specific grant funding such that the allocation shown on this slide and in the CIP is less than the total amount of the project. I just wanted to mention it because we do have some grant funding for the project. Staff also recommends a one-time general fund allocation of $1 million to the 2025 resurfacing program. The 2025 resurfacing is intended to be designed in the next fiscal year with construction following the subsequent year after that. For resurfacing, we usually do that work in the fall where weather is better dependent for it. Next slide. The city has two full-time dedicated project managers. In addition, our engineering division, as well as myself, do step in to manage some projects on the capital program. Estimating work loading for our staff is very difficult to do since projects tend to change in complexity and they can also be impacted by other things such as weather and contractors availability. Nevertheless, project managers cannot address more than about seven projects at one point in time, and with the total number of projects for the next fiscal year being closer to 43 projects, additional project manager assistance will be needed in order to execute some of these projects. Staff did prepare a rough schedule for the projects and recommends seeking consultants, consultant firms to assist with addressing projects that are important to initiate in this summertime, such as the old city hall skylight project. I mentioned this one because we got to get it done this summer before it starts raining. As other projects are completed, our city staff can take over individual projects initiated by our consultants. So as we free up time, as we move forward, our two project managers can step in. Next slide. Funding for the more than 43 projects is available within the budget centers available. A total of $6.3 million is recommended to be committed for these projects. My staff will be making every effort to complete the work on the CIP. Changes and modifications should be anticipated since the details of these improvements are not completely known at this time. In addition, as noted in the staff report, staff continues to examine budget criteria such as MLK and the general fund to make sure that numbers conveyed to council with the next fiscal budget are relatively accurate. Next slide. A couple pictures of projects that we have, we'd like to initiate. I won't run through these because of the lateness of the hour, but you can tell we do have a lot on our plate at this point in time, and we'd like to move forward with them. Next slide. Thank you. Lastly, this is a very dynamic process. Our intent is to identify capital projects before they become emergencies. We have not presented the CIP to the Planning Commission yet, and that's one of our requirements. We're anticipating bringing that to the Planning Commission either next week or the week after. So it'll be basically the same presentation that you see here. And that concludes my presentation at this point in time, and I'm here for questions and comments. Thank you. |
| 04:09:03.42 | Steven Woodside | I had one quick question. You mentioned the skylight, or I forget what you called it, at Old City Hall, which is the Gene Hiller building building. In looking at attachment six, the restatement of our fund balances, it's showing that we have a fund balance in Old City Hall of 488553, but it's showing zero estimated revenue in fiscal year 2526. Can you address what, because they pay rent, and so I'm wondering why there's zero revenue for 2526. |
| 04:09:19.38 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 04:09:39.06 | Unknown | Basically, because we're still looking at that operating budget as well. So there are expenditures in there also. So we're wanting to make sure that we have a clear handle on what the expenditures will be before we put them into and then give you a fund balance for that amount. But there are expenditures as well. |
| 04:09:55.43 | Steven Woodside | Okay. Thank you. Um, |
| 04:09:57.47 | Unknown | And just to point anywhere where you see a blank, that's because we're still working on those revenue and expenditure numbers and trying to make sure we have a clear handle on them. |
| 04:10:06.17 | Steven Woodside | Okay, because the arts building, that's the SCA? |
| 04:10:06.77 | Unknown | Thank you. Yeah. |
| 04:10:09.08 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. And so we obviously get revenue from that as well. |
| 04:10:12.18 | Unknown | We do, but I believe it's currently maybe showing a negative. So again, we're looking at the revenues and the expenditures associated with that fund for next year. |
| 04:10:22.16 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay. |
| 04:10:22.97 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, if I could follow up on that question. What's the negative revenue from the SCA? |
| 04:10:28.57 | Unknown | I think it's just an over a balance that's been carried over from a prior year. |
| 04:10:33.40 | Jill Hoffman | I was asking what the negative revenue on the SCA, do you have that? |
| 04:10:37.83 | Unknown | on the S- |
| 04:10:37.85 | Jill Hoffman | The Center for the Arts. |
| 04:10:38.51 | Unknown | Thank you. Oh, I don't have that. I thought you were talking about the arts building. Yeah, that's the arts building. |
| 04:10:42.24 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, that's the Arts Building. We call it, we call it, we call it several different things, but there's, |
| 04:10:43.92 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 04:10:43.94 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 04:10:43.96 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 04:10:43.98 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:10:44.03 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. Yeah, let the city manager answer that question since he's been here a little bit longer. So last year, the city council entered to an agreement with SCA for a lease amount of $4,000 a month, Mayor? Six. $6,000 a month. Okay. And in addition, there's $2,000 a month that we get from the ATM. So there's $8,000 in revenue coming in, but we have debt service on that private placement of about, I thought it was 111,000. So we're running a shortfall of multiply eight by 12, it's 96. So we're running a shortfall of about 15, $20,000 in that operation council member. |
| 04:11:25.34 | Jill Hoffman | $20,000 annually or $15,000? |
| 04:11:28.17 | Chris Zapata | Correct. Yeah. And we'll fine tune those and get you the accurate numbers after we do the payment that we understand we have to make for the placement and then add up our ATM and lease revenues. And then that will Delta between those two will give you the difference multiplied by 12 months what we are short in a year in that particular building. |
| 04:11:50.36 | Jill Hoffman | And because I've asked for that, so when will we have that reconciliation? |
| 04:11:55.34 | Chris Zapata | We can do that in a week. That's easy. |
| 04:11:57.57 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks. And then also, and then the... the total of what we're spending on it with the CIP, and that's in the CIP, right? |
| 04:12:07.66 | Chris Zapata | this. Thank you. |
| 04:12:08.59 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. So I don't have any projects associated with the in the CIP associated with the arts building at this point. |
| 04:12:16.26 | Jill Hoffman | Oh, we don't? Oh, because the Veritas had |
| 04:12:19.66 | Steven Woodside | identified issues, but we're not going to address any of those in this CIP, according to |
| 04:12:25.02 | Kevin McGowan | Absolutely. |
| 04:12:25.28 | Steven Woodside | Proposal. |
| 04:12:25.95 | Kevin McGowan | Let me clarify that. I do have one project that has small maintenance items. Items that are less than $35,000 are all bunched into one project, and that may have some items at the arts building itself. But those projects that are greater than $35,000, I don't have a specific project on the CIP associated with the arts building. |
