| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:00:02.46 | Walfred Solorzano | Good evening, Mayor of the City Council. Today's meeting of February 17, 2026 is being held at 420 Litho Street, Sausalito, in Council Chambers. This meeting is also being broadcast on Zoom, on the city's website, and on cable TV channel 27. |
| 00:00:22.93 | Steven Woodside | Thank you, Mr. Clerk. If you would kindly call the roll. |
| 00:00:27.08 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Cox. Here. Thank you. Councilmember Hoffman. He has not arrived yet. Council Member Sobieski. Vice Mayor Blaustein. |
| 00:00:36.94 | Steven Woodside | Here. |
| 00:00:36.97 | Melissa Blaustein | Here. |
| 00:00:37.22 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 00:00:37.43 | Steven Woodside | Mary Woodside. I'm here. I should just note for the audience that's watching in the record that it is pouring, it's hailing. |
| 00:00:38.34 | Walfred Solorzano | I mean, |
| 00:00:46.20 | Steven Woodside | And it may well cause people to be delayed coming to the meeting, including member Hoffman. |
| 00:00:51.31 | Joe Farns | member. |
| 00:00:52.65 | Steven Woodside | But we will now go into closed session. We have three items on the closed session agenda. One is public employee employment for the city manager. The second is our negotiation with labor negotiator representing Is the city manager and miss Gitas and then lastly, one matter of conference with real property negotiators, and that is for the property at 558 bridgeway Sausalito before we go into closed session is there any public comment on the closed session items. Sinnad. Very well, then we'll now go into closed session. And I think we'll take the 558 Bridgeway matter first. |
| 00:01:36.39 | Unknown | Thank you. Yeah. about this. |
| 00:01:38.90 | Steven Woodside | So I think we're ready to go back into session. And we'll begin with a pledge of allegiance. |
| 00:01:51.02 | Steven Woodside | I pledge allegiance to the flag |
| 00:01:51.52 | Babette McDougall | allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to be called for Richard's hand. |
| 00:01:58.04 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 00:01:58.21 | Babette McDougall | you |
| 00:01:58.48 | Joan Cox | one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. They're just for all. |
| 00:02:08.82 | Steven Woodside | So welcome, everybody. Thank you for being here in this blustery day. If you were here about an hour ago, it looked like we had an avalanche of hail coming off of a spout right over here, but I think we've survived. Before we do the roll call, we have a special treat tonight. We're having a little musical prelude. Would you like to come forward and maybe tell us what we're going to be doing? |
| 00:02:38.91 | Emily | Emily L. hi Council hi everyone, thanks for having me, my name is Emily i'm a local musician and music teacher, I have a business called Emily melodies. And... I wanted to share a song with you guys. I want to encourage everyone to sing along. I did print out microscopic lyric sheets. If you were so lucky to have one, you can look at that or you can find it on your phone. We'll be singing Sitting on the Dock of the Bay. by Otis Redding. And in case you guys didn't know, this song was written in Sausalito over by Waldo Point about Sausalito. So it's a really special song. |
| 00:03:14.68 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:03:19.85 | Emily | I want to encourage everyone to sing along. |
| 00:03:27.34 | Unknown | Thanks. |
| 00:03:32.20 | Unknown | 30. Thank you. And I'm going to go. |
| 00:03:36.30 | Joe Farns | Oh. |
| 00:03:40.37 | Unknown | Peace. |
| 00:03:40.82 | Joe Farns | you |
| 00:03:41.03 | Unknown | and |
| 00:03:41.82 | Unknown | Thank you. And... you Thank you. Thank you. Peace. |
| 00:03:48.10 | Unknown | Yeah. you |
| 00:03:48.99 | Unknown | It is. |
| 00:03:49.07 | Unknown | It is. |
| 00:03:52.25 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:03:55.39 | Unknown | Thank you. Bye. So good. |
| 00:04:01.90 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:04:04.47 | Joe Farns | . |
| 00:04:04.55 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:04:04.58 | Joe Farns | a little |
| 00:04:05.97 | Unknown | Bye. Thank you. Bye. Peace. Oh, no. |
| 00:04:20.58 | Unknown | I'm all on Georgia. |
| 00:04:22.34 | Joe Farns | So, Oh. |
| 00:04:25.05 | Unknown | and I'm ready. Christmas. Thank you. Bye. Stupid. Stupid. But nothing's going to come out of the way So I'll be sitting. On the dark way. Watching the piano and the piano Good. |
| 00:04:54.48 | Unknown | to go to the wheel. |
| 00:04:55.51 | Joe Farns | Thank you. |
| 00:04:57.13 | Unknown | way. . Thank you. Bye. Love is gone. Things still remain the same. Thank you. I can't do what people tell me to do. |
| 00:05:15.20 | Joe Farns | do it. Doon! |
| 00:05:19.04 | Unknown | Well, Oh, yes, oh, hey. I'm sitting here with some old songs. |
| 00:05:29.25 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:05:30.75 | Unknown | . Oh |
| 00:05:35.78 | Joe Farns | I'm going to go. |
| 00:05:40.48 | Unknown | Hey. |
| 00:05:40.52 | Joe Farns | Thank you. |
| 00:05:40.55 | Unknown | you |
| 00:05:40.74 | Joe Farns | Thank you. |
| 00:05:40.86 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:05:40.94 | Joe Farns | Thank you. |
| 00:05:42.85 | Unknown | Thank you. . |
| 00:05:44.72 | Joe Farns | It |
| 00:05:47.25 | Unknown | Oh, baby. |
| 00:05:47.33 | Joe Farns | Bye. |
| 00:05:49.93 | Unknown | watching the town. Bye. Bye-bye. Your last chance. in the dark of your bay. Thank you. Ciao. Thank you. you And then you can find this card. |
| 00:06:05.12 | Emily | And you're going to |
| 00:06:07.81 | Unknown | Bye. Thank you. Oh, oh, oh. |
| 00:06:11.96 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:06:14.18 | Unknown | . Or whistle if you can. I just can't. |
| 00:06:17.93 | Joe Farns | Thank you. |
| 00:06:17.95 | Emily | with the |
| 00:06:19.62 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. the six-hour Thank you. Thank you, guys. |
| 00:06:35.90 | Steven Woodside | Emily, thank you very much. We loved it. I think I enjoyed the most part when we couldn't read the words and we could hear your voice. But thank you very much. We're going to try to do something akin to this once in a while. We live in a town that cherishes musicians and other artists. And just so wonderful to hear your voice. And a little piece of news. There's a piano in this building that we think will very soon be downtown and available for people to play. cover and so forth. And Emily is taking the lead in making that happen along with our parks people. So thank you very much for what you're doing for all of us. |
| 00:07:28.37 | Steven Woodside | So for a moment, we'll get back to the business. We'll have a roll call. Mr. Clerk? Sorry. I know you love the music. |
| 00:07:36.72 | Walfred Solorzano | All right. by the music council member Cox here. Councilmember Huffman. Here. Councilmember Sobieski. Vice Mayor Blaustein. Here. |
| 00:07:47.70 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 00:07:47.72 | Steven Woodside | and Mayor Will Tech here. We were in closed session, but there's nothing to report regarding the closed session, so I have no report out from closed session. I'm asking now for approval of tonight's agenda. So moved. Second? Okay, any objections? Seeing none, we're gonna stick to this agenda. We do have a number of special presentations tonight, some wonderful ones and very important ones, but I wanted to start with something a little bit out of order because we have someone from the SBA here who, um, They are setting up here in Sausalito to provide information to the public regarding the floods from early January. So Jo Ferra is here. She has materials. Would you like to make a brief comment now? It's fine with us. We'd love to hear from you. I know there were a few people in Sausalito who suffered damage, many more just to the north of us, but the setup is taking place here to be interviewed by someone from the SBA. Joe? |
| 00:09:02.46 | Joe Farns | Thank you so much. Thank you. Again, my name is Joe Farns. I'm with the Small Business Administration. I am here because of the flooding and the King Tide's floods that you guys It's a Suclea experience December 31st through the beginning of January. Um, We are SBA has declared an agency declaration for Marin County. And with that declarations, it's low interest Low-interest federal loans are available for homeowners, renters, small businesses, and private nonprofit organizations. When I say low-interest loans, I'm referring to for homeowners, if you are unable to get credit elsewhere, at 2.875%. For businesses, it can start as low as 4%. And for small nonprofit organizations, small small nonprofit organizations at 3.625%. What these loans are intended to do is to help the community rebuild by rebuilding, repairing, and or moving. Once you Speak to the customer service representative downstairs. They can help you, assist you with filing for the loans and setting up an application. This service is free of charge. You can go down and speak with them at no cost. You're not required to accept the loan once they... advise you on what you're available for. The loans can be repaid over up to 30 years, and the first payment wouldn't be due until after that 12 months after the first dispersed loan is given to you at no interest cost. So there's a lot of information available downstairs. There's two representatives, Mr. Reggie and Mr. Paul. They're down there. They'll be here all week up until Friday to answer any questions that you may have. I'm also available in the area. I will be here. Then we are going over to San Rafael next week and then to Stinson Beach the week after. I also will be in the area until March 13th to offer any, answer any questions, offer any assistance, and just help out the community. Mm-hmm. |
| 00:11:25.83 | Steven Woodside | Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you for being here. I think most of the visitors tonight are here for our police officer ceremony. Chief Gregory, shall we do that at this point in time? |
| 00:11:26.74 | Joe Farns | Thank you. |
| 00:11:42.72 | Steven Woodside | Okay, let's do so, please. |
| 00:11:56.71 | Unknown | Good evening, Mayor and Council Members, City staff, and most importantly, the family of the new officers that will be sworn in tonight. I'm honored to be here to introduce our three newest employees. They're Officer Daniel Schumann, Officer Dustin Leandro, and Officer William Bryce. This is an exciting time for not only Police Department, but for these individuals as they share this special accomplishment with their friends and family. This ceremony is a defining moment for not only these officers, but also for our department. They're going to take the oath tonight and they're with that oath. They commit to uphold the Constitution, serve with integrity and also protect our community with courage and honor. That promise carries a lot of responsibility and forms the foundation of our profession, ultimately. For our department, this celebration and ceremony represents renewal and continued commitment to the values that guide us. which are character, dedication and professionalism. So I'm going to ask officers Schumann, Leandro and Bryce to come join me up here, please. |
| 00:13:15.55 | Unknown | I think you just stand right in front of the screen there so both sides of the room can see you. So I'm going to read their bios and then they'll be sworn in by the city clerk. And at that point, after the swearing in, we'll have each have a family member come up and pin their badge. I'm gonna start with Daniel Schumann. Officer Schumann joined the Sausalito Police Department in October of 2025 after lateraling from the Department of Consumer Affairs Division of Investigation. where he spent six years conducting criminal administrative investigations for the Medical Board of California. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in Criminology Law and Society from UC Irvine and graduated from the Golden West College Post Police Academy in 2018, gaining extensive law and state enforcement experience. A native of Marin County, Officer Schumann spent his early childhood in Sausalito, where his family owned a condo at 100 South Street. And he was baptized at the First Episcopal Church, Christ Episcopal Church. Outside of work, he trains in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, currently holding a blue belt, and enjoys studying languages, having spent the past five years learning Russian. So that is Officer Daniel Schumann. Sorry. wave your hand and show everybody who you are. So it's sorry about that. Sorry about that. Okay. Officer Dustin Leandro waved everybody. Okay. Dustin Leandro grew up in Santa Rosa and moved to San Diego in his early 20s, where he lived for about five years. After his time in San Diego, he returned to Santa Rosa and began to work at Bank of the West. Not long after moving back, he met his wife, and they eventually married and welcomed their family. Baby boy. Prior to being hired to the Sausalito Police Department, Dustin worked in fraud investigation for credit. Sorry. Redwood Credit Union. While working there, his passion for investigations and law enforcement developed, solidifying his dedication to pursue a career as a police officer. He is very grateful to have a career that will make his son proud as he grows and one that allows him to help so many people. And then last but not least, thank you. Officer William Bryce, he was born in Guatemala City, migrated to the United States at age 12, settling in San Mateo, California. In 2013, he joined the United States Army and served honorably on active duty for over a decade completing deployments in the Middle East and Europe before transitioning to the Army Reserves in August 24. After leaving active duty, William joined United Airlines where he worked closely with pilots working on major aircrafts. He then transitioned into a career as a police officer after being put through the police academy by Sausalito Police Department. He is married to his wife, Anna, and together they are raising their eight-year-old daughter, Adelaide. In his free time, he enjoys mountain biking, playing soccer, overlanding, and spending time with his family. Okay. Are you ready to be a city clerk? |
| 00:16:41.00 | Unknown | I'm figuring the NHS. You follow me swear. You follow me swear. That I will support and defend. That I will support and defend. The Constitution of the United States. The Constitution of the United States. And the Constitution of the State of California. And the Constitution of the State of California. Against all enemies. Against all enemies. Foreign and domestic. Foreign and domestic. That I will serve to debate and allegiance. That I will serve to debate allegiance to the Constitution of the United States, to the Constitution of the State of California, and the Constitution of the State of California. That I take this obligation freely, that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation, without any mental reservation, or purpose of evasion, or purpose of evasion, and that I shall well be faithfully discharge, and that I will well be faithfully discharge the duty upon which I am about to enter, the duty upon which I am about to enter. |
| 00:16:45.82 | Unknown | He's following me. |
| 00:16:49.68 | Joe Farns | or Thank you. positive issue going to get |
| 00:16:53.93 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:16:53.97 | Joe Farns | United States. and the constitution. |
| 00:17:03.60 | Joe Farns | Amen. |
| 00:17:07.62 | Joe Farns | They're a super big family. to the Constitution of the United States. and the Constitution of the State of California. All right. I love you. Without any message. |
| 00:17:38.52 | Unknown | Amen. which, |
| 00:17:46.09 | Unknown | Okay, from here, we have our department photographer in the room. So Nick White is going to be moving around taking pictures as your family pins your badge. So we'll start with Officer Schumann. Go ahead and invite your family member up. and introduce her to the group. |
| 00:18:04.12 | Unknown | Fred? Yep. Been to get for about two years. |
| 00:18:08.65 | Jacqueline Amaricus | Right. |
| 00:18:29.70 | Babette McDougall | Wait, pose for a picture. |
| 00:18:48.73 | Unknown | Okay, Officer Landrieu. |
| 00:18:55.82 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:18:59.70 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:18:59.75 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:18:59.97 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:19:00.04 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:19:00.12 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:19:09.10 | Unknown | Lauren, my friend, Logan. Go Packers. Thank you. |
| 00:19:34.88 | Unknown | I'm going to put Logan in the picture. |
| 00:19:35.15 | Jill Hoffman | Logan in the picture quick. |
| 00:19:38.31 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:19:57.77 | Unknown | Okay, and Officer Bryce. |
| 00:20:10.09 | Unknown | you |
| 00:20:10.98 | Unknown | What I can have is the power of the Thank you. Let me get it. |
| 00:20:16.41 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:20:16.43 | Unknown | Mm-mm. |
| 00:20:22.22 | Unknown | . |
| 00:21:06.65 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:11.60 | Unknown | Okay. That's it for us. And they want to shake your hand. So go, yeah, go ahead and shake their hands. |
| 00:21:40.42 | Unknown | All right, here we go. Thank you. very much. Thank you. Thank you. Right there. Retired, you can save it. |
| 00:21:51.88 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:52.50 | Unknown | Yes. |
| 00:21:53.02 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:54.10 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:54.27 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:54.41 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:54.42 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:54.44 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:21:54.53 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:21:54.80 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. They're all over there. |
| 00:21:58.66 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:22:01.14 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:22:01.16 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:22:01.28 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:22:01.55 | Unknown | Right? Oh, yeah. Please, the ones, and the others. . I thank you, God. |
| 00:22:17.90 | Unknown | Thank you. that will burn us. But maybe if someone was really good, stay, see you. |
| 00:22:24.83 | Amy Stenberg | Thank you. |
| 00:22:24.97 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 00:22:25.15 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:22:26.93 | Unknown | Yeah, so I'm very ready. |
| 00:22:27.31 | Unknown | Yeah, so I'm very glad. Thank you. I know. It's good. All right. I'll see you guys back. I'm going to say one thing. Bye. |
| 00:22:31.95 | Unknown | I'm scared. |
| 00:22:35.60 | Unknown | So I've heard of it. What's this? That's sweet. That's them. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. |
| 00:22:40.06 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:22:46.32 | Unknown | I have a little bit. |
| 00:22:48.64 | Unknown | want to say something. |
| 00:22:55.77 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:22:55.97 | Steven Woodside | I'm typically going to read like the first thing. Yeah. |
| 00:23:04.07 | Michael Dumont | Thank you. |
| 00:23:07.36 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, yeah, yeah. I had a feeling when I heard a couple of clips. If you're not. |
| 00:23:14.87 | Steven Woodside | Thank you again, Chief Gregory. We have a few special presentations tonight. And the first, I think, is going to be a presentation from, actually a short presentation from Dennis Webb regarding the sale for Parkinson event. I'll just describe it briefly. We're honored here in Sausalito to be kind of ground zero for the first in the nation Sale for Parkinson's. And this is actually a two-day event. The first day here, April 11th, will be a sale out or motor out. And the idea is to bring someone who has Parkinson's disease on your boat or a friend's boat or whatever because it's been determined that exercise and being out on the water, particularly out on the water, actually slows the progression of Parkinson's disease. This is a relatively new discovery, and to bring attention to it, we've been honored here in Sausalito to host the very first part of that three-day event. So, Dennis, do you want to say a few words? This is Dennis Webb. He lived here for a long time in Sausalito and now lives just around the corner. |
| 00:24:30.92 | Dennis Webb | Thank you, Mayor. Yes, my name is Dennis Webb, and I want to talk a little bit about the sale for Parkinson's regatta and what we're doing here. About two months ago, I was at the Presidio Yacht Club, and I listened to this lady, Amy Bridges, talk about, Parkinson's and sailing and, um, I was very, very, very, It's an ugly disease and people are getting sick every six seconds in the United States because of it. So we want to bring awareness to this disease. And so Amy basically spearheaded this regatta on Sunday, April 12th. And April 11th is going to be a big sail out. We want everyone out on the water, flying the flags, and just to participate, to create awareness. We want to make change and, it's a bad disease and we need everybody's help and everybody's input here. A lot of it's coming from pesticides, herbicides, stuff like that. So anyway, thank you all. |
| 00:25:33.68 | Steven Woodside | Thank you, Dennis. We'll be putting more information out about these events in our currents, and I'll be signing a proclamation and encourage people to participate. Thank you very much. We also tonight have a proclamation for Women in Construction Week. And I'll just briefly say that Women in Construction Week, which this year will be celebrated March 1 through 7, 1st through the 7th, it's celebrated annually to recognize and honor the significant contributions of women in the construction industry. And ironically, Dennis, that's your business. And I think you employ women in your business. So... This is also something we like to recognize and publicize to honor those who are working in perhaps what was once a non-traditional. industry and perhaps still is for women. So thank you for that. We now are going to have a very special presentation from Marin Rapid Response. And thank you very much for being here tonight. There's a lot of information that we're going to hear that's important, I think, to all of us. Thank you. |
| 00:26:49.06 | Chris Zapata | Mayor, before Lisa starts talking, I'm going to add some Preliminary comments, if you'll let me, please. Sure. Thank you very much. So there are actions across the country by the federal government, in particular ICE actions that are creating serious community questions. And so what does Sausalito do? Sassuolo follows the law, particularly the California law. So the California Values Act SB 54 is a 2017 state law that limits state and local law enforcement's involvement in federal immigration enforcement. making California sanctuary a sanctuary state by prohibiting the use of state resources to support mass deportations, ensuring schools, hospitals, and courthouses are safe places, and restricting police from asking about immigration status or holding individuals for ICE with narrow exceptions. It aims to protect immigrant communities and foster trust and prevents local law enforcement from acting as federal immigration agents. Sassilo specifically has a flexible policy, 412.6. It says, absent of an urgent issue or of officer safety or other emergency circumstances, requests by federal immigration officials for assistance from this department should be directed to a supervisor. The supervisor is responsible for determining whether the requested assistance would be permitted under the California Values Act, Government Code, et cetera, which is Assembly Bill or State Senate Bill 54. So the presentation by Lisa Bennett is important to the community. She was invited by the vice mayor and the city agenda setting committee agreed to have her here tonight. And she's here. She'll talk about resources that are available and some of the things that citizens can do to be aware. So, Lisa, it's yours. |
| 00:28:46.85 | Lisa Bennett | Thank you. Thank you for having me here tonight. It's really exciting for me to be out spreading the word about the Marine Rapid Response Network. Next slide, please. How do I do this? Who's doing the slides? Who are like, ah, perfect. All right. There's a model for community defense when a community is under attack. It's used across the country, across the world. It is included, but not including, but not limited to mutual aid, which I wanna say some people don't know what that means. Thank you. When there's a natural... disaster, for example, everybody just shows up to help. What do you need? Here you go. I have it. That's mutual aid. It's very simple, very organic. very not tied to an organization, just tied to community, Connections. It includes legal support. information sharing and education, community organizing, and physical defense. And the most important mantra of a model of community defense is everyone is accountable to the community And we learn and grow together. And here we always must remember, too, we have to develop an organizing capacity to keep it going. Wing next slide. In Marin, we have a 24-7 hotline, the Marin Rapid Response Network. as part of our defense against ICE. We have legal observers, and I'll talk about what those are, to document ICE actions. We have trainings. KYR stands for Know Your Rights, for both individuals and employers. We have accompaniment, where people say, I have an appointment to go see ICE or have a court date. I'm really scared. Can someone go with me? Absolutely. We have ties to financial support to get people what they need to stay here in Marin County if they can after a major breadwinner is detained. We connect people to legal support, which is desperately needed. advocacy and power building from within the community. We definitely see where they could do better there. mutual aid systems I just referred to, and policy change directed by community members. There will be a lot of bills coming up in the state legislature, for example, sponsored by immigrant-led organizations, which we should definitely pay attention to. Next slide. There are some gaps in community defense in Marin County. There's no system in place that I can see for long-term support for these families. Once the major breadwinner is taken, Mom may be home with two kids, can't work, now what? I don't know. I don't have that answer, but definitely working on it. There's not enough funding for basic needs. We're learning now. We've been in this for a while. Most families need money for at least six to nine months before they can even know the outcome of the legal case that their person in detention is going to have. Removal defense means if someone's detained, we need lawyers to help get them out. policy change centered in the community. We can do more of that. And a collective gathering of community groups, which would become the Marin Rapid Response Network, not just housed in one organization, but owned by all of us collectively. Next slide. Ultimately, we're exposing cracks in our system. People will call us and say, someone, my husband's just been detained. Can you help? And in the process of finding help, we're seeing a lot of gaps in our system. We need systemic change, and I say mutual aid, but mutual aid doesn't address the need for mutual aid. Why we even need it here in this county and in this country? And community defense is an opportunity to build community around shared values. It's a wonderful opportunity for all of us to show up in the ways that we can. |
