Good afternoon. I'd like to call this meeting to order of Stockton City Council for our closed session. City Clerk, take roll. Council Member Blower? Present. Council Member Enriquez? Present. Council Member Ponce is absent. Council Member Padilla? Present. Council Member Villapadua is absent. Vice Mayor Lee? Present. And Mayor Fugazi? Present. We have a quorum. Wonderful. Do we have any public comment at this time? We do not, Mayor. Okay, so we are going to be moving on to a closed session. This body will recess to closed session pursuant to government code section 54957.6 to discuss agenda item 3.20. Green light to start the meeting. Welcome everyone to City Council meeting on March 4th. We're going to start off by taking roll. Councilmember Blower? Here. Councilmember Enriquez? Here. Councilmember Ponce? Present. Councilmember Padilla? Present. Councilmember Villapedua? Present. Vice Mayor Lee? Here. And Mayor Fugazi? Present. We have a quorum. Wonderful. So I'd like to invite Rabbi Gwazdoff up. He is from Temple Israel, which I think is the oldest. Is it 1850? That's right. Okay. So you're going to provide us with our invocation tonight. Thank you for being here. I'm Gwazdoff. I'm one of the team members of the city council. Thank you for your invitation. It's an honor to be here to offer the invocation this evening. In Temple Israel... is one of the three oldest congregations, Jewish congregations, west of the Mississippi, a very proud part of this city. Our God and God of all people, you give us the gift of self-reflection. As we prepare to begin this meeting, we take a moment to appreciate the trust that the members of this community have placed in their leaders and the potential for change and healing that can take place in the business of this assembly. And so as we take this moment of reflection, let us ask ourselves, what do we hope to accomplish today? Whose lives are we impacting? What are the needs of our community? Who feels pain? Who fears the future? Who is poised for greatness? How can we take the time we have to work to improve our city, our communities, our families, ourselves? Help our council members and city officials to see that the issues they discuss and the policies they enact should serve to enlighten and animate the divine implanted within themselves and the people they serve. May any disagreements that arise only reflect different points of view. not petty grievances, so that sound decisions can be made that bring healing and wholeness to our world. Let the perils of partisanship give way to echoes of empathy, and may the decisions here reflect the highest values of each of our faith communities. Bless these proceedings and all those who labor here today, and let us say amen. Thank you, Rabbi. So now Amaya Paisano is going to come and do our Pledge of Allegiance. Amaya, it's all you. Everybody please stand. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. attorney do we have anything to report out from closed session yes we do mayor in the matter of roseanne san nicholas versus city of stockton et al san joaquin county superior court case number stk cv uat 2022-0025 the city council's voted 6-0 with council member via padua absent to settle this matter in the amount of 210 000 there are no other items to report thank you City Clerk, do we have any announcements or recognitions this evening? We do, Mayor. Could I have Julie Dunning to the podium, please? Whereas Arbor Week is an opportunity to recognize the importance of trees and the vital role they play in our environment, health, and quality of life, and in 1872, J. Sterling Morton proposed to the Nebraska Board of Agriculture that a special day be set aside for the planting of trees. This holiday, called Arbor Day, was first observed with the planting of more than a million trees in Nebraska. Arbor Day is now observed throughout the nation and the world. And trees provide numerous benefits to our community, including cleaner air, improved mental health, enhanced beauty, and protection against erosion. And the City of Stockton has a long-standing commitment to preserving and expanding its urban canopy through tree planting, care, and community education efforts, and looks forward to regaining its designation as Tree City USA. And whereas Tree Stockton is actively improving our community by planting and caring for trees, promoting environmental stewardship, and working to enhance the quality of life for all Stockton residents, and Arbor Week serves as a reminder of the importance of taking action to protect and nurture our trees, ensuring that future generations can enjoy the many benefits they provide. Now, therefore, I, Christina Fugazi, Mayor of the City of Stockton, and members of the Stockton City Council, do hereby proclaim the week of March 9th, 2025 as Arbor Week. Ms. Dunning, do you want to talk about any activities that are going to be happening on Arbor Day this year, when and where? I do, but can I say a few other words, too? Also, I'd like to invite the rest of the Tree Stockton board up with me, please. On behalf of Tree Stockton and our ever-growing community of volunteers and supporters, I'd like to express a heartfelt thanks to the City of Stockton and this council for reaffirming their commitment to our urban forest. As demonstrated tonight by this proclamation and the upcoming vote to approve a contract for the Stockton Urban Forest Inventory, it is evident that we are turning a page and working towards reclaiming our designation as a Tree City, which I'm told we last held in 2016. Tree Stockton is incredibly excited to be a part of this journey. Although we are a young organization, we are strong in commitment and mighty in spirit. Since last fall, we've planted 19 street trees for individual homeowners, provided education on tree planting and maintenance, and have worked in parks to care for both newly planted trees and established trees. Additionally, since our formation approximately two years ago, We have fought hard to preserve our old growth street trees as their benefits simply cannot be replaced with new trees. We sincerely appreciate being recognized tonight. While our current focus is on replanting street trees, our future goals include being a resource throughout the city for the preservation, protection, and expansion of our urban forest through education and community involvement. To that end, we look forward to partnering with the city and other local tree-centric organizations to enhance city life through a robust and sustainable urban canopy. In support of this, I would like to personally invite all attendants here tonight and those who may be watching from home to join us this Saturday, March 8th, at Victory Park from 10 a.m. to noon to participate in our first annual Tree Stockton Arbor Day event. We will be having tree planting demonstration by local landscape architect and arborist Jeff Gamboni, planting new trees, providing tree maintenance to some existing trees, and even give away a few trees. I'd like to give a shout out to Colin Scott of the Public Works Department who helped make all of this possible, and Little Manila Rising for their assist in this event, and hope that you can all join. I'd like to leave you with one parting thought. As society grows, When society grows great, when we plant trees whose shade we know we will never sit in. Thank you. I'd like to introduce real quick Cacha Evanhoe, Julie Devencincy, and Ava Simpson, three of the board members of Tree Stockton. Miguel Guillen couldn't be here with us tonight, unfortunately. All righty, this part of the meeting is set aside for public comment. I just want to review some of the rules for that. It's obviously up on the screen. It's also on your packet. We are here to conduct business on behalf of the people of the city of Stockton. Disruptions and violations of the council's decorum policy will not be tolerated. For reference, a summarized version is up on the screen and in your packet. As a reminder, the policy applies to people on both sides of the dais, public and council. Violations by the public or council may result in warning or sanctions or censure for those up here. And for the public, it may be a removal for the remainder of the meeting. So with that being said, we have two minutes because how many cards do we have? I lost count over 20. Okay. Who's our first speaker? Julie Dunning please. Well Mae this is a good plan because in my nervousness I forgot to mention also on March 15th there is another tree event hosted by Stockton's Clean City Initiative at Long Park and then also on March 15th at Independence Park. is another tree event hosted by Little Manila Rising. And I wanted to give a shout out to those organizations. But the reason I turned in a comment card is I wanted to acknowledge the District 4 council member, Mario Enriquez. For a long time, District 4 has not felt like they've had a voice at council. And I am so excited to say we now have somebody that hears us, listens to us, is one of us, responds to our concerns, represents us, and is there for us. And I just want to give a very deep, heartfelt thanks for his efforts and continued support. Thank you. Pandora Crowder. Good evening. Thank you. I'm kind of torn about what I wanted to talk about tonight. But I think what I think the main point is, is that I want to bring up Manthey Road again. And it hits close to home with me this time. I had a resident of Conway and a very good friend of mine coming down 8th Street and a couple of young men trying to beat the traffic. turning from I-5, crossed three lanes of traffic to take that turn onto Manthe and smashed into her. She hit her head. She took face bruising from the airbag deploying. She took bruising on her chest from the seatbelt. And this is not the first time that I've been here talking about the danger of Manthe Road. It is dangerous from 8th Street all the way to Carolyn Weston. We have... A LOT OF GRASS THAT HAS HIDDEN ANIMALS, GARBAGE, NEEDLES, THINGS OF THAT NATURE THAT PEOPLE WALK THROUGH TO GET TO CALIFORNIA STOP. CAN PEOPLE PAY ATTENTION TO ME WHEN I TALK? I'M SORRY, I PAY ATTENTION TO YOU GUYS. AND I, WE HAVE TO WALK THROUGH TO GET TO A BUS STOP. We have broken trees that were planted and never taken care of by the city. We have food trucks sitting up on a supposed Caltrans property that flash floodlights at us. We have a barrier wall on the freeway that ends so you're blinded when you're coming down Manthe. I have almost hit multiple cars trying to get from Carolyn Weston onto Manthe just so I can get home. There are fire trucks that park over there so that they can get their food from these food trucks. There are no sidewalks. There are unsheltered living under the overpasses. There is trash. There is damage. This is not okay. It's going to take multiple agencies in order to make this work. Public Works, District 6. And I didn't get to finish. RE Jean Shoemake. Good evening, Mayor, Council, and interim city manager. My name is Ari, and I'm here to speak about the bullying I've seen on social media and in person. I've been told that bullying is a zero tolerance and should not be allowed, but every time I look on social media or come to a meeting, I see that our city council is bullying colleagues, our community leaders, and city staff. To the extent that was said, I'm not going to rest until he's fully held accountable, and I'm always going to stand on what I believe in. I think it's good for people to be held accountable as well, but it gets to a point when colleagues gang up on a person. I'm also not quite sure why you don't know how to get along, but I do know that you are supposed to keep us safe and be role models for us in the city of Stockton. So far from this council, I'm learning that it is okay to bully to get my way. It is okay to call people names, and it is okay to make everything about me, and it is okay to make accusations about people without proof, but not to call out others because of their affiliations with you. This is very different from what my parents have taught me. If it is about transparency and putting in the work, then why aren't you working instead of attacking someone that won't be your yes man? I'm pretty sure you are all human and you're not perfect either. I know this from all the social media posts. So if you're going to call out one, let's call you all out. If you're opening attorney files on one specific person, then the whole die should be reviewed as well. There is no explanation on why the incident of someone slapping a child at Edison was... and they were still made vice mayor with no consequences. Let's talk about another person's misdoings and why they're allowed to belittle and bully city staff in public meetings and why it is okay to reprimand the mayor in the middle of the last public meeting. My mom has always had me coming to these meetings since I was little to teach me about civil engagement and give me back to my community, but I don't see a very good representation of what a good Stockton citizen looks like sitting up there on the bench. And as a young, as a youth person, this isn't the way you guys want to be leading so thank you jessica velez good evening all i'm here to talk to you on behalf of the homeless across the city please stop displacing us i know you all want it clean but this is not the right way to go about it I went to go visit an 80-year-old client of mine today. She's practically dying from pneumonia on the streets off of Hammer Lane. She immediately started to talk about how she keeps getting pushed around by the police, cannot get any rest, and she's afraid to go to the shelter. I took another client to mental health today for inpatient treatment, and he said people are just getting worse out there. They're losing their minds. They can't sleep. They're using more drugs to keep moving. The city encroaches on already or I'm sorry the homeless that are still out there are encroaching on already housed clients Trying to find some sort of relief from the constant pressure of the police which then puts these already housed clients in jeopardy of returning to the streets Trinity Parkway hot topic I know you all have plans for this land but I have been serving this encampment for years now and no one has engaged anyone in consistent services for nearly a decade and While it is portrayed in the media that this camp is dangerous, I counter that position. They are not opposed to relocation, but no one has talked to them. They need equitable relocation, and what equitable looks like to you all may not be the same as what they see as equitable. They are a family, and they would like to hear real solutions for placement together. So far, I have four housing applications in from there. Two of them are veterans that I am playing intermediary for the veteran organization. And one person I'm helping with mental health and court issues, and one has been referred to friends outside. The point is that this community has rights, and they need to be treated humanely. This constant displacement makes it difficult to service our clients. I had one client that was scheduled to go to mental health at CDCC, and because she'd been displaced the day before, she just couldn't handle it. So we have to come about this a different way because it's not working. Pat Barrett. I was devastated when someone said to me, oh, I'm bad. I'm so confused for the last four years. I have felt that I had to watch what I said because of repercussions towards myself and anything I stood for. And when this council was elected and some continued, I thought all those feelings would be gone. During the last council meeting, I was out on the landing and I heard the remark behind you, behind me, not pervade them. Some people come up here with negative remarks when we should be speaking of positive things. I was not going through six hours of video to find the exact wording and six hours of my life for reputations, badgering, and favoritism. Excuse me, but this space here, right here, belongs to every citizen in the city and beyond. That where we should feel free to speak what is on our minds. There are plenty of people. I don't want to hear, but they have that right. I see council laughing, rolling their eyes, which I am also guilty of, but that does not make it right. I was devastated when someone said to me, are you going to Stockton City Council reality show? Are you going to watch Trump and Musk wannabes? What is up with that? Lately, I have seen a witch hunt on the unhoused people that have squatted for up to a decade or more. at White Slough who are not hurting anyone but are in high-ended neighborhood with lots of campaign money which spells out politics over people when there are not far from the same district around businesses starting fires. Sorry, those aren't located in such a ritzy neighborhood. Maybe they would get displaced also. I've said over and over again, without a place to locate them, stop displacing them. We get that close. to getting them the services you all want so badly that we can't complete the end game. Roxanne McKay. I'm here today to represent my daughter, Alexis DeFoya, whose life was taken away, and I will repeat it forever and a day. You guys are spending funding that is to bring her justice and make sure her killers are caught, but you guys are attacking her mother down to the ground because I also live outside, but by choice. I'm Native American. It's part of our culture, you know? And being run from everywhere, the Stockton Police Department have my well-being, my livelihood in their possession. since I've been out of jail. They've given me citations in front of City Hall, block away from resources, shower resources in the morning saying I'm obstructing the sidewalk. But I'm gonna be around here and I'm gonna stay around here until I learn the right language to flip this whole, flip the whole out view coming from the end. You know, we are all people, okay? When somebody has a right to weigh out somebody's life on how much it matters, Nobody has that right, okay, because my daughter meant the world to me, okay? I don't wish that on no parent to go through what I have to go through. But the police keeping me away from my daughter and blocking me from my daughter, I believe in miracles. I believe in the mother's touch of healing, okay? And she was laying in that car and the police officers laughing beside the car caught on video with my daughter laying in that car right there. Now, I don't know how others respond, choose to respond to life, but I'm going to choose to respond to life in truth, not accusations and not false assumptions. So forever live my daughter in my heart, and I'm going to keep it lit for her on my mama. Julie DeVincenzi. I just had a suggestion and that was because code enforcement is gearing up to take vehicles off the street that have expired plates and they go to a yard. Maybe Stockton should have their own yard and collect those fees rather than pass that on to another private company. That's just something I thought Stockton might be interested in. Thanks. Mary Elizabeth. Good afternoon. Wow. So my question today is about $2 million that was set aside for climate action and resiliency plan. I provided this information via email. I started back in August 2014 with the first plan that was developed as a result of a litigation by the Sierra Club on a general plan. And so that was our first climate action plan and nothing more since then. Not a single meeting, nothing. And then we got some money, some TCC money, we got some EPA money, and then comes June 2023 when we start getting this money coming in. And then I got some more money in April 2024. And then in May of 2024, there was this update where I got that data that I provided to you all with the cost breakdown. And then in July, a contract, a $1 million contract was awarded to AECOM. And nothing since. And they're supposedly going to be $243,000 in outreach and engagement with the community. And so Sarah Club hasn't received any information. I haven't received any information. It's very important for our community that we plan and are ready for the changes that are coming. Thank you. Mark Stebbins. Good evening. I have two things I wanted to mention to you tonight. The first is that it's become almost a fashion in public bodies for members of the bodies heads of employee groups to deride the members of their bodies, censure them to do other things against the individual members. I only want for your consideration to you please consider Matthew chapter 7 verse 5. Please take the beam out of your own eye so that you can see clearly to take the moat from your brother's side. Second thing I wanted to say is 60 years ago, I came to Stockton to fight for justice as part of the South Stockton parish. Racial justice was one of the primary focuses. As you know, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1892 prevented Chinese from entering the United States. The city of Stockton prevented blacks from buying houses in Stockton. There is today, and a councilman who's a real estate professional can back me up on this, in the deed restrictions of many properties in Stockton, no person of color may stay overnight in a property unless they happen to be a domestic servant. I say that to tell you this. It is important to name the library in Northeast Stockton for the Autai family. Please reconsider that. It is a call for justice. Thank you. Cynthia Gail Boyd. Thank God I'm still alive. First, I want to assure to try to take it away? Ah, first I want to assure that I'm not just always up here speaking, but that I'm being heard. Truth, trust, and transparency. Somebody's smiling because it sounds familiar, huh? Yeah. It was from the inauguration that night when you knew folk got in there and Vice Mayor Lee, spoke those words. Now, no agency should be able to just do as they choose. There was a saying in the 60s, just do your thing. But there's regulations that say that you just don't do your thing. It's called accountability. By the time the auditors or the grand jury steps in, some questionable or unscrupulous behaviors have already transpired. Now, last council meeting, I spoke of code enforcement closing cases that should have never been closed but left open and followed through on. It only helps their numbers look good so that they can boast about an 80% compliance rating. Well, I pulled the covers off of that last meeting. Now, the truth and a lie cannot stand in the same light together. Neither can right and wrong. I have proof. I got the receipts that they lied. Ah, in my particular complaint. Now, just like Supervisor Ann Swain from Code Enforcement knows the ordinances, well, so do I. I don't talk about stuff I don't know something about. Now, she did reopen the cases after she came out with the officer who closed them in the first place. She realized that I had told the truth. There's no substitute for the truth. I know it cannot be five minutes. We have to do something about that. It was all this here distraction over here? All right, Ms. Mayor. Esperanza, can you get the exact information from Ms. Boyd for me, please? See, that was going to be a part of my comments, that last time you had your assistant get everybody's... name and number except for mine although I know you know it. The truth is what sets us free. Thank you. Dr. Gwendolyn Daly. Good evening. So I will only just have two minutes, so I'll just speak right quick. I did give each one of you a copy so that you can read at your leisure. My name is Dr. Gwendolyn Daly. I'm the president and the founder of the Dome of Hope organization. And what I'm doing now is representing our organization to request an opportunity to come back to give a presentation for a $3.5 million funding request. The funding is a three-year pilot program. for the Dome of Hope organization, for our youth. We know that our youth don't have adequate space and opportunities to excel in Stockton. We have noticed that through last city council, I believe the vice mayor was speaking about that even in his audit when he was talking about the audit and everything else. And we also share that same sentiment. uh... we