| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:00:03.79 | Mayor Woodside | So it's just a little after 3.30 p.m. on Tuesday, May 19th. And I'll call this meeting to order and ask that the roll be taken. |
| 00:00:14.22 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | the good stuff. |
| 00:00:14.96 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 00:00:15.15 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | the program. |
| 00:00:15.22 | Walfred Solorzano | Good afternoon, Mayor and City Council. Today's meeting of May 19, 2026 is being held at 420 Litho Street City Council Council Chambers. It is also being broadcast live via Zoom on the city's website and cable TV channel 27. |
| 00:00:15.51 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Good afternoon, Mayor. Thank you. |
| 00:00:32.80 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. I understand that. |
| 00:00:35.57 | Joan Cox | She didn't call the roll yet. Yeah. |
| 00:00:37.29 | Mayor Woodside | I know. |
| 00:00:37.63 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 00:00:37.65 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. I was going to say, I understand that Member Hoffman is on her way, but may not be here at the time the role is taken. So... Please call the roll. |
| 00:00:46.83 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Cox. Here. Councilmember Hoffman will be here shortly. Councilmember Sobieski. Vice Mayor Blaustein. Here. Mayor Woodside. |
| 00:00:55.84 | Mayor Woodside | here. Thank you. Um, First item of business today is a closed session. We will be discussing items C1 through five. As listed on the agenda, item C1 is a conference with labor negotiator pursuant to government code section 54957.6. Item C2 is a conference with legal counsel. regarding existing litigation pursuant to government code section 54956.9 d1 c3 item c3 is another item of existing litigation pursuant to the same government code section and The first case was Russo versus City of Sausalito. The second case is Sullivan versus City of Sausalito. Item C4 is public employee appointment. And the job title is interim city manager. and the government code section is 54957. And finally, item C5 is a conference with legal counsel regarding anticipated litigation, pursuant to government code section 54956.9 D4. And there is one case. So we will now, go into closed session, but before doing so, ask if there's any public comment on the closed session items. |
| 00:02:21.16 | Walfred Solorzano | Seeing none online. |
| 00:02:22.46 | Mayor Woodside | Very well. We'll now go into closed session. Thank you. |
| 00:02:30.05 | Mayor Woodside | After five, sorry we're a little bit late. We've come out of a closed session. We'll speak a little bit about that in just a couple of moments. But we're now reconvening an open session and the first item is a pledge of allegiance. |
| 00:02:45.98 | Chris Zapata | of the United States of America. |
| 00:02:50.52 | Joan Cox | and to the Republic for which it stands. |
| 00:02:50.74 | Chris Zapata | to. public. |
| 00:02:53.51 | Joan Cox | one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. |
| 00:02:54.99 | Chris Zapata | God. Invisible with liberty and justice. |
| 00:03:03.23 | Mayor Woodside | And may we have a roll call. |
| 00:03:06.09 | Walfred Solorzano | Councilmember Cox. year. Councilmember Hoffman? Here. Councilmember Sobieski? Vice Mayor Blaustein? Here. Mayor Woodside? |
| 00:03:16.15 | Mayor Woodside | here. We do have a brief report out from closed session on items C1, C2, C3, C4, Um, There's no action taken to report out at this time. However, with respect to Item C5, one possible anticipated litigation. We've authorized the city's attorney to file suit and against me case to funny regarding 27 Central Avenue and various code violations that have occurred at that site. And Mr city attorney is there anything else I need to add to the report out. |
| 00:04:06.42 | Sergio Rudin | Um... No, there isn't, other than we should perhaps state for the record that Councilmember Hoppen was present and arrived, I believe, around 335. |
| 00:04:18.77 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. Yes, Council Member Hoppen was present. And I do believe that we have to announce that Decision to authorize suit was a unanimous decision involving all... five council members, correct? |
| 00:04:31.03 | Sergio Rudin | Correct. For reportable actions, we should be reporting out the votes of council members. |
| 00:04:35.85 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. So having concluded that, uh, that report. Let's take a quick look at the agenda. Do we have approval for the items on the agenda? |
| 00:04:48.09 | Unknown | I move we approve this evening's agenda. |
| 00:04:50.18 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. Second. All those in favor? I'm sorry. |
| 00:04:54.74 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 00:04:54.97 | Mayor Woodside | All right. OK, so we're moving on. Um, Item Roman numeral one is special presentations, mayor's announcements, city manager report. And our city manager will be giving a report shortly. But first, we have a special presentation of a musical nature. So you're on. |
| 00:05:24.79 | Scott Gensler | Good evening, everyone. So just by way of quick introduction, my name is Scott Gensler. I've been a resident of the Bay Area for 20-something years, and I'm a reformed tech executive on a second career as a musician. And this has become something of a passion and purpose-driven project over my last few years in a really meaningful and heartfelt way. About a year and a half ago, I said to my co-conspirator in the second career, you know, we should just meet at the park. And that Yi Tak Chi thing has a great view. And so we met at the park. And we didn't intend to violate any anti-busking rules unintentionally. Nor did we go with the intention of trying to get money from folks and from tourists. Instead, what we found, though, is people threw money into our guitar cases and were just... universally delighted by the music. which really gave us the courage to make a little bit more of a second career out of the experience. And so since we've been playing live, we're playing June 6th locally at the No Name Bar at 3 p.m. We'd love to see all you beautiful people there. And just encourage... everyone in this room to remove barriers between humans and art and expression. Because to me, besides the gorgeous natural beauty, that's really what makes Sausalito special and what gives it a spark. And so you can't start a fire without a spark. |
| 00:07:00.76 | Chris Zapata | I get up in the evening. And I ain't got nothing to say. I come home in the morning. I go to bed feeling the same way. I ain't nothing but tired. Man, I'm just tired and bored with myself. Hey there, baby. I could use just a little, well, can't start a fire. Can't start a fire without a spark. Ask Gump's for hire. Even if you're just dancing in the dark. |
| 00:07:46.39 | Chris Zapata | message keep getting clearer. Radio's on and I'm moving about the place. Take one look in the mirror. Wanna change my clothes, my hair, my face? And I ain't getting nowhere. I'm just living in a dump like this. There's something happening somewhere. I just know there is chance not a fire. Can't start a fire without a spot for his guns for hire. Even if you're just dancing in the dark |
| 00:08:30.82 | Chris Zapata | Sit around getting older. There's a joke here somewhere in the soul. They'll shake this world up my shoulder. Come on, baby, this life's so mean. Stay on the streets of this town. And they'll be coving you up all right. They say you've got to stay hungry. Hey, baby, I'm just about starving tonight, dying for some action. Sick of sitting around trying to write this book. I need a low reaction. Come on, baby, give me just one look. Can't start a fire. Can't start a fire without a spark. Let's go. It's for higher. Even if you're just dancing in the dark, can't start a fire. Quarrying about your little world falling apart. This gun's for hire. Even if you're just dancing in the dark. |
| 00:09:37.56 | Chris Zapata | Even if you're just dancing in the dark. But if you're just dancing in the dark, Hey, baby! Even if you're just dancing in the dark. Hey, baby! Even if you're just dancing in dark. Woo! Wow. |
| 00:10:08.81 | Chris Zapata | but, |
| 00:10:09.03 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | So... |
| 00:10:09.12 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 00:10:09.13 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you very much. |
| 00:10:09.17 | Chris Zapata | and you're going to be |
| 00:10:12.88 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Move to adjourn. |
| 00:10:13.93 | Mayor Woodside | Um, |
| 00:10:14.37 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah. And that's it folks. It doesn't get any better than that. |
| 00:10:17.47 | Mayor Woodside | There might be a second and we might adjourn, but I don't think we should because part of the reason to have a little music is because most of you who know Chris, Zapata knows he loves music. And I think I saw your toes tap in. |
| 00:10:35.39 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, so we're going to move on to the city manager report and see if he can follow that. |
| 00:10:41.42 | Chris Zapata | Doubtful, but I'll do my best. A couple of things important to the community I want to report on. The first one is at Thursday's special meeting, the city council directed the city attorney and the city manager to... declined consent to the Pelican Harbor proposed lease agreement. That document was sent and signed this morning, certified mail. We've already received a response back. The second thing I want to provide information to the community and the council on is the notice that I got from Chief Chris Tubbs from the Southern Marin Fire District, where he spoke to the changes in the district that are occurring, including his retirement July 1. But he also took care to make sure that the city council and city staff knew that there was a commitment by the district to continue to work on the Spencer Firehouse recommissioning. So that is really important to this community. This council, you've obviously committed over a million dollars to refurbish and get that ready. You've agreed to a lease, they've signed the lease. And so he's reaffirming the district's commitment, even though there are changes at the executive level, he is saying that he is going to make sure that it gets shepherded and continues to go forward. So that's good news. I have some brief comments. I could be... A man of a million words, but I choose not to. I want to say thank you to a few people. This is my last city council meeting in the city of Sausalito, and it goes by in a blink. I want to start with the public servants that do the work here. My colleagues, some of them who are in this room, past and present, the folks that, you know, make sure that the services in this community, the projects in this community, the issues in this community are dealt with as professionally as possible. And, you know, there's a core group of dedicated small but mighty, you know, folks that I won't start naming because I would miss somebody. But let's just say there are 80 roughly and some part timers and some interns that truly have helped keep things moving. Um, I want to talk about the city council. I've worked for six mayors since I started here. And I want to give you a little sense of the workload In 21, in June, I came on board and Uh, Then Mayor Hoffman held 21 city council meetings. in 22. Then Mayor Kielman held 39 city council meetings And 23, then-Mayor Blaustein held 28 city council meetings. and 24, then Mayor Sobieski held 25 city council meetings. And in 25, Mayor Cox held 33 city council meetings. And as of today, this will be number 16 for the city council. So all that to say there's been a 162 city council meeting since I've been here. And one of the things that I am most proud of is my attendance has been perfect. I've not missed a single meeting in almost five years. So that's important. You know, being available is important. And I also want to thank the 7,000 residents and the businesses that are here. For those that live here, those that invest here, those that visit here, the work that we do is public service to them. And they've been really busy on there, and you'll see more of it tonight. But I looked at my email count this morning, and I had 109,100 emails from different people, not all from the community, but a lot of them from the community. That's an engaged community that cares about this special place. And let me just say this, this is, you know, it's been known, it's no secret that Sausalu is one of the most beautiful places on the planet and cherishing it, being good stewards of it. I have every confidence that this mayor and council will continue to do the best job they can to make sure that, you know, Sausalito stays special, agree, disagree, but you will all work beyond, you know, what people expect of you to do it. And as I always tell people at high pay, I like to make sure that the public understands it. The city manager is compensated well, but the city council is not. They do this out of love for the community and service to the public. So it goes by quick. It will go by quicker as I finish up. But I just want to say thank you to the. people that live and invest here. I want to say thank you to the people that I work alongside of, and I want to say thank you to the council people. And I would be remiss if I didn't thank the council that hired me. I don't want to miss Council member Susan Cleveland Knowles. who was on the council that hired me and council member Janelle Kelman was on the council to hire me without their support. I wouldn't be here, but I appreciate all of that. Appreciate all of you. And as I've told the people I work with and work for and some people in the community, I'm not going to be too far away. I'm going to go join the Maricopa County. executive team led by Derek Johnson and the Board of Supervisors, and I'm really looking forward to that. It was a start date of June 1st, so I am not going to be in Sausalito, but the last time I checked, Sausalito was part of Marin County. So thank you again. |
| 00:16:21.14 | Mayor Woodside | Chris, thank you. We have a lot that we could say tonight, those of us who sit here now, and I know there are members of the community who may wanna speak about your departure and more importantly about what you've done while you're present here. I don't think you're actually leaving the city. And we have a few words to say about that. We have a resolution. |
| 00:16:53.39 | Mayor Woodside | And, Thank you. We often do this in serial fashion, asking each one of us to read a couple of the paragraphs. |
| 00:16:59.89 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:16:59.99 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 00:17:05.93 | Mayor Woodside | You were the mayor when Chris was hired. And some of us haven't seen the language, so if we stumble a little bit, it's understandable. |
| 00:17:16.07 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Oh, okay. Yeah, I'll start. |
| 00:17:17.78 | Mayor Woodside | We are at the top. |
| 00:17:19.14 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Okay, whereas Chris Zappato was appointed city manager of the city of South Florida, May 2021. bringing over 35 years of distinguished public service across cities in California and Arizona and... Thank you. |
| 00:17:33.22 | Joan Cox | Whereas Chris Zapata made history as the first Latino city manager in Marin County, a milestone reflecting both his exceptional qualifications and Sausalito's commitment to leadership that mirrors the richness of our community. and |
| 00:17:48.89 | Mayor Woodside | Where as Chris Sakata is a 25 year member of the International City County Management Association served as President of the International Hispanic Network and received the advancement of diverse communities award from the California League of cities and. |
| 00:18:09.01 | Unknown | Thank you. Whereas Chris Zapata treated every constituent from the harbor front to the hillside, from those who emailed once to those who emailed daily. with equal dignity, respect, and a genuine smile and |
| 00:18:25.28 | Jill Hoffman | Whereas, Chris Zapata navigated the full spectrum of what makes Sausalito uniquely Sausalito. the beauty, the passion, The arts, the houseboats, the hills, the fog. The opinions and yes, the meetings. with grace, humor, and an unshakable commitment. It's a different one. |
| 00:18:48.73 | Unknown | you Whereas Chris Zapata balanced the budget, built a cohesive and high-functioning city staff, championed our beloved jazz and blues programs, and left this organization meaningfully better than he found it. And? |
| 00:19:05.39 | Unknown | Let me do the last thing and you can do the whole end. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. We didn't rehearse this. And whereas Chris Zapata always put community first, proving through action that public service is indeed a calling. |
| 00:19:21.13 | Mayor Woodside | So now, therefore, be it resolved that the city of Sausalito does hereby proclaim May 19th, 2026 to be officially designated Chris Zapata Day. |
| 00:19:36.98 | Kathy Nikitas | There's more, there's more. |
| 00:19:42.53 | Mayor Woodside | In recognition of his extraordinary service, his historic leadership, and his boundless dedication to every person who calls this remarkable city home. And furthermore, the city of Sausalito does hereby confer upon Chris Zapata the title of Honorary Citizen of the City of Sausalito, so that wherever life takes him, He will always belong to this fog-kissed, opinion-rich, music-filled, breathtaking little city, and it will always belong to him. |
| 00:20:31.72 | Joan Cox | Yes. |
| 00:20:33.91 | Mayor Woodside | And if you'll stay there, we're going to come around with something else. |
| 00:20:35.97 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:20:36.01 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 00:20:36.04 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:20:36.07 | Joan Cox | you |
| 00:20:36.12 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:20:36.14 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 00:20:38.18 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:20:40.85 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:20:52.68 | Janelle Kellman | part. |
| 00:20:57.51 | Chris Zapata | Well, I'm going to present this to you. |
| 00:20:58.06 | Janelle Kellman | to you guys. |
| 00:20:59.85 | Chris Zapata | of some years. And I'd like the teeth to come up. |
| 00:21:01.39 | Janelle Kellman | And I think that's a good question. |
| 00:21:03.93 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. That's it. I just wouldn't be here but for the Chiefs House. Thank you so much. I'm presenting this with City Manager Chris Apata. Thank you for your service to the City of South Florida of 2021-2026. |
| 00:21:23.85 | Chris Zapata | Woo. |
| 00:21:37.97 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:21:40.15 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. |
| 00:21:50.27 | Janelle Kellman | dropping on so we feel up there |
| 00:21:54.93 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 00:22:04.28 | Mayor Woodside | My wife reminds me from time to time that instead of saying goodbye, there's a West Indian phrase that says, I go to come back. So Chris, we know you're going, but we know you'll be back. Thank you very much. |
| 00:22:23.06 | Vicki Nichols | I had some comments. |
| 00:22:25.04 | Mayor Woodside | And any additional comments? Thank you. |
| 00:22:29.12 | Joan Cox | Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Woodside. Good evening, everyone. Tonight, I want to take a moment to honor a colleague, a partner in public service and a friend, our city manager, Chris Zapata, as he prepares to close this chapter of his distinguished career here in Sausalito. Chris came to us in June 2021, bringing over 35 years of city management experience from communities across California and Arizona. From the moment I met him, I recognized that his depth of knowledge and steady hand were exactly what Sausalito needed. When I was appointed mayor, I was determined to leverage my 30 years of municipal law experience alongside Chris's 30 years of city management experience to tackle the long deferred infrastructure and facilities challenges our city faced. And together, that is precisely what this council and Chris do. |
| 00:23:13.54 | Babette McDougall | it. |
| 00:23:13.79 | Joan Cox | Thank you. The results speak for themselves. Under Chris's leadership, the City Council approved an ambitious $17 million infrastructure improvement program to address our streets, stairs, ADA compliance, and city-owned facilities, a once in a generation investment in our community's future. We completed the ferry land side improvements at our plaza, a project that enhances one of the most visible gateways to our city. We secured the city's participation in a property-based improvement district, strengthening the partnership between our municipality and our business community. Chris brought to fruition the transfer of our sewer collection system to the Saucer-de-Marin City Sanitary District. An effort more than 10 years in the making that was finally completed in 2025, creating a single integrated entity responsible for all sewer services in our community. streamlining operations and eliminating nearly $2 million in long-term interest payments for our ratepayers. And we successfully placed and approved the extension and expansion of Measure O, preserving critical sales tax revenue that funds our infrastructure and essential services, revenue that Chris rightly called the first and most important part of getting to some kind of structural balance for our city. Beyond these headline achievements, Chris brought stability and professionalism to City Hall at a time when we sorely needed it. During his tenure, we greatly lowered the rate of staff turnover successfully negotiated a three-year police department contract, improved customer service and transparency, strengthened our disaster preparedness and earned a glowing report from our insurer by reducing the city's overall risk profile. Chris once told this council that what drew him to public service was the opportunity, and I quote, to help plan and manage facilities and programs that benefit all walks of life in a community, to do something good for someone every day. Chris, you have lived that philosophy here in Sausalito, and our city is better for it. On behalf of myself, my colleagues on the city council and the residents of this extraordinary community, thank you, Chris. Thank you for your dedication, your expertise, your patience, and your tireless service. We know that you intend to continue in this profession and begin a new chapter of public service, and we have no doubt that the county of Marin will be as fortunate as we have been. It truly takes a village, Chris, and you have been an indispensable part of ours. We wish you every success, happiness, and fulfillment in the road ahead. |
| 00:25:41.66 | Jim Madden | Well done. |
| 00:25:46.29 | Mayor Woodside | I said to Joan less than half an hour ago as we were coming out, you may want to give a little share a few words. |
| 00:25:57.44 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Jill, do you want to add anything? |
| 00:26:02.45 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | No, I think Joan summed it up for all of us and did a nice job. So thank you very much. Thank you. |
| 00:26:06.92 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:26:06.96 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Thank you. |
| 00:26:06.98 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:26:06.99 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Okay. Thank you, Chris. |
| 00:26:07.01 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, Kristen. I'll create something. |
| 00:26:12.44 | Jill Hoffman | It was a tough time that you showed up. Remember we had our encampment. We had real uncertainty about our finances. Amazingly, I think we had 77 employees and We hired something like 73 employees within a year. It was incredible staff turnover. you helped stabilize the organization, not just with your experience, but who you are. your steady hand at the helm. You're the boss that doesn't act like a boss, but more like a mentor and your staff I know loves you and respects you as do the city council members and the community. We're richer for your having been here. and uh lucky i'm lucky every day i wake up in sausalito in this beautiful place in the beautiful bohemian culture that we have here and we owe you a debt for taking care of it for the last several years and helping bring some creeping excellence back to our portfolio so good luck in marin and when i think about the beautiful music we just heard. There is one boss more than this boss, and that's the boss himself. And I know you like to play basketball, so his quote that you may appreciate from one of his songs is, may you stay forever young. May your... Sure. Your hands always be busy and may your feet always be swift. Good luck to you. And I hope we'll always see you here in our little town. |
| 00:27:41.09 | Sandra Bushmaker | I mean, |
| 00:27:44.26 | Unknown | This is really hard for me because I have been dreading since you told us you were leaving the day has finally cut. Um, and I can't believe this is our last city council meeting with you at the helm. You have brought so much life and revitalization and new energy into not just our community, but our, our staff. And I really have so enjoyed seeing the way. the members of the team look up to you, relate to you, communicate with you and you really make everyone feel important and heard. And you've extended that same courtesy to all of our constituents as well, responding as your proclamation noted to every email to the best of your ability, even though you have tens of thousands literally in your inbox. And I have been so impressed and I really have learned so much from you. It's been really an honor to be able to have my first, you know, term on the council with you as city manager, someone with so much experience and so much to teach all of us. And you did it with so much grace. And I really consider you a mentor and a friend and you will be dearly missed and please come and visit us. And you always have a seat at my table at Jazz and Blues all summer long. |
| 00:28:55.42 | Mayor Woodside | Sometimes when you've had a long, long time to think about this, the words, you can't find the words. And that's true for me tonight. I was appointed mayor, and no sooner am I appointed than Chris and I have a meeting. And he says, you know, I might be leaving before the very, very end of, uh, The fiscal year. And I was just assuming that Chris would stay on for, well, not forever, but for at least another year. Um, So for others, it might have been shock. For me, it was just like, oh, my gosh, how did that happen? And, uh, But Chris being Chris, didn't let me be too concerned about that because he gave us early notice. He helped us in transition. He continues to help us. And the good news is he's not going very far and we'll be seeing him often. And just on a personal note, what I look forward to He says he has moves on the basketball court. And, uh, came earlier, many years earlier, I think it was his son's wedding and he happened to come over and shoot hoops right outside right on this campus. And I don't know, did you ever get a chance to shoot hoops there since? This year. Okay, good. Well, I look forward to when you come back and we'll shoot a few hoops. Thank you, Chris. |