| 00:32:16.76 | Lisa Bennett | Next slide. Here's what we're doing in the Marine Rapid Response Network. We're doing case management, which we had not originally signed up for. But as the first call someone makes when something awful happens, we don't want to ever abandon them. those families and we stay with them. We have over 1,000 volunteers in our legal observer pool. We have employer training. We're doing accompaniment, which is when someone is scared to go to court or in a meeting by themselves. And there's a lot of great community organizing happening. Endy Lawn, Adopt a Corner, I'll talk about that. We've done lookouts. We've got a whistle campaign. Many other things are happening that are in support of the community needing to feel more welcome and able to live here in Marin without so much fear. Next slide. There is money available. We're connecting families with that emergency aid, cash assistance, legal fees, and food. We are now helping, actually I wrote this last week, we're now helping 12 Marin families who've been impacted by ICE detention, where the major breadwinner has been taken. So I want to talk a little bit about Adopt-A-Coroner. The next slide, please. NDLON is National Day Laborers Organizing Network. It's centered in Los Angeles. They have actually, instead of day laborers gathering on corners, they have actually day laborers centers where they're much safer to gather to look for work. Here in Marin, you see the gentleman on the corner looking for work. They're very vulnerable. So what we've decided to do is take them up on their campaign where volunteers show up on a recurring basis and get to know these guys, mostly these guys, who most of them are here on their own, their families back in their home country. And if ICE were to come, there would be no one to call. because they are completely on their own. So there's a beautiful thing happening now where the volunteers in Novato and San Rafael are showing up recurringly and getting to know the guys for Thanksgiving. They gave them bags with tools and gloves. Christmas they shared tamales and shared more gifts with the guys so they're really getting to feel like they're not so alone. And even you don't have to speak Spanish. You can speak Spanglish or Google Translate. It doesn't matter. The fact is that you show up. Next slide. Whistle campaign, you've probably heard about this. Like if you ever see ICE actions in other cities, you can hear the whistles going off in the background. This is a campaign where whistleblowers identify ice and let the community know ice is there by a series of repetitive whistles. It started through the schools in Nevada is spreading across the county and expanding to San Rafael To me, I'll say more about the whistle campaign next. That's a next slide It has to be done. in collaboration with communities, not helicoptering in. I always say it has to be done with community, not to community. If this is not your community, They... You should think about what it's like for someone who doesn't know you walking around blowing a whistle. They may not know what you mean. Um, And the Rapid Response Network is about reducing harm. de-escalating tension, and the WSCOs can actually escalate and not deescalate. However, they can also They can also increase the likelihood of aggression, which is not what we are about. but they do serve a purpose in letting people know that ICE is coming or is present. In Marin next slide. So far to date since January 2025, there are 18 Marin residents who've been detained by ICE. They have most of the most of these involve a family being separated. They are targeting individuals not doing raids yet in Marin County. I have never used a warrant in any of the calls we've gotten. ICE generally will surveil someone's residence or their work and then arrest them. They're driving unmarked vehicles with no plates or plates that don't belong to that vehicle. They are arresting people in public and more recently in court in San Francisco. The fact that we haven't had a raid doesn't really matter to our community. They feel it as if it was happening every day. And then one thing, too, I want to point out, 90% of the calls we get, ice is it's so and so in the canal. And I get a picture like the next one. It's actually the sheriff's undercover unit. And I would say 90% of the time it is not ICE. It is this policing that we're seeing frequently in the canal and it's often scaring a lot of people. So we do our best to clarify what that is, clarify what the sheriff. Once we have confirmation, we let the community know. Next. There are a lot of apps out there people have created to let people know about ICE being in their community. I don't really like them. particularly next door or tick tock. They basically air a allows people to spread rumors without any re any ability for me to take it down when I know it's not true. Generally, I'm pretty good about next door and jumping on and saying that was not ice. I know it. How do you know? Because the sheriff told me it was him. |
| 00:37:14.06 | Joe Farns | I know. |
| 00:37:17.54 | Lisa Bennett | I can't do that on all these apps. TikTok is terrible for this. One thing we see is now more... circumstances where ICE is being reported, but it's AI or it's a video that's two years old or two weeks old. So I don't trust anything I see in social media, neither should you. Please call the hotline first, 415-991-4545. Next. What we get on the hotline, we have 20 trained multilingual dispatchers. They're mostly, 99% are volunteers. I have two staff members. I have the worst day ever was 150 calls in one day and 150 texts. That was another situation where it was the sheriff and not ice. Normally we get about 10 to 20 calls a day. We basically try to debunk rumors. particularly sheriff's units, and we get now abusive calls where people our, trying to, either they're really offensive or they're just really kind of pedestrian, but either way, it's a toll on my dispatchers, but they are coming in now. Next slide. |
| 00:38:28.50 | Lisa Bennett | So here's what I want people to know. We need to educate our community on what is helpful information to share. families need to be prepared if ICE detains someone. This is what's called a family preparedness plan. It is on our website. It's a very daunting document, though, so I actually don't share it without someone being there to help that family fill it out because it's a, highly traumatic experience to fill that out. And just remember, rumors are damaging. We will never share a rumor. Even if I think I know what it is, I wait till I know for sure what it is. Next slide. Hotline, again, 991-4545, bilingual dispatchers. We dispatch legal observers. I have one. Lovely legal observer in the audience. Jerry, thank you very much. Sure. with our very threatening same apron. |
| 00:39:15.22 | Unknown | with. |
| 00:39:17.96 | Lisa Bennett | This is what our observers wear so that they are clearly not a threat and they are clearly visible to the community. We offer connections to resources for community members impacted by ice and we prepare intake forms for those arrested for both aid and legal services. |
| 00:39:18.35 | Unknown | This is what our |
| 00:39:36.22 | Lisa Bennett | Legal observer, you want to come up? monitor it. You're going to model. Then I'm going to talk about legal observers again. Respond directly to the site of an ongoing ICE raid. You bear witness to immigration enforcement and provide data for the network and the impact of community members' legal defense. Because as we know, civil rights are being violated left and right, and the observers document that so the family can use it. Next slide. No. Requirements to be a legal observer, US citizen. Friend of Jerry's, no, valid driver's license, attend training, complete return paperwork. It's just like that. The training is three hours and it's in person. And I think it's pretty good training. Excellent. Right. Okay. You're not free yet. To sign up, go to multiculturalmarin.org slash MRRN, fill out the survey. We'll send you a link to upcoming trainings. One thing, you can sit down now. Thank you. One thing that we try to have our community know, go to the next slide, please, says SALUTE. We use an acronym that's used across the country in rapid response hotlines. And salute, it stands for the size of the operation, the activity that's being seen, the location, the unit, the time and any equipment. And that's what we really need for people to share with us when they call. Often I get somewhat helpful information, but I rarely get very helpful information. And if you can play that next video, that would be great. |
| 00:41:08.47 | Unknown | If you see the possible activity of ICE, don't spread the information without checking. First, call the RRM and use Lucha to make a report. L is for the place. Where are you seeing the possible activity? U is for the time. What time is happening? C is for the number of people, vehicles or departments involved. H is for the weapons, weapons or visible objects. A is for the actions. What are you doing and how you are feeling? Call 415-991-4545 and use Lucha to create more precise information and avoid panic. |
| 00:41:46.49 | Lisa Bennett | Thank you. That's Hedardo, one of my coordinators. He's a pretty amazing guy. Okay, next slide. |
| 00:41:52.04 | Unknown | It's possible. |
| 00:41:53.80 | Lisa Bennett | The trends you're seeing across the country and in Marin, obviously, multiple agencies are working together with three-letter acronyms, often lawlessly. In Marin, we're seeing what we're seeing mostly is the Sheriff's COPE team, which is part of the Specialized Investigative Unit. It's an undercover unit. Looks a lot like ICE, as I shared with you. |
| 00:42:12.48 | Joe Farns | Thank you. |
| 00:42:15.48 | Lisa Bennett | Elsewhere. Next slide, sorry. As we know, nightmarish disregard for constitutional rights. U.S. citizens are being detained in sweeps now. And community power is building as an antidote, and it is amazing, and I gotta say, this is what gives me the way to go on because it's been pretty impressive. Next slide. At the courthouse in San Francisco, there's two main courts in the Bay Area. One is in San Francisco, one is in Concord. And there's now one in Stockton that we're putting people into. Most people are going to their court appearances or ICE check-ins, and they're being immediately detained from those locations, not from their home in Marin, not from their work in Marin, but from their... Court appointment or ICE meeting. And family preparedness, again, is one thing that we talk about before we do accompaniment. We ask the family to at least sit down and think about What documents should someone else have who should we call, those kinds of things. It's really hard to think about. But it's necessary. And those forms, again, are on our website. Next. One thing I also want to stress is that we are completely aware that workers, employers, need to be prepared. Should there be a paper raid or an actual raid at their place of business? And conveniently enough, the next slide. We have a training tomorrow on Zoom from 2 to 3 p.m. for employers. And to prepare you for either of those possibilities, we follow up with a lot of resources, and we're going to do it in Spanish very soon. So it'll be open. It's free, and it's just an hour long. It's on Zoom. And next slide. We do need to reach more employers. We would really like to have... Chambers of Commerce contact us so we can do presentations to their members. We've done this in San Rafael a couple of times, maybe three or four times. It's been really successful and really well received. and we really need to have large employers reach out to us. The training applies to anyone who has people who work for them, who really wants to support people who work in businesses in Marin County. And next slide. We're in our community building era. As I said, we've got 1,000 volunteers now, so we're pretty stable as far as having a group of people. We're having potlucks once a month with our legal observers together and with community members that they're working with. We're connecting with the day laborers. We're building a network of volunteers, and we're becoming much more active in the community For example, on Saturday and Sunday, the Guatemalan Consulate is doing a mobile clinic in Novato. We were asked to show up as legal observers there, and we are going to. So we're going to have almost 100 volunteers there on Saturday and Sunday. Next slide. Easy actions. You can sign up to be a legal observer. You can advocate for more transparency. There's a lot of effort right now to have the sheriff and all cooperation with ICE. Add the hotline number to your phone as a contact so you can call it quickly if you see anything. Follow us on Instagram at Multicultural Marin. That's where we let everybody know about alerts and updates. I brought some cards for the Rapid Response Network. They're on the table over there. Please take one. Share our website and then obviously donate. We love money. um, Next slide. The reason we ask for donations is we don't have all of our costs covered. Thank you. the vests, the money to put in someone's commissary account, The incidental expenses we cover are not covered by our funding, so we have to raise the money to cover that. And next slide, please. Our motto is poder no panico, that is power, not panic. Power is information. Power is solidarity. Power is community. Power is advocacy. All of that is power, and that's what we're hoping to build more of in Marin. And then last slide, and there's a little video. If you play that. |
| 00:46:07.36 | Unknown | Before you get into panic for an ICE report, listen to this. The rapid response of Marin is a community network that protects and supports immigrants in Marin. When there are ICE reports, our team verifies the information and responds responsibly. Our goal is to keep our community safe and informed. If you see a suspicious activity, don't spend time. Call our line 415-991-4545 because the correct information will protect our community. |
| 00:46:38.93 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:46:41.42 | Steven Woodside | Thank you very much. |
| 00:46:42.46 | Melissa Blaustein | Big round of applause. Yeah. |
| 00:46:47.41 | Steven Woodside | Go ahead. |
| 00:46:48.20 | Melissa Blaustein | I'm so thrilled to have you with us tonight, Lisa. We're extremely lucky to have you be a member of our community who is really spearheading and leading this effort. And I just wanted to reiterate how important the work of Marin Rapid Response Network is and how easy it is to do all of the items that are listed. If you're a Sausalito business, it's not too late to participate tomorrow. And here on the dais, I just wanted to share on February 6th, the Board of Supervisors endorsed the statement from the elected county supervisors across the Bay Area. Thank you. Here on the dais, I just wanted to share on February 6th, the Board of Supervisors endorsed the statement from the elected county supervisors across the Bay Area, reaffirming their commitment to members of the community and to supporting our immigrant community. And as a starting point, I would like to see us sign on to that letter as well and to continue and commit to conversations with the Rapid Response Network to make sure that we're doing everything we can as a community to really support our most vulnerable during this really frightening time. And I'm just really grateful that we have Lisa. So if you guys are okay with it, I don't know if we could talk about that at future agenda items or if we can affirm it as part of this, but I would at least as a starting point, like to sign on to that and- |
| 00:47:48.32 | Steven Woodside | We praised it and we'll follow through. |
| 00:47:49.73 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. Right. |
| 00:47:50.25 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. I think others may want to make a brief comment. |
| 00:47:54.49 | Joan Cox | Yeah. I did wanted to endorse what you said about social media, because I received an inquiry from the Sausalito Women's Club members on Saturday. concerned that someone had observed a suspect being apprehended and thought it was ICE because they were in unmarked vehicles. I checked with the police chief who advised, no, it was not ICE. And so I was able to debunk that rumor for the people who inquired of me, but I was unable to find the post on next- I found it. Okay, good. In order to- you know, have it taken down. The rumors are damaging. They are. |
| 00:48:36.34 | Lisa Bennett | Yeah. |
| 00:48:37.31 | Joan Cox | And I also wanted to know, you know Darryl Nimoreau, Have you, so she's the executive director of Sausalito's Chamber of Commerce. Have you talked to her about doing a presentation? businesses, including restaurants in Sausalito, that are very concerned. |
| 00:48:54.14 | Lisa Bennett | Yes, I've started that conversation, but I'd like to complete it and do that presentation. Well, let me know if we can help you with that. |
| 00:48:59.61 | Joan Cox | and I help you with that. Yeah. |
| 00:49:01.76 | Lisa Bennett | Great, thank you. |
| 00:49:02.57 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 00:49:03.94 | Jill Hoffman | Thanks Lisa for coming and giving us this report and for all the work that you're doing here in Marin and for the update and the report. So as I understood it, there haven't been any ice raids here in Marin County. Is that what you said? And you're. No. |
| 00:49:15.18 | Lisa Bennett | No, not in a couple of years. A raid is defined in rapid response world as 10 or more people arrested in a county in a day or one worksite raid. And we haven't had that. Okay, thank you. |
| 00:49:26.82 | Jill Hoffman | And I appreciate everything you're doing and for... Um, volunteer observer spalter back there in the back so thank you for your your ongoing volunteer work in our community. And I was wondering if you wanted to, I wrote down the phone number, but I wonder if you want, we wanted to flash it back up again. |
| 00:49:42.18 | Joe Farns | Mm-hmm. |
| 00:49:44.27 | Jill Hoffman | It may be included in one of our reports. I wrote it down as 415-991-4545. That's it. Okay. Put it in my contacts. So anyway, thank you for that. Thank you for coming. I appreciate that. Thank you. |
| 00:49:50.75 | Lisa Bennett | That's it. |
| 00:49:57.81 | Steven Woodside | I'm just going to thank Chris and thank you for the presentation. It's much appreciated. I received about a week ago a request from the Conference of Mayors with a one day deadline to take a look at an amicus brief. That's a friend of the court brief that was being filed. on behalf of a group based here on the West Coast, but it was supporting the city of Minneapolis in the case pending in the Supreme Court. And I just want to... read just one sentence from the brief. It's the authority of local governments to make their own policy choices about the health and safety of their communities is a fundamental feature of our constitutional system. I feel strongly about that. I've practiced in that area before, and I think it took me about 30 seconds after reading the brief to sign on as an individual, etc. But I think it's important for those of us in the local community to be communicating with one another, to understand what's going on, and to keep the peace. Our police chief is here, well aware of what it takes to keep the peace in our community, and we want to stand up for our community in that process. So thank you very much. Thanks to all of you. |
| 00:51:22.76 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. Awesome, thank you. |
| 00:51:24.48 | Steven Woodside | Okay. |
| 00:51:24.85 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:51:24.86 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 00:51:24.97 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you for coming. |
| 00:51:32.04 | Steven Woodside | So now is a time when we take public communications for matters that are not on tonight's agenda, which means we can... we can |
| 00:51:45.11 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:51:45.71 | Steven Woodside | Wrong ones, okay. |
| 00:51:47.93 | Unknown | by ladies and gentlemen. |
| 00:51:48.84 | Steven Woodside | Okay. |
| 00:51:52.89 | Steven Woodside | So just to make sure everyone's clear, we can listen to you. It's your chance to provide some information to us, but because it's not on the agenda and out of fairness to others who might wish to be heard on the same topic, we can simply listen and perhaps direct you to a future date or to someone on the staff, but we're not able to have a discussion. So having said that, I do have a I believe it's just two speaker cards. I'm going to call first Curtis Cavill. |
| 00:52:33.09 | Steven Woodside | Curtis was hiding. |
| 00:52:37.85 | Curtis Cavill | Good evening, City Council. I want to start by saying I'm sorry, and I apologize for missing the special hearing on Thursday, February 12th. Thank you. In reviewing the agenda, I was encouraged to your counsel is exploring how to modify overly restrictive land uses here in Sausalito, particularly with respect to the waterfront and the working waterfront. especially encouraged that you're re-examining the ramifications of ordinance 1022 Um, 10 20 to use a textbook example of why ballot box zoning also known as a voter initiative, is so harmful. In this instance, 1020 to prevents elected officials, public servants, and members of the committee from considering alternatives that might be better for the community. that we're going to be able to The preamble to 1020 states a couple of things, but to you, I wanted to highlight It's designed to reduce permissible density in the commercial industrial areas. And it also states that there should be no conversion or change and uses that may be permitted when the conversion or change will result in increased commercial usage or density. So in essence, what this ordinance has done is strangled the waterfront. There's no opportunity for diversification, for revitalization, because we simply can't do anything. The conversation is being initiated. is really in response to increasing interest from the working waterfront. to be able to enable our citizens to work with the city and other community groups to modify, diversify, and revitalize the waterfront. It's not a conversation we should be afraid of. It's a conversation that we should dive into. And I appreciate your leadership on this matter. And we're here to continue supporting that conversation. Um, you know, and looking at the agenda and, I appreciate the fact that it contains points about careful analysis, robust public engagement, I, along with others, look forward to the conversation. Thank you. |
| 00:54:42.17 | Steven Woodside | Thank you very much. Um, d is the next speaker. |
| 00:54:50.89 | Unknown | I don't think |
| 00:54:52.97 | Steven Woodside | When we hear the presentation, special presentations, we don't have public comment. They're just one-way presentations. The last item being the one about ICE. |
| 00:55:07.14 | Joan Cox | Yeah, you can do it now. |
| 00:55:09.62 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, you're free to speak now. |
| 00:55:15.16 | Unknown | I, turn. |
| 00:55:23.63 | Steven Woodside | Go ahead. Go ahead. Sure. |
| 00:55:28.46 | Unknown | I want to thank you. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:55:30.43 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. do too. So comment on the presentations and then comment on it. |
| 00:55:36.71 | Unknown | you |
| 00:55:36.78 | Unknown | He said go ahead, so I'll see you on the screen. |
| 00:55:39.73 | Steven Woodside | address what I'm doing. |
| 00:55:40.94 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:55:41.05 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:55:41.13 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah, no, you should. |
| 00:55:41.80 | Unknown | Yeah. Thank you. |
| 00:55:47.78 | Unknown | Yes. for the Council, just one copy. The last page is very important. So this is on presentations. Of course, they all were here, but they left. regarding the policemen. I want to congratulate the new officers being a part of the community. here in Southern Marin, it's all city, Northern Marin City. The last page I circled something. Thank you. Um, Regarding, I wanted to address them. peacefully and tell them not to engage. It was interesting having Nick White here and Stacey Gregory when she's gone. They have harassed me. Ah. A few times. Miss Gregory has. Nick White also. So seeing them here, with all this was interesting, but my point is, uh, I gave you something regarding a lawsuit in THE EAST BAY. It pertains to policing. and housing. That's a lawsuit that was filed recently in Piedmont, When 1924, a black family moved into Piedmont, they were, the KKK and the city and white folks just basically the Kicked them out of town. They owned a home. They said, you gotta go, we're gonna kill you. 1920s. And... With that, it's in Piedmont, California. And with that, the chief of police in Piedmont was a, No. Ku Klux Klan. Top commander. It's reported. So I asked the city of Sausalito, as you continue your numbers, your RIPA data, I have 32 plus years of data myself. That's someone I know pulled from the county that pertains every department in Marin. including Saucelito, Do you... continue to push inequities and racism on people. Are your police members a part of the Ku Klux Klan, the way you operate and have been operating? what I want to say. I don't expect any feedback, but That's important. And, Saucedo is one hell of a town. |
| 00:58:03.17 | Steven Woodside | Okay, thank you. I THINK I'M GOING TO BE Matters not on the agenda. I have Tim Rogers. |
| 00:58:24.48 | Tim Rogers | Thanks, guys. I'm going to go ahead and read this one. I typically don't read, but it's a letter, and I send it to all of you as well, so you'll have it in your inbox. Um, Good evening, Mr. Mayor and council members. Thank you. I'd like to begin by referencing the language from ordinance number 1022, which amended title 10 of the Sausaludal municipal code. It was adopted on the 4th of June, 1985. In its findings and purpose, the ordinance states that its goals are to reduce traffic, Preserve maritime character, protect property rights, and ensure orderly development that does not harm public health or welfare. Those goals are sound, but the framework used to achieve them, particularly as it applies to the marine ship and our working waterfront in the mid 1980s, is no longer aligned with today's realities zoning ordinance 1022 is written at a time when the marine ship was more uniformly industrial and when the economics the marine trades were quite different Today, the MarinShip is a complex ecosystem, boatyards, fishermen, marine service businesses, artists, small manufacturers, and legacy operators with many sharing limited aging and in some cases unsafe infrastructure under growing economic pressure. In practice, this ordinance has become antiquated in the marinship because it restricts the dapurism. reused in functional density rather than supporting the evolution of working waterfront uses It limits the ability of marine businesses to modernize facilities, add workforce supporting space, or invest in resilience, even when those investments would strengthen maritime activity rather than replace it. Ironically rules intended to preserve maritime character now risk undermining it when zoning makes reinvestment difficult the result is disinvestment. When flexibility is removed the only uses that pencil out or the highest rent least maritime uses exactly the opposite of the ordinance is stated purpose. Marinship does not need to be frozen in time to remain a working waterfront and needs zoning that recognizes the economic realities of modern marine trades, the need for workforce adjacent uses and the importance of keeping maritime businesses viable, not merely permitted on paper. |
| 01:00:31.77 | Steven Woodside | Thank you, Mr. Rogers. I take it you have a little more to add, and we'll take a look at what you submitted to us in writing. Next speaker, our last speaker card for the items not on the agenda, Carlito Berg. You may come back up after Mr. Berg, sure. |
| 01:00:56.35 | Carlito Berg | Hello, I wasn't going to say anything, but Curtis and Tim inspired me here. So just really briefly, A lot of folks on council talk about the financial state of the city. And the financial state of the city is determined by a great many things. You could say unfunded pension liabilities are totally dependent on interest rates. Nobody knows what those will be. You could sort of say between $5 and $30. You could say $100 million of deferred infrastructure. You could say $100 to $200 for sea level rise. All of these things require business to pay for them. And if business doesn't pay for them over the long term, then residents pay for them. But they have to get paid for somehow. So to me, the question, especially to those of you who are more concerned about the financial well-being for the city over the long term, is we have a sort of odd bug in the way that you folks are elected, where you have problems that are going to take many decades to fix that greatly exceed the timeline of your tenure. And so if we begin to address those problems all the time, as we've seen in the California state budget, a lot of West Coast budgets, the state of Washington, Oregon, where, you know, for instance, just as an interesting thing, up 70-plus percent since 2019 for the California state budget, we just will never get to an area that's sustainable ever. especially not within your guys' tenure. And so for me, a really important thing to think about is what are the economic uses that work in harmony with what's existing and that also can pay for all of the needed infrastructure and all of the things that the city and all its people need? Because if we don't do that, then Residents pay for it. Thank you. |