| 04:12:41.21 | Charles Melton | Thank you. |
| 04:12:41.22 | Jill Hoffman | OK. |
| 04:12:41.49 | Charles Melton | Thank you. |
| 04:12:48.97 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry for that tangent. |
| 04:12:52.21 | Steven Woodside | I'm going to continue. I had a couple of questions. So again, on attachment six, we list a construction impact fees. Are we not considering updating our impact fees? |
| 04:13:03.75 | Unknown | We have the council authorized impact fee study, and that is going to commence fairly soon, but it'll take some time before we come back with those final recommendations on impact fees. |
| 04:13:16.32 | Steven Woodside | But within this calendar year, we will update our impact fees. And so that may increase the projected revenue that you have for fiscal year 25, 26? |
| 04:13:29.22 | Unknown | I think this is a different type of impact fee is what we're considering under the study, which is impacts to new development or that new development would have to pay for under an impact fee study. |
| 04:13:43.25 | Steven Woodside | Okay, so what is construction impact fee? |
| 04:13:45.65 | Unknown | I'd have to actually look, but there is an actual definition for that fund. I don't know if you know that. |
| 04:13:53.74 | Sergio Rudin | I do believe that is the city's existing theme. It's the construction road impact fee, I believe. |
| 04:14:03.50 | Kevin McGowan | Yes, that's correct. We bring it to your council, usually in the fall each year. And so it would be the same thing. |
| 04:14:11.99 | Steven Woodside | Okay, so then, Sergio, what impact fees are we updating based on the study we're doing right now? |
| 04:14:19.05 | Chris Zapata | I can answer that question, Mary. Yeah. So we want to look at the gamut |
| 04:14:20.30 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. |
| 04:14:22.96 | Chris Zapata | fees and come back with a menu based on the analysis by will dan which is part two they started with the user fee analysis they'll come part two with impact fee analysis and you know we brought some preliminary information to you all a couple years ago where we suggested you know everything from library impact fees to park impact fees to street impact fees and augmenting existing impact fees would be brought back so the council could consider them so that new growth pays for its fair share. So that's in process. I'm not sure what the time frame on that is, but Will Dan has been contracted to do that work as they did the user fee analysis. |
| 04:14:25.49 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 04:14:25.59 | Steven Woodside | there's |
| 04:15:00.81 | Steven Woodside | So really the purpose of my question was to confirm that although we have estimated revenues contained in attachment six, there is some hope that some of these revenues may go up or there may be additional revenues. So that if we spend a significant amount of our unassigned fund balance, we have some confidence that those funds will be restored within our coffers. |
| 04:15:26.68 | Chris Zapata | Yes, if you get money in future years for from these impact fees, then that could really augment your capital improvement program to the point where, you know, maybe you pay back your unassigned use of general fund or you, you know, have a less reliance on the general fund for capital improvement projects. Thank you. |
| 04:15:49.30 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Sobieski. |
| 04:15:52.37 | Ian Sobieski | Hi, thanks. Let's see. Director, thank you. It's good to see you at the podium again. I actually had my question for Director McGowan, actually, sir. Sorry. How are you tonight, Kevin? So I'm the one that brought up the – there was a lot of people who brought it up, the notion of paving or treating Bridgeway from the south end of town in Napa Street. and you responded to that comment in your staff report with two estimates one for a slurry seal or micro seal south end of town in Napa street. Uh, and you responded to that comment, uh, in your staff report with, uh, two estimates, one, uh, for a slurry seal or micro seal at roughly $5 million and then a complete rebuild at six point something. And I was surprised that those two numbers were so close together, uh, because I thought the reconstruction was dramatically more expensive since it lasted for 20 years versus a slurry seal that lasts for three to five. Uh, so how did I get that wrong? Like what, is there something I'm missing? there. |
| 04:16:46.75 | Kevin McGowan | Are you asking me to make a comment on your assumption that they would be vastly different? |
| 04:16:52.66 | Ian Sobieski | Yeah, because I thought that they were, yeah, I misunderstood. I thought the reconstruction fundamentally was a lot more expensive, and it's not, it sounds like, than a slurry seal. |
| 04:17:01.96 | Kevin McGowan | Well, with some projects, you have to look at where they're being constructed. In this particular case, Bridgeway is the busiest road in town. A lot of the construction effort will be into traffic control and managing the traffic through that specific area. So the costs are relatively close because a lot of that goes to setting it up, making sure that you control traffic through town. When you take a look at the difference in the cost of between asphalt and micro seal. Yeah, there's not a huge amount of difference. But like I said before, the major cost there is the traffic control. |
| 04:17:43.74 | Ian Sobieski | So just help me out with one more just sanity test. When we were considering the thing we unanimously rejected, the grant for the bike lanes, I was under the impression that within that grant 500k we were going to get a slurry seal from the Golden Gate Market to Princess Street but was that wrong? We weren't that was wildly not the correct price because that's roughly |
| 04:18:11.11 | Kevin McGowan | No, that was based on a, you are correct. We were going to get a slurry seal across that road. from Golden Gate Market down to Princess. And that was based on 2021, 22 timeframe when I submitted for that grant. |
| 04:18:28.24 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, but that's 500K, it seems like the length, that's like a- |
| 04:18:31.19 | Kevin McGowan | It does seem a little |
| 04:18:31.97 | Ian Sobieski | THE END OF |
| 04:18:32.04 | Kevin McGowan | low. |
| 04:18:32.54 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 04:18:32.58 | Kevin McGowan | you Thank you. |
| 04:18:33.00 | Ian Sobieski | you |
| 04:18:33.07 | Kevin McGowan | That's true. |
| 04:18:33.57 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. Is there a way of just giving direction to explore some creative thinking on the pricing, maybe get some more estimates on ways it could be done? It sounds like there might be a variable cost there. So I don't know how, how did we get the pricing? Is it from your estimate? How did you come up with it? What was the process? On which one? |
| 04:18:55.04 | Kevin McGowan | $1.1 million slurry seal. As I mentioned in the staff report, I took a look at the latest estimate that we have for the work straight out in front of us that goes from Napa Street to Johnson Street. And I took a look at those costs and compared it to the square footage that's out here compared to the square footage that you requested going from the southern border all the way to Napa Street. |
| 04:19:19.78 | Ian Sobieski | Okay. And by the way, for that thing you just mentioned, that project, is that going to be a slurry seal or reconstruction? |
| 04:19:25.90 | Kevin McGowan | The original plan is to have a slurry sealed. However, based on council's request, we're including a bid alternative to resurface the road at the same time. So the council can choose, depending upon how much funding is available, which option you would like to pursue. |