| 00:30:28.54 | Mayor Woodside | So tonight we also have a special presentation and I wanna thank those who've been waiting patiently. to make this presentation, and I don't mean just patiently tonight, but I know the Economic Development Advisory Committee has been wanting to do this for quite a long time. if you can approach, and just so everyone in the audience knows, special presentations are not designed to Uh, at least not at this meeting, lead to action or extended discussion. But we're getting a status report and a special presentation. We look forward to it. So thank you. If you are going to be doing this by yourself. Thank you. |
| 00:31:08.82 | Levi Eastwood | We'll be doing this by myself, but I do have friends in the audience. So if I look a little nervous or squirmy, they're going to come up and I can phone a friend. Okay. Okay. And you've got a presentation? We did put together a deck. It's brief. We'll keep it under 10 minutes, but we do have a deck. |
| 00:31:11.55 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. |
| 00:31:18.62 | Mayor Woodside | We do. |
| 00:31:24.92 | Levi Eastwood | So thank you, Mayor and Council, for allowing us time. We're excited. This is a tough act to follow. Chris, congratulations on your perfect attendance over the last six years. That was impressive. I've been a resident for the last three years here. My wife works in the Marineship, and when we first moved here, I asked Chris to a coffee, and he surprisingly said yes. So that's the City Council, or that's just the City Manager he's manager he's been and he's it's gotten better every year since we've lived here so thank you and you all for that. I'm Levi Eastwood I'm the Economic Development Advisory Committee Chair aka EDAC and tonight I want to share a quick update with you on what EDAC's been up to and what we're looking forward to in the future. |
| 00:31:34.45 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 00:32:06.97 | Levi Eastwood | Thank you. what we're approaching this year, what we're hearing, what we're beginning to organize that in a practical objective and staff aligned way. And if we could jump to the next slide. I just wanted to start by grounding EDAC's role real quick. EDAC exists to advise city council on economic fertility and long-term resilience. Our role is to listen, synthesize, and bring forward useful recommendations over time. We're not here to direct staff work or set policy. I also want to acknowledge that this work builds on prior EDAC efforts over the last several years, including vacancy and business outreach, marineship and blue economy discussions and coordination local partners. We've had. some really stellar members over the last several years, and they've done great work, and I want to acknowledge that. Our goal is to build on what we've already been doing and sync with the council and the city to make sure that our efforts matter in the years ahead. We can jump to the next slide. So the good news is Sausalito is in good shape and we've headed in really good direction. We already have meaningful economic advantages in motion. We have substantial visitor and commuter flow. Strong local household spending power, continued business interest, and a somewhat broader pool of eligible businesses after the formula retail update. This isn't a conversation about economic value from scratch. It's a conversation about supporting what exists today and tomorrow, reducing friction where possible and helping our local leaders making thoughtful choices going forward. We'll jump to the next slide. So we've heard a lot, but we thought we'd consist it into one slide amongst the group. And I'm sure many of these things are what you have been hearing day to day in many occasions as well. We're servicing What we've heard through conversations are most consistently a need to think clearly about long-term revenue and infrastructure, the importance of permit encoding streamlining, the continued challenge of retail vacancies, and the future of marinship and the working waterfront. Also hearing a desire to balance tourism and the community experience and better understand where South Slido may be able to align with outside funding, infrastructure opportunities over time. These are signals we think are worth continuing to test and refine. Nothing conclusive, but definitely trends that we thought were servicing here today. On the next slide, we've done our best. Um, as we move forward this year, we thought we'd bucket, um, our efforts into three focus areas. The first being business fatality and district health. The second focused around marinship and the working waterfront. And third, process clarity and benchmarking. I've got slides after this that dives a little bit into each of these. But their purpose is to help EDAC gather input, structure analysis, and eventually bring forward his focus and cite recommendations in a way that's clear and useful for the council here. We'll jump to the next one. For business fatality and district health, This is about supporting both new and existing businesses in Sausalito's core commercial districts and thinking about larger conditions, not just individual cases, cases one at a time. That includes improving the conditions that help businesses open, start, and reinvest. In downtown, that includes the progress from the PBID into an active business organization structure. Kudos to Cass Green and many others from the EDAC group that have worked on that. Along Caledonia, it includes the new organizing and place-making energy beginning to take shape there. Kudos to our member Alex Blayleven for leading those efforts as well. Really excited to see the energy building there. It also includes making good use of formula retail changes help fitting businesses and broker outreach. And a huge kudos to Monica Finnegan and Alex Woe for their efforts on that as well. EDAC's role is to surface friction points, support business attraction, and help bridge business needs to realistic city attention. On the next one, we'll dive into marinship and working waterfront. The marineship is different from our commercial districts. It's a distinct economic geography with its own infrastructure realities and long-term questions. Support of the maritime and industrial use that already exist for EDEC. EDEC can be useful here by helping run analysis, compare scenarios, and surface tradeoffs from an objective lens. That could include demand questions, infrastructure implications, revenue implications, and where outside funding or resilience tools may or may not line up. A big kudos to John DeRay, Craig Morellos, and Malcolm Morgan for their efforts on that so far as well. We'll jump to the next slide. process clarity and benchmarking. This might be the most simple and most consistent practical theme we're hearing. Businesses are asking for greater clarity. They want to better understand pathways, timing, and key steps, work streams to focus on clearer permit pathways, better guidance from tenant improvements and change of use, and more usable business-facing information overall. There's room for simple tools like workshops, orientations, or recurring sessions to help people understand starting or expanding a business in Sausalito. EDAC's role is to surface or could be surface recurring friction points, gather user experience, feedback, and support practical tools that make the system simpler to understand. So that's where we're going today on our next slide. I do come with just two asks today. Um, fairly straightforward. The first is we are a very eager and mighty bunch and we are, um, as we move forward with our different work streams, we just wanted to share this with you all. And as you mentioned earlier, made it, this doesn't have to be a conversation tonight, but we are looking for confirmation that these do align with your, uh, needs and where you can be most useful and additive going forward. Second, and this one's a little bit more time sensitive, we are Come summer, we will have five open roles in EDEC, and we are looking to backfill them quickly. So we have one seat open today. We have three members who are going to be sorely missed their terms will conclude in June. And we unfortunately just had one other member resigned within the last 24 hours due to moving and other life situations. So to avoid a gap and maintain momentum, we would recommend beginning recruitment now, conducting interviews. And hopefully having these positions backfield by fall. We have a range in our council from seven to 12, seven being the minimum 12 being the max, and we will be approaching seven, um, come, come this summer. In the next two slides here, we'll just give a brief overlook to kind of spotlight that second ask of our members today when their terms expire and then on the final slide here, just some of the gaps Oh, so sorry. On the next one there, we'll have the, um, the gaps, the ones in red are, um, terming out in the next month. And then we've got liaison roles open as well. Thank you. Council member Jill Hoffman for all of your support and mentorship over the years as well. This has been very helpful. So this is the crew. It's a small but mighty, well, about to be a small but mighty crew. And we are eager. We're already having conversations throughout the community and looking for stakeholders and voices that would really help drive it forward. So with that, that is the end of my presentation. If there are any questions and if that's not the format that I will screw on out of here. |
| 00:39:58.05 | Mayor Woodside | Well, before you leave, I know you're asking for alignment, and I would just want to say one thing about that. Um, We will talk about this at another time in greater detail, but just off the top. There is alignment. And, uh, you don't have to worry about that. Uh, sometimes the devil's in the details, but we do want to work more closely with you in the next year. Uh, that includes helping you, um, fill the vacancies and we need to do that ASAP. Um, the process, um, at least from my perspective in the past for some of these is, is rather truncated and not very satisfying, a very short interview, for example. And I hope we could offline work with you on a process that goes in a little bit more depth. and, uh, Jill, you may have a comment. |
| 00:40:51.50 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, I think as the liaison, Levi and I talked about this actually yesterday, we do have an August meeting that's, that'll be posted on the website and we invite anybody interested in starting on EDAC to come to our meeting or to dial in. It's, it'll be remote. I think it'll be in person. We usually meet here. at three o'clock on, I think the first Monday in August. And so. If you're interested in serving on EDEC, please feel free to come and join us. And we'll be looking to also recruit members. who we think would be good to serve on EDAC to come to that August meeting. So we're going to be looking for people. |
| 00:41:31.69 | Mayor Woodside | Um, Since there are one vacancy, perhaps two right now, and what, three more by the end of June? Yep, that's correct. Just off the top of my head, August seems like it's too late. We should be starting sooner than that, but we'll talk. And we'll try to move forward because we do want continued vibrancy, because you've made a lot of suggestions over the years that have been very helpful to us. Anyone else want to comment briefly? OK. Thank you for coming. Sorry that you were delayed tonight and also delayed in getting you on an agenda. It was great. |
| 00:42:03.38 | Jill Hoffman | You hear that? Thank you. |
| 00:42:07.80 | Jill Hoffman | Or could I just say thank you, Levi? |
| 00:42:08.11 | Levi Eastwood | Thank you. Sure thing. |
| 00:42:10.20 | Jill Hoffman | No one thanked you. So thanks so much. |
| 00:42:11.92 | Levi Eastwood | Absolutely. Thank you. And thank you to John. Craig. Alex and Matthew in the back there. Thank you for all of your help as well. It's been a team effort. Yes. |
| 00:42:20.71 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yes, our staff liaison, Matthew Mandich, has been tremendously helpful. And Deirdre this week, too, with the presentation. So thanks very much to both of them. Thank you. |
| 00:42:31.18 | Levi Eastwood | Thank you all. |
| 00:42:41.18 | Mayor Woodside | Excuse me, I'll get my mic on. We turn to public communications. These are communications regarding items that are not on tonight's agenda. I will note. We do have other things that may take some time, and I've been handed a fairly, not terribly thick, but thick enough. So I just want to alert everyone. Item is not on the agenda. We're not able to really respond or act on them. Why is that? Because they're not on the agenda and others in the community may not know about what you have to say tonight. But rest assured, we listen. And to the extent these items will come up at a future agenda, we take your comments tonight into account. I would. We'll also note that we've received a number of written communications prior They are listed, your names are listed on the posted agenda if you've got your written comments in. by a deadline. They are and we will certainly keep a record of your comments tonight. So having said that, |
| 00:43:55.35 | Mayor Woodside | So these are all, I believe, public communications on matters not on the agenda. |
| 00:44:03.62 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 00:44:03.70 | Chris Zapata | That's it. |
| 00:44:04.61 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 00:44:04.63 | Chris Zapata | Yeah. |
| 00:44:04.87 | Janelle Kellman | you |
| 00:44:05.88 | Mayor Woodside | So if I mispronounce your name, I apologize in advance. I'm going to call in pairs. So the first speaker will be Denise Fafette. And followed by Rob McCullough. So... Is Denise here? Oh. Thank you. Welcome. I think I saw you outside of the city manager's office today. |
| 00:44:38.20 | Denise Fafette | Hi, my name is Denise. I've lived in Sausalito for over 20 years. To me, Sausalito has always felt like a beautiful harbor town where life feels close to the water and close to the people. During the fires, when people lost power, we were able to go to Taste of Rome. and share connections and share help. When I first moved here, I rented from a retired couple on Tourney Street who became what I called my California grandparents. Over the years, I've tried to give back to the community while serving on a variety of organizations. That's why it's painful for me to find myself here now with this. I'm asking this to be put on the agenda because of the impacts to the community. I want to be very clear, this is not about attacking neighboring homeowners or landlords. Anyone who lives nearby, I'm specifically talking about 911 through 917 Bridgeway, 923, 925 Bridgeway and 931 Bridgeway that are owned by a single homeowner residing in Belvedere. For the past five years, my husband and I have paid rent on time while repeatedly reporting Worsening conditions, including water intrusion, mold that has been improperly covered up instead of remediated, and continues to inhabit within the walls. Unsafe utility and mechanical systems, repeated drainage odors, rodent activity, and deteriorating structural conditions that threaten to destabilize the hill that has already encountered not one, but at least two erosion activities that were significant. Neighbors uphill reportedly continue using portions of the original clay sewer infrastructure. after a neighboring shingle house experienced a catastrophic sewer failure. I have more, but I will include that in written, and I will be following up, and I'm in contact with the city, which I appreciate their support. Thank you. |
| 00:46:47.68 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Thank you for being here tonight. So, Mr. McCullough, you will be followed by Katie Nelson. |
| 00:46:57.73 | Rob McCullough | Robert McCullough, Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members. My name is Robert McCullough. I've lived aboard Pelican Harbor for approximately 26 years. I'd like first to thank the council, the staff and the city attorney for the thoughtful and professional manner in which the Pelican Harbor assignment matter was handled at last week's meeting. The presentation and supporting materials demonstrated a serious effort to distinguish verified facts from unverified allegations, who are recognizing the city's obligation with respect to state grant tidelands and long-term public trust stewardship. Not here to re-argue last week's decision, rather, I would respectfully encourage the city to continuing pursuing compliance review processes consistently, transparently, and professionally with respect to all marina operations subject to city oversight. The staff presentation and identified a number of unresolved issues involving inspections, permit status, fire and life safety systems, environmental compliance. Live aboard limitations, sanitation and other operational matters. These are in public important public issues independent of any particular transaction. I would also respectfully request that were legally appropriate. The results of future compliant reviews inspections and enforcement findings be made publicly available. So the residents tenants in the broader community can better understand the conditions and stewardship of these important waterfront facilities. Finally, I would note for the record that as of tonight's meeting, my pending California Public Records Act request has not yet been fully completed. I understand the staff, Deidre, and everybody's been working to do that. I appreciate it. But... I want to emphasize the importance of maintaining a complete and transparent public record regarding matters involving these state-grant tidalands, marine operations, and public trust stewardships. Thank you again for your time, professionalism, and public service. |
| 00:48:50.31 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 00:48:50.58 | Rob McCullough | you. |
| 00:48:50.75 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Katie Nelson. followed by |
| 00:48:59.12 | Mayor Woodside | And well, I think it says Freddy Rivera. |
| 00:49:07.08 | Unknown | Good evening, Mayor, Councilmembers, and members of the public. My name is Katie Nelson, and I work as the Senior Planner in CDD. I'm honored to have the opportunity to speak with you tonight. I'm here representing my colleagues, the men and women of SEIU Local 1021, who show up every day to serve this community. We maintain your infrastructure, care for your public spaces, process your applications, and support the operations that make Sausalito the remarkable place that it is. We do this work because we are proud of this city. and because we truly care about the people who work and live here. I want the council to know who we are. We are not just job titles on an org chart. Behind every city service, there is a human being. Most of us didn't stumble into these jobs. We chose to dedicate our careers to public service. Many of us have been here long enough to watch the city change and grow. We are familiar faces at local restaurants and shops. We interfere. regularly with our fellow community members and we show up every day because we take genuine pride in our work As we move through the current negotiation process, we are simply asking to be seen and valued for the contributions that we make. fair wages, reasonable working conditions, and benefits that reflect the cost of living in one of the most expensive regions in the country. These are not extraordinary asks. They are the foundation of a dignified working life, and they're what allow us to continue showing up for you with pride and commitment. We believe in a Sausalito that works well for everyone, residents, visitors, and the employees. We hope you'll carry that with you as negotiations continue, and we look forward to reaching an agreement that reflects the mutual respect we have for this city and for each other. Thank you. |
| 00:50:45.07 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Mr. Rivera, followed by David Jackson. |
| 00:50:52.90 | Freddy Rivera | All right. Good evening, everybody. Thank you for having me here today. My name is Freddy Rivera. I'm a representative for SCIU Local 10 to 1. I've recently been assigned as a beautiful city to come work with and I want to say, you know, thank you for having me here today. I would like to echo as well as my uh friend katie over here who i help and represent as well as the other folks here that are sitting over here that uh work hard and diligently for the city of south toledo um We just heard also from the EDAC team. Two things that I actually have been thinking about myself because I've been coming to this town now for over seven months now to check in. Something that really struck me was the concept of, you know, really investing in the city, both in the business and but also tourism. I know this is a big tourism town, and I believe that the folks here that enhance and make this town work hard and beautifully for this place are the staff and the public workers of South Toledo who maintain the city looking as beautiful as they do. And, you know, this is one of the most expensive places to live, duly so. And we have the duty, I believe, as any city in the Marin County area to keep providing equitable salaries that maintain at market rate to continue working hard for the folks of this city. I think that's only fair to bring forward. I will be here working diligently for the workers' work, continue to have this partnership with the city of Sausalito because I know that over the years, both the SEIU and the city have worked hard to continue to have a great partnership. So I just want to say thank you for having me today and I hope you enjoy the rest of your day. |
| 00:52:32.62 | Mayor Woodside | Right. Thank you. |
| 00:52:34.41 | Freddy Rivera | David, |
| 00:52:34.96 | Mayor Woodside | Jackson followed by I'm, Adam Blair. |
| 00:52:39.47 | David Jackson | Thank you. Yes, good evening everyone. My name is David Jackson. I work for DPW here in Sausalito. And again, my colleagues over here, |
| 00:52:43.40 | Mayor Woodside | His name is David J. |
| 00:52:50.62 | David Jackson | We're just, I'm just, I never... seen any of you before. And so I'm glad I'm here. So now I got to put a face with a name on the wall there. And, um, I finally got to meet, I met you once. one time and I met you once. I haven't met everybody else on the panel. But But we're here to, we're in contract negotiations and we would like, you know, just some, I love my job. I'm lead custodian here and I love to keep the parks beautiful. Um, as well as my other colleagues, but we're always asking for is a fair and equitable wage. We want to continue to keep the city looking beautiful. But we also want you to be fair when we come to the table in terms of a living wage salary. not to insult us at all, but something that's, you know, that is comparable with other surrounding cities. I thank you for this opportunity for me to meet everyone here. And the residents here are just outstanding. They love the work we do. And we want to continue to provide that kind of service to the city of Sausalito. Thank you for having me. Thank you. |
| 00:54:19.01 | Mayor Woodside | Adam Blair followed by Bob Mitchell. |
| 00:54:27.59 | Adam Blair | Right. Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council members and members of the public. My name is Adam Blair and I'm an associate planner with the community development department here at the city of Sausalito. I've been with the city for just over two and a half years now, and I'm proud to be a part of the Sausalito community. I just wanted to come up and voice my support for my fellow colleagues and union members. who are currently bargaining with the city for necessary pay and benefit increases. We all love and take great pride in the community in which we work. and hope that in the face of high housing prices and the rising cost of living, We can reach an agreement that serves both the needs of the city and supports the daily heroes who work to drive our community forward. Thank you. Thank you, Adam. |
| 00:55:12.53 | Mayor Woodside | Bob Mitchell is followed by Vicki Nichols. Bob, you served as mayor here, correct? |
| 00:55:19.88 | Bob Mitchell | long time ago. |
| 00:55:20.96 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. |
| 00:55:21.49 | Bob Mitchell | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:55:22.04 | Mayor Woodside | Welcome. |
| 00:55:23.60 | Bob Mitchell | almost 40 years. Anyhow, I wanted to just say that with regard to converting to a charter city, there's a lot of potential pitfalls in doing that, I think. And I just feel that it's a good way to Good something to explore, but it's something to be very aware of because it can create a lot of extra expenses and, um, lack of control in general. Thank you very much. |
| 00:56:01.01 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 00:56:01.03 | Bob Mitchell | Thank you, Bob. |
| 00:56:02.49 | Mayor Woodside | Vicki Nichols followed by |
| 00:56:10.41 | Mayor Woodside | Scott. Boy, I'm having a hard time. Robinson. Oh my goodness. Thank you. Okay. Vicky. |
| 00:56:21.88 | Vicki Nichols | Good evening, Mayor Whitside and council members. I'm going to just divert a little bit from the subject I wanted to talk about and just urge you to be the most generous you can with your... workers that are bargaining. I have the most occasion to interact with your CDD department. And after witnessing what we went through around COVID, it has been restructured. They are excellent. They help us all the time. I've seen them give great, excellent service. So there is my biased plug on that, unsolicited. But the reason I wanted to talk to you tonight is I want to talk to you about a situation up near Rotary Housing on Olima Street. We are in... gratitude for the parking signs that were just put there, but this has caused, which I finally just tracked down through public works, about five barriers to be put up there, which is going to take about a third of the parking on Olima Street. When the project was put in, there were exemptions for everything, setbacks, et cetera, which was worth it. It was a good public project, but it's created a situation where with only 12 parking places on site for the 22 units, it is required that we park on the street, some of us. It's first come, first serve if you get the one in the back. Not everybody drives, but we have some people that are not ambulatory and are being serviced by health care workers that come in and help them that need to park as well. So I didn't really notice it at first when i started living there but the first time i almost was side side swiped coming around the corner before the stop signs um i looked around and i think you have a potential solution up there with some city um options and i would love to talk with um our cdd um manager who are AC ACM I never remember his new title anyway I'm speaking for myself but it's a concern for everybody and they're going to start really getting more active and I said let me just go and talk and see what we can do I also was going to bring this up in six speed to see if we could get this agenda eyes so I don't know what spot. |