| 01:03:00.39 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. D. matter not on the agenda. |
| 01:03:10.91 | Unknown | As I stated, it was interesting seeing Gregory, Captain Gregory and why it's also interesting seeing Mr. Havel here too, who I watched, uh, I watched. throw people's lifelong belongings. into a big trash bin, crushed. This is what Sausalito has been about. destroying people's lives, destroying dreams. and the I watched it, saw it, videoed. Camera. Got him on camera. Scary. So. what I'm getting at. you know, As we talk about these things, nothing will change. lawsuits are brought before you. That's it. As we as I say this, I ask you, are you going to bring the school district here to talk about this, the community paying twice for a before he failed. The bond was passed in Salt-Sea-N-Marin City. Who loses out? Marin City. They want to have another bond. Where is she? How about inviting Marin Housing Authority to talk about residents of the school district? Ah. moving out of the community, whether they're able to move back, they should be here presenting to you their plan. What are they doing? They haven't been here. They don't give a shit. Excuse my language. You don't care. The least you can do is pretend to care. Have him come here, present to you their plan. People are moving out for construction purposes. Will they move back in? or is the plan to get rid of all black and brown folk and you have a new campus here for white people. |
| 01:05:03.47 | Unknown | At least pretend. Have MHA come here and present, have the school district come here and present for the community. |
| 01:05:10.66 | Unknown | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 01:05:12.01 | Joan Cox | Mr. Mayor, I'll just note, we don't have jurisdiction over the school district, and we don't have jurisdiction over Marin City, although we've often offered to collaborate, but we don't have jurisdiction over the school district. regarding those matters as much |
| 01:05:28.53 | Unknown | you |
| 01:05:28.73 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:05:31.97 | Unknown | We don't know. Thank you. |
| 01:05:33.81 | Steven Woodside | Okay, are there any other speakers, Mr. Clerk? |
| 01:05:36.82 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, we have some people online. We have iPhone SE second generation. their hand up. |
| 01:05:46.16 | Eva Crisanti | Hello, yeah, this is Eva Crisanti, and I'd like to point out that I believe you violated the Brown Act. You are required to take comment on each numbered item. and the presentations, even though you mashed it into one item, You were still required to take comment on that, so I would like to I ask that my time be restored for pointing this out and I will need to comment on that and then I have a non-agenda. public comment. I do wanna point out that the presentation was a little deceptive. because nobody pointed out the elephant in the room. You just appointed three new police officers But despite the vice mayor's performative words about how much they care about you know, the community and doing the right thing and, and some measure of autonomy within the community. not one of you required any of those police officers to state whether they were willing to arrest any ICE agents who violated the law. Let me tell you why that's important. Because there's a president of the board of supervisors in Santa Clara County who himself is an immigrant. who was able to say, that if ICE agents violated the law when they came into Santa Clara they would be arrested. by the county sheriff deputies and by local police. That's really important because you're setting the bar so low. You've got Lisa Bennett coming in here with her, like save your package of whistles, and you're going to become a legal observer. Well, what good does it do? masked thugs are coming into the community and violating the law. you are obliged to take action. And that is what you are specifically refusing to do. So when Mayor Woodside brings up this amicus brief, and talks about the one line that really moved him. It's performative. And people should be able to identify it. uh, I'd also like to point out that with the amount of Israeli spyware that ISIS |
| 01:07:58.20 | Walfred Solorzano | No. All right. Bye. Next speaker is Michael Dumont. |
| 01:08:07.24 | Michael Dumont | Are you able to hear me? |
| 01:08:08.76 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 01:08:08.79 | Michael Dumont | Yes. Good evening, Mayor and Council members. My name is Michael Dumont and I'm speaking as the Board President of the Sausalito Community Boating Center at Cass Kidley Marina. I'm here tonight to share another update about our organization and let you know that we've shared a proposal via email with council members and the city manager earlier this afternoon to renew and update our lease with the city of Sausalito. 2025 was a milestone year for us. We finished the dock construction, officially opened the full facility for public access as part of the SF Bay Area Water Trail, and launched our first sailing and rowing classes in partnership with Parks and Recreation. Since opening, the dock has seen near daily public use. Our sailing classes sold out. We logged over 3,000 volunteer hours, and we're now approaching $1 million of investment into city waterfront infrastructure, all raised through community donations, fundraising, grants, and significant in-kind professional services. That averages to about $6,000 invested per month over the life of our lease so far. We're now moving into our next phase. In 2026, we're planning to expand our partnership with parks and recreation to include youth sailing programs, summer camps, expanded adult sailing lessons, community boating days, and small boat rentals. We will be offering youth sailing camps in August, supported by a grant recently received from the county of Marin. To responsibly grow and continue investing in the marina, we're requesting renewal of our lease under the same successful framework we operate under today. Revenue sharing with the city while we continue to shoulder the responsibility for capital improvements and maintenance at the marina. A longer-term lease will also help us responsibly pursue additional grants and funding that require long-term site stability. We're looking forward to working with the city on finalizing this agreement and we'd also like to invite you all to attend our 13th annual hearing festival on March 7 at the IDAS Hall on Caledonia street at 5pm Thank you for your time this evening. |
| 01:09:58.02 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Any other comments? |
| 01:10:00.45 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, we have Babette McDougall. |
| 01:10:06.82 | Babette McDougall | Good evening and thank you for acknowledging me. So first of all, I want to just say that it's really wonderful to see the flexibility exercised by the mayor and the council. To allow like the same citizen to speak twice under the same under the. the identical speaking item, in this case, public comment. So, That's really great that you're willing to be flexible, be flexible on time, be flexible on the number of times one may approach the microphone for any given item. But really, the best thing to do, as you can see, the town is coming back to its governance, and we really need to readopt Robert's rules of order, because Rosenberg deliberately omits the citizen voice. And why wouldn't we want a vigorous discussion? Why wouldn't we? Just look at what's coming up now just through your public comment phase. I mean, everybody's got something juicy to say, and every bit of it relates to the economic and mental, emotional vitality, physical vitality of this community. So with that, I yield back the balance of my time. Thank you very much for all that you do. Please reinstate Robert's Rules of Order. Thank you. |
| 01:11:16.88 | Steven Woodside | Mr. Clerk, are there any other comments online? No further public speakers. And no one else in the room right now. So we'll move on to our first public hearing item. The same calendar? Pardon? Consent. Oh, I'm sorry. Thank you. I'm ahead of myself. Yes, we do have a consent calendar tonight. Items 3A through E. I am just looking... |
| 01:11:31.09 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Yes. |
| 01:11:42.43 | Steven Woodside | Uh, I have a conflict on item 3E. So I will not participate on item 3E. |
| 01:11:55.80 | Melissa Blaustein | So I move to approve the consent calendar items 3A through 3D, and then we'll take a separate vote for 3E, Mr. Mayor. |
| 01:12:04.01 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:12:05.82 | Melissa Blaustein | But we have to take public comment on the consent vendor first. |
| 01:12:08.59 | Steven Woodside | And just by way of explanation, the project on item 3E is fairly near to my home, and that's the nature of the conflict. Thank you. |
| 01:12:21.97 | Steven Woodside | So public comment on items 3A through D. Seeing none, Mr. Clerk. |
| 01:12:29.38 | Walfred Solorzano | We have somebody online. |
| 01:12:34.93 | Eva Crisanti | Thank you. Can you hear me? |
| 01:12:36.89 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes. |
| 01:12:37.75 | Eva Crisanti | Okay, great. I am looking at the, um, item see um certain computer equipment surplus and authorizing its disposition. I'd just like to point out that the surplus inventory list is very vague. And given the lawsuits that have recently been filed regarding tech equipment, more on the software side, more on the app side. that has come up because of ice activity but also law enforcement using Israeli spyware, Israeli surveillance equipment, I think it's important that whenever you guys do a surplus inventory list of anything related to technology, you should be explicit in what what companies you're using. Because what we're finding is that You know, you had this presentation earlier about Um, what to do if ICE shows up. Well, and should law enforcement cooperate with ICE take money to cooperate with ICE or so on and so forth. The reality is with the Israeli spyware between the Paragon graphite system and you know, the cobweb system, basically, it's not necessary for ICE to have the cooperation of local law enforcement for records. They can simply hack everyone's phone now. It's not even one tap. They can go right in. You don't have to accidentally open a file. These are programs that our government has spent millions of dollars on to provide ICE with. And you know that if they're going to provide that to ICE, local law enforcement will also want it, which means that you really have It's game over. You have no privacy. You have |
| 01:14:38.05 | Steven Woodside | All right, no further public speakers. So there's a motion on 3A through D. |
| 01:14:45.86 | Joan Cox | I'll second the motion. |
| 01:14:47.16 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Do we need a roll call? |
| 01:14:49.98 | Joan Cox | No. |
| 01:14:50.72 | Steven Woodside | Okay. All those in favor? Bye. And no opposed. Motion carries. Thank you. |
| 01:14:56.59 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 01:14:56.61 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:14:56.63 | Joan Cox | 0 since you you |
| 01:14:58.60 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:14:58.62 | Melissa Blaustein | THE FEDERAL. |
| 01:14:58.72 | Joan Cox | That's fine. |
| 01:14:58.89 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:14:58.92 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 01:14:58.94 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:14:58.97 | Melissa Blaustein | Bye. |
| 01:14:59.01 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:14:59.02 | Joan Cox | That's five zero. |
| 01:14:59.26 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:14:59.29 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 01:14:59.35 | Steven Woodside | 5-0. |
| 01:15:00.05 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. So, |
| 01:15:00.41 | Joan Cox | And, |
| 01:15:00.63 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:15:00.64 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 01:15:00.86 | Steven Woodside | Now 3E. |
| 01:15:02.80 | Joan Cox | I move approval of consent item 3E. |
| 01:15:04.96 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 01:15:05.32 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 01:15:05.45 | Melissa Blaustein | Second. Okay. All in favor of approving consent item 3E. Aye. That's 4-0 with 1 abstention or recusal from Mayor Woodside. |
| 01:15:17.64 | Steven Woodside | Thank you very much. So now we finally, sorry to get ahead of myself earlier, but we have the item 4A, which is the introduction and title only in waiver of the first reading of ordinance number 03-2026, which is an ordinance regarding formula retail. |
| 01:15:47.12 | Brandon Phipps | You may proceed. Good evening, mayor, members of the council. Um, All right. So as you'll see right here, this has a project ID from 2024. So just want to remind the council, we've kind of been kicking this around for a little while here. It's been in front of this group twice before. And so I'm just going to kind of run through, you know, what the current ordinance is, what are some of the issues with that, and then some of the history of planning commission and city council before talking about the proposed amendments before you today. So next slide, please. |
| 01:16:23.33 | Brandon Phipps | So the request already stated by the mayor, introduced and read by title only, and waived first reading of ordinance number 03-2026, an ordinance of the city council, the city of Sausalito, amending 1044-240 formula retail, as well as table 1024-1, our land uses and commercial districts, and chapter 1024-040, which is the special requirements for our commercial districts of title 10, the Sausalito municipal code. Next slide, please. So the current formula retail ordinance was adopted in 2003 and amended in 2007. It currently requires a conditional use permit or a CUP to establish a formula resale use in the city with additional specific findings beyond those required by the conditional use permit on its own. It also requires a CUP for expansion of a formula retail establishment of 500 square feet or more. It currently allows for formula retail uses to locate in the central commercial, the shopping center, and the neighborhood commercial zoning districts with the issuance of a CUP. The definition of formula retail is also not clearly defined in our existing ordinance and does not provide a set number of location or standardized elements that constitute formula retail business. Next slide, please. So what are some of the issues with this? Well, first of all, there's a CUP requirement. So a conditional use permit must run with the land. It cannot be establishment specific. So a good use of a conditional permit, a use permit, for example, would be for a restaurant or a bar or something of that nature, a specific type of land use that can run with the land to the subsequent purchaser. However, a conditional use permit is not great for regulating a user, such as a McDonald's or a Target or something of that nature. Right now, we are using the conditional use permit to regulate a user. That also occurred in Malibu with their Measure R, which lost in court. And the conditional use permit as well is something that has a number of subjective findings that are typically attached to it. It makes them easier to deny. So that's one of the issues with the current ordinance. Another one, as mentioned already, is that we're not clearly defining formula retail in our code right now. Kind of, we have a, you know, a current definition could apply to all businesses in the city with a logo sign or trademark and really any business with more than one location could be considered formula retail the way that the ordinance is currently written. The current ordinance also increases risk to the city per city attorney violates that recent court ruling that we discussed above Malibu are not measured. There are it's also too vague to properly enforce given the issues with the what the definition is, and also could be understood to discriminate against interstate commerce commerce next slide please. So a little bit of background on this. I'm just going to kind of cover it from the beginning all the way into present day and just go through the different kind of iterations the ordinance has taken. And I think a lot of this work has gotten us to a really good place today. And I think the amendments before you today will show that work. So it was first heard 2024, September 25th. The key amendments, first of all, included redefining formula retail business. So at that time, we chose it to be a threshold of six would be what is formula retail. More than six locations worldwide would qualify as formula retail under that version of the ordinance. That version of the ordinance also removed the CUP requirement and required the issuance of a formula retail zoning clearance that would allow for a certain number of formula retail establish establishments per zoning district that hearing was continued by the Planning Commission they had additional requests for information they wanted to know a little bit more about how that formula retail zoning clearance process would work how those would be issued tracked and recorded as well as who on staff would would issue those so we had a second hearing in front of the planning Commission on this ordinance January 15 2025. All those questions were answered to their satisfaction won't go into the details of all that right now because they've all kind of been rendered as moot points but that ordinance was adopted on a 5 o planning Commission vote next slide please. So following that, the ordinance came to council for the first time April 1st, 2025. Upon introduction, the ordinance was approved by a 401 vote with the following modifications, which included some textual changes to what the standardized elements comprised, as well as requiring that the Planning Commission, rather than a member of staff, issue the formula retail clearance, regardless of the fact that there would be no CUP. It would be more of a kind of a ministerial act, but carried forward to the Planning Commission in that way of just having it done in a public setting. It would also modify the zoning clearance table as follows. So as mentioned, this was kind of the previous iteration of how we were going to have formula retail go forward. So this was the table that was approved at that hearing with different allocations of different amounts of establishments per zoning district, depending on the size of the zoning district and its commercial nature. Next slide, please. So that was the first reading. Typically on a second reading, when an ordinance is approved, it comes back just as a consent item. However, there was definitely some concern in the community, among the council as well, about what the impacts of this ordinance might have on our commercial zones. So at this hearing, the second reading was brought back actually as a business item and heard by the council at that time. Staff presented some different alternatives, including how we could potentially redefine formula retail ordinance. Some of the options that staff gave at that meeting were, maybe the definition is 10, 15, 25, 30, 50, 100. Council really liked the number 50. So that was what we were directed to do when this was remanded back to the planning commission, that it would be 50 plus locations in California and not worldwide. So the first iteration, we had six worldwide, now 50-plus in California. So raising the bar quite a bit to what would be considered formula retail. We were also directed to work with the council working group comprised of council members Hoffman and Sobieski to decide which zoning district we would be able to permit formula retail by right. Working with that working group, we came up with the shopping center district, which is a single parcel, but it is a zoning district. It's where Molly Stone's currently located. Next slide, please. So these are the proposed amendments in front of you today. Got a little bit of the background history lesson, and this is what we're looking at today. So we want to clearly define formula retail. So in the ordinance in front of you, we have a business with 50 or more locations in California. So anything below that threshold would not qualify as a formula retail establishment. Anything above that threshold would qualify as a formula retail establishment. Certain uses are exempt. This also carries over the grocery store, pharmacy, banks, medical, real estate, service stations, movie theaters, and couriers would never count as formula retail. We have removed that CUP requirement due to the problematic nature of that and the conditioning of the user rather than the use. We will be permitting, or the amendment in front of you today will be permitting formula retail in one zoning district, which is the shopping center zoning district. And that would be a buy right permittal, so no CUP required. And then we'd also amend the use table accordingly. And we're also adding a prohibition of any fast food drive-thrus in our special requirements section. So that's that 1024. All of these amendments were approved by the Planning Commission at their hearing on January 28th, 2025, or excuse me, 2026, that should read. And they only had some minor textual adjustments to some of the language in that. Next slide, please. So just a little bit of a quick little map here just to show you our commercial zoning districts outlined in red, and then the one zoning district where we will be allowing formula retail by right, and that is the shopping center or SC zoning district in green there. Next slide, please. So. Just a couple examples of a few businesses that would not qualify as former retail because they fall below that threshold of 50 locations in California. Got some different retail clothing stores, Marine Layer, Faraday, Household Goods, Hudson Grace, Serena Lilly, additional clothing, Anthropologie. Believe it or not, Louis Vuitton only has 22 locations in California. Aloe as well only has about 30. Equinox about 35, the gym. Anthropologie also around 35. So, you know, there's quite a few businesses that fall below this threshold that would now no longer be considered formula retail. However, of course, certain uses such as restaurants, for example, if a GATS wanted to locate in the CR district, they still would need a CUP. So next slide, please. So any of the, any of those discretionary use permits that are required for certain land uses to locate in certain zones would still carry over to these. It's not like they get a free pass or anything. They would still have to go through the processes depending on what the use type is. However, the, the bar, of course, for what a formula retail establishment is becomes much higher. So next slide, please. So staff recommends that the council adopt the ordinance in front of them today with all the amendments you see there. Staff believes that the new ordinance is simple, streamlined, and objective, allows for more diverse businesses to locate in the city. It should help fill some of these difficult, stubborn vacancies we've seen downtown and improve the economic vitality of our commercial districts. It also complies with applicable case law and reduces risk to the city. And I think some of the other options council's been looking at in the priority sessions, such as vacancy tax, reducing business tax, this is another thing that we can look at and something we could do right now to help some of those vacancies we're experiencing. So that concludes my presentation and happy to answer any questions the council may have. Thank you. |
| 01:25:59.09 | Steven Woodside | So it's time for questions, and then we'll hear from the public, and then we'll have discussion. So Ms. Hoffman. |
| 01:26:05.22 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, Matthew. That was a great summary. Very fast. |
| 01:26:08.05 | Brandon Phipps | Thank you. |
| 01:26:10.04 | Jill Hoffman | But one thing that you didn't talk about was the collapse of the, the individual commercial neighborhood districts. And so one of the things that the council talked about specifically at the April 1st meeting, I'm sorry. that we, one of the proposals at the April 1st, 2025 meeting was collapsing the commercial neighborhood districts into one CN district. And there's three. Could you bring up the commercial neighborhood slide that you had? Yeah. |
| 01:26:38.12 | Brandon Phipps | Would you like the map? |
| 01:26:38.88 | Jill Hoffman | The whole map, yeah, it makes it easier. So that everybody can see that there's actually three commercial neighborhood districts, it's a little bit confusing because there's three, actually three commercial neighborhood districts, but there's two CN designations. Correct. And so on page five of the staff report, there's a, there's a little, um, chart and people may recall that at the April 1st meeting, We talked specifically at the council level about that, and we had several members of the community come down here specifically from those neighborhoods actually and beyond. And talk about that. So If you can show on your cursor this 2C in two neighborhoods, And those are uh this we have i think we have one c and two Remind me. |
| 01:27:23.82 | Brandon Phipps | Remind me. The N2's here. The N2 is here. |
| 01:27:25.62 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, that's that's. |
| 01:27:26.67 | Brandon Phipps | CM1 and CM1. |
| 01:27:28.27 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, so we have CN1 is Golden Gate Market and 7-Eleven neighborhood. And the CN2 is Tommy's walk neighborhood. And so those are the scene at the commercial neighborhood. Um, districts. And those are specifically where very small districts you know, two, basically two blocks long. And that was a conversation we had on April 1st. And we decided as a council after taking community input that we were gonna leave the three C and two districts as is, and we were gonna sprinkle the five uh the five uh permits um the five formula retail permits amongst those three uh specifically amongst those three um zones, those three commercial zones. We did that for very specific reasons after probably a 30 or 45 minute conversation. here at this council. And that was a direction to the planning commission. And so I was disheartened when I saw that the report came back to us. the opposite that the planning commission took an opposite opposite tack on that and collapsed The CN into one CN district. So now the CN districts have disappeared and the five that we're going to be again collapsed. Have I got that wrong? |
| 01:28:49.00 | Brandon Phipps | Yeah. So there are no more zoning clearances. The formula retail zoning clearance is gone. So... The collapse, it's all just a moot point. I just kind of had all that up there to kind of reiterate the path this has taken to get there. So right now it's either you qualify as Formula Retail 50 plus in California, you can locate in one place. You below that, you can locate accordingly, depending on... on your use type in the different commercial zones, some other. |
| 01:29:17.51 | Jill Hoffman | So I look for the record that's hailing again here in Sausalito and there's noise in our skylight. Thank you. |
| 01:29:22.67 | Steven Woodside | Let's take a pause so everyone can hear. We've got Hale. |
| 01:29:30.16 | Unknown | Wow. |
| 01:29:32.36 | Steven Woodside | We're going to take a five-minute break. |
| 01:29:34.77 | Unknown | I'm sorry. |
| 01:29:38.24 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:29:38.26 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 01:29:42.84 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:29:42.85 | Brandon Phipps | Thank you. |
| 01:29:42.89 | Steven Woodside | it is. |
| 01:29:43.04 | Brandon Phipps | Yep. All right. Okay. Well, welcome back everyone after our brief weather delay. So, Councilmember Hoffman, did you want to continue on with your question? |
| 01:29:54.56 | Jill Hoffman | I'll just confess that we did have a short follow-up question in the hallway during the hailstorm. And so, and Matthew, could you explain what you explained to me? Yes. No. |