| 04:19:43.82 | Ian Sobieski | And if we wanted to give, if there was consensus to give direction on doing that kind of treatment all the way south on Bridgeway for the 5.1 or $6 million, how much more money would you need? than is currently being asked for in the CIP to do that project. I don't quite understand the question. You recommended not doing that project because it would take away money from other capital projects. That was the staff's recommendation not to do the full bridgeway because it would take away money from other staff projects. So incrementally how much more money would you need in the road program to redo Bridgeway? |
| 04:20:21.47 | Kevin McGowan | So while we're diving into the amount of details on one project, I think that the latest estimate for out here from Napa to Johnson Street for resurfacing it with a two-inch mill and fill is $2.1 million. Now, the estimate that I came up with based on the same thing is $6.7 million for the entire reach that you requested. So if you subtract 2.1 from 6.7 and it is almost midnight, so I can't do math anymore, but it's in that ballpark. |
| 04:20:55.96 | Ian Sobieski | And then we'd have to allocate more money from some one of our funds to be able to |
| 04:21:01.36 | Kevin McGowan | Yeah, another four something million or so. |
| 04:21:04.00 | Ian Sobieski | Okay. City manager, you... I think you answered the vice mayor's question, but I wasn't sure I heard it. I want to make sure I heard it. I know we'll have a budget discussion next meeting, but your current best guess is that the operating budget going forward is going to be balanced or in surplus for next year? |
| 04:21:21.29 | Chris Zapata | So we are getting our numbers together, our estimates of revenues and expenses for 2526. And we're pretty close, depending on what, you know, the departments have presented in front of the city council. And they have a wish list that I call a wish list of items that, you know, could be a million dollars, and then we'd be a million dollars out of whack. But as it stands right now, if we said no to everything the departments asked for in this coming budget year, you'd be essentially balanced. Okay. |
| 04:21:58.32 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. And I have a question. I don't know who to direct this to. It's about the fire station, because that's in there, and I'm supportive of it. But I know that the whole presumption of the fire station redo, half of it is a document business, but the actual physical improvement relies on the fire department. And I see some firemen in the background, and I'm looking over your shoulder. And my question to them or to someone in the city is, can we get a lease agreement with the fire department before we spend the money? So we're sure that the money isn't wasted. And then I have a related question I'll ask after that. But can we actually negotiate the lease deal with you before we spend the money? |
| 04:22:16.41 | David Lay | Thank you. |
| 04:22:27.14 | Charles Melton | Yeah. |
| 04:22:35.09 | Unknown | Good evening, Madam Mayor and Council. And yes, we're open to partnering in any way, which makes the most sense. And working directly with the city manager and staff to develop a process and come to some sort of agreement. And I think we can do that. prior to any promising of any money. |
| 04:22:55.88 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, and then just a related question, because I don't know how it works between districts and different agencies. Would you be willing to consider possibly buying the fire stations from the city? So we don't have to pay for those improvements and we'd actually get turned that physical asset into cash on our balance sheet. |
| 04:23:11.03 | Steven Woodside | it. Are you considering the surplus lands act requirement that we make it available for affordable housing before we sell? |
| 04:23:18.31 | Ian Sobieski | I do, but I also know that we don't have to take the bids. If the bid from the fire department is higher, we can take the bid from the fire department. So is that something that you'd be willing to consider? |
| 04:23:27.32 | Unknown | Yeah, we would consider any option to reoccupy the station that works for both the city and the district. Thank you. |
| 04:23:34.05 | Ian Sobieski | Okay. |
| 04:23:34.25 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:23:34.35 | Ian Sobieski | Great. |
| 04:23:34.54 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:23:34.61 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. That's all I have for now. |
| 04:23:37.12 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Thank you. Yes, Councilmember Blaustein. Thank you. |
| 04:23:40.41 | Melissa Blaustein | Hi, Director McGowan. I know it's late. Thank you for being here. I wanted to just ask a couple of questions about the additional projects and then more generally about priority projects based on the direction that we've given. So the skylight on the downtown or sorry on the old city hall building that's not necessarily required immediately and needs to be in this in this cycle or does it in your perception. |
| 04:24:05.22 | Kevin McGowan | It does. It does. It needs to be done. Otherwise, we'll be, our tenant may be impacted by us not fixing that skylight. |
| 04:24:12.86 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay, what about the police vencing? Can you give more of an in-depth explanation of what that might be? Because that was a new decision. |
| 04:24:18.33 | Kevin McGowan | Police venting? |
| 04:24:19.36 | Melissa Blaustein | Fencing on the roof. Oh, fencing, yes. So the projects. |
| 04:24:20.03 | Kevin McGowan | Oh, fencing, yes. Our police department has requested that we put a fence around the top area of the building itself because they've had folks come on that section of the building from the roadway. They feel it is a safety issue that they need to make sure that they don't have entrance to their police station from above. |
| 04:24:39.88 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay, and I appreciate the additions of the Cloma street bridgeway the street street trees, but one of the things that we've talked about quite a bit here is just prioritizing disaster preparedness I think it's timely that we have our fire here safety folks here. But was there consideration or could there be direction or consideration for addressing and improving the roadways at exit routes and at the stairways and we have one stairway project in here, but I would really like to see. or understand why that may or may not have been prioritized or included. |
| 04:25:11.37 | Chris Zapata | Let me answer that question, Kevin. So the answer is yes, Council Member Blaustein. So we're asking for $2.9 million for street improvements. We normally get $1.9 million. An augmentation of $1 million is $2.9 million for street improvements. So when we come back with the pavement program, whether it's more money for Bridgeway or programs that we have or streets we have in our plan throughout the city, one of the things that was asked by the council is, do we make sure that whatever we do considers exit and disaster evacuation, and we will do that when we come back with the $2.9 million program. But tonight we're just saying we need to get your approval on a funding amount. But no, we don't have that detail yet, but we will. |
| 04:25:11.42 | Melissa Blaustein | THE END OF THE END OF THE THE FAMILY. |
| 04:26:01.64 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay, and then I noticed as well that in the staff report and packet, there were a few letters of correspondence that we received in 2023. with images from tourney street and while I appreciate the decision to include the tourney street correspondence, I know that there are a number of neighbors who have in the last, at least in my tenure on the council written letters regarding the quality of pavement or their complaints about their roads. Could you speak to why you decided to include those specific letters or that emphasis on tourney street? |