know that the teen center has been closed a long time there's a number of uh... nonprofits do not have uh... space we have three locations that we are ready equipped to handle the youth uh... the funding would be a three year funding with a five-year renewable uh... with the cna which is a community needs assessment at the end of that and it would be five hundred thousand for a set up for one time and it would be split cost through with the county and the city. If the county doesn't take on we would ask that, humbly ask that the city would take on the full cost of that because it's our children. We're looking at for data collection for 200 but not limited to. We would just only focus on the data for the four categories of and I don't have the time. you have this thank you Armando Rodriguez good evening so my name is Armando Rodriguez and I'm a city advocate I did a proposal of here was the last Thursday on a human sex trafficking I went to the state capitol and I spoke to Rhodesia there's gonna be a an assembly bill called 379 that we're gonna start lobbying in April, trying to make a prostitution into, it's a misdemeanor, we're gonna try to make it into a felony. I think that's a great start for us, for the county. So hopefully the city can help me advocate. I went to the Board of Supervisors and they're on board. Also for the smoke shops, if we're going to be giving licenses, some of these smoke shops have clickets, which it's illegal. And they're smoking meth and doing fentanyl. So when you start there, too. So that's all I got. You guys have a blessed one. I must go now. Thank you. Sheila Wardshaw. Good evening, Madam Mayor, council members. I come before you this evening to discuss the issue of the city auditor proposal. And I do not have an objection to a city auditor department, but my concern is that we at least maintain an annual independent auditor. for propriety's sake. Greg Graffetto. Hi everybody. I'm Greg Graffetto. My dog Buddha was outside . Apparently there's such a thing as, Homeless king. Jesus Christ is king, but apparently that's a thing. And apparently homeless people have to, I'm homeless still, but other homeless people have to do what I say or something. And it's like, I'm not trying to tell people what to do. I'm trying to inspire people. I stopped using dope about 10 weeks ago now. I was eating my dope. Not because I use it, it just doesn't get its hooks in you that way. I'm supposed to be on that stuff under a doctor's guidelines, but probably about triple how much I was taking. That's how much I'm supposed to be taking more of it. Right now, I'm setting a good example for all of us by not doing anything. And the thing is, other homeless people are doing that. Even homeless people who don't even like me do what I do, which is, have you met me? I'm difficult to take sometimes. They do what I do, and you can't even give away your sweets at the Gospel Rescue Mission or at St. Mary's, I'm hearing. Tweakers eat a lot of sweets when you burn the candle at both ends. Anyway, I'm an actual person. Read my book backstage at Chippendale. That was the way I worked my way through UCLA and the Royal Law School of Los Angeles as a Chippendale dancer, big deal. The greatest thing I've ever accomplished in my life is being homeless. I want housing. But if it serves the people of this city and of this county, I will stay on the streets for $1. I love homeless people. On the whole, we use way too much drugs. And, you know, we're really keeping ourselves reeled in, and we're cleaning up after ourselves better now. I'm so proud of all of us. But, you know, me and Boodle, we serve housing too, but if it serves the people of this city better, I will do what it takes to keep us You know, getting along with everybody. Because some of us are just, we need some work, but we're getting a lot better. Every day in every way we get a little better, hey. Thank you. Rocio House. Good evening. My name is Rocio House. My husband and I relocated to Stockton, District 4, six months ago. We lived in Lodi for over a decade. My work and community involvement has been focused on Stockton for more than 25 years. However, it's truly been a pleasure to return to the city that holds a special place in my heart. As a relatively new resident, I am eager to explore how I can continue to contribute to the community through volunteer work, partnerships, and engaging with the city council members. As a matter of fact, I have emailed my district city council member. And I know you're very busy, but I hope you can see my email so we can meet. And I believe I have a pending meeting with Council Member Padilla. I'm here today because I've heard many of you express that transparency is a priority. I choose to believe that as council members, you are committed to providing transparency and honoring the promises that you made during your campaigns. You all appear to be dedicated and hardworking individuals and genuinely seek to what is best for our community. I share this belief not because I take everything at face value, but because I think it's important to approach people with an open mind, offering the benefit of the doubt unless proven otherwise. However, I must acknowledge that I HAVE OBSERVED SOME OF YOU ENGAGING AND DISRESPECTFUL BEHAVIOR PUBLICLY, BOTH DURING CITY COUNCIL MEETINGS, ON SOCIAL MEDIA, AND UNFORTUNATELY EVEN IN PERSON. SOME OF YOU SEEM TO TAKE THE LIGHT AND PUTTING THE SPOTLIGHT ON YOURSELVES WHEN IN REALITY IT TAKES A TEAM OF DEDICATED INDIVIDUALS TO ACHIEVE WHAT OUR CITY NEEDS. YOU NEVER KNOW WHO IS WATCHING, UNFORTUNATELY, BECAUSE YOU HAVE CHOSEN TO SERVE IN THE PUBLIC OFFICE. THIS PLACES YOU UNDER SCRUTINY OF MANY EYES. Anyone can hold a title, but true leadership goes beyond that. It often takes a road less traveled, the less popular road, but if it's the honest, ethical, and right one, please take it. Can I just have like 10 seconds? Thank you. With that in mind, I would just like to offer the following thoughts from one leader to another. As leaders, you have a unique and powerful opportunity to influence the community. I'm sorry, just... Thank you. Four minutes. It is essential that you use your platform responsibly, setting a positive and constructive example for both your colleagues in the city. I just want to say something. Hold on, hold on, hold on. I get to sit up here. Point of order. Point of order. Listen, I love public comments, and I love when the public comes out, whatever they have to say, good or bad. But the rules have to apply evenly to everybody. Everybody has something that they want to say, and I don't care what anybody says about me or anybody up here. But we have to have the same amount of time to do it. I just want to say that. I apologize. I thought I read in your. I'm sorry. City attorney, city clerk, mayor. I'm sorry, but it's not appropriate. Thank you, Ms. House. Veterans forever. Mayor Christina. Vice mayor. Jason Lee, and the rest of the city council. I'm grateful to be here today. I had an accident, and this is something that happened when I was in service in Vietnam. Now I have to get a knee replacement, but I'm back. I'm up walking. I was in rehab for over a month, so that's why you haven't heard from me. But I'm here today, and let me hurry up. Now, I have a church, Greater New Hope Deliverance Church. In that area, what we are trying to do is do a drop-off for the homes out there. We want to put in for our children, the parents that have homes, they need to drop their children off, and that's what we want to do. So we already have the plans. When we built the church, we just have to complete it. Fire, sprinklers, so that's an easy fix. But we need that in that area. And also, now I'm getting to the veterans. My veterans program... There's three tiers of veterans. There's one, those who made it back, okay? One that's trying to get help. And there's the other, the low tier, that don't want no help and just walk away without benefits. So what we're doing is want to house those veterans, talk to the same areas and they have a little platform that's already set up. We have two homes, one for women and one for men. I've talked to, I think it's Julie, well, she's over at the county. So everything's set. We just need a small amount of money. It's not asking for a million dollars and all that large amount of money. These homes are already set. We have the plans. We just want to pursue it and get it going for our veterans. Just don't leave our veterans behind. And that's me. I kept going. When I was in Vietnam, so thank you very much. Ms. Fialma, can you get Pastor Easter's information? Alyssa Leyva. Good evening. I just wanted a continuation of talking about decorum on the dais. I want to encourage everyone to follow the censure hearing that just happened last week because there's a municipal hypocrisy of allowing the decorum on the dais, outside, online, and with other municipal stakeholders who are participating in workplace mobbing during the campaign trail and after. The first meeting started with the mayor yelling on the dais because the public did not get their right to full public comment time. And I also wanted to defend Carrie Wright and the Department of Economic Development. She had to stand up there and defend herself and say that she has been in your district. The city under Harry Black has done extensive outreach to District 6. I'm from District 6. They have town halls. They have things in Spanish. They're out there in the dark. Maybe you guys can't relate. Maybe you guys don't know the struggle. You know, whether you all appear Y'all are with Jason. I really don't care. You're not my enemy. We're all from Southside. But this workplace bullying, workplace mobbing, and especially the stakeholders who think they can throw rocks and hide their hands, you will be dealt with. Thank you. Bobby Bivens. GOOD EVENING, MAYOR AND COUNCIL. MY NAME IS BOBBY BIVENS. I AM THE PRESIDENT OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE AND COLORED PEOPLE COME IN ALL COLORS. I'M HERE TO SPEAK TO THE FACT THAT I'M NOT VERY HAPPY AND I DON'T THINK THAT COUNCILMAN LEE REPRESENTED THE CITY APPROPRIATELY WHEN HE WENT ON HIS PLATFORM to talk about what the NAACP does or does not do, or the defending of a white woman. We should all know that the NAACP was founded by a group of white women, white men, black women, black men. And we defend all people. And in fact, when Mayor Fugazi was harassed by the police, we defended her. So you might want to step next door and just ask the question, who we defend? More importantly, we serve all people in the community and we, the NAACP, do not endorse candidates. So for the public record, we do not endorse candidates. Councilman, I did not endorse your predecessor. You can direct your comments to the mayor, don't direct them to me. Mayor, I did not endorse his predecessor. nor do we nor have we or I ever. And more importantly, the NAACP is here to represent those folks that can't speak for themselves for whatever reason and or are harassed or intimidated. And we will continue to speak up. Thank you. Amani E. Nelson. Good evening. I am a mother for an only child. His name is John Nelson. He's 20 years old. John is deprived from food. He's forced to be starved. He's forced to vomit by a terrorist cartel. This has been for the last, I figured out about it, since 2021. When I figured out about it, his father told the police that it's in my mind. Since then, a ring of domestic violence started. John lost most of his weight. He has kidney stones. His pulse is 109. He doesn't sleep and he doesn't eat. And they are getting more and more harsher, more and more tormenting him. John is tortured every second and every moment. The police have been trying to reach to him, but because they broke his leg when he was 10 and his leg is lame, John doesn't walk straight. And he have all the time pain because his bones is hurting now. So third degree of starvation, they started it since 2021. Most of them are Egyptian women. Some of them are Americans, and they live in south. Some of them come from nearby places. They deal in drugs, and they are very high on drugs. And they threaten. and torture him. I don't know what to do. I'm a restrained mother now. I can't hold to him. I can't go to him because he's living with his father. And John needs help. Please to help my son. Thank you. Alberto Gonzalez. Good evening. I just want to take a moment and come up here and address, I'm not addressed, I just wanted to speak something that's on my mind. I love how much negativity we get up here instead of coming up here and appreciate that things are being done. I am so excited and happy every time I come down the bridge on Airport or Charterway lit up. I don't remember the last time I seen that thing lit up. But we don't get no appreciation for our district, what, you know, they're trying to do for us. I'm happy for everybody seeing some of the monies getting invested into our district every every other councilman is trying but yet instead of coming with ideas of what we should do they want to come up here and harass negativity and we're all grown people here we're supposed to come up here with ideas and try to embrace you guys for trying to do better for our city instead of trying to come up here and put you down and it's every meeting i've been here every meeting i never speak on it And I go home, and I'm like, why is it that people don't know how to see good? They only know how to see the bad. And they want to live on the bad. It's time to change and be positive. And instead of trying to put someone down, embrace you, help you, greet you. Like, what can I do? What's my part to make the city better, to light up the city, instead of living in the dark and coming up here and trying to make it darker? So I'm excited for my district. I mean, I love coming. my grandkids come they throw their hands in the air at night when we come through their bridge they never seen that and we honk the horn and we throw our hands up in the air so thank you so much for that lighting up that bridge and i can't wait for everything else is coming with it that concludes general public comment okay thank you uh... that brings us to the consent agenda Are there any items that council would like to pull? 12.2 and 12.5. Okay. Mayor, I also have a public comment card for 12.2, 12.4, and 12.5. Okay. Council Member Enriquez, did you? Okay. I was going to pull 12.2, but Council Member Padilla. I have questions for 12.4 and 12.5, but they're going to ask public comments. I can pull it. Nobody said anything about 12.4. You don't want 12.4. You want 12.4? Okay. Okay. Okay. Public, those, so we have 12.2, 12.5, then 12.3 and 12.4. I'm doing them in the order that they were brought up. So we'll start with 12.2. Councilwoman Padilla. Is there someone that's coming up? Okay. Sorry. Courtney Christie, Deputy City Manager. This will be a group effort, so we're kind of waiting to hear what the direction we're going. Okay. Okay. I am in support of this. I just have a couple of questions with regards to the security measures. So I noticed on one of the line items, it said $4,800 for signage and materials. I was wondering if we can expand on that a little bit. Good evening, Chattery, Director of Public Works. So that cost is what we estimate to put up the required signage for all entrances to be able to display what the regulations are and what we're looking for and That's what that money is allotted for. Okay. So do we have like a lot of doors and windows that that means? I mean, that just seems like a lot of money for, you know, a sign that says you have to go through surveillance. I'm just curious. Yeah, for sure. So, you know, we want to have quality signs and we want them to look appropriate. And so we want to have multiple signs in the multiple locations that you enter and exit the building. So when we cost it out, That was the amount of money that we came up with for the estimate. Okay. With regards to the actual equipment, can someone answer what is going to be moved over to new City Hall specifically? Yeah. So the x-ray machines that we're ordering, those will be moved to City Hall. The metal detectors that we have right now will be moved to new City Hall. The signage will be moved to new City Hall. I don't know about the curtains and the glass, that wouldn't be appropriate, but the machines and the nuts and bolts. Okay. And then the last question I have, is the position already posted or will the position be posted if this is approved? The position for the security manager? Sure. So again, Courtney Christie, Deputy City Manager. The position is not currently posted, so what you guys are approving tonight is giving us the authority to add an extra position to the overall FTE count for the city, which you guys only have the authority to do, and then approving the job spec. So once that's approved, then we can post, then we can start recruiting and work on the hiring effort. Okay, thank you for that explanation. I don't know if anybody else has questions. Council Member Blauer? Yeah, I will say, when I first came to council back in 2016, I remember walking in and seeing that it seemed like security was pretty lax. And I remember when I asked about it, I was told, well, the dais is bulletproof. So, something goes down, just jump under the dais. And I thought, that's not quite what we need. There should be something better. So, I have been, you know, happy to see the security taken a little more seriously. I am glad to see the metal detectors and I do think that makes sense that, you know, that we treat things a little more seriously than just, you know, jump under the dais. My question is some of these expenses I see for like the, you mentioned the drapes and you mentioned like the bulletproof glass for the second floor lobby. I guess my question is this building was built in 1926 so we've been here 99 years and we're getting ready to leave. Why would we spend that money on those items when we're just about to leave? And then my other question, just to follow up on that, is hiring somebody to oversee this, why do we need to do that? Why, I mean, what's happened before that and what's the deficiency that this is gonna fill? Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council, Scott Graviat, Assistant Chief. So the security service manager, to your point, Council Member Blauer, looking at the overall concept and objectives of security, there was a deficiency and we all could agree to that. In doing so, we felt that this security service manager bridges the gap, not only with the police department, but with city manager's office and direct correspondence with the council to meet all the needs, what I mean by that, is daily reports, interacting with staff on a regular basis. And we're talking about facilities outside of police facilities. So we're talking a very large undertaking. So every city building will have access to this manager who then can be responsive to the executive needs, and more important, the staff needs. So they're reviewing safety plans. They're ensuring that there is active shooter training. There's multiple policies and procedures that probably weren't to standard and this person we felt it was a position that need to be created to fulfill that need so will that will that relieve some pressure from from PD yes sir I mean we will still have a collaborative effort together but this person will whether it's CDD or library or this person is going to tie that all together and then we can come with a collective plan but that this person is going to be that point of contact for all city staff outside the police department. Right. Thank you. You're welcome. Vice Mayor? Yeah, I just think it's important for context that the security at City Hall was something that I actually brought up when I got elected. And I will tell you, going back to Council Member Blauer's point, when we got our training, the city clerk said, just so you know, the dais is bulletproof, so if anybody starts shooting, just get down below. As somebody who's been shot before, who's survived gun violence, who's watched people die in my family of gun violence, I take my safety and security very serious. But it's not just about me. It's when you come to City Hall, when our staff come to work every day. It's not all about us. It's about everybody being safe. And so I just want to be very clear and transparent because the true trust transparency thing is something I did start, and I love that I'm hearing people say it. There was no sophisticated camera system here. Security had no walkie-talkies to even communicate with three points of entry. Police chief told me that police department wasn't even involved in the security plan here, nor were they connected to what was happening outside of council meetings. Our security staff here didn't have radios or each other's phone numbers to talk. They had no plan to deal with a crisis if something was to happen. That is not the way that Any institution, whether it's the welfare department, whether it's here, hospitals, you need to know how to keep people safe. And when we have you come down here, we want you to be safe. Since I've been here, I have watched a pastor hit people with papers. I've watched people come in here and hit a city council member, which she's had to go and file police reports. And look, come up here with whatever your concerns are. Get them out. Be articulate so we can hear them and follow up. But attacking people physically, threatening to harm people, all those type of things is just completely unacceptable. And so when I asked the police chief to do an assessment, he was really shocked at how unsafe City Hall was. And I want to thank our staff for being able to put a plan together and have a dedicated emphasis put on making sure that everybody's safe. And the fact that our when you went through the metal detector today you saw how they looked in your bags and stuff they weren't even looking through bags and city staff were allowed to walk around the metal detector now we put a policy the mayor and the council asked that all staff to go through metal detectors because we want to make sure that we're checked too so when i come through the city hall front doors they go through my bag and i take my time and i thank them for that and i want to thank the staff and our security for being consistent in implementing what we've done so far this is just another step the other point of council or blower saying Why get the bulletproof glass? Because we're leaving soon. That date moving into City Hall keeps changing every week. Y'all know it was January, February, April, June, October. Chad, you know, whenever you get up here, we're going to ask you. But we don't know when that's going to happen. And you take security measures and you get car insurance, for those of us that get it, to make sure that you have it in case something happens, right? We don't want anything to happen, but if it does, we want to be protected. I do have a question regarding when is the potential, when is the projected date for moving? Thank you, Mayor, for asking this question that we all want to know. Man, that wasn't even on the agenda that I, not even close. Okay, so. It's your best estimate. Right, right. So we are looking. Weather permitting. Weather permitting, that's right. I quote seasons, remember? But no, seriously, we're looking at, you know, August for building two temporary occupancy and then October for building one for temporary or for occupancy and then our goal is to have city council meetings in New City Hall in 2025 towards the end of the year okay so uh both building one and two will have security measures in place for them absolutely okay and uh looking at this list here um are there curtains over at the new City Hall? So with all the well-spent money, we have better measures than curtains at New City Hall. So the walls are protected, the windows are protected. Okay. I mean, for me, that's a little bit of a stretch to have curtains. I do get it. But nobody can even see through these windows. I mean, realistically, if you've ever tried to look out of them, you can't see in or out. Most