| 01:30:05.38 | Brandon Phipps | Yes. No, just to clarify, the older formula retail zoning clearance table that we brought before the council to begin with has now been done away with, and it's more of a binary exercise. So if you have 50 or more locations in California, you will qualify as formula retail, and you will only be allowed to locate in the shopping center district by right. If you have 50 or below, you will not qualify as formula retail, and you'll be able to locate in the city's commercial zones accordingly. Depending on the use type, you may still need a discretionary permit of some kind, an MUP, a CUP, but you will be able to locate in the commercial zones without any additional formula retail zoning clearance or anything of that nature, so. Sure. |
| 01:30:46.69 | Jill Hoffman | What's an example of a use that would still need a CUP? |
| 01:30:51.16 | Brandon Phipps | So for example, a restaurant use in the CR still requires a CUP. Um, that's an basic example there. I mean, a lot of stuff's more permitted in the CC, for example, there's a lot more permitted uses that don't require a CEP in the CW certain things require a CEP that are permitted in the CC. So it just really depends on, you know, the land use that you're looking at. |
| 01:31:12.31 | Jill Hoffman | you |
| 01:31:12.32 | Lisa Bennett | Okay. Thank you. |
| 01:31:15.18 | Steven Woodside | Other questions from the dais? Thank you. So members of the public, would you like to comment before we bring it back for discussion and action? |
| 01:31:27.26 | Steven Woodside | See you next time. |
| 01:31:28.84 | Walfred Solorzano | Carlito. |
| 01:31:31.39 | Steven Woodside | Mr. Berg, I have a card from before, but I recognize you. |
| 01:31:36.74 | Carlito Berg | Nice to be recognized. This is actually what I came here to comment on this evening. Like we talked about earlier today at the State of the City, for those of you who saw it or were able to attend, the thing that businesses need in town is certainty and clarity of process and ease of process. And this does that. For too long, formula retail and the ordinance in general has been something that people have twisted themselves into ridiculous contortions to get around. You all know all of the stories. And in general, it's made Sausalito have a perception, especially among retail brokers, as an unfriendly place to be. I really, really urge you to take a look at this, pass it. It makes good sense. The chamber supports it. I support it. I don't know anyone that doesn't support it. Thank you very much for your consideration. Thank you. |
| 01:32:31.10 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:32:32.07 | Walfred Solorzano | comments? Yeah, we do have one. We do have one more, but I just want to confirm that we did open the public hearing at the very beginning. officially or we can do that now. We did not just for... |
| 01:32:41.22 | Steven Woodside | Absolutely. |
| 01:32:45.41 | Steven Woodside | I do believe I said it was a public hearing item, but maybe I didn't use the word open, but it is open. OK, thank you. Well, yeah, we open it. |
| 01:32:47.70 | Walfred Solorzano | Might have. |
| 01:32:53.73 | Walfred Solorzano | you All right, so next speaker we have is Adrian Brinton. |
| 01:33:02.69 | Adrian Brinton | Hi, good evening, Mayor and City Council. Thanks for taking my comments. I think it's great that we're doing this item and moving this forward. I wish this was a magic bullet that we could kind of point at our bacon storefronts and how to fix the problem. It's not. It's one big step along the way, and it's one piece of the puzzle. We've done so much work in the last couple of years with the Business Improvement District, with the SCA, with trying to make, Sausalito a little more friendly, a little easier to do business in. And this is another step in that direction. You know, there was talk last week about the February 12th meeting about property taxes You know, property taxes won't fix everything. And you know, that's right too. No one thing is gonna fix everything for us, unfortunately. with a series of small steps that we take is going to get us there in the end. And this is one of those steps. It's a great step that we're taking. I'm really glad to see it. Thank you so much. |
| 01:34:03.22 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Anyone? |
| 01:34:03.98 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, we have Justine. Thank you. |
| 01:34:10.34 | Justine | Yes, hi, City Council. Thank you so much for this initiative. I'll be brief, but I have Botnia Skincare, a local skincare manufacturing company in the Marin ship. And as I dream about expanding inside Sausalito, It would be so wonderful to have clarity around the process of commercial real estate and what's available for businesses like mine. I have found it to be challenging to figure out what districts are friendly to local businesses like mine if I was to expand into a storefront. Um, the. cost of renting downtown is astronomical. and not friendly to local businesses here And it does scare me a little bit to have formula retail takeover in certain areas of town, especially Molly Stones, where we have a delicate ecosystem of light-makes manufacturing businesses. And so I just want to say, you know, I think this is a good step forward to making an easier process for businesses, but I also just want to say you know, really building in clearer infrastructure for businesses like mine that want to expand within our community would be so greatly appreciated. Thank you so much for your time. And Matthew, thank you for your work. And I appreciate everything you all are doing. |
| 01:35:40.43 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay, next speaker is Babette McDougall. |
| 01:35:47.59 | Babette McDougall | So I thank you so much for recognizing me. I think this is such an important topic, and I wish we had a panacea to help correct our economic woes. I suppose many of you are not a stranger to Strawberry Plaza, you know, right up there where... The Safeway and some of the other businesses like U.S. Bank are located. And so the Strawberry Shopping Center has had a lot of attrition lately. I don't know if you've noticed the number of empty facilities there now. So this is something that we should be looking at very seriously. On the one hand, maybe it's because we are a destination for visitor traffic that we might be ideal for various types of considerations. The very formula retail that would never consider strawberry, but I think we should always sort of look within the region for a regional perspective, the demographic shopping profile for strawberry compared to Sausalito. And also the number of people, you know, so look at foot traffic per square foot. There's so much that we're not thinking about when we take into account Formula retail concepts. I'm really glad to see you guys relaxing. the whole thing about formula retail, it's a bit frightening. But I also have mentioned in the past, and I'll say it again, the local businesses that are organically grown from the inside out in the southern Marin community, Sausalito in particular, I don't know how they're going to stand up to competition that's been tested at the national level. I mean, it's an economy, it's a comparative advantage situation, really. And I just want to ask us to be mindful and realistic. We cannot think of pie in the sky reality because pie in the sky is not real. |
| 01:37:21.53 | Joe Farns | No. |
| 01:37:22.78 | Babette McDougall | But we do need to look at places like Strawberry, which we share a demographic profile with once again, and we need to ask what's going wrong there. that we might be able to do better here. Thank you so much. I yield back my time. |
| 01:37:38.95 | Walfred Solorzano | No, for the public speakers. |
| 01:37:44.03 | Steven Woodside | Please identify yourself for the record, Amy. Thank you. |
| 01:37:46.78 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:37:47.30 | Amy Stenberg | Amy Stenberg representing Poggio and Copita. I just want to add that as we've seen cultivar and the long process that has taken for cultivar to open, It took a lot of money. Thank you. And I love my small businesses, Sausalito, Soxolito, Hook House. But sometimes you need bigger funds to really take on these older buildings. I'm housed in one. Copita is a really old building, and it costs a lot of money to renovate and to upkeep. So sometimes small businesses don't have those funds. So I think it is totally fine as a business owner to expand and have other larger corporations come to Sausalito. So thank you for considering it. The business community does appreciate it and value it and thanks you for your time. |
| 01:38:34.04 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Seeing no further public comments, I'll bring it back to the dais and close the public hearing. Comments? Motions? |
| 01:38:48.05 | Ian Sobieski | Yeah, if I could just make a motion just to get open the discussion and. And it's just to do with the staff recommended. So it would be, uh, to go to the recommended action, which is to wave. I move that we wave the first reading of ordinance three. Dash 2026, an ordinance of the city council of the city of Sausalito amending chapter 10.44.240, formula retail, table 10.24-1, land uses and commercial districts, and chapter 10-24.040, special requirements of title 10 of the Sausalito Municipal Code. |
| 01:39:23.71 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:39:23.74 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 01:39:23.76 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:39:23.79 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 01:39:23.84 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:39:23.88 | Ian Sobieski | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 01:39:23.94 | Steven Woodside | THE END OF THE END OF THE |
| 01:39:24.11 | Ian Sobieski | THE END OF |
| 01:39:24.30 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:39:24.90 | Melissa Blaustein | Second. |
| 01:39:25.31 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. discussion. |
| 01:39:28.97 | Joan Cox | I want to thank council members Hoffman and Sobieski for investing the effort with our community, our assistant city manager to, and with Mr. Mandich to really dig into this and even though the Planning Commission ultimately sort of put aside the distinctions that you developed I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that I think this type of change requires. So I endorse the action of the planning commission to really just turn it into a binary process. um, We heard this morning at the State of the City address delivered by the mayor concerns about from businesses about the empty storefronts downtown. And I think removing a barrier to potential businesses is an important step in the right direction to address that. So I'm in favor of this. Thank you. |
| 01:40:32.62 | Ian Sobieski | I guess I'll just chime in then and just say, I obviously I support this measure. It's a very modest step to be clear. McDonald's is prohibited. All these big fast, all these chains are prohibited. The only place in Sausalito that formula retail is allowed is the currently and probably, you know, very stable, uh, supermarket location that council member Hoffman and I determined, uh, By law, there has to be one location in every city where such a thing is located. So this is the most restrictive. measure for very large chains, but by setting the limit where we have, and what the planning commission endorsed, we allow very boutique kind of names that feel of a character, with Sausalito into town, like the ones that Matthew showed things like, uh, Rothy Foot Rare, wear for instance, or Cotopaxi, the outdoor clothing line, Marine Lair or Viore, the, um, athletic clothing line. So, uh, you know, the biggest chain, the biggest chain, the biggest franchise in Sausalito is called vacant storefront. And they have numerous locations just here in town and thousands and hundreds in Marin County. So... Uh, you know, for now, I think doing this, uh, is one important step. in helping fill these empty storefronts, many of which, as Amy from Poggio underscored, require substantial capital investment to get up and running. So one of the great ways we can save the architectural integrity of our historic district and the vitality of our neighborhoods is to vote yes on this measure and move it forward. |
| 01:42:10.47 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 01:42:10.48 | Steven Woodside | Amen. |
| 01:42:10.89 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. I'm happy to go ahead after. I'm really thrilled and I appreciate so much the work of council members, Sobieski and Hoffman and staff to get this to where it is. As we saw, it was a number of meetings and a lot of discussion. And now we can finally embrace those when businesses like Rustic Bakery, for instance, approach us about the opportunity to be in our downtown. There is no longer an extensive to-do list in order to be permitted. So we're creating a really impressive, streamlining way to say Sausalito is a strong location to be doing business. And I'm really excited about exploring what types of businesses that might be. I serve as the city representative with assistant city manager Phipps to our PBIT. And one of the things we're always talking about is what kind of businesses do we want to see in the downtown? And with Alex Woe on EDAC, and also thanks to Monica Finnegan, we've kind of come up with a couple specifically, and Mayor Woodside has committed to meeting with me with businesses to say, we're available and open and we'd love to have you and what can we do to support you? And I think this is the first step in listening to the business community. And we've got more work to do, whether it's streamlining the permitting process or providing a tax holiday or thinking about other ways we might welcome and embrace new opportunities in our downtown. But this is a great first step. I'm really excited to see it come forward and I'm happy to vote in favor of it. |
| 01:42:44.64 | Joe Farns | THE FAMILY. |
| 01:43:36.26 | Steven Woodside | Ms. Hoffman. |
| 01:43:37.57 | Jill Hoffman | Yep. Well, I would say, you know, we've always viewed formula retail and Sausalito cautiously. And I think this is, This is an aggressive step for Sausalito. It may not seem like an aggressive step, but I think for Sausalito, it's an aggressive step forward. Um, and I'm. cautiously optimistic with it. One of the things that I think people are most concerned about is that we've done away with the ability of Sausalito and more probably of concern to the residents of Sausalito is the ability for the residents to weigh in because we live so closely, most of the residents live so closely to our commercial districts. And we're, especially in, well, in most of the neighborhood commercial districts, we are impacted so closely with the businesses that are steps away from people who have homes next to those businesses. And so. We liked the ability to weigh in and talk about those businesses and how they would impact us, but also how we could support those businesses. So, and what those business, what businesses would work well in our neighborhoods. And so I think that's the concern that most people felt with formula retail, along with Justine, who called in about concerns of, you know, of local businesses that who would be priced out by larger chains coming in and driving up the prices of the rents. We do have to deal obviously with the reality of sat on EDAC for a number of years, our economic development advisory committee and every meeting we have We have a report of the empty storefronts and what we're doing. going to attract businesses to come to Sausalito and it's tough. And I like that we're talking at the council level and we talk at every EDAC meeting and I know that the PBIT also talks about the businesses that we'd like to attract here. And we've talked about it during these conversations about formula retail, about our wish list of businesses, but getting those businesses to come here is quite another thing. And the thing that we've done away with is Now we have zero ability or very little ability to keep out businesses who we don't think are on brand for Sausalito. And that's the vulnerability that we now have. And so we'll see how this plays out and whether or not we need to do further adjustments as we go forward. If we feel we're moving in the wrong direction in our business community and we're pricing out or we're. We're, especially in certain districts, we're getting businesses that are negatively impacting our neighborhoods, or we're getting businesses that are not on brand for what we think Sausalito stands for. So we'll see how it plays out. But I'm cautiously optimistic. I'm glad we're taking a step forward. |
| 01:46:35.15 | Steven Woodside | I'm prepared to call the question and just say thank you to everyone and especially the planning commission that did us a great favor by streamlining and coming up with some simple solutions. and Mr. Mandich. Thank you. |
| 01:46:53.56 | Steven Woodside | Well, Roll call. Oh, no, we don't need a roll call. Nope, because we're all here. Oh, that's right. I'm sorry. All in favor. |
| 01:47:03.04 | Eva Crisanti | I. |
| 01:47:04.31 | Steven Woodside | That's unanimous, passes 5-0. Thank you very much. Okay, now we have a report from, I guess the city manager is going to take the lead on the audit report, and we do have the auditor independently available on video. Is that correct? Thank you. |
| 01:47:21.88 | Chris Zapata | Yes. Yes to both. So thank you, Mayor, members of the council, members of the public. I want to give you the cliff notes that I take from the audit process, which is extensive. And I want to begin by thanking and saying that our finance director, our new finance director, is ill. So she will not be with us tonight. She is under the weather in extreme ways. So we've worked on this together, and we've worked on it with the auditor and with the departments. And so we're going to present our information and then our auditor is going to present the audit that he has done independent of the city. So next slide, please. So I will give comment some flavor. Then I will introduce our auditor, who will then work through what he's done. And then in lieu of the finance director talking about the recommended steps, I will handle that this evening. Next slide, please. Understanding that a city audit provides an accounting of all city funds, restricted funds, general funds, grant funds, all funds. Knowing that the largest fund is the general fund, and I want to make sure that you understand the year. This is 24-25. If you recollect in 24-25, the reserve requirement for the general fund was 15%. So this audit reflects that. Next year, when you have your audit come through, you added another 10% to that for a 25% reserve requirement in a formal way. And although that was the practice of Sausalito, that wasn't a formal policy to get in place. And so next year you will see that 25% rather than what you see this year in this audit, which is a 24-25 audit, the 15%. Next slide, please. So under this old policy, what you see in this audit for the 24-25 audit is 15% of the general fund, which is $3,200,000 in change. And you see the big number, the unassigned general fund reserves at $19 million. And that reflects not just a general fund, but also Measure L money. It's about a 50-50% split. So this coming year, when you see your audit for this year, you will see the 25% amount, which we budgeted at $5 million, not $3 million. And you will see that the unassigned general fund reserves were lowered significantly from the 19 million to 10 million as a projection because of the big investment in our capital improvement program. So that money that was sitting there last year, you said we want to invest more in our infrastructure. So you took Measure L and some unassigned general fund money, aggregated that and created the largest capital improvement program in the city's recent history. Next slide, please. So as we look at the snapshot that I look at, and it's predominantly the general fund, and we'll go through some of the other funds, we project, we budget at the beginning of the year. We guesstimate at the beginning of the year what we think we're going to do based on input from our sales tax consultant, our property tax consultant, our past trends, et cetera. And we come up with a number. And the number we came up that we budgeted this past year in 2425 was $21,575,000, $832 in revenue. And that includes various sources of general fund revenue, property taxes at 56.5%, our sales tax, our permit fees, et cetera. The good news is we under-budgeted the revenue side. We actually looked this year and it's audited that we received $23,110,731,000. So that's a significant difference to the good. On the expense side, we guesstimated and we budgeted and we projected those expenses at $21,442,330. Unfortunately, we guessed wrong because we had more expenses than we had projected. So our actual expenses are higher. They're $21,451,297,000. The punchline is that your revenues exceeded your expenses in the general fund by $1,659,434. That's good news. But there's some cleanup to be done. So next slide, please. When you look at your city funds, it's not just a general fund. And I always tell people I like to know, I like the council to know, and I like the public to know where their money is. And so at the end of last year, the audited number, the auditor shows in his work this year that the parking fund had available... $2.4 million in change. The old city hall had $615,000 in change. That will be lower next year because of some improvements that were made. In the MLK funds, that's one that's pretty interesting in that you have a bunch of moving parts to the MLK fund. You have a 2015 certificate of participation debt service that you pay out of that. You have operating costs that you pay out of that. new uh you know approach to the bus barn and what that could mean in terms of losing those 13 tenants and what that could do to your revenue and then you also have you know meetings that we've been having and i thank uh council member cox and others on the council for working with us to try to ensure that our two largest tenants there, Lice Francais and New Village School, are comfortable with what's coming. And so that one bears watching. So I'm telling you that, and we'll bring back reports on that in more detail in the future. Next slide, please. |
| 01:53:24.22 | Chris Zapata | The Sewer Utility Fund, this is the good news. That's what you had at the beginning of last year, at the end of this year, and that's gone now. As you know, we transferred the sewer collection system to the Sausalém Marin City Sanitary Sewer District this past year, and so that will be off your books in the future to a large degree, but it was there at the time of the audit this year, And that's the number we used to defies $5.1 million in sewer bonds and $560,000 in a loan that was applicable to the sewer enterprise as well. The end of last fiscal year, we had about $1.5 million in the Title L Fund. And in the Section 115 Trust Fund, there was almost $6 million. That number has now grown to over $6 million. And that's split between pension funds and post-employment benefit funds. The pension funds are about $4 million of that. And the post-employment benefit funds, about $2 million. And that represents a strategic approach from 2015, years of saving. And we'll be bringing that forward in the next couple of months to tell you what we think you should do with that to smooth our pension challenges that are coming and have been here for the last 10 years. Next slide, please. In general, what the audit showed was no material weaknesses, which is good news. The audit wasn't as early as it was last year, and that was due to some staff turnover. As you know, we had a new finance director that came on board after an interim finance director in the summer. And so this was a big catch-up for her, and she did a good job with it, working with our auditor to get them the information they need. But there is a finding, and that finding is one that our expenditures exceeded the appropriations in various departments. And that's something that needs to be cleaned up. Next slide. So we'll talk a little more about how we do that cleanup. We'll have to bring back some budget adjustments for the city council to approve. And then I want to talk about these fund balances you have in these hybrid funds, I call them. They're not utility funds, enterprise funds. They're hybrid funds because they all are and can be and have been used for the general fund. In 2013-14, you took $1.6 million in change from MLK, parking, Old City Hall, and applied it to your budget balancing scenario. In 14-15, you took $1.6 million again. In 15-16, you took $9,163,000. That sounds to me like there was some interfund borrowing going on that got paid to or paid back. In 16-17, you're back to normal. You allocated $2.1 million from these funds to support the general fund in a transfer. In 17-18, you allocated $1.2 million In 1819, $1.5 million. In 1920, you allocated $2,999,000 in a general fund transfer from these funds. In 2021, you did $3.5 million. In 2122, you did $1.2 million. In 2223, you allocated $2.2 million. In 2324, you did $2.5 million. In this last year, we did something similar. And the reason I bring all this up is because it's been a longstanding conversation with people in the community. And I really believe that now that you've done the Rio Veritas study and you understand what it is that these facilities are going to require in terms of investments, or as I call them, a sinking funds, we have a good beat on the operational costs that are required for parking. And so all of this is going to be a good discussion to have so you can formalize whether you want to keep doing this or not, because I believe it's really important to not have a practice, but to have policy. Are you going to do this or not? Because then that will inform the budget process on a go forward basis. It's something that's always been done. It's something you do. And do you want to continue doing it and formalizing it? Because if you don't, then that's a different budget conversation. I want to go to the next slide, please. I want to say that there will be public access. We're bringing back the OpenGov platform. That will be live in April. I also want to say that the city council priority conversation resulted in consensus to go through an annual comprehensive financial report in the next budget cycle. So those are all things that the budget and the finance department will work together with you all and make sure that that's transparent to the community so that people know where their money is, what it's being used for, how much is there. So with that, I'd like to introduce our auditor. He's been with us for over, this is his third audit with the city. You may recall that you had a practice, you had an auditor, an independent auditor by the name of Mason Associates who did your audits for six years. And typically audits are three-year cycles, so you entered into a three-year contract with Bedowin Associates. I think that's a good practice. You shouldn't have an auditor for 20 years, the same auditor. You want to bring fresh eyes to them. And Bedawin and Sosich are those fresh eyes. And this is the third year of them auditing Sausalito. So with that, I'll turn it over to Ahmed and he can go from here and then I will wrap it up with some comments. |
| 01:58:51.46 | Ahmed Badawi | Great. Thank you, Chris. Good evening. I am Ahmed Badawi, the audit partner on the city of Sausalim. |
| 01:58:56.44 | Steven Woodside | Excuse me. I think one council member would like to ask you a question first, Chris, before we turn it over to Mr. Bedouin. |
| 01:59:05.23 | Joan Cox | I just wanted to be clear about the finding. which. We don't like to have findings by our auditor. The staff report talks about the fact that you know, these funds had expenditures that surpassed their budgeted expenditures. However, When you look to see what funds had expenditures that surpassed their budgeted expenditures. It includes, for example, the Tidelands Fund, It exceeded its budgeted expenditures by $85,000, but we still have a $1.5 million balance in the Tideland Fund. So I am not understanding. um |
| 01:59:46.59 | Jill Hoffman | I think that's what Mr. Badawi is going to explain. |
| 01:59:50.45 | Steven Woodside | Well, that... |
| 01:59:51.01 | Joan Cox | Well, |
| 01:59:51.21 | Steven Woodside | Let's let Ms. Cox finish your question to the city manager, and then we'll go from there. |