| 00:58:37.68 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah. Okay. We did hear you and just, we do take these suggestions to look into staff taking takes notes and we try to be responsive as much as we can and if it requires an agenda and further discussion will we try to do that as well. So I apologize, Scott, for mispronouncing or not being able to pronounce your name. Robinson. Robinson. followed by Steve Harris. |
| 00:59:05.22 | Unknown | Thank you. You needn't apologize. Well, anybody, that's my handwriting. You're trying to decrypt. Um, What I want to comment on. Is it post charter? change. I think we need to approach this very carefully. and I'll announce it and vote on a month later. There are complications in that. Um, it permits. I think some additional taxes. which maybe needed. City always thinks they're needed. the people who live say, well, maybe Anyway, I wish to, at this time, I wish to expressed my opposition to that change. |
| 00:59:42.37 | Unknown | Thank you, sir. |
| 00:59:43.07 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Mr. Harris. followed by Alice Merrill. |
| 00:59:56.97 | Steve Harris | Good evening, Mayor, City Council members. My name is Steve Harris. I'm a field representative for the North Coast State's Carpenters Union. I'm here tonight to talk about the importance of labor standards and making it the foundation for all developments in Sausalito. Without these standards in place, the construction workforce is subject to widespread abuse of wage theft, misclassification, and no access to workers compensation and numerous safety violations which this is too far common which makes this project a crime scene And access to health care and a liberal wage is not a luxury. It's a necessity for all workers who are building the future. And we all know that the Bay Area is facing a serious housing crisis, and the solution is clear. We must build more housing, especially affordable housing, but not in doing so. We cannot afford to exploit the very people who build it. Those workers deserve the ability to live in the same communities as they help create. The labor standards we are advocating would reward responsible contractors who already follow the rules, invest in their workforce, and uphold the values of the city. These are contractors who have constantly delivered high-quality work by adopting labor standards in Los Angeles. |
| 01:01:21.57 | Janelle Kellman | People. |
| 01:01:22.29 | Steve Harris | and Sausalito can raise the standards for all workers and send a clear message to we value the people who we build our city. I truly welcome the opportunity and to have a meaningful conversation with each one of you tonight. Thank you. |
| 01:01:39.77 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Alice Merrill followed by William Ehrensberg. |
| 01:01:46.49 | Alice Merrill | Hello, I'm Alice Merrill. I'm gonna start just by saying A lot is going on in this town right now. I think that there are changes that are being suggested by you guys, by some other groups in Sausalito, positive people and by Just, you know who they are. And it is so discouraging. I don't have any money in the game here. I just live here. I've lived here a long time. I feel like We have a place that's a wonderful place. People are saying it's the most beautiful city in the world. People love it here. But why... Why do we have people who just want to make money off of it? Why do we have people who it just looks like all they care about is the cash that they can take home? And I do think that's true. And I'm not going to name names, but... I really do. And I, I'm just sad. I'm sad that that seems to be the case. The workers who work here and do the, the digging and et cetera. Why are they asking for a livable wage? Why? Isn't it just giving them? Why don't they just get it? Why are they asking for that? What is it off of anybody's backs here to not have a livable wage for these guys? We don't need another fancy this, another fancy that, another, you know, ferry landing, et cetera, et cetera. We don't need a fancy park here or whatever. We need people to be taken care of. And that's what Sausalito is to me. It's a place where we care about people. We care about the ins and outs of what goes on. And we're thoughtful. We're nice. Let's be that. Thank you. |
| 01:03:52.55 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Mr. Ehrensberg followed |
| 01:03:54.03 | William Ehrensberg | by Lauren DeRimmern. Good evening. Thank you. I reside on Tamale Street in Sausalito. I'm here tonight to speak about an urgent safety issue regarding the new MLK campus and students commuting to and from school. With the opening of this new school, traffic patterns in the immediate area have drastically changed. Specifically, the intersection of Tamales and Watery, which is less than a block from the campus, has become a major crossing point for students and families. Currently, there are no stop signs to control the flow of traffic, leading to speeding cars, near misses, poor visibility, and generally unsafe crossing conditions. We have a very small window to address this issue before an accident occurs. The city is aware of this, specifically Andrew Davidson, city of Sasselita Senior Engineer. Pedestrian signs weren't stalled, but the requested safety study has stalled. We are currently operating under wait-and-see approach for essentially a child to be hit. Installing stop signs at this intersection would immediately calm traffic, provide a designated safe crossing zone for children, and align with Sausalito's goals for pedestrian and bicycle safety. Under the California MUTCD, stop signs are specifically justified near schools to protect vulnerable students. Furthermore, as of 2025, AB 413 mandates daylighting, meaning parking is illegal within 20 feet of these crosswalks to provide visibility. And currently the visibility is blocked and there is no stop sign. I know the council cannot vote on this tonight since it's not on the agenda. and I am respectfully requesting that the council direct the Department of Public Works and City Engineer to conduct a traffic study at this intersection to evaluate it for stop signs and have this completed by the next meeting and to immediately paint the 20-foot red zone as required by state law to improve current visibility and safety for the students. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Sobias. |
| 01:05:38.76 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. Could I just ask the city manager, is this something that we've already directed? I know that there are some stop signs and crosswalks we made a bunch of directions. So is that part of this project? |
| 01:05:49.41 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 01:05:50.38 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:05:50.40 | Chris Zapata | I would have to defer that to Mr. Davidson. And I'm not sure if he's in the audience. Mr. McGowan is out. |
| 01:05:57.25 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:05:57.29 | Chris Zapata | Can we be sure to get |
| 01:05:57.98 | Jill Hoffman | back to this gentleman about that it may be to all this I can't. |
| 01:06:02.01 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah, the area generally has been of great concern to the community and to us. Public Works and Mr. Davidson have been, as I understand it, on site. with a traffic engineer. That's as much as I know tonight, and I'm just What is your name? |
| 01:06:18.85 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:20.51 | Mayor Woodside | William what? |
| 01:06:20.98 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:06:21.28 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | We also received public comment tonight that's attached to our agenda, and I believe we can take this up on future agenda items at the bottom of our page. |
| 01:06:30.63 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah, we'll make sure this comes back and give you notice. |
| 01:06:31.36 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Thank you. |
| 01:06:35.41 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | THANK YOU. |
| 01:06:35.47 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. |
| 01:06:35.83 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Thank you for your, thank you for your written public comment. It's yeah, there's a lot more information in the written public comment. |
| 01:06:42.71 | Mayor Woodside | Lauren DeRimmer. |
| 01:06:47.12 | Mayor Woodside | And that's the last speaker card I have. If someone else wants to speak and fill out a card, now's the time to do so. Lauren. |
| 01:06:55.22 | Lauren DeRimmer | One thing I should start with is my name is Lauren D. Reamer. I think all of you have said it wrong for a long time, so I thought I should... Clarify. |
| 01:07:02.88 | Mayor Woodside | I'm saying wrong for what? |
| 01:07:03.17 | Lauren DeRimmer | I don't know. It's okay. It's okay. Um, am I allowed to ask a question in my public comment? Thank you. |
| 01:07:10.93 | Mayor Woodside | Well, you can ask, but we won't answer. |
| 01:07:12.90 | Lauren DeRimmer | Okay. My question is for all of you. including those anyone in the room and anyone online. I'm curious how many people who have actually used Arkez personally, have actually put money into any business in that property. Because I bet you it's really small. |
| 01:07:31.18 | Mayor Woodside | Which property? I'm sorry. |
| 01:07:33.47 | Lauren DeRimmer | Archives property. I wanted to speak today to talk about, I'm very concerned. I know that some of you know, council members know, about the initiative put up by AIN. And this AIM initiative is something that even some of my former employers are backing. And it's something that I've lost sleep over. And I just thought it was really important to get ahead of it and to tell you all how I feel and why. You know, for one, we talk a lot about Port Townsend and comparing that to Sausalito, and we will never be Port Townsend. But one thing we do have that they don't have is three times as many slips almost. We have a huge economic opportunity here. That with the way it's written, by the way, I read all 266 pages of this amendment to the membership specific plan that was created when I was born. And I'm very concerned about it. to 40% for retail, you might as well just take, you might as well just give it all away at that point. Because it's not about preserving our kids. Nobody disagrees that it looks like crap. but it's also bringing in millions a year. Yeah. benefits of investing and redoing all the infrastructure, including the ways, is critical for the success of our maritime. And I don't believe this is the way to do it. I think it's a world in sheep's clothing. Thank you. |
| 01:09:01.41 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, seeing no more speakers in the audience, are there any online? |
| 01:09:05.88 | Walfred Solorzano | Yeah, we have Linda Pfeffer. |
| 01:09:10.51 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:09:10.52 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 01:09:10.57 | Mayor Woodside | to be able to do that. |
| 01:09:10.76 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:09:10.86 | Mayor Woodside | Ms. Pfeiffer. |
| 01:09:10.88 | Walfred Solorzano | Bye. |
| 01:09:10.96 | Unknown | I don't know. Hello, can you hear me? We can't hear you. We cannot hear you. |
| 01:09:15.90 | Mayor Woodside | We cannot hear you. |
| 01:09:18.94 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:09:18.98 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 01:09:19.03 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:09:19.08 | Joan Cox | that she's speaking, but we couldn't hear |
| 01:09:21.73 | Unknown | Hello. Um, you cannot hear me still. |
| 01:09:27.36 | Mayor Woodside | We cannot hear you. |
| 01:09:34.74 | Unknown | Can you hear me now? |
| 01:09:36.34 | Mayor Woodside | Yes. |
| 01:09:37.44 | Unknown | Okay, great. My name is Linda Pfeiffer, I'm a Sausalito resident, and I wanted to say I oppose the proposed charter city and property transfer tax for Sausalito. I urge the Council not to agendize this topic on June 2nd or any time between now and November. Do not rush this to a November ballot. A charter city with a property transfer tax is not a priority. Road maintenance is a priority. Parking availability downtown is a priority. Re-commissioning the census firehouse, these are priorities. A charter city with a property transfer tax, not a priority. Do not waste precious staff time and our tax dollars on fat cat consultants chasing a charter city and property transfer tax that literally no one asked for. Keep the focus on what really matters to your constituents. Financial stability, housing element transparency, maintaining small scale in our neighborhoods, and fixing deferred maintenance of our infrastructure. These are your priorities. And I would add that there are several emails on this topic that did not make it to the agenda yet, that are not yet posted, that came in a little later, including mine. So just a heads up that there are Several emails that are currently missing from the list. Thank you, please. Do not agenda is the charter city with the property transfer tax, not a priority. |
| 01:11:17.56 | Mayor Woodside | Any other speakers online? |
| 01:11:20.12 | Walfred Solorzano | Yes, next we have Sandra Bushmaker. |
| 01:11:24.63 | Sandra Bushmaker | Good evening, Council. First, I want to thank Chris for his service to Sausalito. I met Chris approximately five minutes after he sat down at his desk, and I appreciate the work that he did to stabilize our staff at city hall. Please be generous with the staff. That's my request. Secondly, I want to speak to the Charter City movement. We first heard it was a possible ballot measure for this coming November at the May 5th meeting. This is a big change for Sausalito, moving from a general law city to a charter city. It is a drastic change in power. And as your previous speaker talked about, taxation. Five months is not enough time to get the city residents up to speed on the advantages and disadvantages of this matter, of changing from a general law city to a charter city. I think that given the fact that this is a serious matter for the residents of Sausalito, I request that you remove any efforts toward putting this on the ballot for November. And then thirdly, on the 1022 AIM initiative, This will kill our maritime business. I am very much against it, and I hope the city council is too. Thank you. |
| 01:12:44.43 | Mayor Woodside | Any other speakers online? |
| 01:12:48.63 | Walfred Solorzano | Next we have Babette McDougall. |
| 01:12:50.66 | Mayor Woodside | Ms. McDougal. |
| 01:12:54.34 | Babette McDougall | Good evening. Can you hear me okay? |
| 01:12:56.60 | Mayor Woodside | Yes, we can. Thank you. |
| 01:12:58.16 | Babette McDougall | Thank you very much for the acknowledgement. Well, I shall certainly echo everything that's been said here so far by all of my neighbors. And I agree with everything with regard to livable wages, absolutely. And because of livable wages, let's just look at some of these brand new things that you got thrown right at us without any invitation from anyone or any hot spot. suddenly being uncovered that we have to address. And if we do them, it should be called out. And that's the charter city thing. Now I speak, personally started looking into a charter city status for our town two years ago. Here's what I learned about charter cities. Well, first of all, You redefine how you do with the city council. The mayor is independently elected, which means the mayor draws a salary. And so not only do we change the structure, there is untold authority and power invested in each council member and particularly the mayor as well as executive staff. So that essentially takes the work of the town and puts it into the hands of a few. Now, the template for a starter city, I learned, was designed for 100,000 people, plus or minus, but mostly plus. So if you have 100,000 people, then you have a tax base, unlike what we have here in Sausalito with a mere 7,000 odd members as residents alone. So we don't have a comparative advantage in this regard. We have the exact opposite. We have a comparative disadvantage. So it will most certainly tank the city. It conveys untold power and authority to those in the leadership roles. And we already see evidence that some of the people, there's a reason why they're called the Gang of Four. There's a reason why these things end up making people not trust and doubt very much whether we're on the right track at all. So we have to be mindful of the fact that there's already a problem with trust. So you have to ask yourself, do you really want to suddenly cut bait and you want to ram this down the visitor at the residence next? I don't know. I feel like the foie gras being stuffed. |
| 01:14:59.12 | Walfred Solorzano | Thank you. |
| 01:15:03.04 | Mayor Woodside | Anyone else? |
| 01:15:04.63 | Walfred Solorzano | Seeing no more public comments online. |
| 01:15:07.95 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, thank you for your public comments. I won't comment on some of the things I've heard tonight, which will be discussed later. At an appropriate time. I'll only say that Um, I will. I won't say anything more. |
| 01:15:32.15 | Mayor Woodside | Sorry. It's tempting. I, you know, I want to assure you, it's very tempting. But I do thank you all for your comments. I mean, we've got to listen to everyone. There's a lot of questions that are raised tonight. And our job is to make sure whatever's been raised, if we can address it, we'll bring it back. and bring it forward for public discussion. We now can turn to the consent calendar. We're only one hour behind schedule. |
| 01:16:13.00 | Mayor Woodside | And... We are now um, I'm turning to the consent calendar, item 3A, |
| 01:16:26.34 | Mayor Woodside | trying to get page turned carefully here, through 3J. and I see a card from Jim Madden who wishes to speak to item 3C. So what normally happens if we haven't removed an item, and moved it to the foot of the agenda. We will take comments before we move in one motion to adopt Thank you. Um, the consent calendar. And it's possible that we would adopt all, for example, but one item. or more. |
| 01:17:01.00 | Chris Zapata | more. |
| 01:17:01.39 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 01:17:01.40 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 01:17:06.62 | Mayor Woodside | On the consent calendar, is it clear to everyone what's on it and what we're being asked to vote on tonight? I'm just looking at my colleagues. |
| 01:17:07.44 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 01:17:16.39 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yes, Mayor, but I would like to remove item 3G. That's the... A motion to approve Badawi as the audit we've talked in the past about going back to an annual comprehensive financial report as opposed to just an audit. And I didn't see that up for discussion in any of our |
| 01:17:37.84 | Mayor Woodside | I'm sure I'm not understanding. |
| 01:17:38.61 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | financial markets. |
| 01:17:40.94 | Mayor Woodside | We're required to have an annual audit. |
| 01:17:43.32 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yes, but we've talked in the past about going from... In the past, we've done an annual, we used to call it the certified annual financial report. That's it. |
| 01:17:54.46 | Mayor Woodside | That is in addition to the audit. |
| 01:17:57.93 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | The audit is subsumed inside the certified annual financial report. So you don't do one. In addition to the other, the audit is subsumed inside the |
| 01:18:08.07 | Mayor Woodside | I respectfully disagree. The audit is legally required annually of every public entity in this state. |
| 01:18:13.49 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah. You don't do both. |
| 01:18:19.47 | Mayor Woodside | And typically. |
| 01:18:19.48 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | No. |
| 01:18:21.37 | Mayor Woodside | M-m-m- |
| 01:18:22.11 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | No, you don't. |
| 01:18:22.82 | Mayor Woodside | So you want to pull this. |
| 01:18:25.22 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, and discuss it. And either we, either discuss it at the end of the, because we talked about going back to doing the, What is now called an act. |
| 01:18:33.23 | Mayor Woodside | I'm sorry, but you say we have talked about this. |
| 01:18:36.39 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah. |
| 01:18:36.41 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. You're using the royal we. |
| 01:18:38.53 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Council. |
| 01:18:39.51 | Mayor Woodside | go. |
| 01:18:40.09 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, we have. |
| 01:18:40.83 | Mayor Woodside | we have never talked about supplanting the annual audit with a comprehensive financial report that we may well want to do. |
| 01:18:54.55 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Well, we... Apologies if it was before you were on the council, but we've talked about because when we switched from doing the certified annual financial report I thought you were on the council and we talked about going back to doing that because the audit didn't give us enough information. It was before the issues about forensic audit. |
| 01:19:14.97 | Mayor Woodside | Here's my suggestion. |
| 01:19:15.14 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Thank you. Yeah. |
| 01:19:17.08 | Mayor Woodside | that we comment on the album but not remove |
| 01:19:24.91 | Mayor Woodside | If we remove it, it's going to the foot of the agenda. |
| 01:19:27.15 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, or we can talk about it next time. Not this week when we're talking about the budget, but next week. It logically would fit when we're talking about the budget. Yeah. |
| 01:19:37.28 | Joan Cox | What if we move forward with the audit, which is required, and we add as a future agenda item for our next meeting, discussion of an act? |
| 01:19:43.55 | Mayor Woodside | That would be fine. |
| 01:19:44.58 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 01:19:44.60 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | See you soon. Thank you. Yeah, it should be a simple discussion. It's just a different way to do accounting. And we used to do them annually and it's just a different way. |
| 01:19:54.02 | Joan Cox | We used to do the Kaffir, but it was every two years. And we still did the audit every year. |
| 01:20:00.44 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | the, |
| 01:20:00.78 | Joan Cox | The audit is a subset of an act. Yeah, we can talk about it. |
| 01:20:02.62 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, we can talk about it. Yeah, well, that'll be part of our discussion. I'm happy to do that. That sounds like a good, great. |
| 01:20:07.67 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, so it stays on. Yep. |
| 01:20:09.35 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah. |
| 01:20:11.73 | Mayor Woodside | And before we go further. |
| 01:20:13.34 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Well, no, it doesn't stay on it comes off and we talk about it. It's goes to future agenda items and we agendize it. |
| 01:20:13.49 | Jill Hoffman | Oh, yeah. |
| 01:20:18.91 | Jill Hoffman | I think, Mayor, if I might interject, Just this is where the rules help. This item is very clear. It's about the audit. It's not about other ways or other reports. |
| 01:20:27.01 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah. |
| 01:20:27.73 | Jill Hoffman | I think future agenda items is the right place to bring that up and we can decide when to schedule it when we, |
| 01:20:30.45 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. Yeah. |
| 01:20:33.77 | Jill Hoffman | can schedule it, but this item has nothing to do with that topic. It's tangential. I mean, it's related, obviously. It is. |
| 01:20:39.06 | Mayor Woodside | It is approving Badawi to be the annual auditor. Correct. |
| 01:20:46.43 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Well, No, that's not what I, okay, so let's just pull it off and talk about it at the end of the gen. |
| 01:20:50.73 | Mayor Woodside | I'm not willing to pull it off. We need to have an annual life. |
| 01:20:53.31 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | It's not your decision. I'm, as a council member, we've been... It's not your decision. |
| 01:20:56.56 | Mayor Woodside | It's not your decision either. Is there a motion to pull it off? |
| 01:20:59.03 | Jill Hoffman | Half the agenda, actually. |
| 01:20:59.90 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I, AS A COUNCILMEMBER, REQUESTING THAT WE PULL IT OFF, THE CONSENT |
| 01:21:03.02 | Jill Hoffman | I think what we could do is simply put it as the first item. We can have a motion to approve it as is. She has her opportunity to have a comment, and then we can vote on it. and that would dispatch it immediately. |
| 01:21:14.07 | Mayor Woodside | I have to say I'm just appalled |
| 01:21:17.65 | Joan Cox | It's all right. Let's just do it as a new 5A and we'll just dispatch it. Yeah, we'll dispatch it. |
| 01:21:24.55 | Mayor Woodside | because we have to. |
| 01:21:25.49 | Joan Cox | Yeah. |
| 01:21:27.17 | Mayor Woodside | you |
| 01:21:27.18 | Jill Hoffman | Just put it first. That's my suggestion. Thank you. |
| 01:21:30.78 | Mayor Woodside | I will move this then to item 5A. And the rest will all be re-sequenced accordingly, the rest of item five, after we take public comment on the consent calendar. |
| 01:21:44.06 | Jill Hoffman | And I'd suggest we just have a motion to approve it at that point I'll make that motion and there'll be an opportunity for the council |
| 01:21:50.13 | Joan Cox | Let's wait till we get there. The process is if a council member pulls it, we treat it as a business item. |
| 01:21:52.06 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:21:55.06 | Mayor Woodside | Well, Okay, if that's been the practice, I question it. I think you single council members shouldn't just be able to pull items. |
| 01:22:04.00 | Joan Cox | in our protocols. |
| 01:22:09.98 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. Mr. Madden, would you like to make a comment on an item on the consent calendar? Thank you. Welcome. |
| 01:22:23.85 | Jim Madden | Hello, counsel, Jim Madden. I'd like to have a brief comment on the Friar and Loretta proposal. I believe it offers Sausalito more practical engineering focus path forward. One that protects our working waterfront, incorporates stakeholder expertise and delivers real implementation strategies instead of limited revisions to an existing plan. The proposal better reflects the council's direction to truly hold the line and move towards actionable shoreline protection. |