| 04:26:31.07 | Kevin McGowan | So we've had a couple different requests for different areas. It wasn't just Turney Street. I think it was, yeah, it was. That's right. It was Turney and Upper Intersection. And so in taking a look at that, obviously, we look at the PCI for the roadway itself, but we actually do a field view review. And it does look like those specific areas, the concrete itself, is displaced in such a way that it's not fixable. So the intent is to include that on the street resurfacing program, maybe not do the entire street, but to do just that section that really looks pretty bad. So that was the intent. |
| 04:27:03.96 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 04:27:08.55 | Melissa Blaustein | Do we receive any other correspondence that we're aware of from neighbors with similar concerns? And have we considered how we might address our way those with the same level of, I don't know, urgency? |
| 04:27:20.06 | Kevin McGowan | Yes. Other places such as Ariana Circle. Okay. It's on the street resurfacing list. We've got a couple others that are on the list as well. We've had some complaints about North Street, where North Street joins Josephine. |
| 04:27:22.62 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay. |
| 04:27:30.05 | Unknown | Mm-hmm. |
| 04:27:33.20 | Kevin McGowan | Another complaint on Josephine itself. So we're trying to include those in our street resurfacing project. Josephine and North Street are going to be bid alternatives for the design that's going through right now. And Ariana Circle is already on this list at this point. Thank you. |
| 04:27:51.78 | Chris Zapata | Council Member Blassey, if I can give you a little flavor on requests from residents. 87,000 emails I get, but I know I've seen four from Mrs. Umbertus Lyons about the work that she believes needs to be done to make that corner of Bridgeway safer. So that's definitely one of the things that I'm aware of, and I believe we're trying to address that in this capital improvement program, as far as specific requests for capital projects, I can sort through what I have and come back with you in terms of what residents have specifically asked me for, and Kevin can do the same. |
| 04:27:51.80 | Kevin McGowan | Okay. |
| 04:28:33.75 | Melissa Blaustein | Just think it would be helpful. I was I was happy to see the three letters, but I know that we've received a lot of correspondence from a lot of neighbors who have concerns about their respective streets. So if we could just be fair in what letters we choose to consider in the staff report going forward, it would be helpful. That's it. Thank you. I know it's late hour. I appreciate it. |
| 04:28:56.09 | Steven Woodside | I'm not seeing any raised hands. I'm going to ask about Dunphy Park phase two. So city manager, I thought there was perhaps consideration of deferring that as we complete our planning for that area of town. |
| 04:29:09.78 | Chris Zapata | Yes, Mayor and members of the Council, there's an asterisk on that particular item for that particular purpose. The City Council has been improving parks since 2015 with the COPs. Phase 1 of Dunphy is done. Phase 2 was scheduled, what, three years ago, Kevin? It's been worked on, trying to get approvals from the tribe, trying to figure out the cleanliness of the site. And so the project itself is ready, but given the conversations around that strategic area of town, whether you want to expand Dunphy or whether you want to integrate it into some other use that is much more comprehensive or broader, that's why I put an asterisk on it, because that could be one of the projects in that $16 million ask that gets pushed to $27.28 or $26.27. But I thought it would be important to have that conversation before we went out and said we want to build phase two even though I think the public's expecting that and waiting for that I think it may be a situation where you're building parks that create expense and if you have an opportunity to create something that involves housing or revenue you might want to consider integrating that into the ultimate design of that property and hold off on this 1.2 million dollar project that's been planned for the last three years. |
| 04:30:37.65 | Steven Woodside | So on slide 14 of the PowerPoint presentation, Dunphy Park is the second one listed, and it is designated as a project heading to construction. So I just wanted to be sure that we were timely giving direction so that we don't continue to head something towards construction that we might want to. Thank you. |
| 04:30:57.44 | Kevin McGowan | Yes, I think the city manager is correct. It's almost ready to go if you choose to. So whatever you'd like to do, we're ready for it. |
| 04:31:05.71 | Steven Woodside | So is tonight the time to give that feedback? All right. |
| 04:31:08.78 | Chris Zapata | I would appreciate it, you know, because we pulled it. I unilaterally pulled it off an agenda because I thought this conversation needed to be had before we went too far down the path of approving a phase two project at Dunphy when you might want to do something different there, be it a mixed-use development, housing, potentially a hotel, any of those conversations that we haven't had. We've had this whole Bridgeway Marina on our agenda and the conversation going back to then Mayor Kelman, where that land is so strategic and so important and so trying to integrate it into a better plan than just continuing along the path we're on is why I pulled it to have this discussion tonight. |
| 04:31:54.66 | Steven Woodside | And then we, the, uh, Council Member Sobieski inquired about the fire station and I, I see we have funds set aside. We don't, I did not see funds set aside to address the $300,000 expense mentioned by our city clerk for moving the records out of the firehouse to facilitate its recommissioning if that's the path forward. Yeah. |
| 04:32:19.72 | Kevin McGowan | Madam Mayor, there is an item in the CIP that includes $80,000 for that. And the news from our city clerk that we'll need more, I'll just need to amend the CIP to include the amount that he's stating. But we did have a line item for it. It just wasn't the total amount that he's requesting. |
| 04:32:19.77 | Steven Woodside | you |
| 04:32:20.01 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 04:32:20.03 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 04:32:20.16 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 04:32:36.09 | Steven Woodside | Okay. |
| 04:32:39.99 | Steven Woodside | I just didn't see 300,000. That's... |
| 04:32:42.11 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. |
| 04:32:42.47 | Steven Woodside | Yes. Thank you. |
| 04:32:45.44 | Melissa Blaustein | Just to follow on on your questions about and your request of us on extension of Dunphy, I think a pure extension of the park as it's currently planned for Phase 2 is one thing. When you say mixed use, there's a whole lot of host of issues that could be possible that we probably should at least consider before committing to to the park only on our property There's adjacent property that could work with us on a public private partnership that would accomplish Park like uses that would be you know In effect an extension of the park, but not currently as planned It might be in conjunction with some other neighboring property. I'm just thinking out loud I don't have a proposal, but I think that may be part of your thinking |
| 04:33:00.51 | Charles Melton | all. |
| 04:33:33.16 | Chris Zapata | Yeah, that would be my recommendation, that you keep your powder dry on it, even though you've been doing the study and been working, have actually spent money to turn it into a project tomorrow. I just don't know that that's the project that you want to turn it into until this conversation is had. |
| 04:33:50.22 | Melissa Blaustein | So your recommendation is hold off for a bit. |