| 01:59:51.24 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 01:59:55.82 | Joan Cox | So Thank you. Um, First of all, I agree with the staff. promise to exercise increased diligence in adhering to budgeted amounts. But could we not simply have done a transfer from the tide? You know, in other words, we exceeded, we spent more than we thought we were gonna spend, but we still are within the amount in our fund. And so I don't understand why that constitutes a finding. |
| 02:00:24.62 | Chris Zapata | Again, I think there's a good answer for that that will come from our auditor who issued the finding. And then, you know, I think we can course correct with some direction from the auditor and our own ideas about how to do that. But, yeah, we have to acknowledge when we overspend what we project as expenditures. And in certain accounts, we did do that. Other accounts underspent significantly and so this six hundred thousand dollars over in expenses is predominantly out of two departments and it's community development and it's public works and there are good reasons for those and we can identify those whether it's the housing element that we had to pay for and all the consulting costs that we paid for or or whether it's cost overruns for construction projects in the public works department. That's offset significantly by some departments underspending, including the largest department, your police department, which underspent by $500,000. And that's anticipated because we freeze two positions, but it's still there as a savings. But the real, what I call the real information that I would pay attention to is, are you in the black or are you in the red? And you're in the black by $1.6 million. And so we have to come back to you with, you know, appropriate council requests to clean up these fund overruns. And we'll do that. |
| 02:01:47.36 | Joan Cox | So the biggest overrun was in the general capital improvements project $400,000, but we have measure l to fund our capital improvements so was there simply a transfer that wasn't made to reflect the expenditure. |
| 02:02:01.60 | Chris Zapata | That's my guess. |
| 02:02:04.52 | Joan Cox | Okay. So, um, No city, no municipality ever spends precisely what it projects it's going to spend. It has to make transfers. as appropriate to ensure that it's spending from the correct funds and that its expenditures are transparent. But It would seem to me to be an anomaly to say, you have money in the capital improvement fund This project is going to cost more than initially anticipated for legitimate reasons. You simply transfer money from the Capital Improvement Fund to that project. That's why I'm not understanding why these expenditures resulted in a finding. |
| 02:02:53.33 | Jill Hoffman | Well, excuse me, Mayor, I think the appropriate person |
| 02:02:56.99 | Steven Woodside | I'm going to just cut it off because this was caution time and we've finished, if you will, and we're ready to go. She said she had a question of. |
| 02:02:57.29 | Jill Hoffman | I'm going to just... |
| 02:03:06.71 | Joan Cox | Yeah, that my question is, why did this result in a finding? And if Mr. Badawi can answer that, great. |
| 02:03:07.20 | Steven Woodside | That would make it. |
| 02:03:14.59 | Joan Cox | We. |
| 02:03:14.66 | Steven Woodside | We... I think that's what we've heard from our city manager. So I think we'll go now to Mr. Badawi. |
| 02:03:20.46 | Ian Sobieski | Mayor, I just have a different question than that for the city manager. A question. A question. Yeah. Not a comment. Nope. Okay. Thank you. You went over a great table of all these, uh, transfers going back to 2012, uh, to the general fund, you did it verbally, but I couldn't find it in the documents anywhere. Is it do you have it somewhere in a document? |
| 02:03:38.90 | Chris Zapata | It is not in the document, but I'm happy to create an addendum to the document so that the public has it. Can you have it? I have it right here. It's just too big. |
| 02:03:45.49 | Ian Sobieski | I have a good day. That's a big piece of paper. All right. Yeah, please, if you wouldn't mind. That's a good idea. Thank you. |
| 02:03:52.20 | Steven Woodside | THE END OF THE END OF THE year. Excuse me, we're going to hear from the audience. He's ready to go. Okay. Sorry for the interruption. |
| 02:03:58.02 | Ahmed Badawi | the state. Bye. |
| 02:04:02.80 | Ahmed Badawi | Not at all. Not at all. Thank you again for inviting me to the meeting. And my apology that my slides were designed. I made the assumption that I would be controlling my slides. So it has a lot of animation. So if I may ask the person controlling the slides to just bring all the bullet points of the slide at the same time, I would really appreciate that. If we can go to the next slide. |
| 02:04:24.40 | Joe Farns | for the |
| 02:04:27.45 | Ahmed Badawi | So this is the 2025 audit of the city of Sausalito. And if we go to the next slide, the agenda for today. Thank you. I'll give you a brief overview of our firm and the engagement team assigned to the audit. What were the deliverables in the scope of our audit? A brief overview of the audit methodology that we followed. Some of the primary audit risks that we identified. The type of audit report we are getting ready to issue and a very brief overview of the numbers in the financial statements. Provide you some of the required communications as your independent auditor and a very brief overview of the new in the financial statements, provide you some of the required communications as your independent auditor, and a very brief overview of the new accounting standards coming your way. If we can go to the next slide, please. And the next slide, yes. Next, yes, thank you. Thank you. So this is our firm by the numbers. We have about 25 years of experience. We're a highly specialized firm. We only work with municipal governments in California. We currently work with about 65 government audit clients. We're also very focused on cities. We have about 44 city audits that we perform. We have about 30 employees and so far zero lawsuits, legal or disciplinary actions against the firm. We actually just completed our peer review, which we're required to undergo every three years, and we have received a clean opinion on our quality control and systems and processes. If we can go to the next slide, please. So this was the composition of our engagement team. I was the engagement partner, the person ultimately responsible for the audit. We have a quality control reviewer that reviews our work and also provide a second review of the financial statements. We also have an IT specialist that we use to assist us in understanding the controls embedded in the city's computer system. We had one senior auditor, Everly, assigned to the audit and two professional staff assigned to the audit. If you can go to the next slide, please. As far as our deliverables and scope of our audit, if we go to the next slide, |
| 02:06:28.85 | Ahmed Badawi | We were mainly engaged to provide an opinion on the city's basic financial statements. So that's the financial statements that include all city funds and assets and liabilities. The city is subject to government auditing standards. So we are also responsible to issue a report on internal control over financial reporting and on compliance. We perform an agreed upon procedure on the appropriation limit schedule, also known as the GAN limit. And then finally, the communication with the Ostrange with Governance, which is what I'm doing today. And we also issue a letter summarizing those communications. The next slide, please. And the next slide, audit methodology. So this is a very brief overview of our audit methodology. Just wanted to let you know that the audit is really performed throughout the year. It starts early in the year with planning, gathering information about personnel changes, system changes, new transactions, anything that assists us with planning our audit. then we have our interim phase, and the interim phase involves review of systems and processes and assess the risk. Um, And excuse me, I'm sorry. I need to close my office. My son ran into my office, opened the door and leapt away. So my apologies. Let me just close my office. |
| 02:07:49.45 | Unknown | Mmm. |
| 02:07:54.22 | Unknown | just like during COVID. |
| 02:07:55.78 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 02:07:55.84 | Unknown | Okay. I go for the BBC. Thank you. |
| 02:08:02.61 | Ahmed Badawi | I am very sorry. |
| 02:08:04.21 | Unknown | you |
| 02:08:05.07 | Ahmed Badawi | So the interim phase is really done during the summertime, and it's focused more on evaluating systems and processes. We interview city staff, we evaluate the controls, and we use those to perform our risk assessment and determine how much testing work we need to do during the year-end phase, which gets us to the year-end phase. And this is the time when we validate the account balances. We make sure that we are able to substantiate them with audit evidence. And then finally, the reporting phase, which we're in right now, drafting the financial statements of the city, review those financial statements, and finalizing them. And we are in the final phases of this process. If we can go on to the next slide, please. So areas of primary audit risk, I think, yeah. So I always like to say that there are no risk-free audits. So any audit have some risks involved, similar to when you drive your car. There are some inherent risks that are always present. Most of the risks, actually all of the risks that we identified relating to Sausalito are pretty standard risks that exist in almost every audit we do. So nothing that was very unique to Sausalito. The first one is the risk of management override of controls. And we always look at management, they are the one responsible for designing control, responsible for monitoring those controls, and they can sometime override those controls. I want to say, I know that I have a part about the budget filing, but this will be a good example where budget is the only control that the city council can exercise over the spending of the city. The city council then delegate to the city manager certain authorities to move money between departments or between funds. in the case of Sausalito that city manager authorities to move money between departments or between funds. In the case of Salasolito, the city manager do not have authority to move money between funds in the general fund, between departments, I'm sorry. So their budgetary level of control is at the department level. and management has to put controls in place to ensure that If any spending is going to happen, there is more than what was approved by council in that department. that it has to get council approval. And the whole idea of the control is that the approval needs to happen before the spending. not after the spending occurred, because if the spending already occurred, the council really cannot say, no, we're not going to approve that. uh, that budget amendment. because the money has already been spent. So this is an example of the controls that are supposed to be in place were not followed, that some funds expended over what they were authorized to expense by the council, and some departments expended more than they were authorized to expense by the council. The fact that there were some additional revenues or available fund balance is really not relevant because the control is controlling the spending and ensuring that there are authorization before the spending occur. So I just wanted to just discuss that, but I would have another bullet point about the finding later. We try to mitigate the risk of management override of control by making sure that we assign more experienced staff to more complex areas of the audit, that we incorporate an element of unpredictability in the audit process, that we consider the selection of accounting principles followed by management and make sure that they're consistently applied and appropriate. We tested the human answers prepared by management. We reviewed. we consider the selection of accounting principles followed by management and make sure that they're consistently applied and appropriate. We test the general entries prepared by management. We review estimates prepared by management. We evaluate business rationale for any unusual transactions. And we also evaluate the appropriateness of our fraud inquiries to city staff and other management level. If we can go on to the next slide, please. Another area of risk is revenue recognition. Auditing standards actually do require us to consider this area to be an area of a higher risk. So for the governmental funds, we rely heavily on confirmations with third parties. So we confirm property taxes and sales tax and other significant revenues with the state, with the county, with the granting agencies, with others, and reconcile those to the city's accounting records. For proprietary funds, we do substantive analytics. We do testing on the revenues and so on. And then next slide, please. Starts of the slide, please. Another area of risk is estimates, accounting estimates. Just due to the degree of uncertainty usually involved in accounting estimates,, just wanted to give you a general idea that some of the numbers in the financial statements are estimated numbers. The fair value of the city's investments, pension liability and OPEB liabilities are all based on actuarial assumptions and estimates. So we normally evaluate the basis behind those estimates. We evaluate the actuarial assumptions and make sure that they're reasonable. But again, it's another area of risk. If we can go on to the next slide, please. As far as the auditor's report, so we are getting ready to issue our audit report, and normally it would state what standards we followed, that we followed the generally accepted auditing standards and also the government auditing standards. We are getting ready to issue an unmodified opinion that in simple terms mean a clean opinion. it means that the financial statements are fairly presented in all material respects that all accounting policies have been consistently applied that all estimates are fairly presented in all material respects, that all accounting policies have been consistently applied, that all estimates are reasonable, and that all disclosures are properly reflected in the financial statements. If you can go on to the next slide. So this is really like a bird's eye view of the numbers in the finance statements, and I really don't have a whole lot to add to them. This just summarizes to you, for example, on this slide here, the summary of your assets over the last three years. The reason why I'm saying I don't have a lot to comment on them is that the numbers are pretty consistent. There are no significant changes over the last three years in any of these numbers. But like most of our city clients, the largest two assets are usually your cash and investments and your capital assets, and that's expected. And that's the case with Sausalito. If we can go on to the next slide. And this is a summary of the city's liabilities over the last three years. Again, fairly consistent over the last three years. Obviously, the largest liability is the net pension liability. Then you have your bonds and your other loans and long-term liabilities and your OPEB liability. So again, fairly consistent over the last three years. And if we can go on to the next slide. Thank you. On this slide, here's a summary of the city's net position, which is assets minus liability. And it is divided into three categories. The first one is net investment in capital assets. This is the amount of the city invested in streets and roads and buildings. And so it's not really in a spendable form. But this is how much the city invested in those types of assets. The restricted amounts are amounts that have legal restriction on them, outside legal restrictions. So it can be like gas tax, unspent funds or grant money or bond money or a variety of things that can fall into the restricted category. And then finally, the unrestricted amounts are the amounts that have no legal restriction. This amount is deficit, 9.3 million. I would say probably the main reason for that is the pension liability. Keeping in mind that this is really looking at the overall city, not just the general fund or any other fund. So the pension liability is the main factor in that deficit. If we can go on to the next slide, please. Net cost of service to tax revenue. So this is really just looking at the governmental activities and looking at the cost of running city departments, which is the net cost of service. So that would mean that the cost of running the departments minus any revenues that the departments are able to bring in on their own. that can be grant revenues or fees to users or some other type of revenues. The idea is to see whether tax revenues are sufficient to cover the net cost of service. And for the last two years, tax revenues were below net cost of service. It doesn't mean the city did not have money to pay for those expenses, but basically investment earnings and transfers from enterprise funds were used to cover that. Net cost of service also can fluctuate, keeping in mind this is a full accrual basis. So it includes depreciation of assets. It includes pension expense. It includes some expenses that you normally would not see. keeping in mind this is a full accrual basis. So it includes depreciation of assets. It includes pension expense. It includes some expenses that you normally would not see in the general fund, for example. So speaking of the general fund, if we can go on to the next slide. This is just focusing on the general fund. On this slide here, we look at the unrestricted portion of fund balance, and we compare it to annual expenditures to see basically how healthy your fund balance is. We have determined that the city have about 11 months worth of expenditures in its unrestricted fund balance, which is very obviously a very healthy fund balance. So that's just focusing on the generative fund itself. And if we can go on to the next slide, please. This slide is looking at your pension liability, and I mentioned earlier that some of the numbers are estimated, so this would be a good example of an estimated number. Currently, the pension liability is about $36 million. This slide is to show you what would the liability be if the discount rate is increased or decreased by 1%. The discount rate is one of the most significant assumptions that the actuary develop in measuring the pension liability. So you can see that the number fluctuates significantly by 1% increase or decrease in that discount rate. So that's for pension liability. And similar to that, if we go to the next slide, OPEB liability also is an estimated number and the discount rate is one of the significant assumptions there. So this slide is showing you what the number would look like with a 1% increase or decrease. If we can go on to the next slide, please. So the next part of my presentation is the required communication as your independent auditor. And on this slide here is a summary of responsibilities. I think there are probably two more bullet points left. So on the left side is responsibilities of the audit firm. We are mainly responsible to provide an opinion on the city's financial statements. We're also responsible to evaluate internal control over financial reporting, evaluate compliance with laws and contracts and grants that could have a material effect on the financial statements. We're responsible to ensure that the financial statements are clear and transparent. And then finally, we're responsible to communicate with the governing body. Management have a lot of responsibilities in this process. So management have to take responsibility for the financial statements. Our work does not relieve management from its responsibility. To establish and maintain internal control over financial reporting. To make all financial records available to us. To establish internal control that will prevent and detect fraud. Informers of all known and suspected fraud. And I think there are two more bullet points. Thank you. comply with laws and regulations and take care of detect fraud, informants of unknown and suspected fraud. And I think there are two more bullet points. Thank you. Comply with laws and regulations and take corrective action on any audit findings. If we can go on to the next slide, please. |
| 02:19:32.23 | Joe Farns | Yeah. |
| 02:20:04.08 | Ahmed Badawi | So as far as our independence, we are mainly responsible to maintain our independence. We follow the AICPA rules and the California Board of Accountancy rules and regulations. We evaluate any additional service that we offer the city and make sure that it does not impair our independence. We do compile the financial statements on behalf of the city. And this is a service that can potentially impair independence if we don't put safeguards in place. That's why we have an independent reviewer who's not involved in the audit who provide the review of those. that can potentially impair independence if we don't put safeguards in place. That's why we have an independent reviewer who's not involved in the audit who provide a review of those financial statements before they are finalized. As far as timing of the audit, I believe the city manager mentioned that it was not within the timeframe communicated to the city initially. And the main cause for that was obviously the staff turnover. There were some new accounting standards this year that were implemented. GASB statement number 101 relating to how the city accounts for vacation and sick leave and other types of leave. And then GASB statement number 102, which is a disclosure statement, and it did not really impact the city. If we can go on to the next slide, please. |
| 02:21:11.28 | Ahmed Badawi | So I'm pleased to say that we encountered no difficulties during the audit. We always felt that management was cooperative and provided us with good documentation and did what they can to keep the process moving. As far as significant audit adjustment and unadjusted differences, there were some adjustments and reclassifying entries, and management has posted all of those proposed adjustments. As far as deficiencies in internal controls, so we identified no material weaknesses. This is the most severe. As I mentioned earlier, we did identify the budgetary controls. And the budgetary controls are whatever controls are in place now. Obviously, the city can change that. Not every city have the budgetary level of control is at the department level. Some, they have it at the fund level, even for the general fund. which allows a city manager to move money between departments or up to a certain amount. We evaluate whether the city complied with its own controls based on what's in place. And what's in place currently is that in the general fund, the budgetary level of control is at the department level, which means that no department can exceed their budget without council approval. So if council feel that this is maybe not practical, then council should change that and maybe give more authority. But we just evaluate based on what are the controls that are supposed to be in place and whether they were followed or not. Also, the reason we brought up this this year is because it was more widespread than before. It was about three departments or four departments in the general fund, and it was about eight to nine funds that had overspend their budget. Small amounts, but nonetheless, it just basically shows that normally the spending that occur after the authorization for spending has been obtained. That authorization for spending should really be embedded in the computer system of the city that stops the user from signing a purchase order or a modification of a contract or any type of purchase without the proper authorization. Also, we see that in other municipalities, they allow this to happen without authorizations in cases of emergencies. Uh... but the city has to define really what is considered an emergency. So you don't have basically everyone trying to justify, say, well, this was an emergency, this was an emergency. So we always recommend that the purchasing policy define what is considered an emergency that allow for spending without authorization. So that was the reason for us giving us the finding this year. It's just we saw there was more widespread than before. So yes, I agree that you can never anticipate your exact spending to the dollar. But when you see spending is going to exceed, management are supposed to obtain authorization before they go ahead and spend. And that was the idea of the comment. If we can go on to the next slide, please. Just a brief overview of the new accounting standards coming your way. Next year, there will be two new accounting standards. One of them is going to be significant, GASB statement number 103. It's going to change some of the presentations in the financial statements, making some changes to the management discussion and analysis. And then there is statement number 104 that is relating to disclosure. And also in 2027, an easy statement relating to disclosure in the notes to the financial statements. That concludes my presentation. I want to say thank you for allowing me the opportunity, and I am happy to answer any questions that you have. I'm not sure if that's the right time or if there's something else after, but |
| 02:25:21.42 | Steven Woodside | This is the right time for council questions. And then we'll hear public comments. Mr. Sobieski. |
| 02:25:29.60 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 02:25:31.46 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:25:31.48 | Ian Sobieski | Thanks a lot for your work. I'm good to meet you here. I can't really see you because your slides are up, but it's probably just fine to be up there. Can you help me understand? the distinction that's being made between a budgetary control finding which you have found, but also a statement that there are no material weaknesses. Oh. Help us understand it because the one sounds well, just please, that's the question. |
| 02:25:56.91 | Ahmed Badawi | I said... |
| 02:26:01.70 | Ahmed Badawi | But they both sound... alarming but In the auditing rules, the findings are classified into three categories, material weaknesses, significant deficiency, and control deficiency. Material weaknesses and significant deficiencies are the only two that we are required to bring to the council attention, because they are significant enough to be brought to the council attention. Control deficiency is more like a housekeeping item that is communicated to management in an informal way. So material weaknesses is the most severe, and that usually means that there is high likelihood that material misstatements do occur in the financial statements and may be not detected. Significant deficiency is just the severity is less. |
| 02:26:52.56 | Ian Sobieski | Got it. And so you found no material weaknesses, but you found this deficiency in regards to budgeting. And what you're basically saying is that in the mid-year budget of all the two, the first budget and the mid-year budget, the city council authorized certain amounts of spending. for each department. And after that's all done, the year was concluded and you looked over all the spending and you found that some departments spent more than they were authorized to spend. Is that my understanding of that? |
| 02:27:23.07 | Ahmed Badawi | Thank you. |
| 02:27:23.09 | Ian Sobieski | That is correct. |
| 02:27:23.59 | Ahmed Badawi | Thank you. |
| 02:27:23.92 | Ian Sobieski | That is great. Now you said that our policy, I believe, is that the budgetary authority to write checks is at the department head level. Is that correct? For the general fund only. I see. And so these these cases where the spending exceeded the authorized amount, was that not in the general fund? This was in other funds? |
| 02:27:47.29 | Ahmed Badawi | So there were a few departments that exceeded their budget. As city manager mentioned, I believe it was community development and public work and a couple of others. But also we had eight other funds that also overspent their budget. So it was really both. It was other funds that overspent their total budget and within the general fund, a few departments that overspent their budget. |
| 02:27:47.30 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 02:28:12.13 | Ian Sobieski | So in the cases of the departments where the authority is with the head of the department, |
| 02:28:17.75 | Ahmed Badawi | Thank you. |
| 02:28:17.80 | Ian Sobieski | uh, The rule is that they not overspend, but how did the overspend occur? |