| 01:23:06.10 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 01:23:06.12 | Jim Madden | Thank you. |
| 01:23:06.14 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Madden. and Thank you over the years for offering helpful suggestions on how we might accommodate and adjust to sea level rise. |
| 01:23:21.49 | Mayor Woodside | Any other public comments on the consent calendar? |
| 01:23:25.81 | Joan Cox | that one from Alice. |
| 01:23:28.16 | Mayor Woodside | Alice Merrill. |
| 01:23:32.36 | Mayor Woodside | And it says here you want to comment about item 3D. |
| 01:23:35.59 | Alice Merrill | Yes, please. 3D. I'm going to say right off that I could have read it wrong. This is not my strong point. |
| 01:23:42.81 | Mayor Woodside | but. |
| 01:23:45.15 | Alice Merrill | Hello. |
| 01:23:46.06 | Mayor Woodside | I must have read it wrong. |
| 01:23:47.70 | Alice Merrill | I guess I'm done. I'm sorry. There's a thing about... |
| 01:23:49.71 | Mayor Woodside | I'm sorry. |
| 01:23:52.36 | Alice Merrill | The security cameras at City Hall and the Corporation Yard. And they want to spend $6,830.09 on something, not to exceed $143,803.09. That's a really big difference. So I just want to say that, you know, just in there looking like that from a person like me, it looks pretty, pretty weird. |
| 01:24:15.39 | Unknown | I just want to. |
| 01:24:22.02 | Mayor Woodside | Let me just add that I understand the confusion. This is meant to be an addition to the existing contract. So it's a $6,000 increase in the existing contract. Am I correct, Mr. City Manager? And I understand, Ms. Merrill, it's not crystal clear from the reading. it. |
| 01:24:46.68 | Mayor Woodside | me. Any other comments on the consent calendar? So I'm asking for a motion. |
| 01:24:54.43 | Jill Hoffman | Mayor, I move to approve the consent calendar items 3A through |
| 01:24:58.71 | Joan Cox | No, 3B through 3I. |
| 01:24:59.13 | Jill Hoffman | Breathe. 3B through 3I with 3. No, 3A. 3I with removing the item that Councilmember Hoffman- Yeah. |
| 01:25:08.33 | Joan Cox | Thank you. removing 3G. |
| 01:25:11.92 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:25:11.94 | Mayor Woodside | G. |
| 01:25:12.80 | Joan Cox | Second. |
| 01:25:13.93 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, so motion and a second. I think we can do this by voice approval. All those in favor? Aye. That was unanimous. |
| 01:25:19.75 | Sandra Bushmaker | I. |
| 01:25:20.16 | Chris Zapata | Bye. |
| 01:25:21.91 | Mayor Woodside | And 3G will be the new 5A when we get to it. Which is right now. |
| 01:25:30.98 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I think. |
| 01:25:34.03 | Mayor Woodside | So item 5A, the former item 3G, Mr. Sobieski. I'd just like to make a motion. |
| 01:25:38.70 | Jill Hoffman | I'd like to make a motion to exercise city contract option with Badawi and associates to provide professional audit services for fiscal years 25 at 26 and 2627 for an amount not to exceed $109,830 and authorize the city manager to execute a contract amendment to professional services agreement. Second. |
| 01:25:57.59 | Mayor Woodside | Second. Okay, there's a motion to second, and we should have public comment. |
| 01:25:57.98 | Unknown | Thank you. Thank you. Can I just add one, just with a friendly amendment that then we add to future agenda items, a request for a comprehensive, reexamining our approach to our comprehensive financial analysis. So either we do a comprehensive financial plan and the audit or just the audit. |
| 01:26:01.81 | Mayor Woodside | Yes. |
| 01:26:14.43 | Joan Cox | Yeah. Can I say, can we add that to our agenda for our next meeting? to discuss and a discussion of whether or not to undertake an ACFER. Thank you. And if so, when? |
| 01:26:25.30 | Jill Hoffman | I wouldn't agree with that if it's the issue, if we're talking substantively about it, our staff has a lot of work to do on this budget. After the budget. There's a big burden on this budget that these numbers |
| 01:26:32.25 | Joan Cox | THE BUDGET. I'm just saying to discuss when to do it, not to say do it right. |
| 01:26:39.98 | Unknown | now. No, I know. But even a discussion about how we're going to assess our financial planning in the wake of everything we have on our agenda, I think after the budget is better. |
| 01:26:40.62 | Joan Cox | Who might know? |
| 01:26:48.48 | Joan Cox | This is something the finance committee has already met and discussed. So there's not additional staff work required. The finance committee had an opportunity to discuss it. I'd like to have the full council have an opportunity to discuss it. That's typically the manner in which our process works. |
| 01:27:03.82 | Mayor Woodside | I agree that we should discuss it. No question. I also think it would be important for us to have the benefit of our incoming city manager, who probably has experience with ACFERS and all the other additional financial reporting that an organization like the Port Authority of San Francisco probably does rather frequently. I do think it takes staff time to have a thorough discussion of the topic, and I don't think there's any rush. So, I would like to see it on a future agenda item, but not necessarily the very next meeting. |
| 01:27:46.11 | Joan Cox | I already seconded the initial motion. There is a friendly amendment to put it as a future agenda item discussion of the act. That's acceptable. I second the amended motion. |
| 01:28:01.79 | Mayor Woodside | public comments. Seeing none in the yacht. None online. Okay. So any further discussion necessary? |
| 01:28:05.67 | Joan Cox | in the yard. |
| 01:28:14.12 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | So it's called an annual comprehensive financial report. |
| 01:28:18.36 | Unknown | All the questions. |
| 01:28:20.11 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, so all those in favor say aye. |
| 01:28:22.31 | Unknown | Bye. Thank you. |
| 01:28:22.90 | Mayor Woodside | I'm going to go. |
| 01:28:22.97 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I. |
| 01:28:23.49 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. post. Okay, that passes unanimously. It's a wonder how we can get things done when we talk to each other, right? The dice. |
| 01:28:32.85 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I think we just did. Thank you. |
| 01:28:34.00 | Mayor Woodside | No, I'm saying, yeah. Um, Okay, so item 5B is the appointment of an interim city manager for the period May 21, 26 through June 30, 2026. There is a staff report and there is a report now from our HR director. |
| 01:28:57.19 | Kathy Nikitas | Hi, I'm Kathy Nikitas, HR manager, and I'll just be very brief because the facts are on the staff report. Once again, I stand up here talking about someone other than Chris Zapata who's leaving. So because he's leaving, we know that we have Elaine Forbes coming on July 1st, but in the meantime, a lot of work needs to get done in the city. So the council has approved offering the temporary city manager position to our current assistant city manager brandon phipps who i don't think really needs much introduction but he has he is very well qualified to keep us going and keep us on the right track and to continue forward with the work that city manager sapata has done and keep us ready for our the next part of our mission here when elaine forbes takes takes us uh takes the reins on in july so uh part of what i need to just move into the record is the financial implications this will will include a, let's see, sorry, I have that right here. Financial implication is approximately $2,736.15 in total for a temporary increase in pay along with the associated payroll expenses. Wages are $24.71.23, plus the employer's share of CalPERS, Medicare, 457 contribution. There won't be any change in fringe benefits, and this will support all of the city's strategic goals. And that is all that I have. I'm going to take questions if you would want. |
| 01:30:38.30 | Mayor Woodside | Any questions? Are there any public comments before we consider this? Seeing none. |
| 01:30:45.64 | Joan Cox | Thank you. I move. We appoint Assistant City Manager Brandon Phipps as Interim City Manager for the period of May 21, 2026 through June 30, 2026 and approve acting pay in the amount of $2,471. dollars and 23 cents plus burden. So I can't. |
| 01:31:06.32 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, motion in a second. Any further No discussion. Uh, question all those in favor. |
| 01:31:13.76 | Joan Cox | Bye. |
| 01:31:15.43 | Mayor Woodside | Congratulations. |
| 01:31:15.63 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 01:31:15.66 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 01:31:15.70 | Joan Cox | I don't know. |
| 01:31:15.77 | Unknown | Hey, Brandon. |
| 01:31:23.01 | Mayor Woodside | So now what you've all been waiting for the preliminary general fund budget information and reports and seeking direction from us before we must adopt a budget before the end of the fiscal year. |
| 01:31:39.43 | Chris Zapata | Yep. A few words before Angeline's getting set up, where I make sure that the council has context. We began the budget process in January, February, and have had internal work done, brought forward some of that work to you last meeting, where we showed you two scenarios. One of the scenarios involved basically maintenance of service levels, and the second one was an enhanced. The city council gave us direction that was easy to follow for that meeting. And so part of that direction was to incorporate the position of community development director as an executive add-on to add a full-time position so that parks and recreation has a full-time assistant aid, so that Human Resources has a full-time assistant aid, and then to leave our powder dry for potentially other jobs that you may want to add to the budget this year. So the second meeting is equally important in that we have refined some of our numbers. We had good questions from the community, good questions from the council about, you know, why our numbers were, where our numbers were. We started with the bigger Delta, In terms of a gap, that gap has been closed in a meaningful way. And so Angeline Loeffler, our finance director, is going to walk through some of the works, and then we'll take questions and then know that you'll come back to first meeting in June with a draft budget that should be mostly close to getting ready. And as Mayor Woodside mentioned, you will adopt a budget by the end of June that will carry forward from July 1st to June 30th of the following year. |
| 01:33:31.54 | Chris Zapata | It's a lot of work. |
| 01:33:34.12 | Angeline Loeffler | Good evening, Mayor and Vice Mayor and Council Member and the members of Publix. And. It's been a pleasure working with Chris, and he's been great, helpful on getting through this journey and getting prepared the budget preparation. So I just want to take a moment to thank you, Chris, for helping me on this journey through this point. So the next slide, please. So tonight's objective is going over some of those changes, major key changes that we have made from the previous, the first review. And also we're going to go through some of those, the available fund balance, which is also has been updated as well. And also the council, we're coming back tonight with the council's request directions of the looking at the potential development fees. and we also have that information and also the pension scenarios that was brought a the questions on the first review so that's also included in our presentation today's along with the some of those the latest questions add-on was the how the the projection of the revenue information is came together. So there are some few slices actually we'll go over on those details of those revenue projections as well too. Next slide please. |
| 01:35:01.65 | Angeline Loeffler | So the quick recap of what we have looked at, as Chris mentioned, that we have looked at the actual two options of the last previous meetings on May 5th was actually the baseline versus enhanced budgets. So based on some of those directions that we have received from the previous meeting, so we kind of modify the enhanced version of the enhanced budget as well as the baselines for the councils to further reviews. |
| 01:35:35.10 | Angeline Loeffler | And also coming back with the staffing needs. So we kind of refined what is our staffing needs from the based on the direction that we have received from the previous meeting as well too. And also the potential revenue options. Once again, this is the development piece. Next slide, please. So we will be coming back after the directions tonight and on the June 2nd. Actually, there is a typo on that one. It's not a June 4th. It's a June 2nd. We'll be coming back with the proposed budget and then the aiming to do the final adoptions on June 19th of the FY27 budget. And I just wanna reemphasize that we are not in this. The FY27 projection will not be utilizing any of the 25% reserve policies, and as well as they will not be tapping into any of the pensions and OPEP under the Section 115 trust funds. Next slide, please. Here are some of the key changes that is actually impacting on the, since the last meeting was that we actually are including the additional 200,000 of the parking citations, revenue, delinquent revenue that has not been the included in our budget on the previous one. And then based on the discussion with the police departments, there was the They quite a bit of the delinquent parking citation has not been collected. So we are in the process of working with getting that delinquent. actively going after and recruit those parking citations, so that's why the additional 200,000 is the optimistically add on to the revenues on that one. And also I made the updates on the hour, the TOT taxes based on our current year trend, we have been expecting to do really better on the compared to prior year. So I actually use the current year's TOT, the projections to kind of increase our next year's projections on the TOT, which is coming up about another 67,000. there. And then also that we also included the Dorothy Gibsons, the lease that it's going to be in the full, hopefully in the full tenants. So that's actually also added into the our revenue projections as well, too. And property tax projection is actually, I will be going into the a little bit more detail in a later slide, how we actually came up with the property tax projections on that one. Next slide, please. |
| 01:38:29.08 | Angeline Loeffler | And then now we're diving into the staffing requirements. And then before I get into that one, we have reduced our closing, our shortfall amount from the previous meeting by $689,000. by increasing $400,000, $3,000 of the revenue and reducing of the expenses by 285,000. So because of that one, our shortfall is actually now the 1.19 instead of 1.8 from the initial meetings yesterday. |
| 01:39:07.09 | Angeline Loeffler | Yes, 1.7 is actually including the additional staffing, the request. The all the staffing request has been approved and of course the edit the short format will increase to 1.7 which was 2.5 in the previous meeting so it's quite a video drastic changes since the first review of that meetings. Next slide, please. |
| 01:39:32.18 | Chris Zapata | Angeline and to clarify, if you add the three positions that one's a transfer in two or new positions, the community development director and the additional help for parks and recreation in HR, that would take you to a number of 1.1 million as a shortfall. |
| 01:39:47.94 | Angeline Loeffler | on. Wow. |
| 01:39:48.53 | Chris Zapata | Point seven. 1.7. |
| 01:39:50.62 | Angeline Loeffler | Yes. So now looking into details of the as requested in the last meeting, we wanted to kind of give you the breakdown of how those positions will the cost of each of the positions. So I kind of put them on the context of the salaries and wages and the benefits and how those positions come together. And there's actually the last columns on the addition of funding is requested is the, as you can see, we have managed to adjust the IT budget along with the Marine IT's contracts adjustments to incorporate that IT positions it actually will absorb within the existing, the budgeted amounts. |
| 01:40:38.02 | Angeline Loeffler | And the admin A's position is actually currently split. They have a time split between the recreation and HR. Okay. And then that adding the one full position will actually allocate each of the department with the full positions allocations. So that's actually currently shared between the HR and Recreation. |
| 01:41:01.70 | Angeline Loeffler | Next slide, please. I just want to give you a quick update on fund balances. There's no changes in the unassigned fund balances. since the last meeting and there was a couple of the other there's no changes in the parking funds available fund but there was changes in the old city hall funding changes which is actually resulted from the additional the fund balance transfer to the general fund to reduce the gap. And the other restrictive fundings actually has the Thailand funds has been updated from the FY25 audited amounts. But that is actually consistent with what was presented in the last meeting as well. Next slide, please. So this is, we're getting into the potential development impact fees, and staff is reviewing the development impact fee in alignment with the city council's directions. And this review is included, the legal requirement, access to services, analysis, and public noticing, and a constant, the consultant to contract services. Next slide, please. And I will not be going into the definition of the development impact fees, but these impact fees can be assessed in the types of most common areas are the police, fire, park and recreation, public buildings, library, traffic, waters, and sewer and storm trainings. Those are the way that we can actually impose on the development fees based on. And then also, most of the time, the local authorities actually do include those fees on our master fee schedules to start implementing the collection of that one. So that will be, actually needs to be coming in, and we have to update our master fee schedules accordingly as well. Next slide, please. Now I like to quickly dive into the patients and specifically unfunded accrual liability trending on that one. And this particular next slide is actually presented by our consultant, NHA, who actually provide these detailed comprehensive analysis So I'm just going to be recapping on those information, which is still true to the FY27 projections as well, too. Next slide, please. Next slide, please. So these are some of these that hump that we can actually expect to see. So any of those, the line above the red dotted line is where we expect to do smoothing effects on that one. So we are expected to see, Thank you. the potential of anything over the 3.5 threshold for the, through the, let's see, I can't, okay, the FY, 2036 so we're hoping to kind of use the pension section 115 trust fund to kind of smoothing of the next 10 years. That's where we have to kind of there's a peak is coming down after the 2036. So hopefully the current balance that we have on our pension section 115 will actually, depending on how the account person is actually performing, we may have enough money to last through the, going through all these peak of those, the unfunded liabilities. Next slide, please. This slide is actually showing the demonstration of the certain type of scenarios, depending on how well the CalPERS is doing. So on the second blue columns is actually based on the last year, CalPERS did very well. So those are the really best possible scenarios. And as you can see on the third columns with the The green. tabs on that one is that is actually the way we see on our current next year's the evaluations that coming in. So depending on the scenarios, we are definitely looking into at the bottom of the each columns and we will have enough of the idea section 115 pension trust fund to last during these those the hums if we'll start using it for the FY28. Next slide, please. |
| 01:45:35.14 | Angeline Loeffler | This slide is actually showing what was the based on the revenue projection and then this was one of the other requested items 75% budget trends versus actual. So on the table on the top that you will see those are the comparison of the last five years through the FY26. Quarter three of that one. So as you can see, the FY25 quarters shows that the revenue is actually, actual revenue is less than. what we have currently in our quarters. However, if you look in the table below, how we finished the ear on each given corresponding ears, there was the graduate, a lot of fluctuation, not a lot of fluctuation, but ear to ear, the last quarter over the revenue is quite up and down. There's no steady stream of, there's no consistency in that cases. So if you are looking at the FY25 from the Q4, we actually generated almost 9 million of revenue within that one quarter versus we are projecting for the idea on the FY26, we will not hit that 23 million at the end of the year. And also, if you look at the previous years right there, that on the FY24 was actually about 8 million in the fourth quarter. And FY23, we have almost another 9 million. And FY22, it's another 9 million. So it looks like we have not really hit all those, the trending of that one. And then FY20, I want to draw your attention on FY27, the revenues, which is pretty consistent. There's the 22.6 million projected for the FY27, which is comparable to the FY27, actual was 23 million. and the year before was 20. One million. am I looking at that, 21.5 million? And then year before, year 23 is actually 23 million. So there has been some unusual circumstances that actually I do need to look into a little bit deeper to really see. But based on the trending of the overall revenues, FY27 revenue is projected in a reasonable, in a manner that it's really kind of, I don't expect anything we will have there, the really large. revenue is projected in a reasonable, in a manner that it's that's really kind of, I don't expect that anything we will have at the end, the really large variances at the end of the years. Next slide please. |
| 01:48:14.29 | Angeline Loeffler | So these are some of the things that, oh, it's property taxes. I know that the print is a little small. So on this one, you can see the FY26. This is the HAL data based on the, this was provided as of the, uh, the, uh, the, the Uh-huh. the information was through the other, April of that one. So this is most recent reports that we have received from the HDL and HDL is projecting that the FY 26 and seven the property taxes is gonna be 5.8 on that one. |
| 01:48:52.24 | Jill Hoffman | I is this slide in our packet. |
| 01:48:55.75 | Angeline Loeffler | No, actually, this was the last minute edition. So that was actually not in the presentation. |
| 01:49:01.66 | Jill Hoffman | I can't read any of those. This is exactly what I asked for, and I can't read a single one of those numbers. |
| 01:49:05.99 | Angeline Loeffler | So we will go ahead and make sure that we provide you with the updated on that one. So this was kind of a last minute at all. |
| 01:49:10.42 | Jill Hoffman | What could you do? |
| 01:49:10.97 | Joan Cox | to kind of lock in it at all. |
| 01:49:15.34 | Joan Cox | Is there anyone who can email it? So, because I think this is going to be the subject of some questions. |
| 01:49:19.02 | Angeline Loeffler | Yeah. Yes. The final version is on the share drive. So would you be able to? I mean, typically... It's not updated. |
| 01:49:29.30 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. It's not updated in the agenda. |
| 01:49:30.85 | Unknown | Yeah. Yeah, she sent an updated one this afternoon. It's not this one, right? This is different. |
| 01:49:36.89 | Angeline Loeffler | No, this is since the update that was- This was actually, they completed on the, at like the 4.30 this afternoon, as the request came in this morning, yes. |
| 01:49:40.37 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 01:49:46.19 | Joan Cox | Can we just request in the future when you, anytime there's an update to a presentation, just have staff forward it to us? |
| 01:49:54.81 | Angeline Loeffler | Absolutely. Yes. I apologize. I should have done that. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Absolutely. |
| 01:49:54.86 | Joan Cox | Absolutely. |
| 01:50:01.02 | Angeline Loeffler | So this is the projection that we have received from the HDL. And then if you do the next slide, This is actually the report that I have received from the county, which is on those columns showing as the current year's tax revenue is actually the actual amount that we will be receiving from the county outside of the true up at the end of the year. So which this amount is actually lower than what was HDL was projecting. And then the last column is the reports that we, that basically they're projecting for the 5.8 as for the upcoming years on that report. So these are some of those reports that we based on and looking at the also trending of the, how the property taxes has been collected in the past. Next slide, please. |
| 01:50:55.65 | Angeline Loeffler | So... This one is just the VLFF, that it's additions to the part of the property tax. And once again, this is the report that I have received from the HDL on the recent, and these are the projections, which is reflected in the budget's revenues as well. Next slide, please. And here's the sales tax, the projections, which is based on through the December of the sales tax collected based on HDL. And as you can see, the projection on the right-hand columns two of the forecast is based on the actual data through the December of the FY20 and as well as the previous, the years of the last two quarters that was reflected in how they actually projected those, the years. the revenue projection, which is very much in line with our, the patterns of our revenue that we have in the past and how much we have received. And this is one of those areas that we could have a lot of the other fluctuations as well, too. Next slide, please. And just a quick recap of the, this is measure L information and how |
| 01:52:19.64 | Jill Hoffman | With respect, we can't read those numbers, so you might as well just skip over these slides and we'll ask you questions. |
| 01:52:23.21 | Angeline Loeffler | Okay. All right. |
| 01:52:25.10 | Jill Hoffman | Amen. |
| 01:52:25.26 | Angeline Loeffler | Thank you. All right, so I think that is the hour. That is my, the last slides, and I'm open to already any questions. |
| 01:52:37.20 | Mayor Woodside | So I think we'll start with questions. I'm going to turn to Ian, because I know you were pretty specific about that. |