people don't know that there's glass even behind us. because they're never opened. Anyhow, okay, thank you for that. Let's see, oh, Councilmember Villalpudua. Yes, thank you, Mayor. I just have one question. We're talking about security. As for the Sikh community, you know, they wear the turbans, and then they have a knife called a kirban. So are we going to allow, because they're religious, let them through without taking their knife out because of religion? Press your button. Thanks, Chad. We have confirmed with the city attorney's office and those will be allowed. Okay, thank you very much. Yes, sir. If there are no further questions, I'd like to move to approve. Mayor, we have a public comment. Oh, public comment, yeah, sorry. Mark Stebbins, please. You know, we lived through a whole period of this United States, and we didn't have any security, so-called. We had more dangerous situations in the city, murders in the city, stealing of gold chains. This police department that you have in place now, has done a great deal to minimize that, and has certainly worked with other partners to minimize it. You have cut down to the point where it's safe for a citizen to walk down the streets of Stockton. My whole point is you don't need all of this extra expenditure. Somebody has come up with it, and they think, Oh, if it's a little bit is good, a little bit more is better. And you just keep on keeping on piling security on security. What does security do? It does nothing but keep you from the public. It does nothing but keep the public from each other. So, you know, you're going the wrong direction. And it needs to, you know, you need to stop it. There were, until what, four years ago, there was no metal detectors in City Hall. Nobody had a problem. Nothing happened. All of this is just, you know, BS piled on top of BS. So think about that. And think about the responsibilities that spend money on important things. Thank you. Cynthia Gail Boyd. If anybody thinks that streetlights are more important than all the lives that are taken in this city. Okay. Is there some pending threat that the public doesn't know about? Why so many armed uniformed police at every single meeting? How much are off-duty police? They must be because they ain't on condition blue nowhere. So how much are we paying these off-duty officers to sit here? Last meeting I was here for five hours before I left. We're paying them five hours to stand here? The scanners downstairs and upstairs. Now listen here. If somebody makes it past the scanners downstairs, I think we're all in trouble by the time they get to the second floor. What sense does that make? Jason Lee said at the swearing in, obviously I've been listening, public safety is a critical situation. It was not just a campaign promise, but a priority. Is it cost effective? It's rather uncomfortable to have such a heavy presence of police everywhere. They're behind there that we don't see them. They're over there where we don't see them. They're all downstairs. I couldn't even get a park. They ought to be over here, what do you call it, carpooling to get to City Hall. Use one of them. horsebacks or something to get them here, but they shouldn't be parked all down there so that we at 71 years old got to walk three blocks to get here. That makes no sense. It reminds me of the changing of the guard at the Buckingham Palace. I've been there for it. I served 16 years for this racist, dangerous country. I think life is more important. I'd like to get back when I have time. Dr. Gwendolyn Daly. My husband taught me how to shoot a gun. I never had a gun in my hand before in my life. He said, sweetheart, you got to know how to shoot and shoot to kill. I'm like, oh my god. He said, because even if you call me, I got to get to you. So you got to be protected. You got to protect yourself. And living on campus at UOP for over 10 years, we have a little blue box. He said, you got faith in that little blue box, but the police got to get to you. I have a 2010 Mercedes. I got full coverage on my Mercedes. My husband laughed. He said, you just need liability. I want to protect myself and everybody else. Unlike my fellow residents, I think it's a good deal. We need to be protected. I also think that, yeah, I also think that... It's good to have the city council to even go through there because we don't know the mental state of anyone. And I only have one life. I think everybody needs to go through. Everybody needs to go through. But another suggestion, too, for your, Mr. Councilmember Blower, for your thing that you have there, your shield, donate that to a nonprofit that also need it. Donate that to another part of the city that also need it. There's a lot of people can also use the money that we can recycle different things. So just to make that suggestion. And also for the young man, I'm here to make suggestions. I've been a friend of the council and the diets for years. All my life I've been here. I'm here to make suggestions and find solutions and not badger. So we have the good and the bad on everything. Nobody is perfect. We have bad days. But you have to see the good as well. I'm not looking through with rose-colored glasses. I'm not trying to blow smoke. It is what it is. Protect me because you represent me. Thank you. That concludes public comment for this item. Okay, before we get there, I just want to make one comment, and that is that... What people don't realize is that we're the 11th largest city in the state of California and the 57th largest in the nation. And when I have gone places, every city that I have been to, into their city hall, they have had security measures there. I do think that there's quite a few things on here. I would like to support all of those that can make it over to the new facility. fan of some of the items on here but I definitely want my fellow council members as well as our staff and the public to feel like they are in a safe location you have to do it at the airport you have to do it at at the county building you have to do it at the courthouse there are many places where you have to go through security and I realize it's a little inconvenient but It is unfortunately what it is and you need to be safe, we need to be safe and that's why this item is on here, so. If there are no further comments, I'd like to make a motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Council members, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. The next item that Councilwoman Padilla pulled. Actually, before we get there, sorry, point of order. We did have two items that weren't pulled. Two items that weren't pulled. So if we can approve the consent agenda for item 12.1 and 12.6, I would entertain a motion. So moved. Second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Councilmembers, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Okay. Councilwoman Padilla, 12.5. Hi, Chad. I am in support of this. I just wanted to know what is the data monitoring? Like how do we know that every tree is going to be touched, that needs to be touched? So we, the contractor will use the current inventory that we have in the system right now. They'll verify what is out there. They'll supply GPS coordinates for any new sites that they find. So it's an approach that they're very professional and they've done this. They're one of the experts in this field. So their system of checks and balances will be matched against the city when they bring the information to us and we cross-verify it. So then after, I assume after they do their report, they recommend... what needs to happen with those trees or not happen? Yeah so they'll give us a condition assessment of all the trees and they'll let us know which ones need to be you know priority ones right so they need to be diseased, dying, they need to be removed. We have money left over in this project to be able to address a good portion of that or what we expect to be a good portion of that. So we should be taken care of. Okay and I hope there's money left over to replant trees that are taken out so that'll be the final phase of this of this project will be actually creating an urban forestry plan so we'll work with the contractor and we'll get a plan put together bring it to council that'll also include community outreach thank you you're welcome so uh i too have a question uh on this uh actually a couple of them because we've had trees that were healthy trees that have gotten taken out And we don't have our own arborist or do we we do not we do not I would like to look at us having our own arborist just because we need to make sure that We are taking care of our trees I mean way back when five million dollars to take care of our trees for tree maintenance not tree death but I also want to make sure that there are places where city trees were and And I know people reached out to me saying this tree is dead, it's been windy, they've blown down on other people's property, I'm afraid of it, you know, doing damage, taking pictures, put it up on Ask Stockton, and they've come back with, oh, yeah, that's your responsibility or we'll get to it maybe someday. So when they go out to assess because there's an empty square, you know, dirt, area, I don't want people to get penalized for trees that were dead if they were reported. There's no penalties to this program. The goal is just to educate ourselves, right, to what is our urban forestry right now and what is the condition of it. So the intent is just to have a good solid platform so that we can build an urban forestry plan as we move forward. Yes, I am very, like I said, very appreciative of this item, and I think that it's a good step moving forward. Council Member Enriquez. Yes, thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you again, Mr. Reid, for that. I just had a couple questions. You mentioned the community outreach efforts. Just wondering, just for the record, how council members and the mayor, we can be supportive in that. That way we can inform our constituents about just the plan, how we can be more engaged with them. Obviously, I know it's an educational experience on both sides, right, as a community is learning about what we're doing as a city. I know to the mayor's point about when trees are removed, you know, the difference between a dying tree, a healthy tree, why certain trees are being removed and, you know, giving full explanations as to why to the public would be helpful. And I know you and I have had conversations about tree stumps. When a tree is removed, then the follow-up is tree stumps as well. So I know that's another component, but I want to just highlight that because I know in my district, we've had several specifics of... TREE WAS REMOVED NOW THERE'S A TREE STUMP WHERE I LIVE IN AN HOA NOW I'M GETTING CHARGED BECAUSE IT'S OWNED BY THE CITY SO JUST HAVING THAT EDUCATION AND DIFFERENCES OF TYPES OF TREES I THINK WOULD BE HELPFUL AND WHEN IT COMES TO THE COMMUNITY OUTREACH PLAN WHICH I KNOW YOU'LL ANSWER SINCE THIS IS A LONG-WINDED QUESTION JUST WHERE WE CAN ACCESS THIS ONLINE FOR THE WEBSITE SO WE CAN SHARE WITH THE PUBLIC YEAH SO I JUST WANT TO BE CLEAR WHAT WE'RE ASKING FOR APPROVAL TONIGHT IS THE INVENTORY ASSESSMENT OF THE CITY TREES RIGHT SO once we get the report back and we've identified the trees that need to come down we'll make that information public through our website right and so everybody will be up to date you know and know exactly which trees need to come out and why the next phase of this project after we get this assessment back that will be when we contract out for an urban forestry plan that part is that project will involve heavy community interaction to make sure that we're building it together yeah and apologies if i overlooked it in the attachments but just for the record can you just give a timeline you said you'll do the assessment how long will that take and when can we let the public know the goal once we execute the contract uh is to have a finished project in six months so we're looking to get the assessment within six months great thank you you're welcome nice mayor So that assessment, once it's done, and forgive me for stepping out if I miss this part, once that work is done, it'll come back to council or to staff, and then we'll assess where trees need to be repaired and where trees need to be planted? No. This is just to assess the condition of the trees right now. So it doesn't involve a replanting plan. This is just to assess what we have, and it will identify what needs to be removed. the next portion once we get that report back in about six months we'll look for contracted services to help develop develop an urban forestry plan that will be where the replanting plan comes yeah so that that so basically what i was saying so what i was trying to get at is there will be a plan once the assessment's done to determine and maybe not areas where there's a tree that's Not well, but where there are no trees. Yes. And that will include in the plan of where to put more trees. Yes. Okay. And then the second part to that second part of the process is we'll have a community engagement process for the community to say, we want trees here, we'd like trees there. Absolutely. And one more thing. A tree is deemed dead, dying, diseased, but the owner says, no, it's not. Or somebody else says, no, it's not. That's maybe an arborist. Somebody pays to have an arborist come out. Is there an appeal process so that somebody doesn't lose their tree? So the company performing this is using a licensed arborist. I know them. Yeah. So there is. Yes. They can bring that forward and we can discuss it. We can show information and share information. Perfect. Thank you. Do we have a motion? We have public comment. Oh, sorry. Public comment. Mark Stebbins, please. Sorry, before I start, did we skip over? Don't start yet. Did we skip over? We haven't done 12.4 yet. 12.4? We haven't done it yet. We're going in the order that it was asked. So Councilwoman Padilla asked for two and five. That's the order that we are. Okay. Two and five. I was confused. All right. There are two things that are a real problem with this request and this appropriation. And the mayor mentioned one of them. This city needs a professional arborist department. We need it. It can be supported with grant funds. There is no reason why it should not be. We had, at one time, a professional arborist on staff at Parks and Recreation. AREA OTHER FACILITIES WITHIN THE CITY DELTA COLLEGE IS ONE WHICH HAS DONE A TREMENDOUS JOB OF THEIR TREE A SURVEY OF THE TREES ON THAT CAMPUS AND THERE ARE OTHERS THAT NEED TO BE DONE SO I WOULD HOPE THAT THE COUNCIL WOULD NOT APPROVE THIS ITEM THAT THE COUNCIL WOULD MOVE TO HIRE A PROFESSIONAL ARBORIST AND STAFF to actually do the job that's necessary for the care of the trees and for the good of the city. And again, you have grant funds that have done this. Part of climate control facilities have planted trees in various areas. And it's been done haphazardly. So anyhow, I hope that you'll think about that and consider it. Thank you. Dan Richardson. And here I wasn't going to speak tonight. I'm in favor of us doing whatever we can as a city to save our tree canopy. It's sad when I go up to Sacramento for entertainment or whatever and I walk down their streets and they've actually bumped out curbs and they've bumped out sidewalks to make room for healthy trees and street trees. We just had the tree crew the city hired to trim trees along Pershing Avenue come through. There was a limb that was taken off one of my major trees in front of my house by a big rig that ran up on my lawn, which is another problem with Pershing. But that being said, I was nursing a limb back on that tree. The tree crew came through and before I could get out my front door, the saw was on that limb and took it off. And I was trying to salvage that tree to get it back in balance. I paid $1,200 to have that tree trimmed to balance it so it wasn't leaning into the street or low where big rigs would hit the branches. I wasn't here at the time we had tree crews on staff. We need to get that back. We really need to think about what trees do for this city. They're good for people's mental health. They're good for the environment. They cool the streets and they cool the sidewalks during the summer when it's 110. Last year we had 58 days, 58 days over 100 degrees in Stockton. 58. Our normal is 19. That's our average. That's brutal. Climate change is happening, folks. You know, there's a lot of dyers out there, everything else. It's getting hotter. And we need these trees saved. The area I live in in Midtown has a lot of old tree inventory. There are diseased and dying trees, but we need to be selective in what we remove. If there's a chance to save a tree, we need to do that. Homeowners need to realize that trees add value to your home. It adds about $20,000 to your property value having a large tree in your yard. If you have an oak tree, God forbid you touch that. Don't touch your oak trees. But please, do what you can to save our trees. Thank you. Julie Dunning. Just briefly, I support this contract and the approval of it. We cannot have an urban forest plan without knowing what our urban forest consists of. I do want to second the concerns about having an arborist that truly identifies what's dead and diseased. BECAUSE A TREE HAS AN INSECT INFESTATION DOES NOT MAKE IT DISEASED. THAT'S TREATABLE. THERE ARE SOME DISEASES THAT ARE TREATABLE AS WELL. SO I DO WANT US TO BE SELECTIVE, BUT I WHOLEHEARTEDLY SUPPORT THIS INVENTORY THAT NEEDS TO BE DONE SO WE KNOW WHAT WE HAVE, AND THEN WE CAN MOVE FORWARD WITH GETTING TREES REPLANTED, WITH DOING THE THINGS THAT WE NEED TO DO. SO THANK YOU, COUNCIL. CYNTHIA GAYLE BOYD. I TOO HAVE COME TO CITY COUNCIL SINCE December 2nd, 2008, I didn't just drive up here, about the decision of what trees are good, what trees are bad. If that means bringing them professional, then I think it should be done. Like on the map last time with code enforcement having the yellow dots and the red dots and the green dots, and they were explaining about what they meant. I would suggest that the city have a system where they identify which trees do belong to the city. And you know personally, Mayor Fugazi, what a horrible... life i lived through with my immediate neighbors because of a palm tree the city said we don't plant palm trees so it's not ours the neighbors said it's not ours because we didn't plant it so i'm asked to go to court to prove who owns the tree the tree was dead took many pictures into the you asked stockton the tree must have been 150 feet tall And the limbs would just come right down on my property every time, come down on my car every single time. So finally, after I've been there 18 years, so finally after 15 years. arguing with the neighbor they finally conceded and they cut down the palm tree but I shouldn't have had to suffer with all the threats from my neighbors and all the stuff that you know that I went through when it would have been simple either belongs to the city or it does not belong to the city that's what I would appreciate and treat the south side of town just like you do the north side why should we have all the sappy ass trees thank you That concludes public comment for this item. Councilwoman Padilla. To that point, Chad, do we have a list of city-owned trees? So we have an inventory right now, and that's what we're verifying. Over the years since this has been done, you know, 11, 12 years now, this is our checks and balances to see what is actually there and what isn't. Okay, so that will show our constituents what are owned by the city? Absolutely. Okay, thank you. Main point of the project. And just want to reiterate, this is being done by a licensed arborist. Thank you. Vice Mayor? I love public comments, by the way. All right, question. So when the survey is done and the report comes back, how will it rate, like, this is critical, needs critical care now, this one? You know, like, is there a rating system, and what would that look like? yeah so it's a the last time i believe it was a percentage so this tree is 100 healthy this tree is 80 it just kind of goes down from there um so we'll get we'll get a nice and easy percentage rating of hey anything within you know under 20 it needs to go okay so i before we get to a motion i do have one more question to uh miss boyd's point uh the tree inventory only goes so back so far Some of us live in the oldest part of the city where there have been trees there for 75 years. So is it the cities because it's on the street side or is it the property owners? Because there used to be somebody that works for Parks and Rec who's retired that would come up and say, no, that's not a city tree. We didn't plant those trees. I said, were you here in 1939? No. Well, then how do you know if it's... city's tree or if it's the owner's tree so I'm just saying anything that's on the street side that is easily identified as a 50 year plus old tree I would say then that is our responsibility as a city I just want to throw that out there agreed and then I'll entertain a motion motion second okay please vote Motion carries 7-0. Okay, moving on to 12.3. Was that yours, Councilmember Enriquez? I wrote 12.3. Oh, no, that was public. Did the public pull 12.3? Okay. No need for 12.3. We'll go to 12.4. You got off, Dr. Lytle. Mayor, because that item was pulled from consent and therefore not voted on, we still need to revote on 12.3. Oh, okay. Motion for 12.3? I motion to approve. Second. Please vote. Motion carries 7-0. Okay, now item 12.4, I think public and vice mayor for that one? Yeah. If you can just, I had one question in looking at this and it was just how are we going to update the community on all these changes? I don't know if you want to. I'm Marissa Vargas, police services manager for code enforcement. We'll be working with our PIO office for the city manager's office and our PIO section and the PD to get the word out. Yeah, I was just looking at it. It just looked like several code changes. And is there a time period in which, if we approve it today or once we approve it tonight, that it's implemented? And then if so, from there, what is the communication plan? Yeah. So Matt Van Fleet, Code Enforcement Field Manager. So basically, if it's approved tonight, it's about 30 days. Or it is 30 days until it's in effect. Right. So 30 days into effect, what is the... plan to notify the community? I mean, because if people know that there's certain rules now and they're changing, I love the fact that we're getting in line with the rest of the world, but how do we notify the community within that 30 days? We're going to work with the PIOs with whatever methodologies they use to inform the public on what's going on. So I'm assuming social media aspects and other publications that they may use. So when you say whatever methods we use and Assuming that means we have no plan. At least that's how I hear it. So hold on. I'm just saying what I hear. I think it's important for people to hear me and hear how I hear things so that way before they get up there they don't have this experience. We just had a conversation at the last council about the AI cars running around and then finding all the stuff and then giving people a six month grace period to get in line. We changed that to reduce it down to three months. so now I'm asking with all these code changes how much time we're going to have between now and implementation is 30 days and so I'm asking between tonight we vote in 30 days what is the communication plan if you're not the right person to answer that question the PIO who's in the back or somebody should come out here and give us that answer I do have a follow-up question though some of these properties though I mean They're kind of grandfathered in. I mean, you're not going and saying, you're not coming to my house and telling me, oh, you've got to put in fire sprinklers in your home. Correct, yeah. The majority of the codes that are being adopted are almost identical to the codes we currently have. The main focus is to bring it up to current standards and the current, you know, it's part of a family of