| 04:33:52.69 | Chris Zapata | Correct. |
| 04:33:55.07 | Steven Woodside | Councilmember Sobieski. |
| 04:33:56.52 | Ian Sobieski | my questions about the stair pilot program is that in the cip Thank you. Spare. the stair, not stair, sidewalk. |
| 04:34:03.62 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 04:34:03.64 | Kevin McGowan | THE END OF THE END OF THE Thank you. |
| 04:34:04.96 | Ian Sobieski | It isn't there. So if we wanted to expand that program, is now the time to give you that kind of direction? |
| 04:34:10.66 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. |
| 04:34:10.69 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 04:34:10.83 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. |
| 04:34:11.55 | Ian Sobieski | I don't know. That's probably more of a discussion point. I'll wait for the discussion. Did you guys see the letter that was late mail from Linda Fotch and Cass Green? |
| 04:34:14.69 | Steven Woodside | That's important. |
| 04:34:15.84 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. Okay. |
| 04:34:24.31 | Kevin McGowan | I did not. Thank you. |
| 04:34:25.27 | Ian Sobieski | Okay. I did not discuss that during I'll just read it into the record. It's one page during the discussion. |
| 04:34:31.16 | Steven Woodside | Okay, seeing no further questions, I'm gonna open it up to public comment. Thank you. |
| 04:34:35.85 | Walfred Solorzano | Babette McDougall. |
| 04:34:37.79 | Steven Woodside | Actually, I see Adrian Britton standing up in our chambers. So we'll hear from folks in our chambers first. |
| 04:34:46.33 | Adrian Brinton | Thank you. |
| 04:34:46.70 | Steven Woodside | Welcome again. |
| 04:34:47.77 | Adrian Brinton | Thank you. I feel like I've overstayed my welcome tonight, but anyway, I'll try to be quick again, do the late hour. The fire station, I think, is a great idea to look at selling. I don't see that the city would get a great benefit for being a landlord to the fire department, so that's an excellent idea that we should definitely explore. The Trident dock is something that I think was not listed as a priority that I think we should definitely look at. I know that there's a lot of work going on downtown looking at that, looking for grant money, also looking for other ways that the businesses can contribute to improving that. And the city, I think we should be willing to do something there to get that fixed. It could be a source of pride in our town. Today, it's not. The last thing I'll mention is parking lot one. We have money to do it. I know there's design work going on. I think we should be open to looking at doing it right. Not just paving it the way it is, but actually looking at how to make it into a more beautiful space while still being a parking lot. It's our front door. We've done the ferry landing. It looks great down there. Parking lot one could really, really be game changing there as well. So thank you for taking my comments. |
| 04:35:56.48 | Steven Woodside | Seeing none, others, and OK. I'm not wearing my glasses, so when I don't get speaker cards, it's sorry. |
| 04:36:04.73 | Vicki Nichols | for me. |
| 04:36:05.15 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 04:36:05.31 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. I I'm interested in hearing about the park its expansion if you're talking about the area that's on the other side of the wetland that the city owns, and then you have the former Malia property on the other end, unless that property is used for a passive park, that is deed restricted by the Coastal Conservancy, and a previous council forgot about that and they went back. If you make a dollar off of that property, you have to give that land back to the Coastal Conservancy. It's deed restricted for park expansion. So I don't know where that is. It should be in your records somewhere. Has anybody looked at that? Thank you. |
| 04:36:57.18 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay, Babette McDougall. |
| 04:36:57.77 | Vicki Nichols | Yeah. |
| 04:37:03.32 | Babette McDougall | Well, I really have to say thank you, Vicki Nichols, because... You saved me from going blue in the face. But yes, you really need to know this idea of deploying the CIP, which is supposed to be a tool to enable infrastructure to move forward in our community. And instead you've created as an assassination hit list, you know, you you're doing subterfuge, you've got your own priorities, all this stuff about the secret deals going up and down the town that are finally eking out in your council chambers by your own admissions. And So you want to take away Dunphy Park where there are permanent conservation easements, and you want to turn it into a hotel or apartment buildings? Great. We will see you in court. So many people came forward from Friends of Dunphy Park second iteration to expand on what is in fact the unique quality is of our town's character, just like trying to use the CIP list to subvert the prominent place that the corporation yards, imagine saying, oh, let's just move the corporation yard to Mill Valley. We separate ourselves by a lake now because of king tides. You're not thinking this through very carefully. And your consistent insistence that you have to keep City Hall somehow relegated to a backseat so that you can somehow, what, bring it back one day and say, oh boy, let's have high density, low income housing. Who needs City Hall? I mean, the ultimate marker is why are you recommissioning these things on the CIP list that that completely contravene the city's own interpretation of its own unique character, which is most certainly open shoreline, open water and open land, especially as it equates to our shoreline. I urge you to not dive into these holy cows. I mean, these are sacred cows. I mean, really, it starts with Miwok burial sites. You have no idea what you're treading on here. These are very deep feelings. Thank you. |
| 04:39:00.82 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 04:39:02.48 | Walfred Solorzano | No further public comments. |
| 04:39:04.20 | Steven Woodside | All right, I'll close public comment, bring it up here for discussion. |
| 04:39:10.65 | Ian Sobieski | Since you didn't see it, I'll just... I would not read |
| 04:39:15.56 | Steven Woodside | I would not read it into the record. It's already attached to the agenda. |
| 04:39:18.29 | Ian Sobieski | I'll just highlight the letter from... |
| 04:39:19.57 | Steven Woodside | THE FAMILY. |
| 04:39:22.49 | Ian Sobieski | Linda Fotch and Cass Green, representing the the analysis that they've been doing on water access to downtown to make a point about water access being important apparently there's been a group of business owners and residents looking at three different locations for water access in the downtown area they've identified pros and cons of all three and they've identified funding sources for grants for all three including the public pier and they note that the public pier was originally from our facilities condition assessment listed as a priority project. The most recent staff report was basically asking a question of whether it should stay there and the letter advocates that it should not for the purpose of rebuilding it currently, that it be remain an active project and their proposal is that 75 K be allocated to doing, I'll just quote this part, the design of the three locations, the preliminary design and grant and supporting a grant application process to find monies to actually refurbish those three areas. So my narrow discussion suggestion would be that we do give direction on that and add it to the project. I have two minutes, so I'll say my other points. I got a really interesting letter from a resident that didn't get submitted about expanding the sidewalk. program with an interesting concept that I hadn't considered. We currently are proposing a little cost sharing. The thought would be to be more generous with the cost sharing. in the first year and less than the second and less than the third. It would encourage people to apply. So if we advertised it well, that we were if we allocated a reasonable amount of money, half a million dollars, let's say, or something like that, and then and set it up in three tiers. And the first people who get, you know, to use it, there'll be an incentive to apply in the first year. So whatever subsidy we provide year one, we cut it in half for year two, cut it half again in year three, and that would deplete that fund. They would also accelerate the sidewalk repair program across town. It's a way of getting scale. So I think we should consider doing that. And then I'm bummed that it's so expensive to redo bridgeway from end to end. But to me, that's still important. So I can't keep track of how much one time monies we have available, but I would be interested in nevertheless, considering an allocation to do bridgeway from end to end now, um, if it's sensible in terms of allocating our one time monies for that purpose. Uh, and I just can't tell without looking at the numbers. So we'd love to direct staff to look at that. Thank you. |