| 01:52:44.22 | Jill Hoffman | Well, I just emailed a few questions this afternoon. So, you know, you inadvertently sent us a slide in one of the packages that showed your Q3 numbers and our revenues. work. were above our projections for Q3. So what I'm trying to understand is what the basis of this projection is. So if I'm going to put it into words, as of the end of Q3, we had $15.96 million of actual revenue that shows up in the Springbok system and $15.6 million of expenses. So we have a net surplus as of the close of Q3. That's the end of March of this calendar year. That's the third fiscal quarter. So we're in surplus of $355,000. And what I think I just heard you say is the fourth quarter. Or is a big quarter, we get 8 million or so dollars. And your projection for the quarter is based then on some preliminary numbers from HDL around our sales tax or property tax and otherwise. Is that a fair assessment? |
| 01:53:46.73 | Angeline Loeffler | Yes, that is correct. |
| 01:53:47.64 | Jill Hoffman | All right. |
| 01:53:47.66 | Angeline Loeffler | Yeah. |
| 01:53:47.67 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. So, We are, of course, only at May 19, so we're halfway through the quarter. And so you're basing your projection for the quarter based on the first half of the quarter. And what are actually all the dates for the data you have so far? Is it as of May 19 or is it as of April 30th or even March? It's another date. |
| 01:54:08.58 | Angeline Loeffler | The report from the county and HDL is based on the January of 2026, which is after the December property tax has been already went out. And also for the, I also look at those numbers based on how much we have received on the, through the MA-19 as of today, how much. And then that is the kind of combination of both data when I was projecting the other revenues. |
| 01:54:35.18 | Jill Hoffman | So just go through the main categories. Property tax, when is the last report that you got? for the tax that are collected. Are we gonna get any more property tax this quarter? |
| 01:54:41.00 | Angeline Loeffler | that are- We do, for this quarter, yes, we have already received, and only thing left is gonna be the ERN Tru-Up, which is around, like, two to three hundred thousand. |
| 01:54:55.07 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. important point so our property tax receipts are more or less gathered |
| 01:54:57.03 | Angeline Loeffler | Thank you. are. |
| 01:55:00.88 | Jill Hoffman | except for this true up. |
| 01:55:01.87 | Angeline Loeffler | Correct. |
| 01:55:02.12 | Jill Hoffman | And you're saying they're lower than they were last year? |
| 01:55:04.40 | Angeline Loeffler | Okay, yes, actually I do. I did not have that information on the property taxes. As of the idea that we have right now, we actually collected about five secure property taxes, we collected about 5.4. And based on the county projections, we are actually left with the 5.6 that we're supposed to receive under the security property tax, which is around like 200,000 of the true ups that it's only left. |
| 01:55:33.65 | Jill Hoffman | So we're getting 5.4. $4 million of property. |
| 01:55:36.45 | Angeline Loeffler | 5.4 has received three of these points, yes. The year? Yes. just on the secure property tax. |
| 01:55:44.53 | Jill Hoffman | lower than I had thought. I thought our property tax was a larger number. I'll have to look into that. But how does that compare to what you budgeted for the year? |
| 01:55:52.56 | Angeline Loeffler | So the budgeted amounts for the FY26 is the actually we budgeted for 5.9. So there was quite a bit of drops on that one. So, but. Having said that, 5.9, we're still waiting for the true ups. The other $200,000, $300,000 will come through on that. So that is, unfortunately, I do need to get back to you. What was the basis on the budget? It amounts for the develop on the. |
| 01:56:09.79 | Unknown | I love it. So, |
| 01:56:19.56 | Angeline Loeffler | FY 26, I do need to kind of get back. What was the back end of that one? |
| 01:56:25.27 | Jill Hoffman | about it. This came up last two weeks ago. So why couldn't we get the answer in the last two weeks? |
| 01:56:31.16 | Angeline Loeffler | Unfortunately, there's a lot of things that I have to work on outside of that one. So I do need additional time because it takes a lot of going back and forth, looking at all of those previous budget data to gather those information. So I'll be sure to get back to you on that. |
| 01:56:46.36 | Jill Hoffman | Is it possible that our trip might be bigger than normal this year? |
| 01:56:49.28 | Angeline Loeffler | possible but in the past trend that we have is between the 250 to 300,000 those ranges |
| 01:56:56.91 | Jill Hoffman | So Q3, we were above our budget on revenue. if I'm reading this table correctly that you sent, why were we above budget in Q3 if our property tax receipts are Lower. |
| 01:57:09.09 | Angeline Loeffler | The other taxes are also incorporating into that one. We had a higher TOT taxes that was coming in. |
| 01:57:09.14 | Jill Hoffman | I think it's really... |
| 01:57:16.47 | Angeline Loeffler | So that is also adding on to the additional, the revenues on that one. Probably that's what happens. It's not really isolated just on the property taxes. |
| 01:57:20.84 | Jill Hoffman | probably. |
| 01:57:26.17 | Jill Hoffman | And is sales tax higher or lower than budget? |
| 01:57:29.31 | Angeline Loeffler | Sales tax is actually on the lower at this point. points so we have received about two millions at this point and we budgeted for 2.6 and i would expect that the we're going to be finishing the year just around the budgeted amount |
| 01:57:45.29 | Jill Hoffman | You think we're going to meet budget on sales tax. We're going to be below budget on property tax, and we're going to be over budget on TOT tax. |
| 01:57:47.31 | Angeline Loeffler | Mm-hmm. |
| 01:57:52.48 | Jill Hoffman | So the economy is doing as projected slightly above, but the property tax is lower. |
| 01:57:58.77 | Angeline Loeffler | Right, for some reason. So I do need to kind of dive into a little bit more on the property taxes. So that is something that I do want to kind of do a further investigation and be sure to get back to you on that one. |
| 01:58:10.47 | Jill Hoffman | That's it for now, Mayor. Thank you. |
| 01:58:13.69 | Joan Cox | Can I just ask a procedural question, not a substantive one, which is, Is that okay? |
| 01:58:19.02 | Mayor Woodside | Oh, yeah, sure. |
| 01:58:19.85 | Joan Cox | I'm not sure. Council member Sobieski, you mentioned sending emails to the finance director. Did you get responses? |
| 01:58:27.68 | Jill Hoffman | We did this afternoon. She sent us all those slides ahead of time. Thank you very much. That's very helpful. So in point of fact, what looks like, you know, is actually because she was so proactive. I had the chance to email her some additional questions, which to her great credit, she tried to pull answers together. So, credit to you for doing that. I'm still frustrated we didn't get that answer, but I want to make clear that you did pull some of these questions. |
| 01:58:51.51 | Joan Cox | I just want to be clear that we all got copied on everything that got sent to you. |
| 01:58:51.90 | Jill Hoffman | to be clear that we're Thank you. Oh, yes, you did. I didn't get some of the things that I'm seeing right here, apparently. So yes, you got everything. All right. Thank you. |
| 01:59:03.42 | Mayor Woodside | And just on the process, Um, For example, at 4.30 this afternoon, we were in closed session. |
| 01:59:10.07 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah. |
| 01:59:10.39 | Mayor Woodside | on other matters. On a council day, it's often very difficult to keep up with all the communications we get pertaining to the meeting. And it's a day to catch up on all of that. be prepared for the meeting. So this is something that as we move forward, we can do better so that we have the information earlier so that we can have our questions answered earlier, the individual questions that come up. |
| 01:59:27.74 | Jim Madden | you know the |
| 01:59:28.60 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:59:40.04 | Joan Cox | Yeah, our council member protocols require that we send our questions at least the day before the meeting. and that any questions to staff, are answered by staff with copies to all council members. So that's, and the whole purpose of that is to avoid answers coming in that we aren't able to review. That's a good point. |
| 02:00:00.48 | Jill Hoffman | That's a good point. She did send it today. Yeah. So it was either that or blindsided here at the dais. So. |
| 02:00:02.38 | Joan Cox | Yeah. |
| 02:00:04.12 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah. |
| 02:00:04.34 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 02:00:05.22 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah. |
| 02:00:06.38 | Jill Hoffman | Agree. Staff shouldn't send us something the day of if they don't want to get that dynamic broken, but you're right. You're right. |
| 02:00:13.27 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. |
| 02:00:13.62 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:00:13.65 | Mayor Woodside | And... |
| 02:00:14.19 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 02:00:14.21 | Mayor Woodside | I spared. |
| 02:00:14.80 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:00:14.82 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:00:14.95 | Unknown | Great. Thank you. Thank you for that. Okay, so I had a couple of questions just generally and then one about what we more specifically, but it's not clear to me from the staff report in looking at the shortfall, which has, you know, around 1.2 million, which is, I guess, one at 1.7 with the positions better than where we were before, but I don't see what your strategy is or what recommendations there are for us to close that in advance of our final budget hearing. |
| 02:00:44.94 | Chris Zapata | Let me speak to that. Okay. Maybe I can calm the tone down in the room. This is the second meeting. There's preliminary numbers. We're working on the numbers. There is obviously some concern about the economy that we are in and are facing. And so some of the projections are a little more conservative than you might like. But I think that's wise to not be aggressive in these uncertain times. So that's important to note. And if you look at the numbers that have been presented, with adding two positions, you would have a shortfall in the general fund estimated, projected at this time of about $1.7 million. So that's the nuts and bolts of right now. And so in the question of how you could address that, there are multiple ways to address that. Number one, you have an economic uncertainty budget of almost $6 million, but we're not asking you to use that. You could pay pensions or OPEB earlier out of the $6 million you saved. We're not asking you to do that. But what you have done in those years where you accumulated these surpluses is you've built a $4.1 million unassigned fund balance in the general fund. And if you took $1.7 million out of that fund, that would balance your budget. That's part of what could happen if that's the comfort level you have with using that money. If not, going back and refining these numbers so that maybe the numbers are more optimistic or the expenses are less, I think is probably not wise. I think it's more important to look at what are you going to do with one-time money when you're looking at adding ongoing expense. And so when you add positions, which total two 60 and one 10 for the two positions ongoing, you could bridge that with your one-time money for at least two years, maybe three. So my question to you is how comfortable are you dipping into any of those accounts? Because that's where the answers are. This, the idea that the city can make numbers, Thank you. appear the way we want them to so that our budget is balanced. And I've said this before, I'm not a magician. We're not a magician. But you do have options, and the options are your one-time, unassigned general fund, fund balance, which is $4.1 million today. Or you could say, we do not want to add these two positions and that ongoing expense. But I didn't hear that the last meeting. I heard we want those positions on the books. And so that creates more work, which we've done to shrink that number. And so that number has been shrunk, uh, even with the addition of those positions, but it's going to have to come from somewhere. And if you make a policy decision to use one-time money on ongoing expenses, uh, as a you won't get in trouble, but you can't do it over the long term. |
| 02:03:41.72 | Unknown | Okay. So to follow up on that, because you mentioned the positions that we had requested, and I'm a little bit surprised with the positions that showed up this evening, rather than the five that we had asked for at the prior meeting in particular. I don't think we had a discussion about an IT manager, though I agree, of course there's need, but that was not one of the five positions that was presented to us at the May 5th meeting. And additionally, one of the positions that, we had discussed, and I think there is opportunity to use one-time funding for and have it be more of a consultant for year one was a permit tax. Um, an additional permit tech to act as like a concierge white glove that could potentially pay for itself. And the direction was that you would explore that, but I don't see any mention of a permit tech anywhere in. the staff report or any of the documents. So I'd love to understand what happened there. I know the IT manager funds itself based on Angeline. And again, I really, I appreciate everything you're doing. I know these are critical questions and we're in a critical time. I also really appreciate that you included the FHJ report with recommendations for how we might you know, in the longer term deal with our art so that we can use that one time money to your point city manager. But anyway, to address the point of the positions, why there's now three and why one of them is not one of the five that we had requested. |
| 02:04:45.70 | Chris Zapata | Yes. |
| 02:04:49.61 | Chris Zapata | So we, excuse me, but I was looking and talking to folks, and I know that there was consensus by the council to add a community and economic development director position so you could keep a full-time assistant city manager. That was done. I was questioning what we would do beyond that, and I was told that we were going to add a halftime position for HR and a halftime position for recreation. and we would consider at a future meeting, which is this meeting, if you wanted to do more. And if you wanted to add a permit tech, the question in the conversation is like this. You could add it, and it may not be as expensive as you think, but it would be added expense. And the reason it may not be as expensive as you think is because there's offsetting fees that come along with that work, whether it's the permit fees and if there is in fact what you call white glove treatment and you want to expedite things and you pay extra. So that position may not be as expensive as the position of community development director or the add-on of a full person to help Parks and Recreation and HR, but you have to make that decision and that decision wasn't clear to me in the last meeting. So therefore we're having a conversation now. If the Council wants to add that position, then that changes the Rubik's Cube, which is what we're dealing with right now. |
| 02:06:11.66 | Unknown | Could we add that position as a consultant or a contractor role so that we could use one-time funds to assess the efficiency of the position before assuming a full-time, the ongoing cost of a full-time position? Yeah. |
| 02:06:24.67 | Joan Cox | I want to make sure you, maybe the city attorney can weigh in. I want to make sure that you are aware of AB 339 and the constraints on our ability to hire an independent contractor to perform work that a represented employee could perform. |
| 02:06:38.99 | Chris Zapata | And that's a good point, Councilmember Cox. The landscape for adding positions is confined by if you are supplanting a position with a consultant, then that's a problem. And that's what Councilmember Cox is referring to. So if you added a full-time position, you would not have that issue if it's not a consultant. But again, going back to the other conversation with this idea of what it would cost you, it's not if you spend $100,000 on it that you'd have to provide $100,000. There would be an offset in permit revenue, and if there was an expedited plan fee schedule attached to it, maybe that $100,000 position costs you half of that. |
| 02:07:19.61 | Unknown | Okay. I mean, when we get to discussion, we can talk about what the path is for that. That's fine. And then I wanted to better understand the state grant revenue, because that was a little bit unclear from the budgeted to now for the 668,000 in state grants. What was that grant? Because it seems like a really big change. And what are some of the conditions or follow-ups on that, just so we can make sure that it's something we're... planning for or should be aware could maybe not happen. |
| 02:07:45.90 | Angeline Loeffler | Part of the, that's 600,000, the large portion of that one is the 500,000, that grant that we have already spent In one of those projects, the sea rise level, one of the grants, that was out of the huge amounts that already spent and we have not filed the reimbursements. That's why I was talking to the resilience, the sustainable managers that those are... ready to be redeemed. So that's why that was add on to that. That's part of the, uh, those, the grant reimbursements. |
| 02:08:20.31 | Unknown | So it's from the million dollars that we have for grants already that we just need to get the funds from the state. Correct. But they've been approved. |
| 02:08:25.16 | Angeline Loeffler | Correct. Yes, yes, it has. The expense has been already incurred. So we are ready to just go ahead and submit the reimbursements. And that should be coming through. It's a matter of submitting the reimbursements. |
| 02:08:37.54 | Unknown | And then the last thing I wanted to ask, and I might know the answer, but it just the expenses in the parking fund seemed higher than they, than they typically are for revenue. Was that the implementation of the new parking? Um, machines like what was that, or was that just a general trend around parking this year or a new position? |
| 02:08:54.53 | Angeline Loeffler | There is additional parking meters funding that was included in the upcoming years as well too. And that is part of the spikes of the increases on those expenses. Okay, great. Thank you. That's all I have for now. |
| 02:09:09.96 | Mayor Woodside | Other questions? Thank you. |
| 02:09:12.76 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:09:12.79 | Mayor Woodside | I'm seeing you. |
| 02:09:13.03 | Jill Hoffman | none. I had, I had one more actually. Okay. Good. Could you put the slide of the, uh, UAL payments from the 115 trust plan up there. This is a question that does eventually require a city council policy question. My recollection is, of the, expectation when the 115 trust was set up you had it there with the cutting off the peak was that the first year that we would |
| 02:09:37.41 | Janelle Kellman | That's it. |
| 02:09:38.31 | Jill Hoffman | These the bottom is the fiscal year ending in 26 ending in 27. |
| 02:09:42.48 | Janelle Kellman | Yes. |
| 02:09:42.83 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. So this is indeed the expectation when that was set up by previous city councils. And the first year it was expected to draw on was 26, 27, the budget year we are talking about right now. In your current budget, you do not draw anything from the trust fund in mind. |
| 02:09:57.58 | Bob Mitchell | We haven't. |
| 02:09:59.47 | Jill Hoffman | My suggestion to my colleagues is that this We should follow the plan that our forefathers adopted and actually draw the planned amount from that, and that would mitigate to one extent at least your projected deficit. So there may be disagreement about that, but that is my opinion is that we should do that this year. we'll talk about during the schedule. Sorry, that wasn't exactly a question. Isn't that correct? Sorry about that. |
| 02:10:28.48 | Mayor Woodside | They're all learning the difference between a statement and a question, right? Okay, I do believe that Member Cox has a question. |
| 02:10:39.14 | Joan Cox | I had a question on this slide. So in looking at this slide, this is the first time that I have seen the spike in the slide at year 24-25, or 44-45. |
| 02:10:50.74 | Alice Merrill | One. |
| 02:10:51.53 | Joan Cox | Where did that come from? Because all of our prior slides on this issue just show a steady downward trend. |
| 02:11:02.85 | Angeline Loeffler | Right. I'm going to probably have to get back to you why there are certain spikes on that one. There should not be, because once we've gone through these big humps, it's really the classic members of the retirement. After that, a lot of PEPRA will be kicking in, so I don't expect it. So I will have to get back to you on that one. |
| 02:11:22.48 | Joan Cox | Did that not occur to you as you were putting this together? Like, why is there a spike in the... I mean, it's just a logical |
| 02:11:30.66 | Angeline Loeffler | Yes. Absolutely. I should have a question that one, but I was just focusing on the, the actual, the next 10 years, the spikes and smoothing of that one. So that's why I kind of overlooked on that one. So I would definitely, we'll get back to you on that one. Okay. Thank you. It's, |
| 02:11:47.62 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. excuse me, since we're focused on the graph, what this shows is that you would not start to draw On the trust fund until fiscal year 28? Yes. Bye. And the amount that you show is 3.5 million. And the analysis is that the trust fund itself can support that level. |
| 02:12:14.17 | Angeline Loeffler | Yes, actually, next slide is showing. |
| 02:12:15.65 | Mayor Woodside | for that. So if we were to draw upon it either sooner or to a greater amount, that would change this graph. |
| 02:12:24.56 | Angeline Loeffler | Oh, possibly and also this is going to be all depending on this are the data is based on the the calpers fy24 the year ending so this is based on that one so fy25 they actually did much better so if we're to use the fy25 data it will get changed and it will be then calpers will be releasing another actuality reports in the June, sometime in the June, and that graph, depending on their performance, this graph may get changed, but I don't expect that it's going to be significantly different than what we're seeing on the curve on that aspect. |
| 02:13:01.65 | Mayor Woodside | And a question to the city manager, I know you've been tracking some. bills recently introduced in the legislature that might have an impact long-term if they were to pass. Can you comment on that? |
| 02:13:14.55 | Chris Zapata | I can. I'm very, I love seeing these projections because they change based on returns by CalPERS. But one thing that's certain is there's a couple of bills in front of the California lawmakers in Sacramento. One that would increase or decrease the retirement age for public safety from 57 to 55, which means you would retire earlier and therefore pay longer. So there's a fiscal impact to cities in that regard if that bill passes. The second bill is a second bill which would restrict the CalPERS investment model from certain types of investment, which CalPERS is estimating will cost them $6.1 billion. And then that would result in a 10% increase to the cities because someone's going to have to make up that money and it won't be CalPERS. So those two bills are worrisome. I'm happy to write an opposition letter. If the council wants me to, I'll do that first thing in the morning. |
| 02:14:20.81 | Mayor Woodside | Um, you know, if we adjourn early tonight, we could stick around and help you draft it. Well, big picture in that regard is that these are projections based on what we know now and what our best guess is going forward, right? Is that fair summary? Thank you. |
| 02:14:40.79 | Janelle Kellman | Yes. |
| 02:14:41.70 | Mayor Woodside | And we don't have all the answers at this moment. predict with certainty. Which is true for any budget. Okay. Any other questions? public comments at this point. |
| 02:14:59.81 | Mayor Woodside | Make it better. I heard you. Write the letter. Okay, I thought I heard you say make it better. Either would be good. |
| 02:15:10.07 | Mayor Woodside | any online. |
| 02:15:12.06 | Walfred Solorzano | Seeing none online. |
| 02:15:12.99 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. And now Mr. Sobieski, comments and discussion. |
| 02:15:18.81 | Jill Hoffman | Well, it's hard to say without, you know, I appreciate that we have this schedule of these multiple meetings, which I guess is good for foreshadowing, but we have to make actual decisions in our budget about resourcing the staff, especially with this transfer that we care about a lot. And when you have a projection of a deficit, it's alarming, of course, every single budget cycle we projected a deficit and. every single budget cycle for the last five years, we've had a surplus. So, especially at this critical time, I wanna be cautious about, undermining our investment in our organization. But at the same time, the numbers tell the truth. I think we have, at least I have to reserve some judgment about what to do until we get closer to the June 16th adoption and have greater clarity on the actuals. A key question is why is property tax going down? I think you posited at one of the meetings, Mayor, that perhaps the office building environment has decreased the value of office building property. So if that's it, that'd be an explanation. But it's so unusual. We did have one big sale, as we know, one Harbor Drive got sold for a number less than it was previously purchased for, shouldn't account for at all. It could possibly, maybe, but, but, It could be a big chunk of it, possibly, but we should get that answer. So I hope, Angeline, that you will get that answer as soon as possible and let us know, regardless of what the numbers are. As I said before, it is my opinion we should you know, you make an investment plan and you stick with the plan unless there's really a material way, reason to change it. And the, 115 Trust was set up to draw in this fiscal year, and I think we should do it as per plan. |
| 02:16:58.14 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, so you've raised a couple of questions, and I want to make sure we focus on everyone's thoughts, including their individual thoughts. Um, Ms. Cox. |