international codes. And so it's just to come in a line with that. It references the other codes that we've already adopted, like the California building code and fire code and things like that. So there aren't a lot of major changes. We will still be conducting outreach with the PIO's office. But other than that, any violations of the new codes, it would still be handled. We always issue a warning, you know, and we give a chance for correction and things like that. So it wouldn't be an immediate type thing, you know. Great, thank you. Thank you. And just to be clear, I'm not against progress. I'm all for progress. That's why we have security at City Hall now. That's why we're progressing. But I'm also really big on communication and having a plan to make sure that the public is well informed. And so I would like to hear that plan if somebody can come out and give us that, or at least tell us what some key high-level points of communication would be, whether it's press, social media, what that looks like, timeline. Hi, Gina McDonald, Police Services Administrator. If passed tonight, we'll start working on a plan to roll this out with our PAOs first thing in the morning. I'm not the PAO, but I envision that we will, you know, maybe break this down a little bit more clearer so that the community knows, okay, we're focusing in on one item here. This is what this means. Because, you know, for me, if I was just a regular citizen looking at this, it is very confusing. So, again, if passed tonight, we'll work with our PIOs first thing in the morning to roll this out in terms of communication weekly, you know, maybe one to two a week, you know, whatever that looks like, whatever's easier for the community to absorb. Love the answer. What I love the most is tomorrow we will get a plan going and staff will let us know so we can share with the community. Yeah, absolutely. A public comment? Mark Stebbins, please. Sorry to be so long-winded tonight. There are some good changes and some bad changes in this change you're about to make. But the worst part of it is that you don't have any idea about whether any of these codes are effective, are good, are bad, have an origin in other than the good of the city or whatever. Now, I'll give you an example. There's a code provision that says you can't park on an unapproved surface. In other words, you can't park on your lawn, right? Now, where did that come from? Well, Harry Montgomery is the one who brought that up when he was public works director. And Harry said it came from the fact that we had commercial vehicles parking in the adobe soil and bringing mud onto the street. That's a whole lot different than somebody parking on their lawn. And in South Stockton, a whole lot of people park on their lawn because houses were not built with two parking spaces. Houses were not built to accommodate cars in the same way. So there's a reason to park on the lawn. Also, a lot of people park on the lawn because it's just like the security you all wanted to approve tonight. Here's a way to secure your vehicle a little better. mess up the lawn in order to be more secure in your possession. So those are things you need to consider. That concludes public comment for this item. Okay. I'll bring it back to council. Motion to approve. Second. Council, please vote. Motion carries 7-0. And that concludes the consent agenda. So we are going to move on to unfinished business and then maybe a break after that. Is that okay with everyone? So Mr. Reed, is this you? Yes, it is. Okay. We're looking forward to it. I know you provided us with a PowerPoint presentation, so council can take those out and follow along if need be. Unfinished business from last week. So first, good evening, Chad Reed, Director of Public Works. At the February 18th Council meeting, Council requested a presentation on the community outreach involved in Columbus Park renovation projects. So tonight's presentation will highlight outreach efforts and the community engagement involved in this project. So Columbus Park is a two acre park in the corner at the corner of south lincoln street and west war street the park is currently in minimal features sorry currently has minimal features and is in poor condition in 2019 community the neighboring community of columbus park and visionary home builders approached the city in hopes of renovating the park five public meetings were held to gather information from the community on what amenities they wanted. This is why we're excited to deliver this project tonight. The abundance of numbers shown on this slide are fantastic. More time than not, we do not see turnouts of this magnitude. So when you have an event and you have 60 attendees to get feedback, that's incredible. that's that's absolutely incredible and honestly even 20 is incredible I mean we've done something you know up in council member Padilla's district and you know we had a good turnout but it was 12 right so these are these are really good numbers so to gain community involvement we used emails flyers and social media however visionary home builders probably had the biggest impact with their Santa Fe townhomes project which really helped engage community members So the following slides are some great pictures on their outreach events. There were multiple events held. They were attended by community members, kids, park planners, city staff. So some were held indoors, some were held outdoors. We had different renderings of how the park could look, different outreach attempts to gain feedback what the community wants and as you can see the events were very engaging I really like this slide you know it's got a lot of kids stuff on here it's super sweet in the top left corner you can see how you know the the way that they presented and the way they gathered feedback was very relatable for the community you know sometimes We put outreach together and we have consultants and it's very dry or staunchy if you would. It's not inviting for people to provide feedback and so we have to go out there and encourage them to provide feedback. Whereas in this slide you can see it just seemed natural for this group. So the culmination of input from citizens showed what they wanted. They wanted an adult fitness area, a children's play area, a picnic shade structure, new restroom, full-size basketball courts, and a community garden and new pathways. So this slide shows the location for amenities and the overall layout. The basketball courts and the community garden is on the north side with the players and the restroom in the middle of the park. and a fitness area towards the south end of the park. So all outreach was done in 2019 and then we had COVID. So staff applied for the Prop 68 grant funding in March of 2021 and received notice of award in December of 2021. Council awarded the design contract in 2023 and the project was advertised for construction in 2024. So one of the great financial benefits of this project is that it's 100% grant funded. There's no match funding required from the city. So even though we bring projects forward that are grant funded, a lot of times there's a match portion, zero match with this. Although the slide shows the construction costs at 2.3 million, or I'm sorry, 2.9 million, it's important to point out the breakdown of this number. I DIDN'T INCLUDE IT IN THE SLIDE AND I SHOULD HAVE PROBABLY BROKE THIS DOWN A LITTLE BIT BETTER, BUT WHAT I WANT TO COMMUNICATE IS THE CONSTRUCTION CONTRACT IS ABOUT 2.3 MILLION. THE CONTINGENCY IS ABOUT 334,000, WHICH IS ABOUT 14%. WE HAVE A CONTRACT WITH GBCC FOR THEIR HELP, WHICH IS ABOUT 106,000, JUST A LITTLE OVER THAT. WE ALSO HAVE A CONTENDENCY OFF THAT CONTRACT, WHICH IS ABOUT 11,000. AND THEN WE HAVE CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT. We guesstimate that at about 167,000. So the total construction in the project is the 2.963567 that you see on the slide. So we talk about fiscal responsibility a lot, right? And so in public works in today's times, that gets tricky because we don't honestly have enough staff to be able to provide management for all of our projects. However, we look for projects like this where we have the opportunity to put city staff on managing the project and hopefully what that results in is an efficient ran project where there's some leftover money at the end that we can put back into the project so this project will be overseen by city staff so the recommendation before you tonight um is to approve the plans and specifications for columbus parks renovation project wp 22041 approve the agreement between the city of stockton and the san joaquin county of office of education greater valley conservation corps in the amount of 106 606 dollars and award a construction contract in the amount of 2 million 345 000 to stonebridge general contracting of clovis california the mounts or for the columbus park renovations project wp 22041 and this completes my presentation and i can take any questions vice mayor yeah thank you uh for the presentation i had asked to see um something to show kind of what the plan was what it looked like from visual and this satisfied that need and i just wanted command staff for having so many people in the public engage in the process i mean to see the people there to see that the amount of effort that we put forth uh... i just hope that that continues to be the standard for all of our initiatives where we're going to be uh... doing projects like this so thank you councilmember villapuja yes thank you mayor thank you chad i love the project and i know the community's been asking this FOR A LONG TIME. I HAVE MY NEIGHBORHOOD WATCHES RIGHT FRONT OF THE CHURCH. SO THAT'S ONE OF THE DISCUSSIONS THAT WE HAVE TIME TO TIME. WHEN IS IT COMING? YOU GOT THE MONEY TO PROVE. SO WHEN IS ALL OF THESE ITEMS ARE GOING TO BE, YOU KNOW, PUTTING IN? YEAH, SO THAT'S A GOOD QUESTION. SO IT TAKES ABOUT, IT TAKES US ABOUT 45 DAYS TO GET A CONTRACT EXECUTED. AND THEN I JUST WANT TO REFER TO project really quick on the staff report so we're expecting construction to begin in obviously 2025 so in the next 45 days and to be completed in spring of 2026 okay you know the only thing I that I really really hate about that is the liquor store right front of it I get calls there's people drinking outside the building when all these stuff comes in in the building and everything is beautiful I just wish something we could do with that liquor store. It's a lack of communication there. There's drugs. There's even gambling there. So somehow we could look into it closely, and hopefully one day we could shut down that liquor store, you know, because we don't need it around our kids. Thank you. We will definitely work with our partners in PD and code enforcement. And I know Council Member Villalpudo and know how that process works from Planning Commission. So we just need to have those complaints. I do have questions as well. So again, this is under the engineer's estimate. I know that there's a small contingency there, but I really want to make sure that this contractor, this construction company delivers as they said they would, unless there's something that flies out of the sky and comes crashing down on Columbus Park, that, you know, 2,345,000, that's a hard number there. Let's expand on that a little bit, right, because I just want to make sure I'm totally transparent here. So with construction, right, you get in the dirt. You know, who knows what happened, right? And that's why we have the contingency. But to your point, the contract amount plus the contingency amount in our changeover authority, we will not be coming back to council to ask for more money. Just what I wanted to hear. Thank you so much. Do we have a motion? Council Member Villalpudo? Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Council Members, please vote. okay motion carries seven zero forty five days get that contract done and let's get working okay moving on to uh... now new business but we're gonna take a ten minute break is everybody okay with the ten minute break okay so we are bringing this meeting back to order and we are starting with new business and we'll start off with item 15.1, let me read it real quick because I find it in my page here while I'm waiting for Councilwoman to get out here. Accept fiscal year 2024-25 first quarter budget status update and authorized budget amendments. Hello again. Good evening, Imelda Arroyo, budget officer. So I'll be going over the fiscal year 24-25 first quarter budget update. So the information that will be presented is cumulative from July 1st through September 30th and so those three months is what comprises the first quarter for fiscal year 24-25. So I'll start with an overview of the general fund budget. The details can be found in attachment A of the staff report. So as of September 30th, 2024, the adopted budget increased from 328.3 million to 390.2 million. And so that was done, we did have about 8.65 million for encumbrances and contract rollover. from fiscal year 23-24 into 24-25. And then we had about 24.99 million for capital rollover. And then about 3.09 million for approved carryover, again from fiscal year 23-24 into 24-25. And then approved funding for projects of about 25 So the total of all of those from the adopted budget to the items that I mentioned brings us to the 390.2 million. The general fund revenues year to date are at 31.8 million, which is 10% of the 320.5 million budget. And then the general fund expenditures to date are at 70.5 million, which is about 18% of the 390.2 million budget. I apologize, it looks better on the screen than up there. So we have four general fund revenue categories that you guys can refer to on attachment A on the top. And so you can see that all of them are below the 25%, you know, pro rata monthly collection. because of the receipt of the funds is seasonal so like for example for sales tax you're not going to start seeing some of those coming in until later quarters as it takes even just 90 days from the time that you know the initial transaction takes place to by the time that the city actually sees the revenue so we have 9.27 for general taxes in terms of how much has been received For Measure A sales tax, we've received about 7.63%. For program revenues, about 17.55%. And then for the inter-fund reimbursements, about 22.66%. So next I'll go over the general fund expenditures. So as of September 2024, the first quarter expenditures of 70.5 million were at, like I said earlier, 18% of the 390.2 million. And so also in attachment A of the staff report presents the revised annual general fund budget with the actual revenues and the expenditures for the first three months. So overall, you're able to see that the departments are below the 25% expenditure level. So we have police at 22%, fire at 22%, public works at 19%, economic development at 9%, OVP at 25%, program support for 8%, administration at 14%, and debt at zero as most of the debt payments are not done until the later quarters. So next I have the Measure A guidelines presentation. So as you guys remember, we did implement the Measure A guidelines back in, when was it? I believe it was like in July of 2024. And so this is the very first quarter that we're actually presenting the guidelines to you guys. I know that I did provide a... around the bench memo that kind of updates the the original or the attachment B schedule that was attached to to the staff report so what was changed was on there's like there's the measure a revenues section then you have the measure B expenditures which are the 65% that are dedicated to to public safety and then you have the 35% that are for like the recovery of restoration of services. So I know in the original one, we had like two line items for like two things that had been funded out of the general fund. So instead we're kind of lumping it together and just calling it restoration of services. And then if you have questions or if you have a question. Yeah, so I do have a question. So mine is more of a number question. So it shows the actual first quarter as $9,274,423. Correct. Now if we continue that trend, we're actually going to be $1,688,000 under the approved budget, correct? Correct. Okay. then that causes pause because we have allocated funds for different things. So is that where then we're gonna be waiting for vacancy savings to save us on that? I mean, I just. What do you mean? Well, because this is for staffing at 425 officers, correct? 60 sworn officers. I know, but our total would be 425. So if we're at 399 now, THAT MEANS THERE'S 26 POSITIONS LEFT TO FILL. IF WE FILL THOSE 26 POSITIONS BEFORE JULY 1ST, THIS POTENTIALLY WE COULD BE 1,688,000. OKAY. VICE MAYOR? IN LOOKING AT THIS PRESENTATION WHERE WE SEE 32%, AGAIN, THIS IS THE QUARTERLY This is a quarterly report, right? Correct. So where it's 32%, that means, well, we're 7% over budget in that area. Do we then, do we balance it out over the next three quarters or how does that work? So I know we've been holding meetings with police department. And so what the recruitment, retention, and wellness efforts, I mean, those are essentially the side letter that was approved. So we're basically reviewing those to see how are they comparing to what we actually budgeted. So based on that, I mean, it is, there are some items that are starting to go over the budget. And so we are having meetings with the department to again assess and see if some of those are going to have to be adjusted. And as you guys remember, the side letter was approved with the contingent that it wasn't going to be a burden on the general fund. So there are two budget adjustments that we are recommending. So the first is for 400 East Main rent payments, they're now being allocated directly to the rent expenses without passing through the general fund property rentals revenue. So we are asking for a BA or for a budget amendment to reduce the general fund property rentals revenue budget. by about 960,000 to account for that change. So is this because we have yet to move into New City Hall when we had projected to move in there? So this is kind of a practice where the revenue was coming into the general fund, the general fund was making the payments, but now the departments are paying the lease directly. So the revenue is not coming into the general fund to make the payments. Okay, so... Are we on month to month? Do we have a longer lease agreement as it flexes between August, September, October? We probably are going to be asking Tina to come in. I know that Chad and Economic Development have been working in terms of requesting extensions to the 400 East. Because I know it's market rate then. We had a sweet deal. Oh, hi, Tina. Good evening, Tina McCarty, Acting Economic Development Director. We are currently working, the county is in the works of buying 400 East Main, so we are working with them and working through arrangement to extend our lease a bit. Okay, thank you. And then the other item is for, there was an approved, the approved fire truck number seven restoration project, so the fire department does need to appropriate about 108 thousand for the backfill overtime for the annual leave and sick time coverage for one firefighter engineer and six firefighters to staff truck seven for the current year. So the 24-25 first quarter recommendations are to accept the first quarter budget status update and then also to adapt a resolution to approve the two budget amendments. Any questions from council? Public comment? Julie Dunning, please. I didn't get to see what the around the memo said, so maybe you already know what. No, it's my fault. I didn't. Well, I'll take a copy and look at it. But I'm glad everybody's sitting down because guess what? The Victory Park pool question has been answered. And I would be remiss if I didn't stress to you how valuable both Chad Reed and Imelda were in solving that. The amount of time, transparency, and trust. They built in walking me through their patients and answering all my questions, going back and re-looking and explaining, and we were able to get to a point where I understood, I agreed, and this was great as I'm on the Measure A committee and I didn't want to go into the first meeting with this question unresolved. Excellent staff, both of them, and I thank them both very, very much for their hard work, and most of all, their patience and grace with me. Thank you. Great. Maybe the record can hire you to write a column where you can put that good information out there. I would be honored to. Okay. Okay, bringing it back to council, looking for a motion. Motion. Second. Okay, council members, please vote. Oh. Re-vote, re-vote. Hold on. We have to reset first. It's OK. OK. Go ahead and vote. Are you hitting the wrong button? Is that a yes vote or a no vote? It's a yes vote. OK. Council carries the motion 7-0. Mayor, can we do a roll call vote just in case? Okay, roll call vote. Council Member Blauer? Yes. Council Member Enriquez? Yes. Council Member Ponce? Yes. Council Member Padilla? Yes. Council Member Villapedua? Yes. Vice Mayor Lee? Yes. And Mayor Fugazi? Yes. Somebody always has to. Motion passes 7-0. 