| 04:41:55.50 | Steven Woodside | Vice Mayor. |
| 04:41:56.29 | Melissa Blaustein | As to the first points on the water access, I'm in complete agreement. I think we have some opportunities. It's a top priority, both from emergency evacuation point of view, as well as recreation, and just overall beauty and sensibility of the whole community. So I'm really looking forward to seeing some actual capital improvements along the waterfront that provide that kind of access when the city manager is recommending holding off on the final go on the expansion of the park my reason for thinking that that recommendation is a good one is not that it wouldn't be used as a park but how would it coordinate with the adjacent property it might be that the design would need modification before we would go forward. That's what I was thinking. I don't think anyone is suggesting that we abandon the notion that there be a park. It's a question of how does it relate to the immediate neighboring property, and there might be a better way. There's also a very important point that goes out into the water right nearby there's been talk about creating an island that would be a refuge for seals and other such things there's a whole lot of ideas floating around there some involve city property some involve private property it would be worth making sure we've looked at the alternatives before we we give the final go ahead that's. That's all I was thinking. So having said that, I'm impressed by the ability to identify as specifically as you have these projects with estimates that I hope are reliable. And I also think that we're going to see things in this next year, such as water access and maybe things we don't foresee right now. So I would hate to spend all of it on one project, such as Bidway. I may disagree with you, Member Sobiesti, but I really think that we've got to be a little careful before we spend all of it on that one project, when there may be some other things that we'll look more favorably upon if we got a little further into the process. So having said that, I'm prepared to accept the overall recommendation with those additions. |
| 04:44:12.89 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Councilmember Hawkins. |
| 04:44:15.41 | Jill Hoffman | You're talking about the one project, the Bridgeway project? |
| 04:44:18.36 | Steven Woodside | The bridge, he wants to do the entirety of Bridgeway as opposed to sections. |
| 04:44:18.50 | Jill Hoffman | BRIDGE. |
| 04:44:23.71 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you for that, sorry. Yeah, that's an interesting proposal. I'd be interested in exploring that and looking at when we get the number from Chris of what we have in our excess and what that number would be to do end-to-end. When we're out there and when we have the crews retained and what that number would be. So, because I, in acknowledging that numbers go up right so you know and and just knocking it all out at once right so whatever the lower bit is between asphalt and What's the nice name we're calling it? It's not slurry, but we're calling it something. Yeah, micro seal. So, yeah, I'd be interested in that and knowing that, right? So I think that's interesting. The rest of the plan that you put together, I think it's a good plan. I support it. It's interesting, the downtown, you know, the P-BID, that they put together this proposal. You know, I don't oppose it, but, you know know that's the reason why we funded the pbid um i'm not in i don't think it's the time to give further um funding for them um i don't you know i don't oppose the conceptually the but that's why we gave them the funding i'm not interested or i don't think it's appropriate for us to give further funding at this point. And I, you know, it's interesting that the amount they're asking for is about the amount that they're underfunded by their own businesses in their business district. So they're underfunded by about $80,000 and they're asking for another 75. So, you know, the city, we funded by 120,000, |
| 04:45:06.88 | Charles Melton | Why? |
| 04:46:06.95 | Jill Hoffman | And they're asking for another 75. So I'm not interested in adding that to our priority list at this point. So thank you for bringing that up. It's an interesting project. I like things on the water, but not this time. |
| 04:46:24.42 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. I first I just want to say I agree with the general budget direction and I appreciate the hard work of our interim finance director and the city manager in securing responsible use of the funds for our CIP and for what our budgeting picture looks like going forward and I look forward to those discussions in the weeks ahead. add um generally just some comments on the projects and it shouldn't surprise you based on my questions but i really do when we come forth with the plan on the repairs for the streets want to see an emphasis on emergency access points and would even push to see potentially more stairs not just one set of stairs because again We need to be aware and prepared in the event of a fire or disaster. We're living in a time of climate change where much is unpredictable. And to that end, I really would like to see a continued emphasis on sea level rise, not just with grant funding, but given the work that Katie's office is doing, I think that we could give a closer look perhaps to infrastructure projects to improve sea level rising, climate change mitigation more generally. I appreciate the beautification efforts here, the street trees. I was at a meeting community meeting yesterday with the vice mayor where everyone raised their hand enthusiastically about the idea of adding more trees. I appreciate the waterfront access point and would like to at least see us cost that out and pursue what that might look like, although I'm uncomfortable. necessarily saying yes to anything without having an idea of our more full budgeting picture and again as i mentioned in my comments i think it's really important that we weigh equally all of the feedback that we receive from residents with regards to their concerns about each of their streets and their pavement so when we do look again at which projects to consider if we can somehow aggregate the correspondence that we have received from neighbors so that we are adequately addressing and fairly addressing everyone's concerns. But I definitely appreciate the strong emphasis on infrastructure as we have consistently prioritized that as a council. And I look forward to seeing this in the context of the budget and appreciate the direction tonight. |