| 02:17:08.45 | Joan Cox | As one of the authors of the 115 Trust Investment Plan, I will respectfully say that I concur with staff's recommendation that we start drawing on it in fiscal year 28 in order to assure its longevity through the the zenith of the obligation and really The purpose, you know, the plan that was made in 2018 was based on the projections that we had available in 2018, which showed. you know, a a shorter and higher um, zenith. And now that, um, Based on what we're seeing tonight in terms of the need for the 115 trust, the purpose was really to smooth the top echelon of the... of the, of the required payments. And so, um, I believe that it's better to be conservative in its use and commence its use when we most need it, which is when we reach that top, uh, level, which shows a significant duration. I, um, endorse. Council member Sobieski's comments about needing full information to make informed decisions. I like Councilmember or the vice mayor's, um, recommendation to consider hiring a permit tech that essentially funds a large portion of the investment. I'd like to see the numbers to be able to better explore that option. I am very concerned. about, and everybody disagrees about whether or not to call it a structural deficit, but when you have an ongoing expense that causes you and not a one-time expense that causes your expenses to exceed your revenues, I believe that is structural. I based on conversations, um, with our, that I've had with our incoming city manager, I understand that, the, um, the desire to invest in our staff and to restructure our staff in such a manner as to perform more efficiently. And so I am willing to undertake that risk for this year with the proviso and the promise from her that we will figure out how to uh, to return that investment into um, a non-recurring structural deficit that we will find a way to fund. those positions, although we don't We haven't yet identified that way for this fiscal year. And I- Do endorse writing a letter. the letter that our outgoing city manager, um, offered to write on his last day. to oppose these two really troublesome bills. All due respect to our chief who's sitting in the back of the room. |
| 02:20:21.31 | Mayor Woodside | That was a wave from the back of the room. Yes. |
| 02:20:22.97 | Joan Cox | Yes. |
| 02:20:25.79 | Mayor Woodside | And I won't ask her how old she is today, okay? |
| 02:20:28.81 | Joan Cox | It's nowhere near 57, I can tell you that. |
| 02:20:31.30 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, I'm sorry. |
| 02:20:32.03 | Joan Cox | Okay. |
| 02:20:33.25 | Mayor Woodside | Um, If we could separate these a little bit for discussion purposes so we can, where we agree, we can move forward and where we are still needing more discussion, we can have it. So the letter, everyone's good with that. Okay. Um, Now, where I don't think we have agreement is on the timing of using the trust fund to, um, yeah, to make an expenditure this year versus possibly next year. |
| 02:21:04.43 | Chris Zapata | It is. |
| 02:21:07.62 | Chris Zapata | next year. Mayor, if I can interject into this conversation about, I get the dynamic of use it or don't use it. The other thing that was brought to my attention recently was the city has $2.2 million in OPEP funds that isn't a part of that type of a discussion. And if you elected to use some of that to pay down some of that expense, you know, that could achieve the same thing without touching the $4.4 million that you have. |
| 02:21:37.98 | Joan Cox | I like that idea. |
| 02:21:39.34 | Mayor Woodside | I'd have to know more about that, but that sounds like an option that we should know more about for you. |
| 02:21:44.66 | Jill Hoffman | Could we ask since there needs to be more work in verifying the HDL and other things, you have a recommendation on the 115 trust that Councilman Evercock cited. Why? Maybe you could report on that in the future. At the same time, this idea you just proffered city manager of using the OPEB money to be another option. You could report on that as well. And that could be part of our discussion at the next meeting on the budget. Why not? What to do with that? |
| 02:22:11.36 | Joan Cox | I'm looking to the the incoming interim city manager to be sure that he's taking notes on these requests. |
| 02:22:18.97 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. |
| 02:22:19.20 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 02:22:19.62 | Mayor Woodside | Thumbs up. Uh, The city manager asked earlier how comfortable we were with using unassigned revenues. These are not reserves. These are beyond that. They're monies that are unallocated at this point. We allocated quite a large number of these funds in the last fiscal year, And. residents can see how that money was, largely how that money was spent on infrastructure improvements. So, I'll answer the question this way, and it's something we'll have to decide as a council. I'm very comfortable doing that with the proviso that some of what those funds would be. in effect paying for are not just one-time expenses. And that's a risk. I don't like it on an ongoing policy. |
| 02:23:11.43 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah. |
| 02:23:14.74 | Mayor Woodside | I prefer not to have to do it if we could. But we must have a balanced budget. And to the point that I think many of us are trying to make, there are certain investments we want to make now. that we think will improve public service, and we think we can find a way to pay for some of these over the long run in such a way that we don't have a gap. whether it's a structural gap or a temporary gap. More long-term gap. We could debate that forever. But clearly this year, it looks like it's a gap going into it. And we have to have a balanced budget. I'm very comfortable with plugging that gap if we can't reach agreement on other funds using those unassigned so that we end the discussion with a balanced budget. And then our new city manager and our interim city manager are going to be looking immediately. to make sure they're spent wisely and that they're monitoring the effectiveness of the new the few new positions, not many, we're not talking about |
| 02:24:18.14 | Chris Zapata | many. |
| 02:24:20.05 | Mayor Woodside | a major, influx of new staff, but some key in, uh, numbers. That's where I sit on that. I wonder how the rest of you feel about that. I understand there's other sources of funds that Ian you're interested in, And, uh, I- |
| 02:24:38.03 | Joan Cox | I'm sorry. |
| 02:24:38.24 | Mayor Woodside | leave. |
| 02:24:38.94 | Joan Cox | I've already expressed my discomfort with spending unassigned fund balance on other than one time expenses, but for this year, I do endorse that approach to the extent it's required. I'm hoping this 1.7 number will continue to go down. based on the additional data that we've sought. |
| 02:25:02.15 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:25:02.17 | Joan Cox | Go. |
| 02:25:03.97 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | So I think what we're looking for at this point and what we're giving tonight is preliminary feedback and going to talk about it and discuss it further at our next meeting. And as further preliminary feedback, I'm going to give a final decision on. June 14th, which I think is our 19th, whatever our budget decision is six. |
| 02:25:27.02 | Mayor Woodside | 60. |
| 02:25:27.75 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | 16th. Whenever that was the 16th. And so here's the issue, as we've all discussed, right? So we're talking about adding adding positions, right? Ongoing expenses. The ongoing expense is. something that, It's not going to go away. In fact, it increases annually with CPI increases, with raises, with step increases. So it's not just the base, what it costs, it's the benefits, and then it increases annually. So unless we're going to be hard nosed and agree that if we. Don't. come out with a surplus next year. that we're going to consider doing away with the position because we can't afford it, or we're gonna do away with other expenses because we can't afford them and we can't balance our budget. which is something that is a very difficult thing. discussion and how are we going to reduce expenses because we haven't had bounce back that we were all hoping for. So we did that. It was a very difficult exercise and I think 21 or 2022, and we reduced our expenses and we brought our budget back into balance, but that was, that was a painful exercise. Um, and I wouldn't want to put ourselves into that position and it seems like maybe were getting close to going down that road. So we have four million in unallocated funds at this point, that's not a lot of money. It seems like it might be, but it's not. And it's not, especially when you look at our Veritas report, where we have many millions more in in on, you know, deferred maintenance on a lot of the buildings that the city owns, this building being a huge example of huge deferred maintenance on our city hall. that we never talk about. we really need to think about when we're going to upgrade city hall. And when were we gonna thoughtfully start. allocating serious funds to other buildings that we own. We did an incredible step, and I want to thank our departing city manager, for really pushing us and thinking about how We talk about our revenue generating assets and segregating those funds in a meaningful way. Um, and the revenue from those funds with MLK with old city hall, um, and thinking about that, but we have. buildings that we own, there are loss leaders that need significant physical improvements that we're not putting money into. we have those challenges. vastly outweighed by $4 million. So these are the challenges I'm, um, and thank you, um, Angeline, for your hard work. I know these are not easy. These are not easy times. And I look forward to delving into the charts that you gave us today. I tried... I did try. Uh, I did bounce a couple of questions to you, um, but I will try in the next few days to go through them and you'll get it, but you'll be getting some more questions from me. I do. work sometimes full-time. I don't work as much as full-time as our you know, as some of our other council members, but I am working full time right now and I'm trying hard to get, to pay attention to all the things that you gave us. So I appreciate that. So, thank you. |
| 02:29:02.16 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. If I may ask, Jill, are you okay with all those reservations, with using a portion of the available funds at this point for the added staff? |
| 02:29:14.24 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, my feedback at this point is that I'm thoughtfully considering the proposal, but I have reservations about it, honestly, and I've got to look through it and weigh it. I mean, it's a big risk. And it's a big risk when we're talking about when we want to start using our 115 trust, right? Because when you look at the when you look at the bell curve, The real curve is in 29 through 34, where you go up to almost a million dollars more And the whole key is to bring that payment down into what our current, you know, what we've allocated for current payments, right? so that we don't have to pull significantly from other funds. Again, because that might completely subsume the four point 4 million. In like a couple of years. And that's what the whole reason why we put up the trust fund. Um, these are risks and we, you know, we did. We did allocate significant millions of dollars in infrastructure. Um, knowing that we had these risks outstanding because we knew what those bell curves were looking at. That's why we did the 115 trust. But, you know, these are the challenges we have going forward. So that's where I'm sitting right now. I need to do some more work before the next meeting. But thank you. |
| 02:30:39.90 | Mayor Woodside | And on the point of do we use any trust funding funds for the next fiscal year or? or not. |
| 02:30:49.91 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Are you asking me that? |
| 02:30:50.72 | Mayor Woodside | I think you already said you're not comfortable using it now. |
| 02:30:56.15 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I'm struggling with that and I'll give you feedback. |
| 02:30:58.08 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. Okay. I'm not an advocate of using those funds now. I think the projection that we saw is a more sensible approach. I think there was a debate. I think Member Cox, you wanted to use a higher... |
| 02:30:59.63 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah. |
| 02:31:13.58 | Mayor Woodside | level of those funds when we got to that point. And I don't agree with that either. We're only talking about a few hundred thousand dollars difference in this in in each year. But I liked the graph that I saw better than the alternatives at this point. That's where I'm sitting. I don't know how. the vice mayor is, |
| 02:31:34.69 | Unknown | Sure. Yeah, I'm happy to weigh in. And I, uh, Angeline, thank you so much for all of your work on this report and Chris, we really appreciate you getting this as far as you did. And, um, uh, lots of great staff work. Um, I, you know, I think a lot of my concerns are similar to those of the other council members. I just think we, the economic situation between now and fiscal year 28 is still uncertain. And so I'm not inclined, but I'd like to see more information from the, from, what potential use of the funds would look like, how much we would use them before I would be able to make that decision. So I think that's something that we'll come back and discuss. But I was wondering, Um, I'll just bring up again the permit tech position and whether or not we are comfortable asking staff to at least iterate what it would cost, what it might cost for a white glove service fee or an expedited service fee. So it would pay for itself. What sort of contribution that would require because That is a revenue generating position because if more businesses are coming into Sausalito, then we're collecting money. more potential TOT, more sales tax, more business license tax, et cetera. |
| 02:32:39.97 | Mayor Woodside | I think Mr. Phipps already gave a thumbs up that he would look at that. Okay. |
| 02:32:45.23 | Unknown | Thank you, interim city manager effective on Thursday, FIPS. |
| 02:32:49.55 | Chris Zapata | Yeah, so before Thursday, can I get some clarity here? Do you want to look at an additional position? Cost it out and what the net cost is of the position. Understood. You are still debating not using the pension of the 115 trust, but I did not hear clarity on not looking at the OPEB portion of it as a budget solution. |
| 02:33:17.23 | Mayor Woodside | I would certainly need to know more about that because I it's not a trust. |
| 02:33:21.77 | Chris Zapata | This is... It's part of the 115 trust. There's a pension portion, which is $4.4 million. Is in the trust. Yeah, and the post-employment benefit, which is an additional $2.2, $2.3, correct me if I'm wrong, Angeline. But there's over $2 million in that for post-employment benefits that is different than the $4.4 million. |
| 02:33:28.72 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah, and the post-employment. |
| 02:33:41.86 | Mayor Woodside | These are primarily medical benefits, et cetera, upon retirement? |
| 02:33:44.95 | Chris Zapata | Right. Correct. |
| 02:33:47.26 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. I want to look at those projections more before I'm comfortable with that. |
| 02:33:53.32 | Chris Zapata | And I think that's a good thing. Thank you. |
| 02:33:53.86 | Mayor Woodside | But it may be the same thing, and it may be that we can use some of those and still feel confident that we can meet our obligations post-retirement for the benefits. |
| 02:34:03.40 | Chris Zapata | Right. And the reason I bring that up is I hear the trepidation about using the pension portion of the 115 trust. So, you know, the OPEB pension is a 115 trust account as well. It's just a different for a different purpose. And that could offset some of the costs that we incur and help your budget situation in a way that is meaningful. |
| 02:34:24.56 | Sergio Rudin | And one thing that I would like to verify before that gets brought to the council is the legal ability to spend that on anything other than OPEB benefits. |
| 02:34:25.32 | Chris Zapata | Yeah. |
| 02:34:34.80 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | And Chris, sorry, just a follow up. My recollection is that if we make these, correct me if I'm wrong. If we make these payments at a certain time of the year, we prepay, we save a significant amount of money too, right? |
| 02:34:48.99 | Chris Zapata | That's correct. If we pay our full share of The CalPERS bill, which is about $3.7 million last year, we saved 3%, Angeline. Is that the number? And so we do that every year to save $300,000. And to Sergio's point about the legal use of the OPEB funds, all of your pension and OPEB costs right now are paid out of the general fund. And so in my mind, if you were to take OPEP and use some of that for general fund expenses, it meets a legal purpose, but we'll do the analysis and we'll make sure it's right. |
| 02:35:23.91 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | What's the, what's the date that we have to do that prepayment? you don't have to tell me that, but it seems like it comes up fast. And then it's always like, |
| 02:35:32.24 | Angeline Loeffler | Repayment is due by the July 30th. |
| 02:35:36.60 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Each year. Yeah. All right. |
| 02:35:36.78 | Angeline Loeffler | 30, okay. |
| 02:35:38.98 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Thank you. |
| 02:35:39.87 | Mayor Woodside | I have one other item that was not discussed. And it relates to a meeting last week at the waterfront and it had to do with gate five road and a number of the local residents, engineers, who are on both sides of the flooding and watching the pumps work and then fail, came up with something that's been presented to our our staff and our consulting engineer that may well buy us 20 years at a certain point at the waterfront that is at the low point. So when the tide reached a certain point, it literally came across a private driveway that was lower than anything else around, and it overwhelmed the pumps. And the engineers on site seem to believe that This could buy us 20 years, and actually, with the addition of the pump that I believe is in the budget, could help solve the problem of Gate 5 Road at least Most of the time. Um, having heard that. uh, It occurs to me. You know, processes like that to approve a project can often take a long, long time. Um, In this case, the owner said, this is privately owned, the owners of the private property said, fine by us. We're okay with it. If your engineer agrees and we can support going to the permitting agencies, etc., we'd be happy to see the project. Now, I'm not saying we should take general fund monies, but it is in the tideland. And we do have, as I noticed, quite a large Tideland Trust Fund at the moment. And so to the extent that may be viable It would be nice to make the appropriate approvals so that we can start a process. And it might be record time, but wouldn't it be great to have a project like that done before winter? It's just to fill... two feet fill reconstruction of a bridge, putting in a gate, doesn't sound like a super costly project. I'm not an engineer, I'm not advocating it, I'm just saying that The people out there and our own staff are looking at it right now. and it would be smart for us to be ready to go. We don't have to decide that tonight, but it's something that I want to put on everyone's radar because it may come up, in time to include an appropriation from the Thailand Trust for that purpose that would really help a lot of people. |
| 02:38:27.31 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | You're just mentioning that anecdotally as a, |
| 02:38:27.61 | Unknown | set them. |
| 02:38:30.65 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah. |
| 02:38:31.02 | Mayor Woodside | It's more than anecdotal. It's in works at the staff level. |
| 02:38:34.12 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I'm just saying it because it's not on our agenda and this isn't a CIP agenda and because it's interesting information. Thank you for reading. |
| 02:38:40.50 | Mayor Woodside | Are you saying we shouldn't talk about it now when he's, |
| 02:38:43.01 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I don't know if it's the appropriate time, and it's not our agenda, but I'm happy for you to bring it up. |
| 02:38:49.31 | Mayor Woodside | Well, we're here to give direction on our budget and we saw a big tideland fund up there, so I thought I would at least raise it now so that we can. |
| 02:38:56.84 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | OK. |
| 02:38:58.34 | Mayor Woodside | be in position to do something. possibly very good for a lot of people. |
| 02:39:02.30 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | But this goes back to our discipline of We have a CIP budget. take, information from our staff and we take information from the public. and, Everybody thinks that their project is the most important, highest priority project in the city. And that's why we have the Brown Act and we have agendas and why it's important to listen to everybody. I take your point. And I don't disagree principally with everything you just said. But I don't want to not disagree with anybody else who might think that they have an important project or any of the other projects that we prioritize on our CIP budget and funded. |
| 02:39:45.74 | Kathy Nikitas | That's funny. |
| 02:39:47.00 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | That was the only point I was making. |
| 02:39:48.42 | Joan Cox | Thank you. I will say, you know, we often talk about things in the context of future agenda items and We rarely get to talk as a group about things. And so to be able to hear about things that are occurring within the context of planning a budget, and giving direction to staff about things to consider, including in that budget. I greatly appreciate it. And I, like Councilmember Hoffman... I'm very intrigued by what you've reported and look forward to hearing more from staff. |
| 02:40:22.54 | Mayor Woodside | It's not something that we're dumping on staff. They are already working on it. I believe. Because they're pretty enthused about the possibility. We don't have an answer yet. |
| 02:40:35.07 | Unknown | Yeah, I had a conversation with Pat Salasco from DPW who mentioned in the context of, I know you're having budget discussions, just the need for the pumps there. So that's just something to consider in the context of our deciding overall where we want to allocate funds. And perhaps that is a future agenda item where we talk specifically about the flooding of Cape 5 Road. |
| 02:40:54.50 | Mayor Woodside | Well, I think we are including in the budget process funding for the pumps, correct? And the funding comes from the Tideland Trust Fund? |
| 02:41:05.44 | Chris Zapata | I'd have to verify that, Mayor, but that's my expectation that it would. |
| 02:41:08.98 | Unknown | For both? Yeah. For the two? Okay. Yeah. |
| 02:41:13.76 | Mayor Woodside | And it's not on Mr. Madden's property, but it's the same idea. |
| 02:41:13.91 | Unknown | in college. And, you know, the |
| 02:41:14.92 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 02:41:21.03 | Jill Hoffman | So I had one other question for Steph that maybe they could work on if no one objects. We had, of course, allocated a lot of general fund money, which was the result of accumulated operating costs. surpluses to the CIP. but not all that money has been spent. I would just like to understand how much of the money that we've passed the CIP over the last two years. has actually now been you know, discharged for completed projects. how much and how much is sitting in the CIP fund not yet, doesn't have a contract associated with actually implementing. |
| 02:42:01.11 | Chris Zapata | Yeah. Mr. McGowan provided the draft CIP a couple of meetings ago. And in that CIP, he stated that we had spent ten point six million dollars on capital projects, whether that's years before current years. I'd have to run that down. But you want an update on that is what I'm hearing. |
| 02:42:17.50 | Jill Hoffman | It went a little more narrow. We made a decision to take our accumulated OPEX surplus and devote part of it to the CI. It was unfunded. I mean, it was unassigned fund balance and we created an assigned fund balance. We moved it to the CIP fund. I would just like to understand how much of that money has actually been spent versus just moving from one pocket to the next. Just want to know what that number is. |
| 02:42:41.09 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 02:42:41.21 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:42:41.63 | Chris Zapata | That number can be provided. We just can't do it right now. Of course |
| 02:42:44.40 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. |
| 02:42:44.48 | Chris Zapata | Yeah. |
| 02:42:44.65 | Jill Hoffman | I'm just saying in terms of direction for the next meeting, obviously, because that could be considered as part of this pocket. You know, my other comment is just the total... |
| 02:42:46.81 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:42:46.84 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 02:42:56.23 | Jill Hoffman | infrastructure liability of Sausalito is huge. We've talked about it before with the little M&Ms show and tell that we did at the strategic budget. We're trying to manage our operating OPEX budget and we want to, do what we can to take care of our infrastructure. But I want to say it again, you know, at our strategic meeting, we talked about coming up with $10 million of annual recurring revenue to tackle our infrastructure. liability and this is why we need to do it. If we want to really tackle our infrastructure, we need to somehow figure out how to do that. So I just want to be the squeaky wheel on that where it's May and we're still looking for ideas that generate that kind of revenue annually. 10 million was the goal and so far I don't think we have any |
| 02:43:41.74 | Mayor Woodside | So, Without if there are no further discussions at this point, I'm going to ask the city manager, do we answer your questions? |
| 02:43:50.34 | Chris Zapata | Yes. |
| 02:43:51.96 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, and the interim city manager, did you understand the questions and the answers? |
| 02:43:59.42 | Brendan Phipps | Yes, and I look forward to working on stuff and digging into them. |
| 02:44:02.02 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. And then we come back in early June, and the target is to adopt the budget on the 16th. I will note that we have a fifth June. I'm not proposing it now. I don't think we should count on. June 2nd and the 16th. Okay. And then we have, |
| 02:44:30.03 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | You may need an additional |
| 02:44:32.09 | Mayor Woodside | We do have a fifth week, if you will, in June. So I'm not a pessimist, but please don't, if you can avoid it. schedule too much on that day if we need to make a final adoption motion. at a regular meeting. Thank you. Okay, so I'm getting nods to do our best. And then Mr. City Attorney, can we adopt the annual budget at a special meeting? |
| 02:45:11.00 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. Yeah, I think so. |
| 02:45:13.45 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. So if push came to shove, let's say on the 16th, we were this close. We could, with a 24 hours notice, schedule a special meeting that works for the majority to take the final action. And this is next to appointing a city manager. This is probably the most important thing we do. And this time we do it every year. City managers, not so often, thankfully. So this is your last budget here, Mr. City Manager. |
| 02:45:46.10 | Chris Zapata | and they're all interesting and they're never balanced when you start. |