7-0. Okay. Moving on to item 15.2. Accept the quarterly investment report for quarter ended December 31st, 2024. Okay. Start over. Carmen Barragan as debt and treasury manager for the city of Stockton. I'm here to present the quarterly investment report ending December 31st for the city's cash and investment. This report is normally done every quarter on consent item. However, this time around we thought we'd bring it to council so you guys could do it, so we could do a short presentation so we could talk about how the city's money is invested. With us tonight I have our two representatives from our asset management firms that will present on how the city's money is being invested and how the market is doing. So first I have Justin Rosarello with PFM Asset Management and he'll go ahead and start off. Good evening, Council. My name is Justin Resuelo with PFM Asset Management. I'm an institutional sales and relationship manager based in San Francisco, so I'm delighted to be with you this evening. Thank you for the opportunity to review the portfolio with you all. This first slide is titled A Look Back, and what we wanted to do was look back on how on the year that was 2024, Core CPI ended the year at around 3.3%, annualized year over year. Consumer spending continues to drive the majority of U.S. economic GDP growth, contributing to nearly two-thirds of the U.S. economy. Inflation and labor ended where most market participants expected, and the general U.S. economy continues to be strong as we see that in yields, normalizing and generally steepening. That said, rates did come down, with the overnight rate down nearly one full point at the end of the calendar year after three rate cuts during the year. Our expectation for future rates will largely depend on inflation getting closer to the 2% level that the Fed has talked about, as well as labor markets remaining strong. We also expect that the Fed will continue its rate cut pause, as they did beginning in January. However, the uncertainty persists among many fiscal policies that have been pronounced from Washington DC, which may disturb the progress that the Fed has made toward taming inflation and promoting maximum employment in order to drive growth in the US economy. The right side of this chart shows one to five and one to 10 year benchmark returns for the year. And we can see that fixed income assets continue to perform quite well with returns that range in a three to 5% for the year. This next slide speaks to recent interest rate trends, and the Fed continues to drive the changes that we see in Treasury yields. While the September dot plot showed around four cuts expected for the year, the December dot plot now shows two, and many market participants expect less than two at this point in time. The yellow line on the left side of this page shows the three-month overnight yield trend, which has benefited the city in its recent highs. Overnight yields have fallen, as I mentioned earlier, by about one percentage point. And before our meeting, they ended at about 4.30 up from 4.23 at year end. The blue line on the right side of the chart represents the 10-year trend, which has also benefited the city, helping to generate meaningful interest income that has helped portfolio performance throughout the year. We see that rates increased by around half a point during the year, and before our meeting, Treasury yields are down to 4.25 from around 4.58 at the year end. So what does this all mean for the portfolio? You can see now the invested program managed by PFM Asset Management. Portfolio balances for the city now stand at $460 million. Yield at cost is 3.78%, and this represents the portfolio's earnings rate looking forward, essentially the yield of the portfolio as it has been bought over time. Average duration is 3.07, which benefits the city by potentially helping to lock in coupons further out on the yield curve in exchange for some potential additional volatility. The average credit rating of the portfolio is high, with approximately 84% of the portfolio rated AA and higher. The pie chart in the upper right side of this slide shows sector allocations for the portfolio, and the large majority of the invested corpus is in treasuries followed by agency commercial mortgage-backed securities and corporate bonds. This next slide speaks to performance for the portfolio managed by PFM Asset Management, and this shows it for various periods. I'll first address the three month period on the far left side of the chart. Observe that interest earned was $3.7 million from the period October 1st through December 31st. With the increase in interest rates during the quarter, we saw market values in the portfolio decline by about 9 million as there's an inverse relationship between yields and bond prices. This results in a total dollar adjustment that was about 5.4 million during the quarter. And with respect to performance, the portfolio yielded negative 1.15% during the quarter, while the benchmark against which the portfolio was measured returned 1.34. So we outperformed the benchmark by 19 basis points. Similarly, please observe that we've outperformed the benchmark for all the remaining periods here. One very important fact that I want to draw your attention to is the growth in interest income. You can see 3.7 million generated in the most recent quarter. But if you look at each of the remaining periods on the slide, one year, three year, five year, and seven year, if you look at those on a quarterly basis, we now outpace those prior periods. One year generated 3.4 million. Three years generated 2.3 million. Five year, 2.2. and seven year 2.3. So the interest income is now very meaningful for the city. I have a question. Can I ask a question? Okay. So explain to me because earlier in another meeting I had asked for a budget for dummies presentation trying to understand the three I see the numbers. What signifies or what creates the growth from 3.7 million to 45 million? I mean what is it that's How is that number growing like that? Yeah, thank you for your question. That's a great question. So it's not that these numbers are, I'm going to say growing, but rather these are the interest earnings that were generated over that time period. So you mentioned the 45 million about the five year column. So about 45 million in interest earnings were generated over the past five years, whereas 3.7 million was generated just in the past quarter. No, I get that. I guess what I'm asking is, because if you look over the last five years, it says that there were 66.66 million accrued. So that number will, can you guesstimate or can you look based on this trend how much it's going to continue to grow? That's another great question. Is it really a great question or are you just saying it? No, no, I genuinely appreciate this because oftentimes I have counsel or elected officials who frankly just you know, push go and we're done. I mean, I'm thinking in my own life, like, how can I put something in that gets me a return like this and, like, how far will it keep going? Yeah, I mean, so California State Code prescribes certain fixed income asset classes for cities, agencies in California. All these are invested in fixed income bonds, and those bonds, just like a mortgage, have sort of interest coupon payments that are paid, you know, for example, every six months, perhaps every one month. So... this interest income is really generated by those fixed and predictable interest payments that we see. And more recently, as interest rates have risen, we were in a period where, you know, rates were near zero, you know, for call it 12 to 16 years or so, right? But over the past year plus, we now see 4% or 5% interest rates. And now the city is able to benefit from a lot of that, which you see in the interest numbers on this page. And this interest as it accrues or accumulates, does it then go into our general budget or where does that money then go or where is it kept? I'll have to defer. Yeah. So yes. So interest is distributed based on the daily cash balance of a fund. So depending on how much the general fund has in a cash balance, then that interest is then distributed to each of the funds in that way. Thank you. All right. So looking forward, you know, we've spoken to inflation, which has fallen, but has picked back up in recent months with, you know, a lot of the sort of pronouncements from Washington, D.C. And while there were rate cuts that we saw in 2024, there continues to be a general sentiment that rates are expected to remain higher for longer. We enjoy our partnership with the city and will continue to work hard to enhance returns for the city's invested portfolio. And despite the uncertainty we see related to fiscal and monetary policy, the portfolio duration is conservatively managed as neutral to benchmark. As the portfolio is actively traded, we work hard to ensure that overnight and invested accounts are optimized to generate returns that are appropriate and in line with the guide rails of the city's investment policy. and as always we function with the central tenants for principal preservation and liquidity when we strategically deploy the city's corpus so that concludes my prepared remarks and I want to thank you for your time you have another question so I know that you know when we're out talking to constituents we always tell people that local politics matter focus on the local whatever and then hearing that there is a direct connection to what's happening in D.C., what impacts do you just forecast that we'll see as it relates to the information in this presentation from what's happening in D.C.? No, that's another excellent question. You really believe that? Thank you for allowing me to speak more. You know, we think about inflation. You know, a lot and a lot of that is being driven potentially by tariffs, which, you know, as we see in equity valuations over the past several days, you know, they've been challenged. Taxes, while those may be positive for growth, they may be, frankly, negative for the deficit. We saw that in the policies that were put forth by Congress earlier this week, and we'll see how that all shakes out. Immigration, that'll certainly have a negative impact to labor if companies have to pay for more expensive wages. So labor mix will certainly change. And lastly, we think regulation may have potentially positive impacts on financial institutions and energy. And that may drive growth, but certainly a lot of the sort of bigger clouds, bigger elephants in the room, namely are labor, immigration, and taxes. And the last question, I don't know if it's for you or for the city staff, but Is there a mechanism that triggers the council being informed if something critical happens to our investment? Or the information you share? Well, so if there is something, yes, we would bring it to council to let you know. We do have that obligation to let you know when something critical does happen. Okay, thanks. And so we have two portfolios. In 2022, we split the, the city moved to have our portfolio split between two different managing companies. And so the second is Jason, I'm sorry, Jason Schmidt with Chandler Asset Management Company. Why did we split the portfolios between two companies and which one's better? No, I'm just playing. But why do we, I do want that answer, but why do we split? I believe to maximize our potential interest earnings. Thank you. I can actually give you a little bit more color on that. As I was there during the RFP process on that and the city at that time decided that they wanted two investment managers because they wanted two separate opinions on the markets and also two different styles in the way that the money was managed. And so in that way they felt that they got diversification amongst the different styles of the managers and also got two different companies so they don't have all their eggs in one basket as they're looking at different companies too at the same time. Okay, so then my question and again I don't want to be here all night and I know everybody up here is saying please stop asking questions. Never mind, I'm going to hold my question but I'm going to make a note of it. Okay, perfect. All right, I'm not going to go ahead and repeat everything because a lot of those things have been said. I'll just give you what our viewpoints are. So here you have employment looking on the left-hand side there. What you can see is that that's non-farm payrolls. That dark green line there is the actual number. The dashed line there is the three-month moving average. What I want you to take away from here is that employment is slowing. at the end of the day. And so we came off of those very big pandemic numbers back in 2021, and now what you can see is it's slowing. It did pick up a little bit more as we got into the fourth quarter, but definitely our expectation is that it's likely to continue to slow. What you can see there on the right-hand side is the unemployment rate. The green line there is the headline number. The dashed line is what we call the underemployment rate, those people that might be wanting to work full-time but might be working part-time. And what you can see there, it's been relatively steady. but we're getting close to that 4% number. And so I do think that what you can take away from here is that the labor market is weakening somewhat, but at some pretty lofty levels that we saw over a couple years ago. Then we look at inflation. That's been the big key, right? I mean, everybody's been worried about inflation. Actually, if you read the papers today, what's the big inflation thing that everybody's talking about? Price of eggs at the end of the day. And so this is looking at a broader measure. So the CPI, or the Consumer Price Index, That green line there is the headline. The dashed line there is the CPI rate excluding food and energy, and that's looking at a year-over-year rate. So we topped out there around 9% on the headline number since that period of time, and it has been falling. We also saw that interest rates topped out, too, at the end of the day. So we saw that the federal funds rate topped out around 5.25, 5.5. Since inflation has been coming down, the Federal Reserve has been lowering interest rates at the same time. At the right-hand side, you can see the personal consumption expenditures. Remember the Federal Reserve? This is their preferred rate for looking at inflation. The green line there is the headline. The dashed line there is the core. And you can see their target rate of 2% is that orange line. They have not achieved that yet, but they have seen that come down. We'll have to see what happens in the future as far as we have a lot of things going on in Washington, a lot of things that could impact the economy, both on a short-term and a longer-term basis. So we'll be watching that. But right now what you can see is that inflation has abated. We haven't hit the Federal Reserve's targets, but they have started to lower interest rates. Our expectation is that the Federal Reserve will lower interest rates again this year approximately one to two times, 25 basis points apiece. We'll have to see kind of, you know, what the timing of that is. We would think the first chance that we get is probably in June that we would see potentially the Fed lower their interest rates at that time. We have seen those since the administration has put the tariffs in. And also there's been some expectation that we might be seeing some slower growth, that interest rates have fallen. So we have the two year treasury note that traded below 4% for the first time in a while now. And so we are starting to see some of that impacts and investors start to look at that expectation. Looking at bond yields, so what you can see on the right hand side here, this is looking back over five years here. The dotted line, there's the two year treasury note yield. The dashed line there, I'm sorry, is the five-year, and the 10-year note is that solid green line. If you look over on the right-hand side, you can see the yield curve itself, looking at U.S. Treasuries. The bottom access there is the terms, and then you can see on the left-hand side, there are the actual yields. What I really want you to take away from here is that used to, if you look at the dotted line, the yield curve was actually inverted, where shorter-term rates were higher than longer-term rates. That's not normal. And so what's now happening is that as the Federal Reserve has lowered interest rates, you've actually seen too that the yield curve has come down. And you can see the most recent there is January 2025. And the yield curve between two years and ten years, which is really what the market looks at when it looks at an inversion of the yield curve typically, is actually not inverted anymore. So we're more towards a more normal environment. Looking at your portfolio, looking at the characteristics, So this is a table here. This shows some basic characteristics, the benchmark, and what your portfolio was on 1231 versus 930. You can see the average maturity of your portfolio is at 2.98. The duration, remember that duration is your portfolio sensitivity interest rates. The greater that number, the more sensitive. The lesser that number, the less sensitive. The purchase yield is 3.01. The market deal is 4.49. It's a AA plus rated portfolio. It's approximately $332 million. Looking at how that's allocated, you can see the different types of securities that are in the portfolio. You can see that U.S. Treasuries are approximately 41%, corporates around 25%. You can see ABS, or asset-backed securities, are around 22%. You can also see that agency collateralized mortgage obligations are around 2.2%. Negotiable CDs are 182, muni bonds are 124. And so you can see it's a very well diversified portfolio using all the tools in the toolbox in order to achieve the goals of the city. Here you can look at how the portfolio is structured as far as different maturities or durations. You can see your portfolio is in the green. Your benchmark is out of the gray. And notice that you have more shorter term securities than that of the benchmark. also some longer term securities too than that of the benchmark. So looking to early on here gravitate to some of the securities that were longer than that of the benchmark, grabbing some of those higher yields, but also having liquidity also at the same time, especially when we have the inverted yield curve to grab those higher yields. There you can see the returns here. The top is the graph. The middle is actually the earnings. I'd rather point you towards the bottom there. which is actually looking at your rate of return versus that of the benchmark. You can see that your portfolio was down actually 70 basis points, and that's because we had a rise in interest rates over the last three quarters. But if you look at that 12-month number, about 3.8%, that two-year number, about 4.19%. We have not been managing the portfolio as long as PFM. That's why we don't have as much of a track record here. But you can see that your portfolio is earning between 3% and 4% here. This is looking at the different part of the sleeve of the portfolio. This is the enhanced cash. Here is looking to just earn a return that is higher than that of some of your liquidity vehicles and things like that. You can see the average maturity there as of 12-31 was 0.04. The duration was same. You can see the purchase yield there was a 427. Look back at 9-30 of 2024. It was 5.22%. That just shows you how much interest rates have come down over that short period of time. The market deal is 429. It's a AAA-rated portfolio, and that portfolio is approximately $31 million. And with that, I can answer any questions that you may have. Are there any questions from council? Any public comment? There are no public comments. Okay. So we are going to look for a motion and a second. So moved. Second. Okay, council members, please vote. Let's see what council member, oh, look, it worked. Yes, motion carries 7-0. Thank you so much for your presentation. Okay, the moment the public has all been waiting for, 15.3 program update on AVA community energy. Take it away, Grant. I'm just here for a brief moment, Grant Kirkpatrick, Environmental and Sustainability Officer, to introduce our AVA community representative who's going to go through this presentation. And then we'll both be available for questions afterwards, so Alex. Good evening, Mayor Fugazi, Vice Mayor Lee, members of the city council, city staff, members of the public. Again, my name is Alex DiGiorgio. I'm the senior manager of public engagement for AVA Community Energy, and I'm thrilled to be here with you this evening. Sometimes these presentations create more questions than they answer, so if that's the case tonight, I'll try to expedite the presentation as quickly as I can, and we'll get to Q&A, because I know that there are some burning questions out there. So what is... Ava Community Energy, we are a local government agency. We're a joint powers authority, and our mission is to provide cleaner electricity at lower rates. It's a straightforward statement, but a complex process. So as a not-for-profit public agency, we reinvest revenues, i.e. your ratepayer dollars, into the community through lower rates, electrification programs. renewable power projects, and support for community-based organizations. And I'll detail some of that here in this presentation. Just a quick overview. AVA Community Energy began in Alameda County. So we've been serving communities in Alameda County since 2018. We serve all of the cities, except for the city of Alameda, that island right there. They have their own municipal utility district, so they weren't eligible for our service. But we serve all of the other incorporated jurisdictions, as well as the county itself. The city of Tracy was the first jurisdiction outside of Alameda County to join our agency. They began service in 2020. And now the cities of both Lathrop and Stockton are, at this moment, embarking on the launch of service. I'll also note that San Joaquin County, the Board of Supervisors, voted unanimously to join our agency as well. So they are now a member of our joint powers authority and service will begin to the unincorporated areas in 2026. So this map is going to get a lot darker green to the east. I won't belabor this, but just the quick history here. I want to point out that in 2022, when Lathrop and with Stockton both joining, board of directors decided that we're no longer East Bay Community Energy originally we had launched as East Bay Community Energy when we were just in Alameda County but now that we're serving such a large portion outside of Alameda County they decided to rebrand as AVA Community Energy and AVA is it's not an acronym it's just a nod to both Alameda County in the valley what are the benefits of this So there are more benefits that I can mention here this evening, but the ones that are most top of mind would be certainly the lower rates that we provide, and I'll detail that in a moment, but also local control. Our board of directors is composed of a democratically elected official from every jurisdiction that we serve. The mayor serves on our board of directors. Our board of directors is responsible for approving our rates, programs, and policies. We are regulated by the CPUC, but we're independent when it comes to setting our rates. There's, of course, the sustainability aspect. We're trying to rapidly reduce energy related greenhouse gas emissions. And then there's just the basic fundamental value of Customer choice. I was born and raised here in California, always been a PG&E customer. It wasn't until a community choice agency like AVA came along that I actually had a choice and an option of where my energy came from. Very quickly, AVA is only responsible for the generation of the power. So the resources that generate the power, wind, solar, hydroelectricity, that's what we're responsible for. PG&E is still responsible for delivering the energy. And they're still responsible for all the billing services. So all of our customers are still PG&E customers for everything except for the source of the energy. And if folks don't want to purchase energy from AVA for whatever reason, you can simply opt out and you'll be purchasing it again from PG&E and their energy supply at their rates, which are a little bit higher than ours. I know this is a familiar sight, but maybe not such a welcome one, the power bill. I want to detail here exactly what it looks like for customers. So historically, PG&E has provided both services of generating the electricity and delivering the electricity. With a community choice agency like AVA, those two services are split. And so for our customers, they will see a separate line item on the bill. for AVA's electric generation charges. I want to emphasize that those are not additional charges. Those are replacement charges for what PG&E would have otherwise charged for those services. And our rates, again, are 5% lower than PG&E's. And I can get into more questions about billing when the time comes, but for the sake of time, I'm going to move along here. currently offer two options the bright choice option which is our standard option for most communities and that's the option that's at a discounted rate it's currently at 55% renewable it's actually closer to about 85% carbon-free when you add in large hydroelectric resources in the state of California those don't count as renewable but they are emissions free and then we also offer for those who want it a 100% renewable option it's a blend of wind and solar it's priced at a quarter of a cent more per kilowatt hour which for the average resident in our service area it comes to about three to five dollars more per month it can fluctuate with usage so we definitely caution people that if you do have times when you use a lot of energy that quarter percent per kilowatt can add up but nevertheless almost half of our member jurisdictions have actually defaulted to that 100 renewable option In Stockton, we're going to start out with the discounted option as the default option, but those who want it can choose the Renewable 100 option as well. And I probably should have said earlier, and I can emphasize this later as well, that the default option, that is by state law, community choice energy agencies like ours, by state law, we have to become the default provider of service. And people can certainly opt out if they choose to, and they do. And there's no fee. No, there's no fee. I'm not going to belabor this too much, but one of the reasons why we exist is to catalyze sustainable development, both within our communities and throughout the state of California, and we're doing that at a pretty fast clip. We've got upwards of almost two dozen contracts, over 1,200 megawatts of renewable energy. These are projects that are real steel on the ground, union labor, and they're... actually catalyzing sustainable development throughout California. The battery storage is really important, too, because that allows you to capture the wind and the sun and then dispatch it when it's needed most. So that's often in the