| 02:28:25.51 | Ahmed Badawi | I mean, I don't know exactly how the overspending occurred. I look at the total expenditures. Uh, I can probably say that normally what we see was overspending occurring is, uh, either um, A P.O. was not issued on time, so goods were already ordered and then a P.O. was issued later. Things of that nature, but I don't know how exactly the spending occurred. I was just reporting on the fact that there was excess spending. in several funds, but we did not investigate further as to how the overspending occurred. |
| 02:29:05.28 | Ian Sobieski | but the spending itself was authorized to prepare a policy by the head of the department in those cases? |
| 02:29:12.34 | Steven Woodside | Council. you know. |
| 02:29:13.67 | Ahmed Badawi | Again, I don't know which items exactly are the ones that went over budget, but I can say that nothing came to our attention that we didn't see any purchases that did not have proper authorization from a department head or an invoice that was not properly authorized to be paid. that did not come to our attention. |
| 02:29:36.13 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, so you did not find any, invoices or payments didn't have proper controls on them. It just was the proper controls... were used, but exceeded the budgeted amount. That is correct. Got it. And then did you see in the audit, any evidence of fraud across the organization? |
| 02:29:57.80 | Ahmed Badawi | Not that, again, we focus on as it relates to the financial statements. And no, of course, we are required to report to you any fraud that comes to our attention. |
| 02:30:07.92 | Ian Sobieski | Do you have any money that's missing? |
| 02:30:10.83 | Ahmed Badawi | Not to announce that. |
| 02:30:11.80 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 02:30:11.82 | Ahmed Badawi | Thank you. |
| 02:30:12.34 | Ian Sobieski | And as far as you know, do the financial statements that you've reported equal the balances that are in our various financial accounts. Thank you. Yeah. |
| 02:30:21.44 | Ahmed Badawi | Yeah, this is what we mean by fairly stated financial statements that in all material respects, like obviously we have materiality levels, we don't look at every thousand dollars here and there, but from a material perspective, yes, we believe things are fairly stated. Thank you very much. You're welcome. |
| 02:30:43.36 | Steven Woodside | I'm, I'm just going to go from my right to my left. |
| 02:30:49.76 | Melissa Blaustein | Melissa. Mr. Badawi, thank you for this report and for spending the time in working with our city departments. Just for point of reference, about how many city audits do you think you do annually? Okay. |
| 02:31:01.75 | Ahmed Badawi | Thank you. |
| 02:31:01.77 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:31:01.81 | Ahmed Badawi | about 40 plus |
| 02:31:03.16 | Melissa Blaustein | 40 plus. And so in reviewing our city audit, do you think that there's anything that has any sort of significant cause for concern? |
| 02:31:12.03 | Ahmed Badawi | I mean, obviously, there's always room for improvement. And part of the reason why we're giving that finding also is, you know, looking for the city to improve its processes. And but not nothing that I mean, I would have reported to the council if we if we had or saw some of those concerns. |
| 02:31:29.78 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay. So in your independent perspective, there are no alarm bells or red flags beyond the notification of the expenditures at this point. |
| 02:31:37.19 | Ahmed Badawi | That's what our art opinion means, yes. |
| 02:31:39.67 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you very much. |
| 02:31:42.83 | Ahmed Badawi | is Cox. |
| 02:31:48.09 | Joan Cox | Um, So you, we, when you were just, thank you for your report, by the way, and for so clearly describing your process and how you came to arrive at the findings that you made. Um, in your, Response to questions from Councilmember Sobieski. you mentioned you were talking about the department heads, but you know, For example, I know that the Community Development Department budget was exceeded at least in part by expenditures on the housing element and on payments to our consultants. Those payments were authorized by the city council. So is it true that some of the expenditures were authorized not just by department heads, but also by the city council? Or do you know? |
| 02:32:42.50 | Ahmed Badawi | Again, we look at the budget that was adopted and then all the amendments that happened to the budget. And this is how we come up with the final budget. And we compare that to the final expenditures. And the final expenditures became higher. So, for example, if the city council authorized... spending to a certain entity called 400,000 and the spending became 500,000. that 100,000 extra was not authorized. And, per the city's policy that the department, that the city manager does not have the authority to basically for that spending to occur without the city council approved. So that's what we're reporting on. |
| 02:33:25.56 | Joan Cox | So most of our, when the city council is asked to approve an expenditure, we are told that from what, you know, it will be this much and it will come from this budget. But what we aren't told is whether there's adequate money within the budget for this year for that expenditure. So would that type of control help us avoid this finding? |
| 02:33:49.05 | Ahmed Badawi | I mean, obviously, the budgeting process should incorporate sometimes unexpected, you know, events or potential increases that can occur. But sometimes you cannot anticipate everything. And when those situations occur, we expect our clients to go back to the council and say, we have to approve some change orders. Things have changed and we need. situations occur, we expect our clients to go back to the council and say, we have to approve some change orders, things have changed, and we need authorization to go forward. What we don't want our clients to do is to go forward first and then go back to the council and say, we went forward, uh, can we get authorizing? |
| 02:34:33.06 | Joan Cox | And so we undertake a mid-year budget adjustment every year, at which time we hear where we're overspending or underspending and we make adjustments to the budget as necessary. So why is the why are we being timed on questions? |
| 02:34:54.63 | Walfred Solorzano | I was instructed to do so. |
| 02:34:57.55 | Joan Cox | Who instructed you to do that? Thank you. Thank you. |
| 02:34:59.96 | Steven Woodside | Keep going. There's no time limit on questions, but I want them to be questions. Please. Thank you. |
| 02:35:05.23 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 02:35:05.89 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:35:06.04 | Joan Cox | So Are these over expenditures expenditures that occurred after our midyear budget adjustment last year? |
| 02:35:20.19 | Ahmed Badawi | it. Most likely. I mean, again, I did not investigate the individual items that caused the overspending. But obviously, if it wasn't captured in the mid-year budget review, then it would have happened after. |
| 02:35:38.12 | Joan Cox | You mentioned that in the prior year, you did see some of the same types of issues, but it did not rise to the level of a deficiency that was reportable to the city council. Did you report a control deficiency for the prior fiscal year? |
| 02:35:58.37 | Ahmed Badawi | No, we did not. For prior fiscal year, it was minimal. It was really limited to maybe a couple of funds. So we didn't see that as an issue. And I'm not going to say that we never see any overspending in any municipality. We see it. But we also, when we see that it's more widespread is when we make a comment. And last year, we did not make a comment because we felt it was It wasn't an issue in our mind, at least. |
| 02:36:30.72 | Joan Cox | And so since our overall expenditures remained in the black by $1.6 million on a $20 million budget, why was this not... characterized as a control deficiency as opposed to a finding. |
| 02:36:48.22 | Ahmed Badawi | Because of how widespread it is, because we're not really looking to see whether there were enough funds or not. We are looking to see whether controls are being followed and spending is occurring based on what the city council authorized. So whether there were sufficient funds or it was in the black or not, we didn't really think it was relevant. it was relevant. Last year, we didn't report on it because it was very minimal amounts that happened or not as many incidents, I guess. In this current year, I'm looking at it, it was in basically about five departments, four departments, and about eight or nine funds that overspent. So just because it was widespread that we felt we needed to report on it. |
| 02:37:43.18 | Joan Cox | And do you have recommendations for controls we should implement to prevent this from happening in the future? |
| 02:37:51.88 | Ahmed Badawi | Definitely. We always recommend to our clients that the budget should be integrated into the accounting system, that people should not have the authority to override the budget controls in the accounting system, that there should be obviously more, I don't want to say more training, but more awareness that when there are purchases being made, that the city follow the process of making sure that we verify budget first, we obtain purchase orders, we follow the process before we commit to the purchase. So there are definitely, and some of those things are already in place. So I'm not saying that none of them are in place. But the end result is that there were some spending that occurred that were not approved by council. |
| 02:38:48.38 | Joan Cox | All right. Thank you so much. |
| 02:38:49.51 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:38:49.80 | Ahmed Badawi | You're welcome. As often. |
| 02:38:51.40 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:38:52.04 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Badawi. And so I'm looking at your... it would have been, uh, for anybody watching, it would have been, um, our finance director, Angeline Loeffler, slide number three, which is a summary of the condition of the fiscal year, several funds exceeded the authorized budget appropriations, and that's her summary slide. But it's also your finding, your draft finding. It's your excess of expenditures over appropriations, and it's your summary page. So I'm looking at that summary page. Do you happen to have that in front of you? It says draft across it. |
| 02:39:34.03 | Ahmed Badawi | You mean in the financials? |
| 02:39:34.72 | Jill Hoffman | Karen Hollweg, It in our staff report sorry it's not our staff report it's included in our on our agenda as the draft. Karen Hollweg, As a draft summary, the draft finding. Karen Hollweg, It lists out the. |
| 02:39:48.34 | Unknown | I was not sure about that. |
| 02:39:52.27 | Jill Hoffman | the major, sorry, the funds were It is actually set forth in the staff report. I can't tell the page though. |
| 02:40:02.29 | Joan Cox | two of the staff. |
| 02:40:03.20 | Jill Hoffman | page two of the staff report. Do you have that in front of you, Mr. |
| 02:40:07.15 | Ahmed Badawi | I was not provided the agenda or the staff report. |
| 02:40:10.61 | Jill Hoffman | Does our city clerk have Evangeline's presentation by any chance? our finance director's presentation. Can you put slide three? |
| 02:40:27.71 | Jill Hoffman | So Mr. Badawi can see it. That's just a summary of his draft finding. excess of expenditures over appropriations. So, sir, this is a summary of your finding that our finance director who couldn't be here today, apparently. So these are all the funds. So it's not, you know, two or three. It's actually 14 different funds that were over budget. And for whatever reason, your draft finding didn't provide a summary, but my calculation was 1.2%. well, $1,365,243. I might be off a few dollars, but it's about 1.3 million. million a little over 1.3 million dollars total of overages and so in 14 different funds so i can see why you think this is more significant and needed to be characterized as as a significant deficiency in your report Um, And my question is, how is this not then added in as an actual expense in the summary of the general fund. And these are, and let me ask you this and just confirm this. These are all from general fund These are all expenses, overages from these different general fund buckets, we could say. |
| 02:42:03.29 | Joan Cox | The Tidelines is not a general thing. |
| 02:42:05.26 | Jill Hoffman | Well, it's a non-major governmental fund, but it's... |
| 02:42:07.10 | Steven Woodside | but it's- Rather than argue about the slide, it's up. You can see two categories. It's |
| 02:42:11.05 | Jill Hoffman | too. I'm asking him, but these are generally under Under his summary, it's... under his... |
| 02:42:21.46 | Steven Woodside | I'm not just understanding the question and, |
| 02:42:24.52 | Jill Hoffman | Well, under his excess expenditures over appropriations, it says major governmental funds. |
| 02:42:30.56 | Steven Woodside | And then there's another column of non-major governmental funds. |
| 02:42:30.84 | Jill Hoffman | there. |
| 02:42:34.25 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:42:34.29 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, so... |
| 02:42:34.30 | Steven Woodside | But some of them appear to me not to be general funds. |
| 02:42:39.03 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, that's true. Well, he doesn't, okay, I'm sorry, you don't have that in front of you. |
| 02:42:42.08 | Ahmed Badawi | You don't have your- I can see it now. When we say major governmental funds, the financial statements, this is how funds are presented. There are funds that are considered major and there are funds that are considered non-measure. Okay. Within the major funds, there were two funds that had excesses. The general fund had in their administration department, in the library, in the community development, in public works, and also in their capital outlay. |
| 02:42:55.11 | Unknown | Okay. |
| 02:43:10.64 | Ahmed Badawi | Then there was the General Capital Improvement Fund that had 400,000 of excess spending. Then on the right side, that column non-measure governmental fund, each of those funds had also excess spending. |
| 02:43:25.35 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks. Thanks very much. Sorry I garbled that question up. Okay, and these are the funds that you found during your audit that were the overages? |
| 02:43:32.89 | Ahmed Badawi | That's correct. |
| 02:43:34.11 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks, sir. And so let me ask you this. In the summary on the first page of our staff report, on the bottom, general fund performed, and then it has revenues, expenses, budgeted, and actual. So these, but these overages that I just did my quick math, and it's about 1.3 million in overages, but they don't affect the bottom line of expenses. |
| 02:44:03.81 | Ahmed Badawi | I mean, they were already recorded as expenses. |
| 02:44:06.26 | Jill Hoffman | So they're already included as expenses. Okay, thanks. Thanks for that clarification. |
| 02:44:08.20 | Ahmed Badawi | Okay, thanks. |
| 02:44:11.35 | Jill Hoffman | Um, And so... When did you, as you were going through the budget this year, I'm sorry, as you were going through your audit this year, about when did you start seeing these, these overages on the timeline. When you were going through your timeline, I understood that it started late and you were late getting started because of things you know, that were happening here in Sausalito. But can you give us an idea about when you know, you started seeing these overages in your review. Just an estimate of when you started becoming concerned about the significant deficiencies that you were seeing in the overages and expenditures in these different funds. |
| 02:44:57.79 | Ahmed Badawi | So my team during the year-end phase, part of the audit procedures that they perform is they do analytical procedures. And that's comparing the actual amounts to the prior year amounts and also the actual amounts to the budgeted amounts. And the idea is to just investigate any major fluctuation. Because the fluctuations here are not material, so our audit would probably would not have inquired about most of those. As I was reviewing the workpapers of our teamwork and reviewing the financial statements that was drafted, I started seeing that even though the amounts were small, they were widespread. And this is when we felt it was appropriate to bring that up to the council's attention. |
| 02:45:50.95 | Jill Hoffman | And about when did you see that? this. calendar wise, like, I'm asking when during the year you were seeing this, were you seeing this in January? Did you see this in December? When on the calendar year were you seeing this? |
| 02:46:04.15 | Ahmed Badawi | Um, I mean, we're in February now and I know, I would say January, um, I mean, the audit was done late this year, so not within the normal timeframe that we would normally perform the audit. |
| 02:46:21.20 | Jill Hoffman | So you were seeing these anomalies in the that you became concerned about. to the level that you concern that it was probably going to be a significant deficiency in the January timeframe. |
| 02:46:34.23 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:46:34.30 | Ahmed Badawi | Thank you. |
| 02:46:35.72 | Jill Hoffman | And when did you convey this to our city manager? |
| 02:46:39.82 | Ahmed Badawi | I mean, I don't recall exactly, but we definitely reached out and provided a brief write-up to Angeline. And we actually had a call with the finance director, Angeline, went over the finding and discussed it. Um, And then we include in our presentation and then keeping in mind that also we are still in a draft form. So we haven't really officially brought up the finding and obtained management response yet. This is just really a bullet point in our presentation at this point. Uh... |
| 02:47:16.15 | Jill Hoffman | Did you convey this information to Evangeline? |
| 02:47:19.91 | Ahmed Badawi | Yeah, yeah. No, I'm asking you. |
| 02:47:21.11 | Jill Hoffman | I know I'm asking when was the first time you conveyed these concerns to our finance director, Evangeline? |
| 02:47:28.32 | Ahmed Badawi | I mean, again, I'll have to look in my emails, but I'll say probably all in the January timeframe. |
| 02:47:38.00 | Jill Hoffman | January timeframe, is that what you said? |
| 02:47:39.84 | Ahmed Badawi | Yeah. |
| 02:47:40.96 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:47:46.07 | Chris Zapata | So I'm here and I can answer the question about when I knew about this and that was two weeks ago. |
| 02:47:50.44 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you, Chris. |
| 02:47:55.13 | Joan Cox | after. |
| 02:47:59.08 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you. in a second. Thank you. |
| 02:48:02.57 | Steven Woodside | If I can ask a couple questions. I believe Mr. Sobieski asked you in your findings if you found any evidence of fraud or missing money, and I believe your answer was no. Is that correct? |
| 02:48:17.09 | Ahmed Badawi | That's right. |
| 02:48:17.47 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. And then secondly, I'm going to just read It's a paragraph or a long sentence. I think it's from our finance director's report, but it's basically recounting or restating your recommendation. I just want to read it. We recommend the city strengthen budget monitoring procedures by embedding budgetary control into the accounting system, regularly comparing actual expenditures to approved appropriations. three processing budget amendments promptly when needed. and providing ongoing report and oversight to ensure all expenditures remain within legally authorized limits. That's your recommendation? Yeah. Okay, and just to parse them a little bit, Embedding control in the accounting system would be such that if, for example, a department head gets a bill and wants to pay it, and the accounting system would then, in effect, control and say, no, there's no money left in that budget to pay the bill. Is that kind of an oversimplified way of explaining that? |
| 02:49:17.26 | Joe Farns | and a hit. |
| 02:49:32.82 | Steven Woodside | . |
| 02:49:32.97 | Ahmed Badawi | That's... |
| 02:49:33.33 | Steven Woodside | . |
| 02:49:33.95 | Ahmed Badawi | That's exactly what it is. |
| 02:49:34.96 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. And then regularly comparing expenditures actual to approved regularly by that. Is that quarterly, monthly? What's a common standard? |
| 02:49:49.12 | Ahmed Badawi | I would say monthly with the department heads, |
| 02:49:53.73 | Steven Woodside | Okay, and then processing amendments promptly when needed. So for example, if the department head realizes he or she has run out of money, they would promptly go and seek an additional appropriation or adjustment. |
| 02:50:07.68 | Ahmed Badawi | That's great. |
| 02:50:08.60 | Steven Woodside | Probably meaning within Thank you. |
| 02:50:10.89 | Ahmed Badawi | before the spending occurs? |
| 02:50:13.03 | Steven Woodside | Okay. Before paying the bill. you |
| 02:50:14.89 | Ahmed Badawi | Thank you. |
| 02:50:15.04 | Steven Woodside | Okay. |
| 02:50:16.14 | Ahmed Badawi | Well, there shouldn't be a bill if, because before you order the service or the goods, the idea is to check for whether there are sufficient budget to do that. So there shouldn't really be a bill |
| 02:50:27.83 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, I'm just thinking there may be some bills that are not anticipated and not pursuant to a purchase order, but simply here you're you're expected to pay this because of some other relationship. |
| 02:50:39.98 | Ahmed Badawi | of the |
| 02:50:40.07 | Steven Woodside | the |
| 02:50:40.25 | Ahmed Badawi | I mean, in those situations, then I would say, yeah, there should be a budget amendment that goes to council approving that. However, I also want to say that this is the city's policy. And I'm not in any way saying that this should be the best policy. I mean, we have some cities that allow city managers to move money between departments. So we are just verifying against the city's policy. And the city, of course, have the right to change that policy. |
| 02:51:08.94 | Steven Woodside | about that. Okay, thank you. I have comments about this, but I'll save those until later. |
| 02:51:18.63 | Melissa Blaustein | I have a couple of questions for our city manager, since I know Angelina couldn't be here tonight, but there is some. specific corrective action that's been applied per the report from the auditor is that right |
| 02:51:31.57 | Chris Zapata | Absolutely correct. You know, when we put our numbers together and we have a finding that involves some deficiencies on our end, then, you know, we want to tell you how we're going to correct it. And that's what's in our recommendation and our approach to go forward. And so I know that I'm hearing a lot of numbers and nine different funds that are out of kilter. Put some context to them. The administrative budget is million dollars, and it's $40,000 over. You know, the age for Indy Sausalito was $1,000. So, you know, when you aggregate them, it sounds like a lot, nine dollars. But in reality, there are slight overruns, but they're widespread, and that needs to be corrected. And so that's what our focus will be on, and that's what my focus will be on. |
| 02:52:21.25 | Melissa Blaustein | So if you go to slide six of Angelina's report, I just want to make sure I'm getting this right since she's not here. And so, and I know that you have been working on this with her. So the first thing you put on here is enhanced budget monitoring. So this means you're going to plan to apply monthly budget to variance reports. Correct. Okay. And then you also put on here, strengthened approval controls. So this means you're going to have new expenditure appropriation limits and additional review and authorization. |
| 02:52:46.16 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:52:47.03 | Melissa Blaustein | Correct. Okay. And then you put on here staff training. So you're planning for department manager and finance personnel training on this topic. |
| 02:52:54.43 | Chris Zapata | Correct. |
| 02:52:55.12 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay. And you also put policy updates. So you're saying per this information that we just received two weeks ago, you're already starting to move forward on updating financial policies for supplemental appropriations. Yes. Okay. And then finally, we're going to have a rollout of OpenGov soon, right? |
| 02:53:11.67 | Chris Zapata | April. |
| 02:53:12.33 | Melissa Blaustein | And that will make it easier for all of us to participate more actively in the transparency of the budget process. |
| 02:53:17.06 | Chris Zapata | The public and the council. |
| 02:53:18.64 | Melissa Blaustein | Great. I just wanted to give you a chance to go through those points because I know you are immediately after just two weeks already taking steps, even though according to our auditor, this is rather normal. |
| 02:53:22.74 | Chris Zapata | Yeah. |
| 02:53:28.78 | Chris Zapata | Let me not mince words. The buck stops with me. You hire me to bring forward a budget and make sure that budget's done properly and that the spending is done in accordance with the council's policy. So in this particular case, I can tell you what my thoughts are pretty simple. We've had some transition. which is happens in cities at the same time, you know, we truly can, do better on our end with the reporting. And so Angeline's come on board and finished up some work that was really important, along with some other work, and at the same time has listened to Mr. Badawi and his team about what needs to be done to make sure that next year there isn't a finding that's similar, because if it's, again, next year, then you've got a problem. So, you know, when we find stuff, we need to fix it. And this year, we found through our auditor that there's a need to correct this by more regular reporting, by more controls, and we will do all of that. Thank you very much. |
| 02:54:33.84 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:54:35.78 | Steven Woodside | Any further questions? So public comment before we have discussion? |
| 02:54:51.96 | Steven Woodside | I see it. Jacqueline Amaricus. |
| 02:54:59.03 | Jacqueline Amaricus | I know we only have two minutes, but good evening council members. |
| 02:55:01.56 | Steven Woodside | Good evening. |
| 02:55:04.85 | Jacqueline Amaricus | So basically this is the responsibility of the city council, um, under Sausalito municipal code, um, expenditures that are budgeted may not legally exceed the department level for the general fund, the fund levels for special revenue debt service and capital project funds. So as the CPA had mentioned, who conducted who's conducting the preliminary audit report, this was the first item I noticed that was attached to the drafted, drafted the financial statements. And so basically the council is responsible to make sure that we stick with our budget and that wasn't done. And there were several members in the community that urged the council to reconcile budgets with actual numbers and that wasn't done. And there were numerous letters. presented to the Council. urging the council not to vote on this budget. And it was voted on anyway. So I wanna point that out. I mean, yeah, Chris does work for all of you, but it's all five of you that are responsible for this. And you have a legal responsibility to adhere to this. You can't. you know, present something and say, okay, well, this is the budget, but you know, look at actual numbers. And so that's just, I know some of you don't know accounting principles all that well, and I think you've got community members are more than willing and able to donate their time. And we have done so and we've made comments. In addition to that, I think that the financial committee meetings should be resumed. There's only been two in the last year. And I think that would be helpful to the community as far as transparency goes. Thank you. |
| 02:57:07.08 | Steven Woodside | Any other public comments? |
| 02:57:09.09 | Jacqueline Amaricus | Yes, we have eight |
| 02:57:09.97 | Walfred Solorzano | in Britain. |
| 02:57:13.25 | Adrian Brinton | Thank you so much for taking my comment. Having spent a career in IT and dealt with budgets and audits on a yearly basis, I know to our city staff and to our auditor for doing the work to investigate our books and make sure that things are But they need to be. Um, Yeah, seeing a finding is not something that's super unusual. I'm raising the flag and saying, hey, you know, we could do better on this is something that's very important. And I'm very glad to hear our city manager take this seriously. I think our auditor said something that really resonated with me, which is, you know, this is room for improvement. rather than cause for concern. Our overall financial picture is under budget. We're doing well, we're investing in our infrastructure, And we have a few budgeting. and spend reconciliation issues that we need to address. And it sounds like they're addressable. So looking forward to hearing from the city manager and city staff. what we intend to do to make sure that this is a one-off, But seeing that we have no material weaknesses is also a great result. So thank you very much. |