| 02:45:48.99 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. Thank you for that. So let's move on to the request is made for a quick break. So it's now 10 minutes to eight. We have. Two more items. So, okay, we'll try five minutes and see if that works. |
| 02:46:12.06 | Janelle Kellman | Okay. |
| 02:51:51.28 | Janelle Kellman | Amen. Yeah. |
| 02:51:53.03 | Joan Cox | That's the movie. |
| 02:51:53.98 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:51:54.22 | Joan Cox | Right. Here we go, team. |
| 02:51:58.15 | Mayor Woodside | Hey, we're back in session. It's 8.04. |
| 02:52:08.17 | Mayor Woodside | And we have an item next. It's the introduction waiver of first reading of ordinance number 08-2026, an ordinance of the city council of the city of Sausalito repealing chapter 2.12. |
| 02:52:28.61 | Mayor Woodside | I can't read the whole thing. officers' bonds, and sections 2.08.250, through 2.08 Point 290 pertaining to the removal of the city manager of the, these are sections of the Sausalito Municipal Code. So, Mr. City Attorney, I think this is an item that you've worked on. And can you describe briefly why you think this should be done? |
| 02:52:58.34 | Sergio Rudin | So what the ordinance that is before you this evening is revisions of the municipal code to clean up some outdated provisions. that have been in existence for quite some time. With regards to the bonding, the City Municipal Code requires the City Clerk, City Treasurer, and Police Chief to maintain bonds in amount of $5,000 to $7,000. Per state law, the cost of those bonds are borne by the city. And additionally, The purpose of these bonds are usually to protect the public finance from things like employee theft, The city maintains a crime insurance policy through PRISM that is effectively duplicative of this. Additionally, the bond amounts that are in the code are severely... Too small to really provide any meaningful protection so for this reason this chapter should probably be repealed the government code does allow the Council to fix any bond requirements by resolution so. The repeal of this chapter regarding officer bonds would not be detrimental in any way, in my opinion. Thank you. |
| 02:54:09.69 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:54:09.79 | Sergio Rudin | . |
| 02:54:09.96 | Mayor Woodside | Would a follow-on action on that issue be a resolution at a future time setting a more relevant bond amount? |
| 02:54:17.75 | Sergio Rudin | That is something the council can consider and direct. However, the city does already maintain a crime insurance policy, which does cover employee crime as well. So I do think that that would not be an urgent item, even if the council wanted to go that direction. Thank you. |
| 02:54:36.35 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 02:54:39.96 | Sergio Rudin | And then with regards, the second half of this ordinance would repeal sections 208, 250 through 208, 290 pertaining to the removal of the city manager. Importantly, the city manager position, like the city attorney position, is one that is at will and reports directly to the council and serves at the pleasure of the council. Um, since, um, The, I believe 1950s, there are provisions in the Sausalito Municipal Code requiring that prior determination, the city manager must be provided a specific list of reasons at least 30 days prior to termination. provided the opportunity for a hearing prior to termination, And Typically, these provisions in the Municipal Code one, our duplicative of certain provisions of the Brown Act, which entitle any employee to notice of any charges pending against them and an opportunity to be heard in open session rather than closed session. Additionally, typically the city has dealt with a lot of these personnel issues with the city manager by contract by providing for severance for termination without cause. And, um, these provisions in the Unmissable Code, may limit the city's ability to promptly respond to any credible issues related to performance of the city manager or you know, otherwise limit the city's ability to contract, uh, with regards to, uh, how they want to handle the city manager's performance evaluation, termination, etc. |
| 02:56:17.43 | Mayor Woodside | out. In the present circumstance, Mr. Zapata's contract is, in a way, inconsistent with the existing municipal code, or could be... There could be some conflicts between the two. |
| 02:56:32.72 | Sergio Rudin | Yes, there is the potential for conflicts. And additionally, I It has occurred in other jurisdictions that these kinds of provisions may be leveraged by a city manager. in a dispute with a public agency to try and, you know, increase their negotiating leverage with regards to exit from the agency. |
| 02:56:54.88 | Mayor Woodside | And with respect to the new incoming city manager, we have taken those concerns into account in her contract, correct? |
| 02:57:03.94 | Sergio Rudin | Yes. |
| 02:57:04.46 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Okay. Those were my questions. Other council members questions? Any members of the public wishing to speak on this topic? Anyone online? |
| 02:57:21.52 | Walfred Solorzano | Seeing none online. Okay. |
| 02:57:22.99 | Mayor Woodside | OKAY. |
| 02:57:24.56 | Walfred Solorzano | Bye. We have Sandra Bushmaker. |
| 02:57:27.18 | Sandra Bushmaker | Thank you. |
| 02:57:28.65 | Mayor Woodside | Ms. Bushmaker? |
| 02:57:30.26 | Sandra Bushmaker | Hi again. I just have one question. So what happens when you change your insurance away from the existing policy? What happens to the bond requirements and the bond coverage? |
| 02:57:46.30 | Mayor Woodside | If nothing were done, whatever the insurance covered would be missing. I'm just going to answer it based on what I understand the city attorney has said. And we would, at that point, consider a resolution that would fill the gap. |
| 02:58:03.16 | Sergio Rudin | Yeah, that's correct. I would assume that if for some reason the city were to exit from Prism, then at that point the city would need to Andrew Tuft, Norcal PTAC, the city clerk and the city police chief, I believe. No, no, the city clerk and the city treasurer. |
| 02:58:35.98 | Janelle Kellman | All right. |
| 02:58:35.99 | Mayor Woodside | Sorry. |
| 02:58:39.69 | Mayor Woodside | Any more comments online? Seeing none, is there a motion? |
| 02:58:42.79 | Joan Cox | I think that. I will move to be introduced by title only and waive first reading of ordinance number 08-2026, an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Sausalito repealing Chapter 2.12, Officers' Bonds, and Sections 2.08.250 through 2.08.290 pertaining to removal of the City Manager of the Sausalito Municipal Code. Second. |
| 02:59:08.39 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. Motion and second. I don't know that there's a need for any further discussion. And we call the question, all those in favor? |
| 02:59:17.91 | Unknown | Aye. |
| 02:59:18.82 | Mayor Woodside | I'm opposed. Seeing none, it passes unanimously. Moving on to the exciting Turney Street Floating Dock Improvement Project, Mr. Phipps. |
| 02:59:38.21 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:59:38.33 | Brendan Phipps | Thank you. Good evening. Mayor members of city council. I'm Brendan Phipps interim city manager. Tonight I'm presenting staff's recommendation on the tourney street floating dock improvement project and business partnerships, specifically our review of the proposals that we received in response to the request for ideas and proposals and a recommendation for selection of a preferred partner. Next slide please. Starwave background, the Tourney Street boat launch area is the city's only legal landing in public waterfront and public waterfront access point. The city owns all of it, the land, the waterfront, the water parcels, the finger pier, the boat ramp, and the floating docks. The docks are in poor conditions themselves and need repair and replacement. We've long viewed this site as an underutilized asset in the city. In February of this year, the city issued the aforementioned RFIP to find a partner who could rehabilitate the docks, activate the waterfront, and generate some sustainable revenue for the city through a constructive public-private partnership. The RFIP asked for proposals that complement Sausalito's maritime character, improve public access, protect eelgrass and the surrounding environment, and importantly, provide a mechanism for visitors to arrive in Sausalito by water. I should also note that in parallel, The city has engaged anchor QEA as our engineering firm and design study for a design study on the site. Any selected partner will coordinate with anchor QEA as a part of this process. I believe that is still currently built into the anchor QEA. Proposal as an optional task 8. Next slide, please. So evaluation criteria. Proposals were scored on a 60-point rubric across six equally weighted criteria. Revenue regeneration to the city, benefits to neighborhood businesses, neighboring businesses, benefits to residents, visitors, creativity, as well as financial viability. And 10 points each to keep it simple. Next slide, please. The city received two proposals by the March 2026, excuse me, 26, 2026 deadline. The first and the. One staff is recommending comes from the Sausalito Waterfront Access Initiative. This is submitted by Josh Rickman and David Kornmeier. They're calling the concept the Tourney Modular Maritime Access Hub. The physical strategy is straightforward. It's removing the dilapidated docks, retain the existing piles as the structural framework, and install a modular floating dock system that can be reconfigured over time rather than locking the site into a fixed layout from day one. The system is designed to evolve based on actual observed use. The proposed use includes public landing and dinghy access, short-term boat parking, rental slips, water taxi, and boat valet operations, charter staging, and food delivery by water, with potential for additional maritime and waterfront commercial activation over time. On the financial side, the proposal contemplates grant funding and philanthropic support to offset initial capital costs, which will be supplemented by operational revenues from slips and services. Critically, the partners will bear all design, construction, and operational costs. There's no city capital outlay currently postulated as a part of the submittal. Revenue to the city would come through an agreed percentage of project profits, which creates direct alignment between the partner success and the city's return. Next slide, please. On the team, Josh Rickman is an active boater and currently serves as rear commodore of the Sausalito Yacht Club. David Kornmeyer is the principal of Daco Architects |
| 03:03:53.34 | Jill Hoffman | Hey. |
| 03:03:54.19 | Brendan Phipps | He's also a valued member of our historic preservation commission. Both are professional design practitioners with deep roots in the local maritime community. Marine engineering fabrication and installation would be handled by qualified specialists. Those will be partners appropriate to the project scope. Staff's view is that this proposal is the stronger response to the RFIP's goals. The modular pilot-based approach is well-situated to the current condition of the site. It reduces risk for both the city and the proposer by letting the operating model prove itself before long-term commitments are made. The profit-sharing structure creates the right incentive alignment, and the proposers bring exactly the combination of local knowledge, design expertise, and community connection that staff feels a site like this needs. Next slide, please. Here's the scoring assessment of the proposal against the six criteria. It scores strongest on creativity, 9 out of 10. The desired paths adaptive pilot model is genuinely innovative for a civic waterfront project. The idea of observing real behavior before permanently committing to an infrastructure design is sound and a planning principle that is often used for innovative applications like this. Very interesting for a novel maritime concept. The proposal scores eights across the three community benefit categories. So neighborhood, neighboring businesses, residents, and visitors. Water arrival capability directly feeds foot traffic to bridgeway and the joinery, improved dinghy, landing, and public access benefit residents. And the water taxi and charter staging capabilities directly fulfills the city's goals of enabling arrival by water. Revenue generation comes in at seven. Uh, the profit sharing structure is the right approach, but The proposal does not commit to a specific percentage or provide revenue projections. That work will need to happen in the negotiation phase. Regarding financial viability, this is the lowest score out of six. The proposal relies in part on grant and philanthropic funding that has not yet been secured. The team does not have prior maritime operational experience. and specialist partners have not yet been identified. The pilot structure itself does mitigate the risks. Staff feels but counsel should be aware they represent some real questions for future negotiations if it's council's decision to move forward. So our advisory score is 46 out of 60 for this proposal. Next slide, please. |
| 03:06:43.02 | Brendan Phipps | Regarding the second proposal we received entitled Wildlife Parade. The proposal comes from Jay Brockman, who is a professional artist with a studio immediately adjacent to the Attorney Street site. His proposal, called Wildlife Parade, envisions colorful, life-size wildlife figures. Seagulls, herons, otters, seals. Installed on pilings and docks visible at high tide with additional pieces revealed or covered as the tide comes in and recedes. So there's some dynamic aspects to this proposal. However, the, well, there is strength here, right? um, The artist, Mr. Brockman, has already installed a small version of the concept on site There are currently roughly five installations that can be viewed at peak times. The joinery has confirmed they are well-received. and public engagement has been strong. However, the proposal does not address the core objectives of the RFIP. It does not rehabilitate the docs, it does not generate revenue. and it does not constitute a maritime business partnership from staff's assessment. Staff's recommendation is that once the City Council finalizes the updated Art in Public Places policy, which was before you last month or more recently, the proposal will be referenced to the Parks and Recreation Department for review under that process. This gives the Brockman proposal a proper home and a fair evaluation on its artistic merits alone. It also provides a formal path for the installations that are already on city property. This is something that needs to be verified by staff, which currently lack any defined status. Next slide, please. All right. So we have two recommendations this evening. First is select the Sausalito Waterfront Access Initiative as the preferred partner, the modular maritime access hub, and direct staff to negotiate a lease and partnership agreement consistent with the RFIP's terms. The second item that staff's recommending is to refer the wildlife parade proposal to Parks and Rec for processing under the Arts and Public Places policy upon its finalization by council. Next slide, please. if council accepts the recommendations tonight. The next steps are generally lease and partnership negotiation with the waterfront access initiative. coordination with anchor QEA as appropriate as the design study continues. referral of the Rockman proposal once the art in public places policy is finalized and a return to Council for approval of the final agreement and any required CEQA determination before implementation begins. That does it for my presentation this evening. Thank you for the time, and I'm available to answer any questions. Sure. Questions? Uh, |
| 03:09:41.73 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, Mr. City Manager. |
| 03:09:41.76 | Brendan Phipps | Yeah. |
| 03:09:44.80 | Jill Hoffman | I have a question for you. So they have no money. Have you talked to them about, their plan for getting the capital required to implement this plan. |
| 03:09:53.98 | Brendan Phipps | I haven't engaged. Thank you for the question. I haven't engaged in any in-depth discussions with the submitters. My plan was to bring this before council this evening and implement council's direction regarding the selection of a preferred partner. |
| 03:10:06.75 | Jill Hoffman | I'm not sure. So they didn't you didn't even talk to them on the phone or anything about |
| 03:10:10.96 | Brendan Phipps | I have spoken with Mr. Kornmeier briefly about the submittal and thanked him and informed him that we'll be bringing it to City Council for consideration. |
| 03:10:18.92 | Jill Hoffman | but he give you no insight into his ability to raise funds. |
| 03:10:22.36 | Brendan Phipps | No, no. As a part of the evaluation, component, I believe I need to take the submittals as they come. |
| 03:10:32.39 | Jill Hoffman | Sure. Just wanted to know. Thank you very much. |
| 03:10:35.27 | Brendan Phipps | Thank you, Ms. Cox. |
| 03:10:36.30 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:10:37.87 | Joan Cox | Um, I heard you mention during your presentation, although I didn't see it in the presentation, that David Kornmeyer is a member of the Historic Preservation Commission. Did you look at any government code 1090 challenge with the city council awarding a contract to a volunteer who is a member of the historic preservation commission? |
| 03:11:01.67 | Brendan Phipps | Thank you for the question. I have not delved into that specific item. I would defer to city attorney on that. |
| 03:11:07.81 | Joan Cox | Sergio, are you... listening. |
| 03:11:11.37 | Sergio Rudin | I am listening. I'm not prepared to give you an answer. I mean, I would be, David Larson, M.D.: You know, if this was a Council Member, you know proposing certainly there'd be a 1090 issue. I need to look into 1090 issues with respect to volunteers on city boards. |
| 03:11:32.48 | Joan Cox | So a couple of years ago, Government code 1090 was relaxed by the adoption of government code section 1097. And so. Um, that gives more latitude. necessarily think it's an issue, but I just wanted to be sure we Double checked. |
| 03:11:53.05 | Mayor Woodside | Questions? I have a few. Are you aware of any similar arrangements that we have going as a city with any docks such as the Community Voting Center. Thank you. |
| 03:12:12.93 | Brendan Phipps | Thank you for the question. I think Cass Gidley would be the closest concept that as far as a maritime partnership is concerned that I'm aware of. I think that some interesting partnerships or interesting innovative maritime uses have been implemented in the Marin ship. However, those are not locating on city property. Those are on private property. |
| 03:12:32.62 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. And my understanding of the arrangement with that group more than 10 years ago was an agreement to build the docks on their own, dime. so to speak. It's a non-profit organization. And they, proceeded, they were interrupted as we all were by COVID. They needed BCDC permits, et cetera. So it took them a while and they're now open and they're probably looking for a long-term contract. So we might wanna make sure we're comparing apples to apples as we move forward. That's more a comment than a question. And secondly, would it be possible for the artist installation to also take place at that public site were some of these docks made available. |
| 03:13:30.32 | Brendan Phipps | I think that would be a great combined approach to implementing both. Yep. Question before council that I'd like staff, well, to follow through on is how would we like that to be handled as far as the, uh, You know the internal city processes would we like to direct that to parks and rec via the public arts arts and public places program or would would Council like to direct rec staff to follow on with this proposer as a part of ongoing negotiations with any preferred partner. |
| 03:14:03.39 | Mayor Woodside | Well, I'm not suggesting combining for the purposes of awarding something. I'm just saying. It might later be considered a possible location. for the arts. Absolutely. Both of these were rather intriguing from my point of view. And I think perhaps from all of us, if we can get access to the water, |
| 03:14:15.41 | Janelle Kellman | Absolutely. |
| 03:14:24.44 | Mayor Woodside | And we're not paying for it directly. And it works. |
| 03:14:30.11 | Jill Hoffman | the only issue is, you know, our dear friends who are, who are making real progress at Cascade Lee Marina took a real long time to crawl across the broken glass of raising money and building the, peers and all that. their, uh, There should be some sort of timeline about performing on some of these goals of raising money and otherwise. Otherwise, you know, in for a penny, in for a pound. And once they start working, it's hard to turn them off. You know, they made a little bit of progress, but aren't really getting anywhere. And our real goal of doing the demo was to activate the space quickly. Without capital, that means they're not going to be quick. So I don't want to say no, since we don't have any other respondents, but a typical thing to do when you don't have a response that was the bullseye of what you wanted is you do reissue it. and In this case, a cornerstone of our desire was to activate it for the summer. That's clearly not going to happen. So, I don't know where that leaves us exactly. I mean, I hate to just say no, I haven't talked to either of these gentlemen, so I have no independent way of assessing how credible their ability to execute is. But I would hate there to be |
| 03:15:38.96 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | And, |
| 03:15:38.99 | Jill Hoffman | I think we're still in questions though. Oh, I'm sorry. |
| 03:15:39.02 | Chris Zapata | or |
| 03:15:39.34 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | So, |
| 03:15:42.11 | Chris Zapata | Yeah, wrong question. |
| 03:15:42.97 | Jill Hoffman | Isn't that right, Joe? |
| 03:15:44.51 | Chris Zapata | I think that is right. |
| 03:15:44.64 | Jill Hoffman | That's right. Sorry, I'm losing track of where we're at. You're right, it says questions right there. I should be reminded. All right, I'll say all this again then. you. |
| 03:15:54.14 | Vicki Nichols | It's all right. |
| 03:15:56.39 | Mayor Woodside | Um, There are no more. . This is allergy season for me. I apologize. When the grass turns from green to brown, I'm a, This is what you get. Anyway, and I apologize if I can't be heard. Um, Let's ask if there are comments from the public. Seeing none in the chambers, any online? |
| 03:16:22.34 | Walfred Solorzano | We have Babette McDougall. |
| 03:16:23.84 | Mayor Woodside | This is McDougal. |
| 03:16:27.35 | Babette McDougall | Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Would you kindly articulate the number of minutes you're allowing per person tonight? It's not seen on the floor. |
| 03:16:33.28 | Mayor Woodside | as usual. |
| 03:16:34.85 | Babette McDougall | Okay, well, you don't see the clock, just so you know. I don't see the clock. All right, so given all of this, I just want to say, I can appreciate the awkward position that you each find yourselves in. It's hard to say no to a local person that thinks that they can champion a great idea. I just want to invite us to remember Sausalito Center for the Arts. This has now come. to bite the citizens of Sausalito in the derriere big time. because they can't afford to sustain themselves and they haven't paid the contract and amount of rent to the city since they moved in. And so here we are subsidizing SCA while it competes head to head against our own well-established art galleries, which as of 501c3, it said it would not do. And yet here it is doing just that. So now we're talking about taking on a piece of the waterfront. And doing essentially the same thing. They don't have any experience in finance. They don't have any experience in the things that are required like the nonprofit would. in sustaining itself over time, or at least coming out with a strong endowment of some kind. So I yield back the balance of my time now. I think you get the point, and I appreciate Mr. Sobieski raising these points in his own good way. Thank you so much. |
| 03:17:51.46 | Mayor Woodside | Any others online? |
| 03:17:52.56 | Walfred Solorzano | No other comments online? |
| 03:17:54.01 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, so now discussions. |
| 03:17:57.95 | Joan Cox | I would like to remind us, you raised Cass Gidley, that following COVID-19, the city council had to give a pretty stern warning to Cass Gidley that during one of their reports on progress to us that if they weren't able to make progress, that we would not be further extending the lease. And I note from the staff report that this is a one-year pilot with an option to extend for 10 years, depending on the outcome of the pilot. Based on the opportunity that we gave to Cass Gidley, based on the fact that this is a one-year pilot with, you know, well-heeled Sausalito residents invested in our community, I would be inclined to take the chance on the one-year pilot. There's no... real downside to the city aside from This is already a doc that's not in use. There's not an extraordinary amount of staff time required to report back to us on progress. And it's a one-year pilot. So I would be inclined to follow the staff recommendation and award the one-year pilot. |
| 03:19:11.97 | Mayor Woodside | Show. |
| 03:19:12.81 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, I'm thinking the same thing, exactly the same lines. I, I, um, I think these guys, at least they have some, you know, boating and maritime experience. Um. And I, like the whole concept of the one-year pilot. I mean, remember, I think this is now the seventh time we've had Turney Street Doc on our agenda. So the, you know, it's been on our agenda seven times because it, the initial was, Hey, let's just repair the doc. We had a grant and we were looking at the. We were looking at the ramp and it's been in disrepair for 20 years and there's a bulkhead that needs to be redone. Um, and, uh, you know, okay, what are we going to do with this eyesore and some slips, six slips that are silted in and what are we going to do with it? And then it was. you know, part of the whole issue with Bridgeway Marina and is going to be part of that redo project of the LOI that we approved and that hasn't come to fruition. So What are we going to do with it? I'm, I support this, this effort. If they don't perform in a year, then I say, we just go back to the original. Let's just redo the doc with whatever's left of the grant and call it a day. Dredge, you know, dredge it if we can and revitalize the slips and move on. And reminds me that what is happening over at Cascadly and they haven't paid rent and what's going on at Cascadly because we didn't sternly give them. |
| 03:20:43.43 | Mayor Woodside | us. They have been paying rent. |
| 03:20:46.84 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Oh, they did? Oh, yeah. I retract that. Pardon me. They did. |