evening. Let's talk about the enrollment process for a moment. So I mentioned before that by law, by state law, we become the default provider of service, but for those who want to opt out, they can. We also want to make sure people know they have these options. By law, we have to send four enrollment notices. The first one went out in February. The second one is going out this month. And then the next two will go out sequentially in the ensuing months. We also have a robust community outreach campaign that we're launching right now. I can detail that in a moment. But make sure to check your mail. And we also send notices by email as well if we have your email on file. And we'll be sending customized notices to customers that have solar, because their situation is a little more unique. And also, the notices are co-branded with the city, so you'll see that and you'll know it's not junk mail. Just to pause, because I know that there are a lot of customers with solar in the cities of Stockton and Lathrop. For those with solar, you will be transitioned in accordance with your true-up date. For those who don't know what a true-up is, that's when the utility... kind of equalizes your usage. They balance it out between how much you've used and how much you've generated. And so they either issue a credit or they send you a bill. So that process is going to occur on your true update. And for customers who have solar and they have specific questions about their bill, we welcome their calls so that we can address those questions. One other detail, though, for solar customers. If you are with AVA and you have $100 or more of surplus generation credit, we will actually send you a check in the mail if you so choose. And people do get checks. We send out tens of thousands of dollars a year in checks to customers who are surplus generators. So again, just the timeline. Right now, we're right in the middle. The second enrollment notice has gone out. THE ACTUAL ENROLLMENT WILL OCCUR ON YOUR APRIL BILLING CYCLE, SO THE DATE AT WHICH YOU'D GET BILLED BY PG&E, THAT'S THE DATE AT WHICH YOU'D CUT OVER AND TRANSITION TO AVA SERVICE. FOR FOLKS WHO DON'T WANT AVA SERVICE AT ALL, WE ENCOURAGE YOU TO OPT OUT BY MID-MARCH SO THAT YOU AREN'T ENROLLED IN APRIL. OH, AND OF COURSE, THE FIRST CHARGES YOU'LL SEE FROM AVA WILL BE ON YOUR MAY BILL. AGAIN, THE NOTICES We try to have a variety of different notices. Some are in a sealed envelope. Of course, in Stockton, it'll have Stockton's seal there, not Lathrop's. But we also send notices that are a little bit more kind of branded, a trifold brochure. There you go. The mayor's got it. We're trying to cover all bases to make sure people actually get these notices so that they can make an informed decision on what they'd like to do. Opting out. Now, we obviously... We want to encourage folks to stick with AVA. We offer lower rates, cleaner electricity, local control. But at the same time, we also want to respect people's wishes. And if they want to opt out, we want to facilitate that. You can do so online or by phone. And I just checked the data before I came here. As of last week, there have been about 1,400 opt outs. And and several opt-ups 1400 might sound like a lot It's about one one point two percent of the customers here in the city So it's not that high but I'm emphasizing that because that's evidence that people are getting the message and people are taking action So we look at opt-outs as as a measure that people are being reached with our messaging. Oh Yes, and as the mayor said there is no five dollar fee that that There was a glitch on our display at one point, but there is not a $5 fee to opt out. So there are a few common misconceptions. We just want to clarify that if you are on any discount programs, like low-income discount programs, CARE, FARA, or Medical Baseline, none of those change with AVA's service. You don't need to re-enroll. You don't need to do anything. All of that is seamless. There's an official who's on our board from every jurisdiction that we serve, as I mentioned before. That's because we are a local government agency, and this is now a democratic endeavor to provide the energy services, the electricity services, that is. We don't provide gas services. That's still going to be PG&E. Oh, and the only compensation that our board members receive is $128 per meeting that they attend. We have monthly board meetings, and I am... I know that for some who are traveling very far, our board meetings are held in Oakland. So for those who are traveling very far, that might cover the cost. We get this question a lot. How can you be cheaper? And really, it fundamentally comes down to the fact that we are a public agency. And so that gives us three sustained competitive advantages. The first is that we do not have to pay shareholder dividends. So we don't have to take your rate payer dollars and turn those into shareholder profits. Instead, we can reinvest those in lower rates. We also have a lower tax burden because we're a government agency, and as a municipal agency, we have access to cheaper capital through municipal bonds. Also, just to be very straightforward, we are a small, nimble organization, a fraction of the size of PG&E. To put it candidly, PG&E probably has more lawyers and lobbyists than we do employees, and there's probably a cost savings there, too. We do not have door-to-door salespeople. If anyone comes knocking on your door saying that they're with Ava Energy, Close the door. That's not us. We don't do that. And if your power goes out, you're still going to call PG&E because PG&E is still maintaining the lines and wires. So you're still going to be calling PG&E if your power goes out or if you have questions about the actual service of the delivery of the energy. Customer outreach. We are at events. We're holding webinars. We're attending public meetings. If you have a community group that you think would benefit from having one of our representatives come and present to them, we'd be more than happy to do so. We have employees that live here in the city of Stockton as well. So we would be more than happy to get in front of as many audiences as possible. We want people to know about this so that they can make a choice of where their energy comes from. And I can also go into some of the other advertising and provide examples of that for those who are interested. We're on social media, just like all the hip folks are these days. And so Instagram, Facebook, Nextdoor, we're on there. We're trying to get the word out in every way, shape, or form. Lastly, just some key resources. We have a Stockton-specific landing page on our website. Because we're a public agency, we are subject to the Brown Act. All our meetings are open to the public. You are more than welcome. In fact, you're encouraged to attend, make public comment, have your voice be heard. All of our key documents are available online. Our budgeting process, it's all done in a transparent process. And with that, I'd be more than happy to take questions. Thank you. Thank you. Very informative. Vice Mayor. First of all, thank you. I really appreciate how thorough the presentation was. I've been trying to just wrap my mind around this whole AVA rollout thing because when I first heard about it and I was asked to speak at the press conference, I did as much research as I could. I had a meeting with your team. I thought I was well informed. I saw the benefits. I know most people think that PG&E is a terrorist organization. I don't understand the way they charge. It's criminal to say the least in my opinion. And then here comes along Ava, and at the press conference I said, wow, this is like Robin Hood, you know, taken from the rich, given to the barely surviving. And then afterwards I went online and it was just like, Christina's getting $190,000 a year. It just became all this gossip and just rumor mill that just kind of eclipsed the opportunity, right? So the first question I have is, well, let me first back up. I think you should absolutely... partner with each one of us at some point to do a presentation to our districts. I think even if it's an online community forum, which I'm good about getting online, I think a Zoom presentation, answer questions, because it seems like the presentation was also coupled with people's anger towards PG&E, people's lack of trust in government or lack of trust in new opportunity. And I just think that there would be such a benefit to the community to be able to have an online or some type of forum with your organization to answer questions. So that's number one, just a recommendation. I want to do it. So what my colleagues do is up to them. The second thing is this fact sheet or fact FAQ in here. I mean, it would be great if we had social media assets that had that information. So when you see all the comments online, we can be sharing social media posts if you have it. I think giving it to council members to be able to share on social media would be a good thing. And then the third thing is I think if there was some type of visual, like an audio-visual explanation of different things, sort of like the way Kaiser did the Thrive campaign where they just kind of explained in a very clear way what the benefits were, I think would go a long way because people share a lot of information on social media. And before people even tried to do the research, it was like opt out, opt out, opt out. Anyway, I kind of gave up, but this gives me hope that there's good information that we can get out to people, and I'll help in any way I can. Thank you, Vice Mayor Lee. I appreciate the comparison to Kaiser, too, because we consider ourselves the public option for energy administered at the local level. And thank you for the suggestions. We'll follow up on that. Council Member Blauer. Thank you, Mayor. I want to thank you for this presentation. I do think it's just very, very important that the community become more educated about AVA. I think that there are misperceptions out there And this is really a good thing. So I look at the 1,400 people that, you know, have already chosen to opt out. And you said it's a small number, but it's like, why wouldn't you want to get a 5% discount? I mean, 5%, it's not a huge amount, but gosh, every bit helps. And knowing that you're using it from a cleaner energy source. So I think getting that word out and doing education is just a huge component of this. I think those 1,400 people, they have 60 days to change their mind, right? Oh, yes. Thank you. They do. In fact, if they've already opted out, then they can request a return at any time. It's if they opt out after 60 days of service by PG&E's standards and terms and conditions, they'll be required to stay with PG&E for a year before they can return to our service. So for now, if they've opted out, they're welcome to return at any time. And I do like the Vice Mayor's idea. I think getting into the different districts and holding educational events makes huge sense. So I would like to participate in that as well. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Enriquez. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Yes, I echo. I thank you again for the presentation. I echo what my colleagues have shared so far. To the point of just for clarification, I know just so folks that are listening, folks that are here, It's great that on your website you mentioned 144 million saved since 2018 by customers to those who would have rather paid PG&E. You don't do door knocking, and their taxes aren't being used to utilize this service. One of the things in terms of the whole opt-out that I know I saw online was, well, why am I being forced? And for the record, this is a state law, right? This is state law AB 117 that on the Stockton website. So please go to the Stockton website for those listening, type in Ava Community Energy. Has a great rundown of all the information. And with the meeting where city council on September 13, 2022 voted on, that has a resolution, has the recorded meetings. So those that want to see that, you know, this has been going on since 2022. But even before that, we also want to give thanks to huge environmental green advocates you know Mayor Fugazi former council member Dan Wright those that know Davis Harper and others that were really committed and city staff that were really trying to bring a way to help minimize costs for the people of Stockton so I want to just put that out there in terms of I know the automatic enrollment was a question of concern and I know you covered it but I want to specifically mention that to the vice mayor's point about community outreach i see here that you've already had two webinars one was actually today at 4 30. i just found out about it and i'm not blaming anybody anybody but i mean if this is on our city website that we had one yesterday at 12 30 and one today at 4 30 um my question would be if they're recorded we'd love to share it and doing the additional work of us being in our districts to bring people in to further educate about AVA and the partnership. So that'd be helpful. I just noticed that on our website. And then one last thing too is in terms of our website, I was looking at the main AVA website and I've had some constituents of mine ask me if there's any way that we can get, I don't know if customer reviews, thoughts, just folks that have been utilizing AVA, especially in the East Bay towns for the last five, six-ish years. If there's a way where we can just have that, just provide any folks that want to feel more at ease to say, wow, I've been with Ava for X amount, this has been great. And would that be possible? And then I have another question. Sure, like testimonials from our current customers? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'm sure we could figure out some way. We have to respect customer confidentiality. Of course. But I'm thinking maybe, especially if we could find some commercial or industrial customers, that would go a long way. Because that 5% really adds up for those customers those large businesses yeah exactly and for those you know every little bit counts as my colleagues have shared if it's if you're saving five ten bucks a month and think about that that's 60 80 bucks in a year that's someone's groceries run that you can make and that could be life-saving for families that we're not really thinking about so every dollar really adds up when we're making that grocery run or we have to pay something diapers etc and then maybe this is to the staff for the ava community energy page on our city website if we can provide just update it, if we are able to do more webinars, provide that updated information. And then also for the opt in, for those that opted out that wanna later opt in, I wanna make sure it's not confusing for folks. So to say, oh, do I go to the ABLE website? Do I go to the city website? How do I get educated? If there's a way, if this is the streamline for our people to be on the city website, let's make sure that there's a section that says, opted out, this is how you opt back in. I think that'd be helpful for folks. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Councilmember Villalpudo. Yes, thank you, Mayor. Great presentation. Just a few questions. I agree with my colleagues, you know, we can have these outreaches in every district. It would be great, right? Okay. As well as we can have, you know, we're sending mail. We can have it in multiple languages, even though when we're going to these outreaches. Come on up. We need that as well, because a lot of it is 40%. There's Latinos. Other question, you said that A was 5% lower than A1. Now, is that gonna be, I mean, for how long? Is that gonna be for a year, two years, and go back? I mean, that is one of the questions, if you can answer that. Sure, yeah, so that's up to our board. Our board has a budgeting cycle Every year, it occurs in May to June, and that's when they review our value proposition, which is the discount for Bright Choice and the premium for Renewable 100. So historically, Ava has always offered a lower rate. It started out as 1.5%, and then it grew to 3%, and now it's at 5%. So the trend has been upward, but in full transparency, this is something that gets reviewed annually. And so it's possible it could be higher in the future. It's possible it could be reduced. That will just depend on our board's discretion and the constraints of the day. But the goal is to keep it growing. Absolutely. My second question is that you said you've been going to city cities. You went to the county supervisors. They're approved. But has there been any other cities that did not approve, and what was the reason why they did not? Ah, no, that's a great question. No, you know, initially when we first launched in Alameda County, the cities of Newark and Pleasanton decided to hold off and see how things would go. And what they saw was that all of their neighbors were... have enjoying lower rates for more renewable energy and so in 2019 along with the city of Tracy they voted to join so no to date there has not been a city with those two exceptions that has ever decided not to join our agency and those that that decided to hold off very quickly decided to join because they saw the benefit okay so on last question the mailing now is that going to be we're going to get two separate mails mailing from AVA and PG&E, or is that going to be all at once, and how is that going to work? Yes, so it will be monthly from AVA, not from PG&E. This is just going to be coming from AVA, and it will come in different forms in a sealed envelope and then in a tri-fold brochure. If we have your email on file, we'll email you, but it's going to be coming on a monthly basis between now and May. Okay, no further questions. Thank you, Mayor. Okay, so clarification on that. Were you talking about the letter or you're talking about our bill is still going to come from PG&E? The bill is still going to come from PG&E. Excuse me. The bill. I'm sorry. I misunderstood. The bill is still going to be issued by PG&E. The only thing that will change with the bill is the line item that says Ava's generation charges. But we're talking about the notices to inform people that this change is occurring. That's going to be coming from Ava. But the bill is still coming from PG&E. Yes, and I was going to add that thank you so much. It's in English and Spanish. So for those of our residents that, you know, want it in Spanish, it does come in Spanish on the same paper. I do have a couple things I'd like to point out. The meetings are every month on Wednesday, the third Wednesday of the month at 6 p.m., and they are hosted at the county administrative base. building because supervisor Rickman is also on the ABLE board along with me so he's agreed to host it over there I said well we can do it here in City Hall and he said will you come over here so maybe I can get him back here when we open the new digs but it's open to the public so anybody and everybody can come to that meeting that would like to be a part of it I also I wanted to say that you know how many people step over a quarter and don't pick it up Like, I pick up pennies, but a quarter. People pick up quarters, dollars. Listen, I found a $100 bill once walking on Edison's campus, and I held on to it for a year until someone stole it from me. But I literally had it for a year waiting for somebody to say they lost it and then somebody stole it from me. But anyway, people would pick up the money. I mean, I can't understand why people are upset about that. And as Mr. Richardson pointed out, you know, global warming is here. We have opportunities for renewable energy. We need to take advantage of those. But the thing that really sold me on this was Alameda County Supervisor Scott Haggerty and I sat on the... ace board together regional rail and he said in all of his years and they don't have term limits in all of his years as a supervisor this was the one thing he was most proud about for bringing to the people in his in his district in his county he said bar none this was it and i just it was a big testament to me to have somebody that had that many years in public office say, the one thing was this, not rail, even though we're very proud of rail, but he said, this really was something that was good for the community because those dollars came back into our community. Any of those, right? It came back into our community and we get to determine where that money goes. So I am very excited about it. I know that the people, change is hard. And people don't know what they like because they only like what they know. And what they know is PG&E. You know, Sacramento has SMUD. I had some people say, hey, can we join the SMUD? You know, gosh, down in Southern California, we don't want to talk about what happened with Edison. But, you know, I mean, there's just stuff out there. People will scream murder about, you know, PG&E. And here we have an option. And it's like, no. I want PG&E. So anyway, if people out there, if you want to go back to PG&E, you can. There's nothing wrong with that. Just call the number. Go on the website. You can stay with PG&E. go for it nobody is stopping you from doing that okay so I'm happy to provide all the information report out on this of our monthly meetings keep people abreast of opportunities to participate and to weigh in so thank you so much vice mayor yeah thank you mayor I mean I'm gonna always support um it cost saving opportunities for constituents because i mean you know we are a community that um you know is trying to figure it out and how to do better i want to be clear you know i i'm not endorsing whether you do it or don't do it it's the public's choice you all do what is in your best interest um i do think though again to continue to get information out there i agree with Councilman Villalpura in terms of translation of documents, because we do have an Asian American community as well, and a Sikh Punjabi community, so I just would want to really be very aware of that. The second thing is on slide 18, you all talk about sponsoring events and stuff. I mean, Black Family Day, Cinco de Mayo, the Sikh parade, Fourth of July, like there's key events activations happening throughout the city. What's the event in your district where people are driving? What's it called? Cruise nights. I think that it would really benefit you to tap in with the community groups or the council people who have activations happening on those dates because you're going to get lots of community engagement, lots of people out, and it would be a great opportunity to both invest in the community that you're wanting to lead in from an energy standpoint, but also to be available for people to come up and engage you in public. Thank you very much, Mayor Lee, and that reminds me that we are actually taking applications for our community grants such as these right now. The application is open until the end of this month, so March 31st, so we'll definitely be looking to that. Okay, people right now are clamoring to figure out where to apply. How do they apply? Go to our website. Okay. Please. Okay, any public comment? Okay. Mary Elizabeth? I'm Mary Elizabeth, and maybe it's because I'm a solar customer, but I received the first letter on the 1st of March. And in that letter, it says, customers have the option to select an annual true-up by February 28th. And so that time had passed. And so, you know, that makes me worry a little bit about, you know, well, how well is this going to be working? And then when I see you show up here, you know, your portfolio with biomass. Biomass is not a clean energy. It may be classified as renewable, but our number one stationary source of air pollution in Stockton is the DTE power plant right over here and we all see that plume and that's the number one stationary source so biomass is not clean. And also I'd just like to take a short period of time here to discuss Lodi has their own power and they're able with their own power to offer help for low income And I'd like to see the city of Stockton, you know, consider reducing the 6% utility tax that we get on all of the utilities that