| 02:58:26.92 | Walfred Solorzano | No further public comment. |
| 02:58:29.31 | Steven Woodside | Okay, it's back to us for discussion. I'm going to take a lead. Thank you for the recommendation. I agree with it wholeheartedly. Having been a department head in three counties. If I didn't look every month at how much money was going to be spent in the next month and made sure I had money for it, I could lose my job. There were very tight, tight controls in the places I worked. Why? They were very large institutions. They had plenty of auditors, plenty of people, lots of controls built into systems, etc. We're a small city. This is not acceptable to me if it were ongoing. And I have every confidence it will not be ongoing. And I thank the auditor for figuring this out. |
| 02:59:10.10 | Joe Farns | you |
| 02:59:10.11 | Unknown | you |
| 02:59:10.15 | Joe Farns | And I have. |
| 02:59:16.43 | Steven Woodside | With respect to the budget we adopted, Thank you. I think Ms. Emmerich is mixing apples and oranges. We have adopted a budget this year. We got a mid-year report. We have, I hope and I trust, better controls in place. so that when we get to the end of this year, and this year is audited, and we see an audit a year from now, or hopefully less than a year from now, I hope we're not going to find this same... kind of problem persists. That in a nutshell is how I see it. That's why we have audits. We have audits to make sure that we're properly not only accounting for money, but that we're staying within the budget. And in this case... Unfortunately, in some departments, that didn't happen. Why? I think we had three different finance directors during the period, and it's pretty clear the controls were not as rigid as they should have been. And I don't want to blame anybody for that. I just think that's a fact. It's been uncovered by the auditor. Thank you. And let's fix it. So that's where I come from. Secondly, It's clear there's no evidence of fraud. This is not a question of missing money. It's a question of not bringing to our attention before the end of the budget year that we needed to make an adjustment, which we could have easily made, Thank you. to make sure the end of the year was balanced, both in each department and citywide. That didn't happen. And... it's not likely to recur, I think. So that's my take on this. And I really appreciate the auditor delving into this and doing what auditors do. I think the action for us is to accept the report and direct the city manager to take these recommendations and respond in due course as to what corrective actions have been taken. I think many of them have already been taken, but we can save a further discussion of that until all of this is till you've heard from all of us. Thank you. That's where I am. |
| 03:01:35.97 | Joan Cox | I endorse your comments. I do. want to point out that In California, an official has to intentionally authorize expenditures in excess of their budget to be held liable for such excess excess of course public agencies are required to use budgetary accounting to monitor. financial activities and to ensure that actual spending does not exceed the legal limits. Um, I'm the head of a department in my law firm. THE END OF THE END OF THE Transmit a budget each year and then I get budget reports each year that tell me each month that tell me where I stand with my expenditures of the prior month against the budget. And I would not be able to spend to overspend, that budget without getting authority from the executive committee within my firm. we should have a similar process. No department head should be able to overspend their budget without GETTING THAT. without a budget adjustment. I don't know why we don't have that. I hate getting findings. I remember getting more than one finding in the past, relieved that it's one finding, but I hate getting findings. But I agree with what Mr. Brinton said this is There is room for improvement rather than cause for concern. but it seems to me that each department head needs to each month be getting a report regarding the budget that they're responsible for to ensure that they're not exceeding it. how, We can have a department that's exceeding its budget by three, $400,000. without a budget adjustment. um, That's just not acceptable. So I'm happy to hear that the city manager intends to implement the recommendations made by the all of which sound very reasonable. to me. but I agree with the mayor. This does not mean we have a problem with the budget. It means we have a problem with the manner in which we control the expenditures within the budget. and that we have not made the required budgetary adjustments to shift monies from the pot that is available for their expenditure. to the pot. in which they are actually spent. We have a housing element budget, we have all kinds of funds I, I, available. are still 1.6 million in the black. So. We need to, but we need to be Every time we approve an expenditure, we need to know what budget that's coming from, and to ensure that we have adequate money in that budget to accommodate that expenditure. Thanks. |
| 03:04:39.36 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:04:43.83 | Steven Woodside | Anyone else? |
| 03:04:45.32 | Melissa Blaustein | You can go on video. Thank you. Again, I appreciate the time of the auditor, and I appreciate how seriously our city staff is taking the fact that there is a finding in this audit. I think it's good to agree with Councilmember Cox that this is, and also with the mayor, that this is cause for concern in terms of how we assess it. But obviously, there's opportunity. There's always room for improvement. And I think we are in good fiscal standing. We are in the black. We have done a good job of prioritizing, balancing our budget. What we need to take steps to do more of going forward is really moving ahead with these budgetary controls. I endorse the recommendations from the mayor to support the recommendations from our auditor. But I would like us to kind of deep dive, I think, in the interest of One, what a good job I know our city staff does already and what they will be doing. And two, in the interest of transparency to just perhaps when we have our next budget review, have an additional staff report that talks about how we're enacting these new enhanced budget controls. So it says clearly in our corrective actions that we're going to have enhanced budget monitoring, strengthened approval controls, staff training and policy updates. And I think we're all in favor of obviously moving forward with that. But I think it would benefit the public to be able to see closely exactly what's happening just so that we can say, look, these are the steps that we've taken. We did see the auditor's report and we did move forward in response to it. We are still in strong fiscal standing. We are still taking necessary steps. So I would endorse the recommendations. And then I would also say that going going forward some sort of staff report that is specific with regards to each of the corrective actions that have been implemented and I'm sure that Angelina and the city manager could work together on that um but I again I appreciate that um as we heard from our auditor, there's nothing that raises any red flags. He does 40 plus audits a year and our city is in fact doing well. And he's heard in other cities where there's really no oversight whatsoever in terms of what the city manager might authorize with regards to respective department budgets. So in many ways, this is us checking our own municipal code and taking steps to follow us through on our commitment to our community. And I'm, I'm, I think we're doing a strong job of that. So I look forward to continued budget reporting and also to seeing what steps we've taken to enhance our budget monitoring. |
| 03:07:11.73 | Steven Woodside | Any other comments? Okay. |
| 03:07:15.74 | Jill Hoffman | So I think, well, for tonight, this is a draft. So I expect they'll come back on the 5th, was what the staff report said, that Mr. Boudalha was going to come back and finish his report. So I would expect. that he's going to. finalize his report, Um, but you know, I do want to, reiterate that it wasn't just one or two Um, funds it was 14 funds and that we had the community development was 300 000 over that our general capital improvements fund was $400,000 over, that our public works department was $177,000 over, other various general fund were under $100,000, but still over, that, and the non-governmental funds, Tidelands, $85,000 over. And interestingly, our business improvement district fund was $195,000 over. And so these are significant overages. These aren't one-offs. These aren't. you know, small amounts of money and together 1.3 million. And so this was also the year that you will recall we had to in the words of our city manager, as quoted in the IJ, terminated our finance director. And at the time there was a significant amount of residents, and myself included, were requesting that we do a forensic audit for various reasons that red flags were flown about what was going on in our finance department and our finances that led to that action. Um, and so that's during this timeframe, that's this timeframe. And so confidence in our finance department is an issue. And so I disagree that We don't need to take further steps to instill confidence in our finance department. and in our finances. and what we can do to further evaluate our funds, this was a shock. And anybody who sits up here and says, this isn't a significant, I mean, it's a significant deficiency in our accounting practices as identified by our city auditor. |
| 03:09:53.51 | Jill Hoffman | You can't argue with that. And so and it came at a time when we had to change finance directors. How are we going to approach that? And so I think we need to seriously think about revisiting the issue of either a forensic audit or some type of further And I have further comments if you want to go on to somebody else, but I have one or two sentences to wrap it up. |
| 03:10:23.55 | Steven Woodside | Please finish. |
| 03:10:25.08 | Jill Hoffman | OK, thank you. So. we at least need to go back and address historically what was going on in our finance department during fiscal year 24 and 25. and we can do an abbreviated forensic audit Um, An auditor is not someone who would be able especially Mr. Badawi and what he was doing to see, pursuant to what Councilmember Sobiassi asked, whether or not he found evidence of fraud or other misdeeds. That's not what Mr. Badawi's competent or what he would have been asked to do in this review. I would specifically ask that we hire someone to go back and look for evidence of that. We can do it on an abbreviated. past, but I think I think now's the point that we needed to do that. If nothing comes up, fantastic, then that's a good finding. um i think we absolutely need to return to an annual comprehensive financial report this is a year to do it we've talked about that um for whatever reason the city manager recommended not to do that this year after this finding Without question, we need to return to that. And so I think we as a city council need to address that. If not give direction right now, then at our next meeting, I hope that we give that direction at the end of our audit. Thank you. |
| 03:12:01.49 | Steven Woodside | I'm going to say something now that I may regret. |
| 03:12:07.14 | Steven Woodside | Um, All five of us know that there's no evidence of fraud. not just from this auditor, but from what we learned from an intense independent investigation. that was conducted contemporaneously that we're not at liberty to discuss except to say there was no evidence of fraud. All five of us know that. To suggest anything to the contrary now is just flat out wrong. Having said that, I will also say that it is serious to have a department overrun its budget by the amounts in a couple of cases. There need to be. better controls. That's the recommendation of this auditor. And when it comes back in final form, I will... again, say that I support that recommendation. Finally, a forensic audit. is an audit when there is some evidence of fraud and you're trying to find the evidence of the canceled check, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I've done that kind of litigation. I know what a forensic audit is. It is not warranted here. |
| 03:13:25.88 | Jill Hoffman | I've done those investigations too, and we didn't do that investigation. |
| 03:13:31.26 | Steven Woodside | an independent investigator and you know it. |
| 03:13:34.30 | Jill Hoffman | We did not do that investigation. We didn't do it. We did a different kind of investigation that did not show that type of evidence. We didn't do it, and you know it. |
| 03:13:44.88 | Steven Woodside | Actually. |
| 03:13:45.47 | Jill Hoffman | Why don't you sit here and say that? |
| 03:13:47.01 | Steven Woodside | Yeah. |
| 03:13:47.36 | Jill Hoffman | We looked at a piece of equipment That's it. That is absolutely true. Okay, here we go. I make a motion that we release the information that we discussed in closed session. I make the motion right now, someone second it. |
| 03:14:09.11 | Joan Cox | It's not on our agenda. That topic of discussion exceeds our agenda. |
| 03:14:13.96 | Jill Hoffman | I request that we add that to our agenda at the next meeting. you're we you can do that at future agenda items great |
| 03:14:20.44 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:14:21.68 | Steven Woodside | So having said that I regretted raising it, I certainly do regret having raised it, but I stand by it. And I want to say this. This issue has been brought up year after year after year by many of the same people claiming there must be fraud and abuse. Let's have a forensic audit. Let's go crazy. Let's spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to look at every canceled check because somebody must have stolen something. We have an independent auditor, who said, no, nothing's been stolen. There is a failure to have adequate checks and balances so that at the end of the fiscal year, You don't exceed a department budget at a department level. We can fix that. and it should be fixed. So again, I'm sorry for |
| 03:15:10.20 | Joe Farns | Again, |
| 03:15:12.43 | Steven Woodside | raising it perhaps, but I'm tired of hearing. And I'm tired of anyone on this dais continuing to say something that we know from our independent investigation at the time, there's no evidence of fraud. So please, let's not go there again. It's my intention to appoint an independent blue ribbon commission, very qualified people, to take a look at that question of whether a forensic audit is necessary, what type of financial enhanced reporting, whether it's an ACFA or something, is warranted, and we'll get a review from people who know what they're talking about. |
| 03:15:56.27 | Ian Sobieski | So, Mayor, if I haven't made any comments yet, and I don't know that any... Apologize. That's all right. I'm not sure any commission is needed for... the forensic audit question, you know, that thing has been brought up over and over again since I was elected on city council. And it is exactly as you say, it's the I don't think most of the people who quote it know what a forensic audit is, actually, in all honesty. They are concerned about money being stolen or misappropriated in some way. And so they use that term. But I know what it is. It is the tool you deploy when you actually have found fraud. and you want to understand its scope and where to go with it. Mr. Bhadwani. Absolutely did an investigation to do a bunch of tests. He listed them on the slides and the city passed all those tests. So as he answered the question, there's no evidence of fraud and, uh, And this recurring Cynicism has a cost. When the finance committee, when I was first on the city council, did engage with the question of the forensic audit, for some reason, it never actually got authorized. So I'm not sure why it didn't, but it did take the eye off the ball that that would have been the time to pay attention to some other financial matters, like refinancing our debt or doing other financially good moves. that could move forward. So I think we should spend our energy on actually how to fix this finding. operationally than going on snipe hunts. You can't prove a negative. can't prove there are no unicorns. And we can keep trying to search for unicorns. Um, but some people will never be satisfied and they'll say, you'll spend money on this audit. They'll say, well, it must, you didn't look under that stone. If you look under that stone, well, didn't look under the stone over there. So it's a wild goose chase and it takes the eye off the ball. You know, the ball, the bottom line here is this was really good work. It was a good audit. It showed that the city passed numerous tests in terms of its fiscal controls. And I think we should be proud and we should commend the staff, commend city manager Zapata and the whole team for their success. But it wasn't perfect. All right, they wasn't perfect. But hey, wetting in Sausalito is perfect. So we have a PCI of 58, right? Our roads aren't perfect. CDD takes some time to process applications. They wish it could be faster. CDD isn't perfect. Our finance department isn't perfect either. How imperfect is it? Well, we had no material weaknesses. So it's pretty good. It's probably better than our roads, but it's not absolutely perfect. And we need to do better. And I think that we should have some sort of additional controls to make sure that there's a real paper trail for when these budgeted amounts move but don't take the eye off the ball you know during the every year people are lamenting because we look at our projected budgets and whatnot and this uh fantasy about perennial deficits keeps getting repeated in In fact, in that year 2024, many people, including some in this room, talked about how the Sausalito was broke. Here we have an independent audit that confirmed that we had a budget surplus for the year across the enterprise. A budget surplus of more than a million dollars. And that money is verified to be in the bank accounts. So just 15 more seconds, if I can. I do think, though, this underscores something we talked about at our strategic planning meeting. It's our choice what the quality of the roads are, and it has to do with how much money we have in our budget and where it comes from. If we want to have perfection in our finance department, it is possible, but it isn't just possible by berating people from the dais. It's about some process changes, but at the end of the day, it's also about resources. CDD was very busy. And if they missed the ball on a budgeting exercise while they were trying to keep 10 other balls in the air and juggling, they would have been better served if we could have hired another body or two there. Why can't we hire them? Because we don't have a business model that gives us enough excess revenue to fix things in Sausalito, to have the kind of Sausalito we want. So we can't have our cake and eat it too. My real bottom line is we need to grow our economy to pay for better services. En-roads. |
| 03:20:01.23 | Jill Hoffman | So if I just respond to one thing, Forensic audits are used to detect fraud as well. You don't do a forensic audit where you know there's been fraud. You do a forensic audit to detect fraud. When you suspect something's amiss, you do it to detect fraud. That's my point. |
| 03:20:20.87 | Ian Sobieski | I got to just say, it's not, something's amiss you do a forensic audit when you suspect fraud I mean, there's always something amiss somewhere. So you don't launch We had a thought. Okay. The whole world's, if all you have is a hammer, the whole world's a nail. |
| 03:20:32.06 | Jill Hoffman | I THINK IT'S A LOT. Right. Listen. Oh, hi, had to fire their assistant city manager. They immediately hired the same company we did to do a forensic audit. they didn't have any indication that there was anything that this guy had done, but they had to fire him and they immediately hired our same company to do a forensic audit. |
| 03:20:59.60 | Steven Woodside | Are we finished? We're going to be getting a final report. Is that correct, Mr. City Manager? |
| 03:21:05.94 | Chris Zapata | Yes. |
| 03:21:06.33 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. And there's no action you're requesting that we take tonight other than discuss it and |
| 03:21:13.55 | Joan Cox | Receive and file. |
| 03:21:14.30 | Steven Woodside | receive and file this preliminary report. And we heard all your comments. Thank you very much. Okay, I've lost track now of where we are. We do have one more waiver of first reading, introduction by title only of ordinance number, let's see. No, that's not right. |
| 03:21:41.47 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 03:21:41.78 | Steven Woodside | Oh, yes, yes. Short term rental. I'm sorry. Yeah. And this is going to be presented by Mr. Rudin, our city attorney. Are you ready to present? |
| 03:21:51.79 | Sergio Rudin | I am, although I would like the city clerk to confirm that the ordinance number is correct now that I'm looking at it. |
| 03:21:59.10 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. Yes, it's correct. This one is 02-2026. And the one with regarding the land uses is 03-2026. |
| 03:22:12.53 | Sergio Rudin | Okay. Yeah. So this item before you this evening is with regards to implementing provisions of SB 346, which is the Short-Term Rental Facilitator Act of 2025. This was a law that was passed by the California legislature intended to assist local agencies with Um, detecting short-term rentals, aid in enforcement, and also collecting TOT revenue. Basically, the state legislation authorizes local agencies to pass an ordinance requiring short-term rental facilitators, such as Airbnb, VRBO, and similar kinds of companies, to report their data to the local agencies in a format that are created by those cities, counties, to assist in them ensuring that they're collecting all of the correct DOT tax. With regards to Soledito, short term rentals are illegal in the city. However, this is a potent tool for the city to aid in code enforcement. In particular, right now, the city relies on host compliance and similar kinds of services, which go and scout listings. Yeah. on the internet. under SB346, the city can just directly request that Airbnb and VRBO and similar kinds of companies provide their financials and their records regarding short-term rentals that are occurring in the city. The proposed ordinance before you this evening would, in accordance with state law, authorize the city to levy fines of $1,500 for a first violation for failure to report. escalating up to 5,000 for each additional violation. Additionally, the proposed ordinance before you tonight, would require that for those short-term rental platforms that collect payment, that they also collect TOT and remit that to the city. So even though This would not legalize short-term renting. If it is occurring, the city is entitled to tax illegal activity, and so this would require that the platforms that are facilitating that activity collect the appropriate TOT revenue. |
| 03:24:33.17 | Steven Woodside | Are there questions for the city attorney? I have one or two, but go ahead, Mr. Sobieski. |
| 03:24:37.45 | Ian Sobieski | Yeah, I was intrigued by the idea that we might get some tax money for this illegal activity. And I'm just curious, and maybe it's a question for staff more than you, Sergio, but I know we have a code enforcement action against... people that short-term rental in town, when they are caught as they often are, say we're sorry or whatever, and they get a fine. Uh, Do we ever ask them to pay their taxes further? And do we ask for their log of the log of their short-term rental activity for the past year. ask them to pay their taxes. |
| 03:25:15.59 | Chris Zapata | the assistant city manager can weigh in as well but we not to my knowledge we don't ask them for revenue |
| 03:25:23.25 | Sergio Rudin | And I'm aware that that is the case in other jurisdictions, that they do go after unpermitted short-term rentals and require back payment of TOT taxes. Um, |
| 03:25:35.28 | Ian Sobieski | So I know this is question time. I guess the question is, and in discussion time, I'll underline it, is, Can we do that? |
| 03:25:46.14 | Sergio Rudin | Legally, I will say yes. I think the... I'll defer to the city manager on this one, but I believe you have a code enforcement department of one, which may be part of the challenging issue here. |
| 03:25:58.45 | Ian Sobieski | would we city city attorney would we have the ability as a city under some law or whatever. if we have someone who demonstrably has been renting something on airbnb here in town and they you know we've cited them and they agree to stop or whatever could we also require them to give us their records, their financial records from their, I guess, illegally operating business and, and then, uh, so demonstrate what they owe us in TOT. |
| 03:26:27.95 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. I think your TOT ordinance already creates rights of audit and processes for requiring payment and compliance mechanisms. In practice, going after somebody, you know, to sue them to get copies of their records, of course, is very cumbersome. So if this is one of those issues where I suspect the city is using its enforcement discretion and limited resources to try and go after the biggest Fish first. rather than chase down every possible aspect of every possible violation. |
| 03:27:06.68 | Ian Sobieski | Would we have to sue someone to get their records or could we simply fine them for not giving us their records? |
| 03:27:11.74 | Sergio Rudin | I do think that you could levy fines under your TOT ordinance for failure to file. Now, if you wanted to get an exact amount rather than rely on the TOT ordinances estimated provisions, allowing the finance director to estimate the amount of revenue. you know, and someone is non-compliant, you likely would need to go to court and obtain an order. Absolutely. |
| 03:27:36.55 | Steven Woodside | you |
| 03:27:36.60 | Sergio Rudin | Thank you. |
| 03:27:37.63 | Steven Woodside | Quick question. This proposed ordinance is designed to facilitate reporting, correct? |
| 03:27:46.34 | Sergio Rudin | That is the primary goal here. In theory, it's not going to be a big revenue generator because in theory, there should be no, Revenue occurring. But that is a catch-all provision that we considered in there at the request of the finance director. |
| 03:28:01.59 | Steven Woodside | And if, for example, as you put it, Big Fish, Airbnb or VRBO were found to have rented or processed the rental of several places here in town, would we be able to go after the Big Fish for a collection of the tax? |
| 03:28:18.74 | Sergio Rudin | I think under this ordinance and under the city's TOT ordinance, yes. And importantly, I think that the current structure it's a lot easier to get compliance from you know, Airbnb or VRBO Um, in a framework whereas here the ordinance is actually drafted to It includes a safe harbor. So companies like Airbnb and VRBO that comply with all the applicable reporting collection provisions are not deemed to be in violation of the city's short term rental ordinance. as long as they are complying. And then this allows the city to still have the appropriate records to go after the property owners and facilitate compliance that way. |
| 03:29:08.50 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Other questions? |
| 03:29:14.91 | Steven Woodside | Is there? public comment. Seeing none. So back for a motion. |
| 03:29:25.92 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:29:25.93 | Ian Sobieski | I don't know what motion is it. Is it to take the ordinance? Someone's got... |
| 03:29:29.66 | Steven Woodside | Yeah, we're at introduction and waiver. So I would move that we waive the first reading of ordinance number |
| 03:29:31.47 | Ian Sobieski | and So I would move. |
| 03:29:40.24 | Steven Woodside | 0202-2026, an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Sausalito, enacting Section 5.16.15, short-term rental facilitator collection reporting of the Sausalito Municipal Code pursuant to SB 346. |