| 03:20:47.51 | Mayor Woodside | Oh, yeah. They have been paying rent. |
| 03:20:51.31 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Okay, sorry. |
| 03:20:52.17 | Mayor Woodside | They would like a longer term contract. Okay. We probably would like the same thing with assurances. Okay, great. It hasn't come back to us yet. |
| 03:20:58.42 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Okay, great. Okay, okay. |
| 03:21:00.88 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:21:01.03 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:21:01.15 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:21:01.20 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:21:01.24 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:21:01.79 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Well, I'm happy that. you happy. That's the Howard Wright group. |
| 03:21:03.63 | Jill Hoffman | So... Since we're talking about our nonprofits paying that Mr city manager, The public commenter said that the SCA is not paying, is not current on the rent. Have they been paying the rent on time and in full? My understanding is they are current. Okay, yeah, that's my understanding too. So I just wanna, I know how rumors get anchored, so Ms. McGilligal, that's just incorrect. They are current on the rent. Uh, and, uh, so I'm, I agree with Jill and Joan and we can take a, I'm moving forward with this. |
| 03:21:36.00 | Mayor Woodside | I think what we'll need in a contract when it comes back to us is a clear financial plan. And at Call of the Sea, we had a very clear, easy process. The Army Corps of Engineers, we built two, one of them, 100-foot floating dock ramps, safety, all that. We had... Lots of contributions that supported the construction. We had sign off by the Army Corps. I don't think we needed a BCDC permit. because there had been a very poor floating dock there before. So that might be an angle for this group to be able to rehab under prior approval and streamline that. So there are many pluses and minuses here. The only minus is we don't have a clear path to seeing it done. and a clear understanding of what the financial implications are. I think we should look to the other contracts, the sort of standard rate, if you will, if it's a, what do you call it, a triple net lease when you're looking at someone's profits, et cetera. |
| 03:22:45.81 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah. |
| 03:22:46.13 | Mayor Woodside | So these are all things that we might be tossing your way, Mr. Interim City Manager. I do also note that our incoming city manager, doubtless, has had multiple experiences with public-private partnerships on our waterfront. on the bay |
| 03:23:03.14 | Joan Cox | Yeah. |
| 03:23:03.27 | Unknown | the best. |
| 03:23:04.30 | Mayor Woodside | And it's likely to be helpful as this comes back to us, perhaps for a contract. |
| 03:23:09.59 | Joan Cox | May I make one for you? |
| 03:23:09.62 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah, make sure. Yes, sure. |
| 03:23:11.32 | Joan Cox | I noted that the proposals came in at the end of March. It's now the end of May. Most of our RFPs only require that the proposals and security remain open for 60 days. So I want to make sure that we are mindful of any deadlines that we have in terms of awarding. I think earlier we said, oh, this is not a big, uh rush but i did hadn't i hadn't realized that the proposals came in at the end of march so that's the 60 days is very nearly up so i do want to make sure that we timely award if if that if that's the direction of the council Thank you. |
| 03:23:51.99 | Babette McDougall | I haven't. |
| 03:23:53.14 | Mayor Woodside | I can only say I'm not sure we want to push the date before we have possible agreement that makes sense. So we may be asking them |
| 03:24:02.14 | Joan Cox | You can always ask them to extend the date of the So most RFPs, require that the proposal and any proposal security remain open for 60 days. But we can we can mutually agree to extend that period of time to give us an opportunity to negotiate the agreement. |
| 03:24:20.31 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, so do we need a motion to that effect? |
| 03:24:24.26 | Kathy Nikitas | Okay. Um, sure. |
| 03:24:26.98 | Joan Cox | Thank you. |
| 03:24:30.15 | Joan Cox | Okay. I think it's just direction. |
| 03:24:33.47 | Mayor Woodside | So if I'm understanding... my colleagues here on the dais, the direction is to proceed to negotiate Um, with your recommended Provider. And you've heard our comments about issues that we're concerned about. and do your best. |
| 03:24:49.30 | Joan Cox | And to direct staff to refer the wildlife parade art installation proposal submitted by Jay Brockman to... |
| 03:24:49.32 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah. |
| 03:24:55.83 | Joan Cox | The Parks and Recreation Department for Processing Under the City's Art in Public Places Policy upon finalization, which was tonight, right, of that policy. by the City Council. |
| 03:25:06.99 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. I believe so. Yeah. Yes. Okay. |
| 03:25:09.42 | Joan Cox | to be able to get a |
| 03:25:09.97 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. That concludes our business items for this evening. Council member reports or other council business. Any reports, Ian, from you? Vice mayor. |
| 03:25:28.62 | Mayor Woodside | cock |
| 03:25:29.04 | Unknown | We have one report actually, just from the transportation authority. I know that we heard from Anne Richmond and approved the measure AA financing, which was great. They're also going to shortly, we recently approved a new grant program that TAM is happy to assist cities with applying for. Our public works department has been, I would imagine, briefed on it, but I would recommend that we at some point agendize what opportunities we might have for applications for the grant process, because if we don't proactively have an idea, we're unlikely to make the cut. So just putting that out there. |
| 03:26:04.55 | Mayor Woodside | show. |
| 03:26:05.36 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I wanted to do a report that Since we finished, it felt like it was very late at the last meeting. It wasn't our latest meeting, but it was very late. We decided not to give reports. But Councilmember Sobieski and I had a meeting with the Um, the, waterfront, the waterfront group, the SSWA, and that was at the direction of you, Mayor, to follow up on the WRT contract and the the concerns that they had with a short line adaptation plan. Anyway, it was a follow up on that. And Councilmember Sobieski and I met with Um, Jim Madden and her, uh, Carlo Burney. at your direction and we didn't give an update on that, but actually item three C on our agenda tonight is a memorialization from our interim manage our interim uh, Alexandra. Anderson. our interim Sustainability manager. I'm sorry. I just wanted to close that loop. Because it was, the, The report 3C is the culmination of that follow-up with Townsend Member Sylvia and Eski and I Sobieski and I, where we're pivoting from WRT to Fryer and Loretta and is actually we think a much better approach we council member sobyanski and i agree with the representatives from the waterfront group, the owners waterfront group of a much more targeted approach and reporting aspect of how to of the engineering and analysis and planning for sea level rise. I don't know, Councilmember Sobieski, if you want to further talk about that. |
| 03:27:59.85 | Jill Hoffman | No, that was a great summary and a good pivot. And we thank WRT for their work. And it looks like we're going to. have a collaborative solution in the next phase with some of the people that know our waterfront so intimately and well. |
| 03:28:14.82 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Okay. I just want to, sorry, follow up on that. The other report I wanted to give was I did attend the Cal City's City Leader Summit in in Sacramento, Again, we didn't give a report out, so... I'm going to report on that. The highlights were some legislative updates, but I also forwarded information to the council about where to do our new financial training that the cal cities was offering so that's exciting the new uh let um required financial training that uh we're supposed to attend um so there were some great uh great meetings and, uh, the, at the, at the Cal city, like I said, the Cal city city leader summit, and including one on veterans affairs that I attended as the new Vice Chair of the Military and Veterans Affairs working group. So that was exciting and reminding people that this weekend is Veterans Memorial Day weekend. And of course, that's when we remember veterans who died in service of their country on Monday. |
| 03:29:32.18 | Joan Cox | That reminds me, I have something. |
| 03:29:33.97 | Chris Zapata | Okay. |
| 03:29:34.32 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | you. |
| 03:29:34.39 | Joan Cox | Thank you. I'm not sure. Yeah, the city of Mill Valley invited me to speak at their Veterans Day celebration. So I'll be doing that at 1030 a.m. on Saturday morning, meeting and convening in front of the depot in downtown. down Mill Valley. Yeah. Great. So, Um... |
| 03:29:51.45 | Unknown | Tell your parents. Oh, yeah. My parents would love to be there, Joan. I'll make sure they know. |
| 03:29:51.72 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:29:55.60 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:29:57.71 | Mayor Woodside | The Mayor's Council Selection Committee meets later next week. I believe the... Nominations are open for ABAG representative and alternate. |
| 03:30:10.62 | Unknown | That keeps calling me. |
| 03:30:12.22 | Mayor Woodside | And, |
| 03:30:13.40 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:30:13.43 | Mayor Woodside | I don't want to say more at this point because we may have reasons for our city to have stronger representation there, given that we have a |
| 03:30:13.45 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:30:27.46 | Mayor Woodside | sort of problem every eight years when a number is set by that group and we're expected to comply with it. That's one reason. But the meeting is next week. So if we're going to do anything different now, Joan, are you the city's representative to that committee? |
| 03:30:47.08 | Joan Cox | I am not. I'm BCDC. |
| 03:30:50.97 | Mayor Woodside | I thought. |
| 03:30:51.34 | Joan Cox | Yeah. |
| 03:30:51.79 | Mayor Woodside | I don't think we actually have one. |
| 03:30:53.01 | Joan Cox | It was formerly. |
| 03:30:54.36 | Mayor Woodside | Yeah. |
| 03:30:54.69 | Joan Cox | the alternate to Pat Eklund. |
| 03:30:57.02 | Mayor Woodside | I will take that on for now. to be this is not to a bag. This is simply to the committee. |
| 03:31:04.26 | Joan Cox | Okay. |
| 03:31:05.00 | Mayor Woodside | And that way they'll know I can what vote. Okay. So that will happen late next week. Um, And I'm trying to think we do want to talk about future agenda items, I'm sure. But Uh, If there are no more reports, let's talk about those right now. Future agenda items? |
| 03:31:30.50 | Unknown | I wanted to bring up something that I heard from a local business, but I realized we don't have a policy around. Someone reached out to me regarding pesticides that were being sprayed around their building. And I know we have some city, I had reached out to the city attorney about this. And we have some city policies for what the city can use, but we don't have any rules about what types of pesticides can and can't be sprayed in our community, and a lot of them can be rather toxic. So I'd love to agendize a conversation on that issue. |
| 03:31:59.44 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. Um, anything else? Um, I want to make sure. |
| 03:32:03.82 | Joan Cox | We already discussed, I want to make sure that's on future agenda. Yes. |
| 03:32:07.22 | Mayor Woodside | Yes, we will consider the, now it's called ACFER, it used to be CAFER. you These are comprehensive reports that go beyond audit reports. Often they're done every two years rather than annually, but that's a choice that we would make, and that will be discussed at a future agenda. We have regular meetings in our schedule, including regular meetings in August, the first and third Tuesdays, we typically take a good portion of August off. Because this year is an election year, should any action on our part be required, regarding anything on the November ballot, that would be the last, um, regular meeting, and I think we indicated earlier that that might be possible. We should hold that date. We shouldn't. indicate to the public that that's not a regular meeting date. And Mr. City Attorney, right now, when we decide to take a vacation or a break, do we just do that by action? Thank you. Um, It's the August the 4th, I believe. |
| 03:33:23.03 | Joan Cox | in August on our regular calendar. |
| 03:33:24.82 | Mayor Woodside | Right. |
| 03:33:25.08 | Sergio Rudin | Usually at the beginning of the year, the council adopts its meeting schedule. So I'd have to refer back to our first meeting in January. to see if you've already you know, directed that those meetings be vacated. |
| 03:33:40.07 | Jill Hoffman | let's just put it on consent to have the schedule adopted at the next meeting. |
| 03:33:45.40 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. So I think we'd like to hold that date. |
| 03:33:48.73 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Right now there's nothing on our August calendar. |
| 03:33:52.69 | Mayor Woodside | Right now there's nothing, that's correct. |
| 03:33:53.96 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Right now, there's nothing. |
| 03:33:55.07 | Mayor Woodside | Right. |
| 03:33:56.94 | Jill Hoffman | I think you earlier in this meeting said there's supposed to be meeting in June. That's also not in our calendar on June the 30th or whatever. |
| 03:33:57.03 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:34:02.82 | Mayor Woodside | I asked everyone to hold that. I've asked again tonight. |
| 03:34:03.68 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. It's not in the schedule on the website and whatnot. So I'm just saying we ought to officially do it, adopt it, have it be on the schedule so the public knows what the meeting schedule is. |
| 03:34:14.53 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | I know you're talking and I can hear you, but there's a fan right in my ear. Yeah. |
| 03:34:19.61 | Mayor Woodside | suggesting that we adopt as a calendar date the June 30th date. |
| 03:34:25.21 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | So you're trying to hold it or you're trying to set it. |
| 03:34:27.69 | Mayor Woodside | I mean, Thank you. |
| 03:34:28.21 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | work. |
| 03:34:28.45 | Mayor Woodside | You're going to set it on our calendar. Those two dates and August the 4th. Right now they can be canceled. |
| 03:34:34.04 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | And you're trying to set, okay, so you're, You're trying to set these as regular city council meetings or special city council meetings? |
| 03:34:42.05 | Mayor Woodside | These would not be regular meetings. The fourth is regular. |
| 03:34:44.13 | Jill Hoffman | is regular. The fourth is regular because it's the first Tuesday. Correct. The 30th is irregular and a special meeting because it's the last in June. |
| 03:34:47.82 | Mayor Woodside | 30th. |
| 03:34:51.97 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Well, August, both of them are going to be ads. They're going to be special meetings because we never, I mean, we've never had, we rarely have meetings in August unless we have to. |
| 03:35:01.02 | Mayor Woodside | We did last year. |
| 03:35:02.27 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Well, it was an ad. |
| 03:35:02.45 | Mayor Woodside | Well, it was a measures Jane Kay. |
| 03:35:04.82 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Yeah, it was an ad. because of measures J and K. They're not, we, we, as a practice, rarely ever, we do not schedule meetings in August. If we have to, We do, but we don't because our staff and our citizens and our council need time to not have meetings. |
| 03:35:27.83 | Mayor Woodside | I understand. I'm just saying that for this year, it's an election year. We may be asked or petitioned to put things on the ballot. And if we're waiting until the very last minute, as we often do, that's not always a good way to proceed. And... adding it to our calendar. It is already a regular meeting, but it wasn't on our calendar. We're simply adding it back on the calendar. We may not need it. My preference would be that we wouldn't need it. Let's, you know, we're a little ways away from August. The other meeting would be a special meeting. And we're holding the date only because it is the fifth week when both the planning commission and council are not meeting. So the, burden on staff, while it exists, wouldn't be insurmountable if we had a special meeting for a particular purpose. |
| 03:36:26.98 | Unknown | exist. |
| 03:36:32.21 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Okay, I'm sorry, Mayor. Okay, so you're trying, you are adding meetings. You're asking the council to add meetings on June 30th. |
| 03:36:42.27 | Mayor Woodside | Add to the calendar a hold for a special meeting. |
| 03:36:46.91 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Thank you. Thank you. Okay, on June 30th and August. Just in case, put them there. |
| 03:36:51.25 | Mayor Woodside | Yes. |
| 03:36:51.64 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Okay, we're holding for June 30th and August 4th. |
| 03:36:54.89 | Mayor Woodside | Yes. |
| 03:36:55.33 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Got it. Thank you so much. Okay. Thank you so much for clarifying that. |
| 03:36:56.85 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Yes. |
| 03:36:59.30 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | We may not need them, but we're holding. We're not scheduling them right now. Holding in case. Thank you so much. I got it. |
| 03:37:03.50 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. |
| 03:37:04.80 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Thank you. |
| 03:37:04.83 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. |
| 03:37:04.85 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | you done. |
| 03:37:07.01 | Mayor Woodside | Any other reports of significance? And if not, public comment on any of the items we've just discussed under item six. |
| 03:37:17.37 | Walfred Solorzano | We have Babette McDougall. |
| 03:37:18.65 | Mayor Woodside | we have missing McDougal. |
| 03:37:22.58 | Babette McDougall | I'm just like that nasty old rash that just won't go away. So under future agenda items, I'd like to ask you to again look at the issue of ethics. Now, I do recall Ms. Cox talking about you all attending classes on how to be ethical. I think we should agendize ethics nonetheless. Go ahead and bring us in. We'd love to know what you learned in the ethics class. But what works for Sausalito is what matters to the people in Sausalito, number one. Number two. Mr. Sobieski, to your earlier point, I did not misspeak. Sausalito Center for the Arts engaged in a contract that they simply did not or could not meet. It was after at least a dozen city council meetings. both public and private, that you finally renegotiated the rates down to something that they said, okay, we'll pay that. And that's what they're current with. The okay, we'll pay that. We should all be so lucky. |
| 03:38:11.17 | Mayor Woodside | Ms. McDougall, comments under item six? |
| 03:38:15.10 | Babette McDougall | Yes, well, that all has to do with ethical conduct in my book, and that's why I raise it as a subset under putting the ethics back on the darn. future agenda items instead of conveniently knocking it off. |
| 03:38:26.94 | Janelle Kellman | I don't know. |
| 03:38:27.52 | Babette McDougall | This whole thing about blindsiding the citizens with let's just run a touchdown for the November ballot and circumvent the public process. You don't know how much trust you lost in this town yet again, just as you were making progress. Everybody's just saying there they go again. Nothing has changed. This is a problem. Trust is an issue. Ethics matter. Ethics matter. I'm so sorry to have to keep bringing this up over the last few years. But yes, ethics do matter. And this whole idea that you want to use a sliding scale to decide what is ethical or what is not is not all right as far as the citizens are concerned. So yes. |
| 03:39:03.99 | Mayor Woodside | Yes. You've indicated you want to have a discussion or see a discussion on future agenda items about ethics. |
| 03:39:10.38 | Babette McDougall | I think you should just put it on the agenda and let us all slash it out as we should. Or you want to open a discussion on it. I would love that. |
| 03:39:17.23 | Mayor Woodside | We've heard your request. Thank you. |
| 03:39:19.09 | Babette McDougall | Sure. |
| 03:39:20.27 | Mayor Woodside | Under appointments, I'm going to appoint myself as the city's representative to the mayors and council committee committee. uh, Well, it's the- |
| 03:39:31.07 | Joan Cox | The City Selection Committee. |
| 03:39:31.83 | Mayor Woodside | Right. And the focus this time is on eBay. Yes. |
| 03:39:34.97 | Joan Cox | you |
| 03:39:36.86 | Mayor Woodside | And- |
| 03:39:37.15 | Unknown | We also note that we received a request from Trisha Smith regarding an appointment for the Commission on the Status of Aging at the County level for which she's currently carrying out the remainder of an appointment of someone who stepped aside. And she volunteered. She sent us all correspondence regarding this. to continue in that role for the next three years, would we be willing to appoint her? I don't know. We did not formally agendize it. But if we can't appoint her tonight to that position, I would be very happy to do that. Okay. |
| 03:40:02.68 | Mayor Woodside | we do have appointments. Okay. |
| 03:40:05.97 | Unknown | Okay. I think that the title is I think the title is the county commit. Can someone look up the formal title of the commission |
| 03:40:12.83 | Mayor Woodside | on aging. |
| 03:40:14.22 | Unknown | Yeah, it's the role that Sybil used to have for many years and now. Okay, so I would move that we appoint Trisha Smith for the upcoming three-year term for the Commission on Aging at the county level. |
| 03:40:24.06 | Mayor Woodside | seconds. |
| 03:40:26.57 | Unknown | All in favor then? |
| 03:40:28.07 | Mayor Woodside | Hi. All in favor? Sorry, I didn't mean to do that. |
| 03:40:29.88 | Unknown | Sorry, I didn't mean to do that. |
| 03:40:30.91 | Mayor Woodside | Okay. |
| 03:40:31.48 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 03:40:33.90 | Mayor Woodside | Thank you. Seeing no other public comments on any of the previous items under six. We've taken care of everything. We are now adjourned at. |
| 03:40:46.79 | Susan Cleveland-Knowles | Oh, wait, wait, I have a, I have a, I do have something. I'm sorry. This is a good one. It's good. It's great. I forgot. Sorry, as we put out, the sister cities had awards. We had an awards. Ceremony Sunday at anyway, and we gave an award to the Theodoresis for all of the work they've done. We gave an award to Yoshi Tomei. We gave an award to Gil and Roxanne Purcell for all the work they've done in Sausalito. and to, um, Another, now her name is escaping me. I'm so sorry, but I'll give it, I'll give the information to the current so we can put it in the currents, but it was a great, it was a great event. And we had a wonderful time. So thank you so much. That reminded me. |
| 03:41:32.75 | Mayor Woodside | Okay, we are adjourned. Okay. |
Rob McCullough — Neutral: Thanked the council for professionalism on the Pelican Harbor assignment; encouraged consistent, transparent compliance reviews for all marina operations and requested public access to future findings. Noted an incomplete public records request. ▶ 📄
Katie Nelson — In Favor: Spoke as an SEIU Local 1021 representative, asking for fair wages, reasonable working conditions, and benefits reflecting the high cost of living. Emphasized the dedication of city staff and requested recognition during contract negotiations. ▶ 📄
Freddy Rivera — In Favor: As an SEIU representative, supported equitable salaries for city workers, noting their role in maintaining Sausalito's beauty. Called for a continued partnership with the city to ensure fair wages. ▶ 📄
David Jackson — In Favor: Lead custodian for DPW, expressed love for his job and requested fair wages comparable to surrounding cities. Highlighted the importance of keeping parks beautiful and residents' appreciation for their work. ▶ 📄
Adam Blair — In Favor: Associate planner in CDD, voiced support for union colleagues bargaining for pay and benefit increases. Noted the high cost of living and hoped for an agreement that supports staff. ▶ 📄
Bob Mitchell — Against: Former mayor, expressed caution about converting to a charter city, citing potential pitfalls and extra expenses. ▶ 📄
Vicki Nichols — Neutral: Praised CDD staff and urged generosity in contract negotiations. Raised a parking concern near Rotary Housing on Olima Street, noting barriers reduced parking and caused near-misses. Requested a discussion with CDD manager. ▶ 📄
Scott Robinson — Against: Opposed the proposed charter city change, urging caution due to complications and potential additional taxes. ▶ 📄
Steve Harris — In Favor: Field representative for the Carpenters Union, advocated for labor standards in all Sausalito developments to prevent wage theft and safety violations. Emphasized workers deserve livable wages and health care. ▶ 📄
Alice Merrill — Neutral: Expressed sadness over what she perceives as a profit-driven focus in Sausalito, urging the council to prioritize livable wages for workers over new projects. ▶ 📄
William Ehrensberg — Neutral: Raised safety concerns about the intersection of Tamales and Watery near the MLK campus, where no stop signs exist. Requested a traffic study and installation of red zones per AB 413 to protect students. ▶ 📄
Lauren DeRimmer — Against: Opposed an AIM initiative she described as a 'wolf in sheep's clothing.' Stressed the economic importance of the maritime industry and argued against limiting retail space to 40%, which she believes would harm the working waterfront. ▶ 📄
Linda Pfeiffer — Against: Opposed the proposed charter city and property transfer tax. Urged the council not to place it on the November ballot, arguing it is not a priority compared to road maintenance, parking, and infrastructure. ▶ 📄
Sandra Bushmaker — Against: Thanked Chris Zapata for stabilizing staff. Requested no rush on the charter city ballot measure, citing insufficient time for residents. Also expressed strong opposition to the 1022 AIM initiative, warning it would kill maritime business. ▶ 📄
Babette McDougall — Against: Echoed others in supporting livable wages. Opposed the charter city change, arguing it concentrates power and is designed for larger cities, not Sausalito. Raised trust issues with some leadership. ▶ 📄