are not provided by the city of Stockton and use some of that money to help our low income people. Because you're right, but I see a lot of humongous, PG&E bills when I look at some records. And just shocked at how much that 6% adds up that the city gets on every single utility. And those in Cal Water pay the most. Thank you. Mark Stebbins. Cynthia Gail Boyd. You know, everything that she said, because she sounds well informed, I kind of lost my question. The presentation was great, but there was just one little part that kind of went blah, blah, blah. And I wasn't sure if he said that you have to stay with PG&E for a certain amount of time or you're nodding yes. Or that you'd stay with AVA for a specific amount of time once the grace period. Something about that, about having to stay there for a year. Because if you say that you can switch back and forth, but that part was like blah, blah, blah to me. I'll finish. I only got two minutes, where I wasn't quite clear about what that meant. So I'd like for you to un-blah-blah-blah all of that. And when you say that it's supplied still by PG&E, I wonder if you have a plant like she was talking about that does all that smoke plume every day, like McDonald Island for PG&E. I know they're out there because I know somebody that- works for me down on island for PG&E. And I love that little smiley face that I get from PG&E every month because I'm a great saver. So I like to keep up that little smiley face. Thank you. Yes, so if you could let us know, I think you said you can leave Ava, go to PG&E, come back to Ava, go back to PG&E, but then you gotta wait a year. Yes, so if you opt out after May, you'll have to stay with PG&E for a year before you can return to AVA service. So if you're considering opting out, although we wish you wouldn't, it's better if you do so sooner rather than later, so then you can come back at any time. And our smiley faces are just as good as PG&E's, I promise. Okay. Anybody else? No further public comment. Okay. so thank you so much for your presentation we really appreciate it and we will be reaching out to you to set up some opportunities in our community to give this information at a you know in neighborhoods okay okay thank you okay next item 15.4 adoption of an urgency ordinance establishing a temporary moratorium on the establishment of new and relocation or physical expansion of existing tobacco retailer businesses also known as smoke shops good evening council Lori Ascension, City Attorney's Office. And tonight I'm going to be providing information to the council so that you may consider adopting a tobacco moratorium. I think a good place to begin is to explain why we're here tonight. I'm sorry, Sue. If you can please excuse me, tap him. Thank you. So, why are we here? We're here because at the January 27, 2025 Council Legislation Environmental Committee. The committee had concerns, expressed concerns, and also amplified concerns from the community regarding the regulation of tobacco retailers. And they directed staff, i.e. me, to bring an urgency ordinance, also known as a moratorium, to the council in March for consideration. And here we are. So, I think that... You know, talking about what moratoriums are for those that are not familiar with them is a good place to begin. And so the first thing I'll say is that think of a moratorium as a pause button. It's intended to maintain the status quo so you don't have new businesses popping up while you're trying to figure out what the best method of regulation is within the city. So it requires a four-fifth vote by council, which means five votes or more. it requires findings to support and those findings have to be they have to constitute a current and immediate threat to public health safety and welfare it takes effect immediately so if adopted as of tonight it lasts 45 days initially that's the pause period initially so that staff can take some time to go and figure out what they want to present to council for adoption by way of either amending creating or both future ordinances. It can be extended, but you have to have a public hearing process and, again, appropriate findings to show that there's still this public health safety welfare threat. The current ordinance. So the current ordinance was adopted in June of 2023. It resides in Title V, Chapter 5.104 under the business license section. It defines tobacco retailers fairly broadly. There's no separate smoke shop definition. It just encapsulates everybody. It contains application process and prohibitions. I've listed a few of them here and I'll highlight them. You can't locate within 600 feet of sensitive uses. Sensitive uses are listed as schools, parks, playgrounds, rec areas, and youth facilities. There's no retailer, no tobacco retailer can locate within 600 feet of another tobacco retailer. Licenses are non-transferable. There's a section in there that talks about revocation and suspension for certain activity and behaviors. And there are operating regulation and conditions that apply. And just to again highlight them, it's comply with all laws. No more than 20% of the window and or clear door coverings can, you know, you can't cover everything up. no nuisance activity so they have to be on the alert for you know graffiti and loitering and all those sorts of things there's no flavored tobacco it's consistent with state law on the flavor tobacco ban and there are penalties included for violation state law state law lately if you read the staff report you know that there have been some emergency regulations that have been adopted the concerns at the state level and you know which are permitting down trickling down to all the local entities It's the use and or infusion of hemp and THC within these cannabis or tobacco, I'm sorry, within the tobacco products. The flavored tobacco ban they implemented, but that's, it's been probably about a year or so since that occurred. And they have general restrictions on, you know, use around school grounds, on or around school grounds. So current challenges. I think everybody understands them, but just to highlight them. Youth access, right? There's a concern that these businesses are allowing youths to go in and or they're attracting youths to come use these products. There's illegal activity that's been identified at these businesses. So, you know, sometimes it's, you know, as simple as a violation of the flavor ban, say. Sometimes it's having products that have cannabis infused within them when they're not supposed to. And sometimes it's, you know, adjacent things. And if you, again, if you read the staff report, you know it's things like illegal gambling. And then the last thing, the last concern or challenge is enforcement, right? You need to go out there, you need to be inspecting these businesses on a routine basis and to make sure that they're in compliance. Other jurisdictions. So the legislation committee in particular raised the issue of Modesto. Modesto, I think, is a near neighbor. It's fresh in everybody's mind because they noticed an increase in these businesses, so proliferation of these businesses. They also noticed more illegal activity at these businesses, and they spent some time with their police force and also with the Tax and Fee Administration folks going out, doing inspections, and noting all these violations. If you read the packet, you know that it's some of the same things I talked about already. The moratorium, they adopted a moratorium in October of last year, which put, you know, again, pause on any more businesses popping up while they figured out how to implement an ordinance, what they wanted in their ordinance. Unlike Stockton, they don't have a current ordinance, so they're working their way that direction. It's in progress. City of Fresno, there's an ordinance in progress right now, and they've done some interesting things in that ordinance as it works its way up to council, two of which I think are important and I've highlighted here on screen. They put a cap on the number of smoke shops per district. Excuse my typo, I just saw that. And they've implemented 1,000 foot separation from sensitive uses. So ours is 600, again, just by comparison, another 400 feet before you can get near sensitive uses. So the last city that I'll highlight is City of Covina, also in your packet. And you will note that it differentiates between smoke shops and ancillary sales establishments. Ancillary sales establishments, meaning things like grocery stores or convenience stores that have tobacco products for sale, but it's a very tiny portion of the business that they do, as opposed to true smoke shops where that's the only business that they do. And in Covina, one thing I think was interesting is that they require a conditional use permit for these businesses in particular. So what findings are required in order for the council to adopt an urgency ordinance, a moratorium? So I've provided them for you. If you've read through the ordinance that I included, it tells you that There's a general one that tobacco retailer businesses constitute an immediate threat to public health, safety, and welfare. That's required. Second one is the approval of additional entitlements for these businesses and the approval of relocation or physical expansion is going to further threaten the public health, safety, and welfare, also required. And then the last one is the adoption of this urgency ordinance is therefore necessary for the immediate protection of public health, safety, and welfare, also required. And those are the general ones. The more specific ones I've included in the ordinance, they're recitals. They get incorporated in. If you read through it, you see that. And it talks about, it lays out sort of the story. And just to pluck out a few highlights for you, it's things like, you know, there are currently 163 tobacco retailer businesses. 78 are identified as smoke shops that have active business licenses in this city, in Stockton. The staff and the police department don't currently know the number of additional establishments, you know, operating without a business license or unlawfully. The city is concerned about the proliferation of these businesses for good reason. We already have 163 of them, 78 again, of which are smoke shops, and more coming. There are other products. Again, I talked about this earlier. There are industrial hemp. There are, again, sneaking in the flavors. And so that, again, is a concern for health, safety, and welfare of our residents and youth. The, and then I think a couple of other good ones are, you know, again, these businesses can be a target for theft and vandalism, as well as affiliated with, again, the sale of illegal cannabis products and drug paraphernalia that encourages further illegal activity. And on and on and on. So the, again, these findings are necessary. I think that they will support if the council, you know, if it's the council's intention to adopt. And with that, I'm happy to answer any questions, but the recommendation is that council consider adopting an urgency ordinance with appropriate findings as listed in the ordinance to establish a temporary moratorium on the establishment of new and relocation or physical expansion of existing tobacco retailer businesses also known as smoke shops within the city of Stockton to become effective immediately. Thank you. Vice Mayor. Thank you mayor and thank you city attorney for just a very thorough presentation. When we ran for office, all of us that ran together, as a group and then in our own individual campaigns talked about a stronger, safer, healthier Stockton. One of the things that's not in the presentation that I know that's happening in my district, and forgive me, I don't know everything happening all throughout the city, I just pretty much have studied my district, is that there's also the sale of illegal drugs happening out in some of these locations. One thing in the presentation that stands out is that there is a smoke shop right across the street from Edison High School that I think probably is less than 600 feet away, so I don't even know how that slipped by. I haven't measured it, but I would put all my money in my bank account on the line to say that if we measured it, they're in violation of our current rules here. But I believe, and I want to thank Council Member Enriquez, the chair of that committee, and Council Member Padilla for coming together in unity to say that we want a healthier community and that while we're not attacking smoke shops, we do believe that. This is in the right direction of getting our city healthier. I also want to say that when this group comes back to further consider staff's recommendation, the ledge committee was very clear on wanting to, number one, this emergency moratorium. Number two, making sure that those that are found in violation have very aggressive penalties up to including the revocation of licenses. For example, if you are found in a violation of something, not egregious like selling drugs, you get caught selling illegal drugs, you need to be shut down, lose your license. But if you are found in a violation of a code that there may be a fine or a suspension of your license for a certain period of time and then up to including revocation, that if you want to transfer, you can't, the license would be revoked and not able to transfer. And so when that does come back, I think incorporating some of what we discussed at our ledge committee be in that we want to continue to reaffirm our position of having a healthier community. But thank you again. Council Member Blauer. Thank you, Mayor. City Attorney, thank you for that presentation. I'm very happy to see this item before us. I previously served as the chair of ledge and I felt very, very passionately about this. was very, very happy that we were able to get the smoke shop, or rather the retail tobacco license ordinance passed in, I think it was June of 2023. And that, you know, was just the first step. And that's how I always looked at it, because the way that it was set up, it had to be implemented as people renewed their business licenses. If they sold tobacco, then they had to get the additional license. So we knew from the get-go that you had to have a starting point and it was gonna take at least a year until everybody that sold tobacco would have that license. I always saw that as a first step and so I'm really thankful to the current ledge committee that you've taken up the baton to take it further because it is absolutely an issue. I look at, well at the time I had kids in high school and talking to to my kids that were students, it was just ridiculously easy for people under 18, for kids to get these products. And then the fact that people in our community are selling flavored tobacco products and that's banned by state law, it's outrageous. And so I've been, you know, I'm very much in favor of this. And I'm very thankful to the Stockton Police Department that they've done crackdowns lately. That was one thing I've said from the get-go, is we can do all the ordinances in the world, and they can be great, but if we don't enforce it, it's not going to have an effect. So I'm just thankful to see enforcement, and again, thank you to Ledge for getting this before us. Councilwoman Padilla. Thank you, City Attorney, for the presentation. Just to clarify, I know it said licenses are non- transferable so if a smoke shop is open does that mean another one cannot go in its place like if it closes or shuts down So the way that the ordinance reads, and for those that want to reference, it's section 5.104.080, and it reads like this. A license is non-transferrable. If a licensee changes business locations, that licensee must obtain a new license prior to acting as a tobacco retailer at the new location. If a business license to conduct tobacco retailing experiences a change of ownership, the business must obtain a new license for that location before acting as a tobacco retailer. So the answer is that you can't just slide in and take the place of someone else and you can't go somewhere else and start operating just because you have an existing license at one location. That answers my question. Thank you. Council Member Villalpudo. Yeah, Council Member Padilla had the same question as well. I feel there's so many, you know, concentrated everywhere. Just like Vice Mayor says, you know, there's one right by Edison. I don't think it's, you know, 600 feet. I know it says here 600 feet. Is that something that we could change and add it on to 1,000 feet? I mean, I don't know how my colleagues feel about that, but I don't want to back them in their schools. I don't want them in parks. I don't want them, you know, anywhere to do with our kids. So even... You know, what do you call it? So if that's something that we could change, you know, if my colleagues feel the same, that's something I want to do. So, and the answer to that for all of the council is yes. How much distance you place between these businesses is up to you. I think that this is a good time to express your preferences and put out your wish list because staff is going to spend the next 45 days looking at this, right? Assuming that you adopt the ordinance tonight. And so when they spend that time looking at things, it's good to know what it is that you would like to see. Otherwise, they're going to make their best guess. Okay, so I'm going to interject here. This is something that I started many years ago and then Council Member Blauer took the baton and now we've got the new ledge committee with it. And I will let you know that our numbers are off. I've been working with the Coalition for Tobacco-Free San Joaquin and I always said I wanted this to be a project with my students to map out where all these are because the one across the street from Medicine, Sky High, it's not listed as one of the ones with a license, which I find interesting. And they covered all their windows with wood. They made it so it's not like there's even a window there. And we have hundreds of kids that pass by it every day. But what I wanted to say is there's actually 274 retailers, 47 within 500 feet of schools, 111 within 1,000 feet of schools, and there's one... per every 1,169 people. 141 are operating without a license that their research found. So, yeah, that's unacceptable. So, since we're talking about making amendments, I got a whole list. There should be an annual retail license fee paid by them that is high enough to cover the cost of enforcement and compliance. That's the first one. There should be a minimum of, and I can give these to you, there should be a minimum of one compliance check for violations of a minimum legal sales age loss per year, so kind of like the decoy, with a recheck for violations within a specific time period, such as like three months. For violations of the minimum legal sales age, penalties should include I want it to be a suspension of sales for 30 days, not just a fine of $1,000. But if you take somebody's ability to sell it, it's going to hit them a lot harder. And it shouldn't be the person buying it that's paying for it. It should be the operator that's selling it. So there shouldn't be any penalty for the purchase. And it should be on the owner. operator of the retail establishment. We simply have allowed this unbeknownst to us to get so far out of control. I have students every day, every single day that we are taking these flavored vape pens from, cannabis, and a student told me yesterday because she had a bad reaction. I had to call an ambulance to come get her. And I said, where did you get it? And she said, from the store. And I'm like, what store? She wouldn't tell me, but her dad said, I'm going to find out what store that she got it from. Because they are absolutely selling to minors. One in five are allowing them to come in, miners to come in, and buy these products. And they absolutely should not be able to do that. And if you do, there's consequences for it. And we're going to ensure that those consequences are a loud enough, strong enough message that it says, if you want to stay in operation, you better knock this crap out. Excuse my language. You better knock it out. Knock it off. Because otherwise, that livelihood that you are making big bucks on, because there are severe illegal activity happening in and around on top of the smoke shop. Go over to Gong's. Go over to Harding Way. There's illegal drug sales, prostitution, sleeping. They're open 24 hours a day. How can a smoke shop be open 24 hours? I don't know how that is possible. But again, I'll say it over and over and over again, our children are not for sale. Period. So this is just a hotbed for me. And that's why I say when it comes to enforcement, I've got my box that I want to bring up to the Capitol to let them know that, hey, they need to be just like they have ABC that goes out, that they do sting operations all the time that's funded by the state. We need the same for these tobacco businesses. if you play by the rules hey great and adults that want to purchase by all means go purchase what you want but not not for kids and it you got to follow the law period so thank you vice mayor lee yeah thank you mayor so um agree with every single thing she just said i'm just tired and not going to go as passionate right now but i will say i agree with everything she just said To Councilman Villalpudo's point, the 600 feet in Modesto I saw I think was 1,000 feet. I just want to be consistent in our policy because cannabis right now, you can't have a cannabis store less than 1,000 feet, but yet for this we've allowed less. So that to me is concerning because we're criminalizing marijuana. I don't know how many people have died from marijuana. I know that a lot of people have died from tobacco. So there's that. The other thing is I love the idea of minimizing smoke shops per district because I don't have a healthy grocery store in my district, but we have lots of smoke shops. There's that. I do think anything operating without a license needs to be closed immediately. That to me is just clear. You have to have a license. You don't have a license, you lose your business. And then the other thing is there's hot spot areas that we know. In North Stockton there was a murder. At a smoke shop in my district in Western Ranch, one of the biggest hotbed issues is the smoke shop. I think that there should be a security and safety plan contingent on getting a license. So if you have a license as a business owner, the safety and security of your patrons should be a priority. Our police are not security guards. No disrespect to the security guard community. That's your job. Our police need to be catching criminals and putting them in jail. and getting our streets safer. So they oftentimes serve as security to go out and respond to nuisances or loitering. I think those business owners that have created a culture of loitering and unsafe activity for our community should be held accountable. And that contingency to their license of having a safety plan should include such. Thanks. Okay. So public comment. Julie Dunning, please. I just want to from the bottom of my heart say thank you. I don't know how we wound up here, but thank you, thank you, thank you for caring enough to get us out. On another note of things, I'd like to acknowledge a fellow Stocktonian that puts endless hours of research and commitment into making stockton a better place not only socially but environmentally and that's mary elizabeth she is like my hero and i hope at some point in time we can adequately recognize the efforts the data that she provides you all the research that she does to make this a better place for all and the last comment i'll make i share a fence with el dorado elementary school that's k through eighth grade i believe Over my fence all the time are packages of flavored cartridges where somebody in that age group is standing at the back of the playground against my fence and tossing the flavored boxes over. They're getting it somewhere. Kimberly Bankston Lee. Good evening, Kimberly Bankston Lee, Executive Director of the Soul Project, saving our legacy African Americans