| 03:29:57.39 | Joan Cox | Second, |
| 03:29:58.62 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:29:58.65 | Ian Sobieski | Just in a second. Just in terms of discussion, I'm wondering, and I don't know if it's appropriate direction on this ancillary issue about going after. current people's back taxes, basically, that they owe. And I'm wondering if that couldn't be a small revenue source. And also a, it's makes money a couple ways. There's some fees, some taxes that are owed. There's also the possibility that this mechanism with this ordinance is going to obviate the need for home compliance, the company that we're paying. because now we'll get the actual records from VRBO and Airbnb. And we can directly bill the people that are doing this activity as well as psych them. |
| 03:30:41.25 | Steven Woodside | Well, My suggestion is that we deal with this ordinance first and simultaneously ask our staff to explore that in terms of what we think in conjunction with advice from the city attorney we can do in terms of actual collection. |
| 03:30:58.00 | Sergio Rudin | And to the council members point and questions, I will just say that, yes, potentially there may be some savings on post compliance, but it may not entirely eliminate the need for that service because. In jurisdictions where short-term rentals are banned, typically it is individuals who are posting them on things like Facebook Marketplace, for example, which would not necessarily be caught by an ordinance such as this. |
| 03:31:23.75 | Ian Sobieski | Okay, thank you for that. You okay with that? Okay. Yeah. That seems like consensus direction to Brandon. He's nodding his head that he heard. He is nodding. |
| 03:31:28.43 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 03:31:28.51 | Joan Cox | Yeah. |
| 03:31:32.50 | Steven Woodside | not |
| 03:31:32.82 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:31:32.93 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:31:32.95 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:31:33.08 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:31:33.37 | Joan Cox | So this gets added to future agenda items. Yes. |
| 03:31:33.66 | Ian Sobieski | I don't know. |
| 03:31:34.17 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 03:31:37.46 | Joan Cox | Sure. |
| 03:31:37.98 | Steven Woodside | just call the question. Yeah. |
| 03:31:38.98 | Joan Cox | Yeah. |
| 03:31:39.18 | Steven Woodside | Sure. Calling the question in favor. Aye. |
| 03:31:42.35 | Joan Cox | . Okay. |
| 03:31:42.67 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:31:42.70 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:31:42.72 | Steven Woodside | Post. Okay, that's passed. Council member reports, committee reports. |
| 03:31:48.80 | Melissa Blaustein | I have a few. Sorry, I have quite a few this week. Councilmember Cox and I convened our weekly, actually twice weekly, meetings of both the task force and the working group with regards to public property to housing. And a really important reminder for those of you who may have not yet heard that you should be receiving a mailer at your home. You should see it in Currents. You should see it. on different social media channels and from different HOAs because we're doing a lot of outreach. But this Sunday at 11 a.m. at New Village School, we are hosting our first community workshop around the joint RFP for both MLK and the Corporation Yard. So if you are able, please attend. We are also planning to create a place where you can leave feedback on the website in the event that you are not able to participate on Sunday and you want to be sure to engage. We've also... Um, got brought on, uh, our favorite facilitator, Amy Haworth to help facilitate that workshop and also to be sure that we have a comprehensive report that we can act on. So we are taking serious steps for moving ahead with the RFP within our, uh, calendar deadline. The second workshop, if you want to save the date now will be two weeks later, Sunday, March 8th at the same time, hopefully same place. That's still kind of TBD. Um, another update. This morning I had a meeting with the PBID and a few things to report. They are updating the lighting on Tracy Way, so prepare to see some holiday-themed lighting in the trees along Tracy Way. Thank you, Adrian Brinton. They're looking into new furniture for Tracy Way as well. Unfortunately, some folks have been stealing some of the bistro tables, so we're looking for a path that would provide a different approach there. And new hanging pots come spring and entering a contract with regards to that. We also took the first steps to approve phase one of a wayfinding campaign for the downtown. And we have been working with the same firm that if you saw the new visitor guide, the House of Height visitor guide for Sausalito, which is really beautiful. And I encourage you to pick one up downtown if you haven't seen it. It's in several shops. And John has been working with the PBID on a really great new campaign for the downtown that we talked about today that we're excited to launch. And additionally, the website. Oh, here. This is the. Beautiful new visitor guide for Sausalito, which was invested in by the P bid, as well as a joint partnership with some businesses downtown. Um, pbid is also working on a comprehensive website about why you should do business in sausalito which will have a listing of vacancies available where you can put your business and we're working with them on the same sort of list of businesses to target so great news about formula retail of which they submitted a letter in support for so stay tuned and they are going to be working on uh the quarterly report which is due march 30th from the pivot to the council so We should talk about that in future agenda items to expect to hear from them. And finally, I attended an executive committee meeting for the Transportation Authority of Marin, and we heard an interesting report generally on innovation policy. And there was a lot of talk about how we best use AI to improve traffic and transportation. So it's just another reminder of the importance of that issue. It's something that I've obviously been talking about for a while. And I think that's it for my community reports. Sorry, that's so many. And also Councilmember Hoffman and I met to discuss the downtown and the data for the downtown, but I'll let you do it because I've been talking for quite some time. |
| 03:35:27.11 | Jill Hoffman | Um, so I attended a budget workshop for Marine clean energy, the second budget workshop for Marine clean energy, um, last week. And, um, we expect to, um, affirm, I suppose the budget, um, at this week's MCE meeting, uh, Thursday night. So at the next, at our next council meeting, I'll talk about the Marine clean energy budget. Um, interesting stuff going on at MCE. and I'll update the next after our board meeting on Thursday night. And yes, council member or vice mayor Blasin and I met earlier this week at the direction of the council for EDAC and and at our Thank you. whatever we called it, our strategy meeting, our visiony meeting, I don't know what it was, our, was not a, uh, our all day meeting, um, uh, to talk about, uh, strategies, um, and drill down, uh, kind of where we wanted to chart the course for, uh, lessons learned kind of really of different efforts between EDAC and the downtown business improvement district. And so one of the things that we sort of thought of for first steps was let's, let's look at the tax, the tax, you know, flow, the tax sales tax increases or decreases over the last few years. And so I've sent a request to Evangeline, our, our, finance team. either through the HDL numbers, or I think we're actually gathering this for... the update to OpenGov. So... Once OpenGov is actually populated, we'll be able to go in and gather these reports ourselves. It's super easy, or at least it used to be. So we want to look at we want to look at the ebb and flow of our sales tax and, and our, our beverage and restaurant, um, returns and look, look and see what those and how they've. actually you know, over the years, And efforts, like we can actually marry those to efforts that we've done over the years and money that we've allocated to different efforts and the downtown improvement district and other areas of town and then kind of see how these efforts have worked. And then that will inform us. of what we want to do going forward. So that was our step number one. |
| 03:37:56.03 | Melissa Blaustein | I just want to add that we also asked for comparisons with other communities. So looking at sales tax trends in Mill Valley and Tiburon to get an understanding of, is this a trend within the region or is this a trend as a result of the work that we're doing? And then additionally, we'll look into What is our parking, et cetera, so we can gather as much data about the year on your trends downtown in particular in the last year since the P bid. |
| 03:38:18.69 | Jill Hoffman | So we had a great report in 2023 that gave us like a five-year or four-year snapshot from COVID. And it did exactly that. And it had some great graphs and I'll forward that to you and you can take a look at it. But that's kind of what we're looking at. So So that's the update from that. |
| 03:38:39.43 | Joan Cox | I just want to remind us that MCCMC will be meeting at the Canal Alliance. |
| 03:38:45.96 | Melissa Blaustein | I got an email saying that it's at Kent Field or something. It's not at the Canal Alliance. Am I? |
| 03:38:51.02 | Joan Cox | I didn't see that. The last I heard was Friday that it was going to be at the canal. Alliance, but it will not be at the Spinnaker Um, so... |
| 03:38:59.08 | Melissa Blaustein | It says Wednesday, February 25th from 6 to 8, the beautiful new Center for Student Success at the College of Marin's Kent Field Campus at 835 College Avenue on Wednesday, February 25th. So next Wednesday. |
| 03:39:10.03 | Joan Cox | next week. Right. So that's where it'll be. I also wanted to just ask, are we noticing the two community workshops as city council meetings so that council members can attend? I think we should do that. |
| 03:39:25.37 | Steven Woodside | you |
| 03:39:25.38 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay. |
| 03:39:26.43 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 03:39:26.83 | Walfred Solorzano | Bye. |
| 03:39:27.04 | Steven Woodside | that. And I guess there's a fairly recent opinion from... |
| 03:39:30.58 | Joan Cox | There's a 2024. Attorney General opinion that says when Um, even if there's only anticipated to be one speaker, where a majority of the council members attend a community meeting, it has to be noticed. So I forwarded that. |
| 03:39:49.72 | Melissa Blaustein | I forwarded that. It's a sea level rise. |
| 03:39:51.03 | Joan Cox | workshops. |
| 03:39:51.61 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 03:39:51.66 | Joan Cox | it was no problem, even if we didn't all attend. I forwarded that opinion to the city attorney today. |
| 03:39:51.67 | Melissa Blaustein | it was no problem. |
| 03:39:58.25 | Steven Woodside | Okay, other reports? future agenda items. |
| 03:40:07.45 | Ian Sobieski | I didn't bring it, but next time we're going to bring it. One of those fundraising thermometers, you know, like the PPA, when you're trying to raise money for a bunch of books, you know, you know, I'm talking about the word goal on the top. and it's going to say $10 million on the top. |
| 03:40:23.25 | Steven Woodside | you want to, uh, have it mounted here in the chamber. |
| 03:40:26.20 | Ian Sobieski | Well, I just think we should have a future agenda item that is a free form discussion among council members and they can include staff and it should actually be a recurring item where this thermometer is the core essence and we ideate and ask staff or hire consultants as needed to do the work to figure out how to make that thermometer add up to $10 million a year of annual revenue. Exactly. |
| 03:40:46.47 | Steven Woodside | Do you have a suggestion as to how frequently we should have that discussion? |
| 03:40:50.47 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 03:40:50.57 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:40:50.58 | Ian Sobieski | I would do it every meeting because it's a primary strategic focus. But, |
| 03:40:53.52 | Joan Cox | But it was not. We said a million dollars per revenue. We did not, as a council, align on generating $10 million in additional revenue this year. |
| 03:41:02.95 | Steven Woodside | but. But as to the fundamental, whether it's 10 million or 1 million, you would like to have this as a future agenda item on the agenda for discussion. |
| 03:41:08.15 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:41:12.07 | Ian Sobieski | Yeah, there's no way of generating $10 million this year. No one ever said that, but I thought we did align around $10 million being Well, no. So yes, I'm, I guess future agenda items are not talking about it. It's that we have a structure where we talk about what is our goal for increasing the budget of SALSLE. We'll pick the number. If it's not 10, then five, then the thermometer changes. But whatever the number is, so that's part of the future agenda item is what is that number? And then what are the specific ideas and how much revenue can they generate? And then authorizing staff or consultants or ourselves to do the work necessary to figure out. the math behind the revenue generating idea. |
| 03:41:51.67 | Steven Woodside | I think it's a good idea as to whether it happens at every meeting or not is an open question in my mind as to what the appropriate this could involve staff time and analysis, etc. But I take your point. So we'll, we'll, you want to have it on a regular basis that we firm that we actually look at this question. |
| 03:42:12.78 | Ian Sobieski | It's a chicken and egg situation with staff because they need direction to do work. And some work might be beyond their capacity, but we can't give them that direction without talking about it. But of course, we won't be sure what we're talking about until we get some information from staff. So it's gonna be iterative. And because it's iterative, that means we have to bring it up many times over the course of this year, probably next year and the year after. It'll be an ongoing. |
| 03:42:34.81 | Steven Woodside | I think from a big picture point of view, we did align on the notion that there's a significant gap between our infrastructure needs, for example, and available revenues. And we wanted to address that on a periodic basis. We'll have to figure it out. |
| 03:42:52.42 | Melissa Blaustein | I would like to add to the agenda the reaffirming of the County Board of Supervisors statements with regards to supporting our immigrant communities in light of ice. It can be a consent item if everyone's okay with that. But I'd also like us to just track going forward local efforts to make sure that we're addressing that and preparing for what might happen. I would like to put, I mentioned this, but just the PBID on the agenda. They're going to want to come and present at some point about what they've been doing and providing their reporting. Also, I mentioned I serve on TAM, and they did some significant work on sea level rise with some recommendations for Sausalito. And I think it would be really great if we had them come and we could hear from them. So I would like to add that to the agenda as well. And I mentioned last time, but the reporting period for Measure AA opened. And if we want to send a letter just saying where we'd like to see transportation priorities, that's it could also be on consent. But I just wanted to put that out there. |
| 03:43:49.63 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:43:53.49 | Steven Woodside | And then- |
| 03:43:53.69 | Joan Cox | And then, you know, I'm going to be a little bit more. We identified two during our meeting tonight. One is a report from staff on implementation of short-term rental enforcement in light of the adoption of this new ordinance. And the second was the report on the steps that staff is taking to implement controls to avoid a finding in our audit next year. Thank you. |
| 03:44:19.33 | Steven Woodside | software. |
| 03:44:19.75 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:44:20.95 | Jill Hoffman | Um, Thank you. Thank you. Sorry, with regard to P-BID, I think there's a requirement annually to Right? To re... |
| 03:44:33.07 | Melissa Blaustein | There is. Yeah. So is that what you're talking about? No, there's two things. They're actually required to give us a quarterly report. And so they've been doing that and they're going to, their next quarterly report is due March 30th. So there's preparing that. And they've offered to come to council to do an annual report and just like present generally. So it's sort of like based on council direction. How much time do we want to give to them presenting? And when do we want to have a more robust conversation? |
| 03:44:35.29 | Jill Hoffman | No. |
| 03:44:55.93 | Steven Woodside | And you're suggesting they would like to do a special presentation to us as to the |
| 03:45:00.55 | Melissa Blaustein | At a certain point, we have to agendize their annual report and have a discussion about it anyway. And I think that would probably be after the approval of this year's budget in June. But knowing they're preparing their quarterly, I'm just flagging that as something that's coming up. |
| 03:45:11.45 | Jill Hoffman | The reason I'm asking is because I was going to Just reiterate eat eat act, uh, once they come and give their like annual, like little there, you know, 10 minute update. And so then I was just like trying to clarify if you're talking about Peebid wants to do like a similar 10 minute update. Right. Or you're talking about they want to, you were talking about like their annual report. |
| 03:45:32.63 | Melissa Blaustein | you I think they're required to give us a comprehensive annual report. So I don't know that we need to hear twice from them. |
| 03:45:35.87 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. in terms of our- |
| 03:45:38.56 | Melissa Blaustein | in front of our use of time. |
| 03:45:40.50 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. That's what I was just trying to clarify. Sorry. Sorry. And you're nodding your head. Our CDD director. I'm going to. So my request is just EDACs. |
| 03:45:47.69 | Michael Dumont | I'm going to. |
| 03:45:51.06 | Jill Hoffman | Right. We've already talked about that. Thank you. |
| 03:45:52.76 | Michael Dumont | Okay. |
| 03:45:53.10 | Jill Hoffman | And then the other one is just because we talked about before. |
| 03:45:53.14 | Michael Dumont | it. |
| 03:45:56.04 | Jill Hoffman | a request if You're going to form a Blu-ray of some kind of Blu-ray committee about forensic audit, then that's, because this is, mine is, So talk about the closed session, the issue of closed session and why, what we discuss about in closed session with regard to our former finance director. |
| 03:46:20.74 | Joan Cox | To discuss whether to reveal to the general public. |
| 03:46:24.24 | Steven Woodside | Okay, and it may well be, and I'll ask the city attorney if it's appropriate at this point, we could schedule the item in a closed session so we can have that discussion. |
| 03:46:25.89 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:46:32.15 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. That's fine. Yeah. |
| 03:46:34.53 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:46:34.58 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. |
| 03:46:35.58 | Steven Woodside | We did hear from a representative of the community boating center. made a couple of suggestions. Specifically, I think they're asking for a formalized agreement. And perhaps I could ask if they wanted to come and do a presentation so we could learn more or discuss whether we needed to set up a closed session discussion on negotiating agreement either way. Um, so that we can move that issue forward one way or the other. Agree. Okay? Any other future agenda items? The list keeps growing. Any minutes that we need to consider, boards, commissions, or committees? |
| 03:47:21.71 | Joan Cox | I'm just curious. The Planning Commission meets twice a month. But we meet twice a month and we never see minutes from the planning commission. So are we keeping minutes from the planning commission? Yes. |
| 03:47:35.67 | Walfred Solorzano | I only get what they give me. |
| 03:47:38.33 | Joan Cox | Well, can we ask our assistant city manager to be sure that the minutes are conveyed to the clerk to add to our agenda? |
| 03:47:46.87 | Unknown | You may ask that, and I'm happy to answer that. We're happy to coordinate on that. |
| 03:47:51.36 | Joan Cox | All right. |
| 03:47:51.67 | Unknown | Thank you so much. I guess the fundamental question is |
| 03:47:51.77 | Joan Cox | Thank you so much. I mean, and I would expect the city clerk when there's an obligation to publish minutes to coordinate with the departments to ensure that he's getting the minutes. I would hope maybe you could do that. |
| 03:48:07.31 | Steven Woodside | I do ask. Okay. Other reports of significance, I just want to mention one thing about someone who's near and dear to many people in Sausalito, Alan Olson. was awarded last week the Lifetime Achievement Award from the national organization Tall Ships America. for what they reported as 70 years of SAIL training, educating youth, et cetera. |
| 03:48:37.33 | Joe Farns | Wow, that's awesome. |
| 03:48:39.46 | Steven Woodside | Pretty amazing. And he deserves, I think it was written up in Latitude 38. And he's a great guy. Many people in Sausalito know Alan, worked with Alan, and |
| 03:48:50.61 | Melissa Blaustein | Maybe you should do a proclamation honoring |
| 03:48:52.74 | Steven Woodside | I will do that. Yes. Um, any public comments on these items? |
| 03:49:00.04 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, we have Senator Bushmaker. |
| 03:49:01.76 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:49:01.80 | Melissa Blaustein | to do our appointment. So yeah. |
| 03:49:03.98 | Sandra Bushmaker | Thank you. |
| 03:49:07.08 | Sandra Bushmaker | Good evening, Council. After your last meeting, immediately after your last meeting, I sent you a letter requesting that the Sausalito Police Department give a presentation for the residents of Sausalito concerning ice activity. There have been reported, there's been reported activity in the north end of town. at the ARCO. in Strawberry and at Marin City. I feel that, and I would like to request that our residents are apprised of what our police department can and cannot do. for us. in the event of any kind of interaction with ice. I don't think the problem is going to go away. And I would like to have our residents... assured of what our police cannot, can and cannot do for us in that event. I did not receive any response from you on this, so I'm bringing it up again. Thank you. |
| 03:50:00.47 | Steven Woodside | I did not receive it. |
| 03:50:05.23 | Steven Woodside | We had a earlier tonight, we had an extensive presentation on that very subject. It's been recorded. It was designed to give advice to our community, complete with websites, places to go, et cetera. And also some of the reports apparently that were on next door were reported to us to be actually invalid, not ICE, which was reassuring, but there are serious concerns, obviously, that We all share a concern, as does our police chief, and there was an extensive report presented tonight, earlier at the beginning of the agenda. |
| 03:50:48.55 | Steven Woodside | Lastly, we do have... |
| 03:50:50.31 | Melissa Blaustein | that McDougal has her hand raised. I'm sorry. don't want to. Whereas I saw Babette's hand raised on the thing. |
| 03:50:58.07 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:51:02.39 | Steven Woodside | So additional public comments on these items? |
| 03:51:09.10 | Babette McDougall | Thank you very much. Um, You know, I want to circle back to my initial public comment regarding reinstatement of Robert's Rules. And perhaps even remind the city manager that when I first met the city manager a few years ago, I mentioned that it would be a good idea for Sausalito to consider a proclamation. declaring that we are a democratic community, that we practice democratic values. I'm talking small d democracy here. |
| 03:51:37.08 | Steven Woodside | Okay. |
| 03:51:37.10 | Babette McDougall | Okay, so. |
| 03:51:38.09 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. Google, the public comment here is on item 6A through 6D. We did hear your public comment earlier and take note of it. Thank you. Any other public comments on items 6A through 6D? |
| 03:51:56.29 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:51:56.30 | Steven Woodside | I see none. OK, we do have one appointment to consider, correct? |
| 03:52:01.48 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, yes, we do. It's we called them. They had interviewed. They said they confirmed that they had interviewed before. It was Dan Farley and Jackie Winkle. Their applications were in the staff report. And so we're waiting to see what the will of the council is if they want to choose an alternate for a three year term. |
| 03:52:23.61 | Melissa Blaustein | I'd like to nominate Jackie Winkles. |
| 03:52:31.34 | Steven Woodside | Any other nominations? There are two applicants. Is that correct? |
| 03:52:35.88 | Melissa Blaustein | I think there's three. There's two. Oh, sorry. |
| 03:52:41.02 | Steven Woodside | OK, Jackie's been nominated. Can we take a voice vote on her nomination? |
| 03:52:48.35 | Melissa Blaustein | I think so. |
| 03:52:49.06 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay. Do we do motion in a second or do we just wanna? |
| 03:52:49.22 | Melissa Blaustein | I'm not sure. |
| 03:52:53.04 | Steven Woodside | was in nomination. |
| 03:52:53.97 | Walfred Solorzano | Okay. |
| 03:52:54.77 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:52:55.23 | Walfred Solorzano | So roll call, Councilmember Cox? Yes. Councilmember Hoffman? |
| 03:52:58.12 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:52:58.13 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 03:53:00.73 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:53:00.75 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:53:00.77 | Walfred Solorzano | you |
| 03:53:00.80 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. |
| 03:53:00.93 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes. Councilmember Sobieski. Vice Mayor Blaustein. Yes. Mayor Woodside. Yes. |
| 03:53:00.95 | Jill Hoffman | to the community. |
| 03:53:04.99 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:53:05.09 | Jill Hoffman | . |
| 03:53:05.14 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:53:06.47 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. |
| 03:53:08.19 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. The appointment for three years as an opportunity |
| 03:53:11.87 | Jill Hoffman | But we can thank the other applicant and oh yeah and actually |
| 03:53:15.48 | Melissa Blaustein | Oh yeah. And actually, yeah. And actually Nan, please stay tuned because there are more terms that are coming up in June. So there are going to be, not only will the alternate move into a post, but then there'll be two more vacancies. So this is a preliminary planning for what we know is coming up. So there will be additional appointments. So stay tuned and we appreciate your enthusiasm and likely we'll have an opportunity to serve within the next six months, assuming we need to make additional appointments. |
| 03:53:21.10 | Jill Hoffman | There's- |
| 03:53:40.91 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. to the next. place is is it appropriate to thank her and ask her if she would be interested in the next opening |
| 03:53:48.25 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, I think. I guess that's a territorial question, but I'll let her know that of the next opening that we might have on the Sustainability Commission, and I'll let her be aware of that, and that will keep her information on file. |
| 03:53:49.99 | Jill Hoffman | It is. |
| 03:53:50.24 | Unknown | They were playing. |
| 03:53:50.50 | Jill Hoffman | That's extremely... |
| 03:54:04.13 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:54:04.15 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:54:04.20 | Steven Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:54:05.25 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 03:54:05.26 | Steven Woodside | All right. Any other further business? If not, we stand adjourned at nine o'clock. |
| 03:54:14.07 | Walfred Solorzano | 904. |
| 03:54:20.70 | Unknown | Music |