| 04:48:27.81 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. I will echo the majority of my fellow council members' comments. With respect to water access, you know, We listed on slide 13, you know, the 11 things that we identified during our strategic planning process that were priorities. Our facilities, storm drains, improve our roadways, deferred maintenance, sea level rise, flooding, stairs. Water access was not one of those. I think that's important. We've been wanting to find funds to fix the Trident dock since 2012, when we considered repairs before it was totally obliterated by a subsequent storm. I think I would want to see us address the basics that we've identified in our strategic planning process at the beginning of the year before we add additional wonderful projects, but Um, not necessary projects to the to the infrastructure needs of the residents in general. If we were able to obtain grant funding, that would be amazing, but most grant funding requires a match of some level, at least 10% typically. And so, I would be concerned. I would be, I would be supportive of seeking out grant funding and considering it. but I would want to be sure that we have other things in hand first, such as Bridgeway, which our residents traverse every day. For Bridgeway, I would be reluctant to spend $6 million in the coming year. I would rather see us divide that into three tranches, with the most important one being Princess to Napa, which is the most traversed, the most necessary to our downtown businesses. and so I'd like to see us undertake Napa, which is the most traversed, the most necessary to our downtown businesses. And so I'd like to see us undertake that project first. If the difference between micro seal and concrete is 10% or less, I would say go ahead and spend the extra money on concrete, depending on that delta. And we'll get to see that delta when proposals come in. For Dunphy phase two, I have to say I was not as green as the vice mayor in my thoughts for the future. I really want us to consider that holistic area, the former police station, the parking pad, what we're going to do with Bridgeway Marina. I really want us to sort of master plan that little area before we decide how best to proceed with Dunphy phase two. So I do think we have to obviously be respectful of deed restrictions and tribal. We've been very careful to preserve our relationship with our tribal partners. All of the work done at Dunphy Park was very respectful of the burial grounds. |
| 04:51:36.22 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 04:51:38.53 | Steven Woodside | I'm going to invite further comments. I had just a couple more. |
| 04:51:42.44 | Ian Sobieski | Yeah, I'm just wondering how to bring that home because we've all provided different comments. Some... like I mentioned at least wanting to explore looking at the total cost with maybe more refined estimate for doing bridgeway vice mayor isn't so psyched with that but Councilmember Hoffman is so how can we I'd make a decision among the five of us around that. I don't know if we should take them one at a time. I have a notion that I would love to direct that we should at least ask the fire department for a bid on buying the building as well as leasing the building. So we have the purchase option as well. And I know we have to go through the whole process |
| 04:52:18.13 | Steven Woodside | I think that's a whole separate conversation. I suggest we have staff come back to us as part of the budgeting process with the revised feedback that we've provided. |
| 04:52:28.33 | Ian Sobieski | on all of our questions on all of our clouds so they have various feedback figure it out so any one council member's comment is direction and so my my comments will get responses but so will everyone else's |
| 04:52:29.37 | Steven Woodside | I'm not. |
| 04:52:38.47 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, I'm just, I feel as though the hour is too late and I can't, I don't feel as though we can do a comprehensive enough job tonight. If we try to take items one by one, I'd rather |
| 04:52:48.56 | Ian Sobieski | So the direction of staff is to listen to all the comments we made and respond to them all. |
| 04:52:52.12 | Steven Woodside | come back with another recommendation as part of the budgeting process. I see the interim finance director nodding his head, which makes me happy. |
| 04:52:56.24 | Ian Sobieski | I see. |
| 04:53:00.46 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 04:53:00.54 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 04:53:00.91 | Melissa Blaustein | It would make us all happy, and I certainly think that none of us would disagree with understanding alternatives and the costs before we have to make a final decision. And I'm not adverse to seeing what the numbers are for these things, but since I was very green at our strategic plan and neglected to mention, as I now realize I should have, water access, to me it is a priority. I think it's a priority to our residents and for a lot of reasons. So I would like to see us at least be willing to not spend all of our capital funds such that we can't during the course of the year as proposals may come forward. There are some public-private possibilities. There are some grant possibilities, and i do think it is a real benefit to the whole community if we can do that one other little part of the roadway that we all think probably all agree is one of the most dangerous parts or or at least risky parts and that's when you first come into town on the south there's no not even a sidewalk |
| 04:53:01.12 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 04:54:03.06 | Charles Melton | Thank you. |
| 04:54:03.08 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 04:54:05.19 | Melissa Blaustein | and such. We haven't mentioned that specifically, but that's a small portion, and maybe we'll |
| 04:54:12.53 | Steven Woodside | Alexander Avenue? Thank you. |
| 04:54:14.12 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:54:14.13 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 04:54:14.15 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 04:54:14.17 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 04:54:14.74 | Steven Woodside | But part of that's owned not by us. |
| 04:54:17.27 | Melissa Blaustein | understand i understand and there may be some private owners interested in cooperating with us on moving a retaining wall for example such that there could be a sidewalk i've heard rumors to that effect in the neighborhood but at least we should for safety reasons when we look at these things be open to that would not be a major project i don't think but it's something that again we're not giving city clerk i'm not seeing |
| 04:54:40.63 | Steven Woodside | City Clerk, I'm not seeing a clock |
| 04:54:42.62 | Melissa Blaustein | Sorry. My two minutes are up. |
| 04:54:45.42 | Steven Woodside | No, it's OK. I just didn't want to. I want to be. I've been doing this. I got called on a clock, so I want to be sure the clock is in use, because we all are having a second bite. So I wanted to finish my comments. Did you have anything further? OK. I want to be sure we have enough money for the firehouse records, uh, 300, not 80. I endorse Councilmember Sobieski's $0.5 million sidewalk fund. to incentivize undertaking that program. I, For the same reasons I enunciated regarding water access, I'm a little leery of an island concept until we've addressed some of our ADA requirements. And we don't yet know what our storm drain requirements will be. And so I'm loathe to spend our entire nut until we have all of the. um data that we need to accomplish a holistic plan but i think we've given good direction this evening i'm going to look at staff and ask do you need further direction from us this evening |
| 04:55:53.49 | Chris Zapata | No, no, I think it's clear, Mayor. Council, thank you very much. |
| 04:55:57.12 | Steven Woodside | And thank you to my colleagues for really engaging in such a detailed manner in this really important project. Okay. I know. Well, and we're close to the end. So we have one more sort of meaty item. Thank you. Mr. Nava, thank you to our fire folks. Thank you, Director McGowan. Okay, we're gonna move on to city manager reports. The first is city manager information for council that includes an update on Pending asset and obligation transfer agreement with Sausalito Marin City Sanitary District. You can assume we've read your staff report, but please. |
| 04:56:39.16 | Chris Zapata | I will be very brief, and I want to thank Vice Mayor Woodside and Councilmember Hoffman for their work as an ad hoc committee. We're essentially at the finish line to bring back a new MOU, which would involve three changes. One is removal of two items that the city put in place when the MOU was approved by the city council, the service area expansion and the board membership, but then also tightening up the finance section of it so that the existing revenue in the sewer enterprise fund which is close to five million dollars is broken out this way that the city of sausalito is able to use that funding to pay about 1.6 million dollars for pension costs another 500 000 for for post-employment benefit costs, another $1.6 million for pension costs, another $500,000 for post-employment benefit costs, another $600,000 or so for a state revolving loan fund. That would then leave approximately $2 million. million dollars in that account and in order to de-feas and pay off the 2015 bonds we would need the sewer district to pay the city three point million something dollars and then we could then pay off the bonds we're working with the bank of new york mail-in we're working with state revolving loan fund to get the payoff schedules and dates that they require and then at that point then and only then, if those three conditions are met, could we bring back the MOU that says, you know, this would all happen with all the specifics in the MOU that currently exists, public engagement, transfer of assets, transfer of records. All of that would happen over the next nine months. But we want to bring this agreement back to the city council in July. We're scheduling a meeting with the sanitary sewer district for June 5th, I believe is the date to get this all finalized and then bring it back to the full council as you've been working on this since 2019. |
| 04:58:39.29 | Steven Woodside | Thank you, City Manager. City Attorney information for Council. |
| 04:58:43.90 | Sergio Rudin | No, nothing to report this evening. |
| 04:58:46.09 | Steven Woodside | All right, council member committee reports. |
| 04:58:54.53 | Steven Woodside | So we have an MCC MC meeting scheduled here in Sausalito for May 28. I had thought we were going to hear about e-bikes, but the county has decided instead to present that e-bikes at the following month in a different city. And so we do not have a speaker for May 28. And so, um, I've invited Senator McGuire, I've invited Congressman Huffman, I've invited Um, Assemblymember Connolly. So if somebody has a brainstorm for a speaker, otherwise I think we're going to postpone the city of Sausalito MCCMC until later in the year. |
| 04:59:40.22 | Melissa Blaustein | But doesn't MCCMC have an agenda in business as expected? It would be. |
| 04:59:44.19 | Steven Woodside | It would turn into a virtual meeting, and then the in-person meeting would happen later in the year. |
| 04:59:50.72 | Melissa Blaustein | And. |
| 04:59:50.79 | Unknown | Okay. Thank you. |
| 04:59:52.58 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. So apologies for that. |
| 04:59:56.48 | Unknown | Yes. |
| 05:00:01.64 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Sorry, I got an update earlier from the people organizing that. So they wanted to see if maybe we can move it over to July. Yeah. People want to come and visit the Spinnaker during that time. |
| 05:00:12.47 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 05:00:15.22 | Walfred Solorzano | And so. |
| 05:00:16.83 | Babette McDougall | It is beautiful during that time. So is July good with everybody? |
| 05:00:20.93 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. And then we'll have a virtual MCC MC meeting at the end of May. |
| 05:00:24.57 | Walfred Solorzano | And I'll contact Jeff over at the Spinnaker, letting him... |
| 05:00:28.32 | Steven Woodside | If you could let him know, and hopefully he won't charge us a cancellation fee, and then... if you'll confirm with Rebecca Vaughn. Okay, yes. Okay. Thank you for that, city clerk. Okay. All right. Appointments. It is my pleasure this evening to appoint Vice Mayor Woodside as the liaison to the library board and to the Marin Clean Commission. |
| 05:00:37.58 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 05:00:50.59 | Steven Woodside | Energy Board. Um, It's also my honor to appoint Trisha Smith to complete the term of Edward Schultz on the Commission on Aging, who had to step away for health reasons. Oh, no. Oh, gosh. Well, I don't have the info to do it, but I'll do the next one. So, Walford, will you remind me to adjourn our next meeting in honor of Ed Schultz, who made a huge contribution in a very short period of time to our Commission on Aging? Okay, future agenda items I have listed here, protection of legacy businesses as a future agenda item. We've already given direction. to the Community and Economic Development Department to bring back the affordable housing inventory to the community. in the early, in the new fiscal year. Um, No minutes. We have minutes from boards, commissions, and committees. Okay. So I'm going to take public comment on items 6A through 6G. |
| 05:02:08.27 | Walfred Solorzano | of Bette McDougall. |
| 05:02:16.12 | Babette McDougall | Thank you. It's awfully late, but I... |
| 05:02:21.28 | Walfred Solorzano | Oh, sorry. |
| 05:02:26.49 | Babette McDougall | Do you hear me now? |
| 05:02:27.90 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes. |
| 05:02:28.62 | Babette McDougall | Okay. |
| 05:02:28.64 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay. |
| 05:02:29.36 | Babette McDougall | All right, thank you. So I wanted to address the issue about committee reports. I seem to remember at the beginning of the... first quarter of this year that Ms. Blaustein mentioned that, did she not mention that she would sit on a committee having to do with tax? And if that's true, I'd like to hear a report on that. um, I have some questions about tax for sure that I'd like to put to Ms. Blaustein if that's, if I remember correctly. So I'd like to put that out there that if that's true, be nice to hear what's going on with regard to tax. And then also we'll circle back to find out how our infrastructure taxes can be properly returned to our municipality so that we may have more direct access and control over our own rightful infrastructure tax remittances. Hopefully, Ms. Blastine will learn something about that, too. Thank you so much. |
| 05:03:16.01 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 05:03:16.04 | Walfred Solorzano | We'll be right back. |
| 05:03:16.09 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 05:03:21.88 | Walfred Solorzano | No further public comment? |
| 05:03:23.08 | Babette McDougall | Thank you. |
| 05:03:23.09 | Steven Woodside | All right, then it's my pleasure to adjourn our meeting at 12, 11 in the morning. Thank you all. We accomplished an awful lot tonight. And thank you for the collaborative way in which we worked. And good evening. |
Babette McDougall — In Favor: Thanked the City Clerk for upholding democratic institutions, praised Brian for revitalizing Sausalito's community spirit, and emphasized the library and communications as guardians of the First Amendment. ▶ 📄
Sandra Bushmaker — Neutral: Requested a future job description for the marketing and communications coordinator, appreciated the City Clerk's document organization and the HR department's strength. ▶ 📄
Sybil Boutilleri — In Favor: Commended Brian and his small team for their high productivity in events and day-to-day operations, noting their civil and helpful demeanor based on personal experience. ▶ 📄