for smoke-free, safe places. And we commend the city, your dedication to public health through the Tobacco Retail Licensing, TRL. Considering evolving data on illegal sales and tobacco retailer density, we wish to share the benefits associated with several key recommendations recently proposed by community partners, including the Coalition for Tobacco-Free San Joaquin, and we hope that you all have received our correspondence with lots of resources, information, and data. A moratorium on all tobacco retailer licenses will give the city an opportunity to strengthen its TRL to eliminate loopholes that have inadvertently allowed an increase in tobacco retailers. And I know you're focused on smoke shops. But 36% of convenience stores, 29% of smoke shops, 21% of liquor convenience, and 14% of small markets sold. So it really should be all retailers. By updating definitions and refining enforcement strategies as outlined in the public health law center's model tobacco retail licensing ordinance, the city can achieve more equitable enforcement. Increasing the distance between tobacco retailers and trying to read really fast, youth sensitive areas from 600 to 1,000 feet serves as a better barrier against early exposure to tobacco products. This buffer helps decrease the likelihood of youth encountering tobacco marketing and access, thereby contributing to lower initiation rates and supporting long-term public health outcomes. Collectively, these recommendations offer significant benefits. They help to systematically reduce tobacco retailer density, enhance fairness, protects youth, and sustain the public health objectives initially envisioned by the TRL ordinance. Thank you. Kessa Bruce. Good evening, Mayor Fugazi, Vice Mayor Lee. esteemed council members my name is kisa bruce i'm the director i am the advocacy director for the american lung association with the mission of saving lives and improving the health of californians and their lungs we strongly support measures to protect the next generation from the harms of tobacco addiction i am here because despite the well-intentioned tobacco retailers license or ordinance stockton has experienced an unsettling trend since 2022 there has been a 3.8 rise in tobacco retailers with a 4.4 percent increase in establishments located within 1,000 feet of our schools. Moreover, in 2023, one in every five Stockton stores were illegally selling tobacco. I have witnessed firsthand the impact of easy tobacco access in our neighborhoods. As a Stockton resident, I drive down March Lane and I pass several tobacco retailers, not just the smoke shops. And I know all of you see them on your way in here to work. You pass them. You see them. So I want to thank you again for your advocacy and for your leadership on this. And I will be brief, but I just want to also emphasize that we have an opportunity here to increase enforcement by placing a moratorium on all tobacco retailers, by also requiring one annual compliance check per retailer, including enforcement that penalizes the licensees and not the clerks, as you have already mentioned. So I want to thank you again for your opportunity to express my concerns, and I appreciate your commitment in protecting our community. Thank you. Mary Elizabeth. Thank you, Mary Elizabeth. And I submitted some data for you all, easy reference. And I want to address the issue of transference. So what the amendment that happened in 2024 allowed for exemptions to be transferred. So one, if there was a tobacco retailer that was in the development, there should be none at this point. You know, we need to find out, well, how many more are there coming in if that exemption is to stay? And then if an existing... TOBACCO RETAILER WAS WITHIN THAT 600 FEET NO MATTER WHERE, WHETHER IT BE ANOTHER RETAILER OR A SENSITIVE USER, THAT LOCATION COULD BE ANOTHER SMOKE SHOP COULD MOVE INTO THAT LOCATION. THAT IS WHAT THAT EXEMPTION SAID. SO WHILE THE LICENSE MIGHT NOT BE TRANSFERRED, THE LAND USE THAT WAS DESIGNATED WITH THAT AMENDMENT WOULD BE ALLOWING FOR ANOTHER SMOKE SHOP. SO IN THAT REGARD, WE WILL NEVER, WITH THAT AMENDMENT, WE WILL NEVER DECREASE THE OVERCONCENTRATED AREAS. AND I SHOWED YOU A MAP, AND IT'S VERY CLEAR. YOU CAN PUT CIRCLES RIGHT AROUND WHERE WE HAVE OVERCONCENTRATION. AND I'D LIKE TO SUGGEST THAT THAT AMENDMENT BE REWRITTEN AND ELIMINATED. ALSO, I'D LIKE TO ASK FOR CONSIDERATION INSTEAD OF EVEN 1,000, 2,500 FEET. AND I COULD NOT FIND ANYWHERE A PENALTY FOR AN OPERATOR WHO WAS SELLING TOBACCO. AND WHAT ARE WE TO DO? THANK YOU. DAN RICHARDSON. I'd like to echo what Julie said earlier about Mary Elizabeth. She does her homework and she knows it. Thank you, Mary Elizabeth. Do you remember a couple of meetings ago we talked about a cannabis store on Fremont Street? You guys did the right thing. I'm curious as to how many of these tobacco smoke shop owners actually live in Stockton. How many of the liquor store owners small outlet stores that are selling cannabis out of the back room or THC products that are illegal live in Stockton. I don't know if everybody remembers back in the day when Oakland went through a crisis similar to this where they had liquor stores on every corner. They were targeting the minority population because they were an easy target. I sometimes feel like that's what Stockton's thought about, thought of by a lot of these retailers that we have an easy target. We had an out-of-towner trying to open a cannabis store within 1,000 feet of another one. And not to correct the Vice Mayor, but I believe the current cannabis law says within 600 feet of a school, unless that's been changed. I believe it's still 600 feet, which you proposed changing to 1,000 feet. Litter. I get litter on Pershing of all sorts. But the one thing I get a lot of are cigarette products or vapes, the pens. They end up in my front lawn, they end up in my curb, in my garden. I have to pick those things up on a daily basis and throw them away because people throw them out their window when they're driving down Pershing Avenue. And that would be it. I'm in total support. I do believe that we need to significantly increase the distance from schools. There are two located right near Stag High School right on Pershing Avenue. One just opened not too long ago. And it's so close to these high schools, they're obviously targeting our kids. And to the vice mayor's comment about protecting our youth, thank you. Cynthia Gale-Boyd. I feel like having to fill out a card every time is probably killing some trees that don't need to be killed up. Yeah, like that. maybe we could have a new card that says i want to talk nine times on one piece of paper or something yeah at either rate i'm kind of sleepy too so i didn't use a scratch paper i'm trying to get my notes from right here but i want to know who approves the smoke shop is it the city council that uh they go through i don't know who like you were talking about the tobacco, what's your name, people before. It's like in the neighborhood where you see a sign that's registered for people that want to open up a liquor license. I walked to the corner the other day and said, my God, they added again? I would be in opposition to yet another bar, yet another liquor store on my block because there's already too many of them. So recently that little store changed hands. by the management. So now the new people are able to request yet another license. So that seems a little tricky-ricky to me. And about the moratorium, I don't know if it's mentioned, but how long are you proposing the moratorium? Is it for the next six months? Is it for the next year? Is it forever and ever and ever? And about the 78 smoke shops, there was a lot of statistics that were given by different people as to what the numbers really are and what not. But I like to see it like the little chart from code enforcement last week. How many of them are in district five? That's where I live. How many are in each of your districts? I would have liked to seen that tonight from the city attorney about where are they located and then I believe it was the vice mayor that said that when they happen, take them license right now. And then I want to know, is there violation number one, number two, number three? That concludes public comment for this item. Yes, I would like to point out that the state gives tobacco licenses. They come to us for a business license. So they have to, if they're going to sell, they have to provide us with their state license. And then we issue them the business license. I see nods out there. And with alcohol, it runs with the land. So somebody else could go into that building, wherever alcohol is being sold, and they can continue to sell there, unless the person sells their business license and transfers it to another address. But it has to... So, yeah. So, okay, Vice Mayor? First of all, I appreciated all the comments of all of what you all said. Almost like you all should be a committee and just create the policy for us. So thank you. I also like the comment of being able to see a map that shows where they are. And it's interesting, this conversation, the manipulation of or the definition of what's a smoke shop versus what's a corner market that sells it versus what's a store that sells it. I mean, to the point of is this strategic oppression, I will go on and say it right up here on the dais, yes. That is why liquor stores and smoke shops exist in certain communities more than others. And those of us proximity to it understand what that is. But that's why we're focused on cleaning it up, right? And I think this is the first step. I agree with everything that everybody said. I would also just point out that somebody sent me a picture of one of the smoke shops that actually decorated their business for Christmas. You know, that's very inviting to families and children. That's almost predatory behavior. And this, I think, is a beginning of ending that. And the last thing I would say in consideration of this ordinance, I do think we need to look at where tobacco is sold. And we should work in partnership with our school districts because I know when the mayor talks about 75 pounds, I think you said, of the vapes that she's gotten from students. We need to work with our school districts to help us identify what's in proximity to their school so that way we can be more efficient in addressing it. I put that on the three-by-three agenda. I'm there with you. Councilwoman Padilla. Thank you, Mayor. And to Vice Mayor's point, as you know, I'm a teacher. I'm a third-grade teacher. And this year we actually had to confiscate a vape from one of my students who is eight years old. Anyways, I don't know if I could direct city manager or wait to my comments with regards to having code enforcement visit those shops that currently do not have licenses. Yeah, you're welcome to make that ask from the manager. It's related but separate from the vote. Okay, thank you. So we'll talk about that. Thank you. Before we do a motion, we said a lot tonight and I know we've got 45 days so just thinking about how we proceed because there's been so many comments on how we want to beef this up and add more teeth and and really make some progress and making our our city safer and healthier how would we a couple things so i did take a few notes and i'll send it to the manager and his staff so that they have that we'll also have this video recorded for all eternity so they can go back and they can watch and see you know clarify whatever it is that you all said on the record to make sure they captured it all what i got was ensure that there's revocation suspension included And I'll just point out that in the existing ordinance for the business licenses, there is revocation suspension. There is a section on that, but it's for the business license as opposed to, I think, the activity that you guys are talking about. It does speak to illegal activity in compliance with laws, but I... I think what I hear everyone saying is that there is a difference between tobacco retailers generally where you have ancillary sale and a difference between smoke shops where it's their only, you know, the only thing that they do. And so one note that I made was for staff to consider separating, bringing forward two ordinances when they come, one for retailers, retailer, tobacco retailers with ancillary sales and one for true smoke shops where they're clearly defined. I heard 1,000 foot separation. I heard annual retail license fee and enforcement component so that there's a nexus between that fee and the enforcement mechanisms that are being engaged in. The minimum of one compliance check per age sales with a recheck for three months if there's a violation. Penalties, 30 days suspension of sales if possible, so to explore that. emphasis on enforcement, including those against illegal operators. I don't know if that will be part of an ordinance or just general direction from the council so that the manager can implement that. I heard cap per district, safety security plans, place the onus on the owners. I heard that council, when this presentation comes back, whatever it looks like, that you would also like information with regard to that. smoke shop that's near Edison High I heard you know from the public I heard look at you know echoing all these you know items but also looking at the possibility of removing exceptions with regard to existing locations and then when this comes back mapping so the council can see where all these are located at least the ones we've identified so far okay so um some of the things that were mentioned and i don't know all of them but you know people that are operating illegally i don't know if we have power with the state But I don't want them to operate a business, period. I'd like them not to be able to get a license. If you're already selling illegally, how can we trust that you're going to sell legally if you actually have a license? You know what I'm saying? So I don't know how we go about that. But if you're already doing it and you're not in compliance with even having the proper licensing, then you don't get to go to the party anymore. So I think a couple of things. I think that the ordinance, as I mentioned earlier, does have a revocation suspension section. So I think that it's, you know, again, enforcement. You can't revoke something that they don't have though. Oh, you're talking about the illegal, the illegal one. You know, I'll defer to PD on that. I don't know what their efforts are or what efforts they may make in the future. So I'll defer to PD on that. But I think that as far, I don't know what the rule is on reporting compliance with the state. And maybe they do. Otherwise, we'll have to look into that. Because as we've spoken about, there are convenience stores. Because even like with alcohol sales, and they go into a community, if they sell beer and wine, or if they say they want to upgrade to... liquor and it's got to be behind the counter and it can only be 25% of the space or whatever I mean there are very strict requirements on that also that clear line of sight that needs to be into the building all of these smoke shops are completely covered and the one on on Wilson Way there that now is you know whatever but you can't see into any of these anyway So code enforcement, let's start writing those citations, whatever, and we're going to come back and check in two days, whatever we need to do. But in all seriousness, and again, we all support business. We all support small businesses, but we support businesses that are abiding by the law and are not preying upon us. those that are most vulnerable in our community. So, like I said, I'm happy to give you some of the information as well, but we all have things that we've kind of thrown into this pot. I know it's a lot and was probably not expected, but I've been thinking about this for a while. So, yeah. I think it's good information, especially because if I had to guess, it's probably going to be collaboration between a few different departments when they're looking at this. So it's good information to have while they're doing that. And the county just passed one. And literally, you cross the street, you're in county. So that's another thing. We've got to look at theirs and make sure we haven't missed anything. And I'm happy to tell Chair Canepa, like, okay, you've got to go back and look at ours and fix yours so that we're uniform. We're uniform in our policy because we have so many county pockets. M&M Market is... it's not it's not city but you go down the street and it's city so we need to work in collaboration a motion to approve second okay all those vote 7-0 let's clean it up okay Okay, one more new business and two public hearings to go. So we're on to item 15.5, adoption of a resolution waiving privilege of any closed session Brown Act violation investigations in the last four years. Good evening again, counsel. Lori Ascension, city attorney's office. On February the 18th, a majority of the council directed me to work through the process, bring forward an item for discussion and consideration at this March 4th meeting for the waiver of any privileges associated with any investigations into Brown Act leaks which may have occurred in the last four years with the inclusion of appropriate reductions, if any. The staff report covers the information presented to this council at the February 4th council meeting, which at its most basic provides that Attorney-client privilege is a codified privilege under state law for the express purpose of ensuring clients receive accurate and competent legal advice by encouraging full disclosure to their attorney without fear that information will be revealed to others. As a holder of the privilege, counsel has the right to waive that privilege, and additionally, closed session conversations among the counsel ensure full and frank discussion on often sensitive topics, and the Brown Act allows the counsel to waive that privilege. Having worked through the process and provided an opportunity for the council to view any such reports in advance of today's meeting, the council may now consider adopting a resolution to waive any applicable privileges for any confidential Brown Act investigations conducted in the last four years to allow for the public release of such reports. Because there are privileges that currently apply, We will not be speaking tonight about anything specifically, but I think that this direction gets the council where it needs or wants to go, assuming that a majority of council would like to head in that direction. With that, I'm happy to answer any questions. Otherwise, it's up to you. And in full disclosure, I will say I went and read the document in the city attorney's office in her presence. So I just wanted to put that out there. Vice Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. I also read it. And thank you, City Attorney, for what you just described. If you can just explain briefly what the Brown Act is and then briefly what privilege is. So are you talking about closed session? Correct. So the Brown Act is, at its most basic, it's a transparency law. And it requires that the business of this council, the business of the city be done with a notice and opportunity for the public to come in and participate and know what's going on. There are exceptions under the Brown Act that are carved out by the legislature to allow for private discussions outside the public eye. I think that the ones that are probably the most current on our particular co-session are existing litigation, anticipated litigation, labor negotiations, personnel evaluations, etc., etc. And so the privileges belong to the city, i.e. the council, and it's the council that gets to choose whether or not it remains so. And so, you know, when I got elected, you know, I'm learning a lot. I learned we have a bulletproof dais, so if anybody comes in active shooter, we duck down low. The other thing is when we're in closed session, they collect our phones like we're kids. And I just, 47 years old, I have four phones, and I have a business and family and things, dogs, that I care about. I didn't understand them. Like, why are we collecting phones? And it's because there have been instances where information that is supposed to be within a contained environment by the law and by our understanding has been leaked. And listen, none of us sit up here or down here in positions of privilege. We sit here in a position of obligation to the public. We earn trust. We didn't just earn votes. And we all need to be accountable. I included. And so when I speak about accountability, I'm not speaking to one individual. I'm speaking to all of us up here. And, you know, we have to lead with integrity and maintain that public trust. And trust in one another. And I'll be honest with you, there was recently another matter where I thought there was a potential Brown Act violation, but it costs almost 50 grand of taxpayer money to have it investigated and go through that whole process that we just want to move forward and focus on the things that are important to our constituents. And so I appreciate this. I did confirm with the city attorney that we're not waiving privilege forward, we're waiving privilege back, right? That's correct. The waiver of privilege is for this specific item or item. And the only thing I would add on top of this is that, you know, I want the city to do a better job at releasing information to the public when they make public records requests, you know, regardless of what it is. I think in terms of transparency, and I love that the public has said truth, trust, and transparency several times because we're going to keep saying it until it just becomes our mantra. And thank you, Mayor, for always repeating it and staff. But thank you for this, and I support this item. Public comment? There are no public comments on this item. Okay, so bringing it back to council, this is an item that we are voting on. Okay, so looking for a motion if nobody else wants to talk about it. I'll make a motion to approve. Second. Okay, so we have a motion and a second. Council members, please vote. Motion carries six to one with council member Villalpudo voting no. Okay, public hearings. Okay, we are moving on to item 16.1 to adopt an ordinance creating title 15, chapter 1534 of the Stockton Municipal Code related to commercial vacant. property vacancy and vacant lot registration and a public hearing to adopt a resolution approving the amendment to the fiscal year twenty four twenty five the schedule i now declare the public hearing sorry So just a little bit of background. Back in November of 2022, I gave a presentation update of where we were at the time in terms of what the action plan would look like, where we were with staffing. And then again, we came back to the ledge committee in October of 2023, as well as January of 2024, just to kind of give another update of where we were in terms of software purchases, staffing, all of those types of things. Came back again to Ledge on February 3rd of 2025, where we were given direction to come back to council to implement the ordinance. So here we are. So we have made some strides in terms of the tools that we acquired, which would be our ComCate, which is near full implementation, as well as CityDetect, which is still in its learning phase. Then we also have Tulami, which is also currently in the procurement process. We have made some strides in terms of our staffing. We're not quite at full staff, but we're going to do what we need to do to get this program moving and up off the ground. Let's see. So vacant commercial building defined. It's a property considered vacant after greater than 50% of its commercial units in the building have been unoccupied for 180 days. As you know, on this next point, there was an around the bench memo that you all received in terms of identifying and solidifying that number of how many vacant commercial properties are out there. So we will be working with our partners in fire, community development, and economic development to help gather a better list of what really needs that attention, right? Additionally, again, we'll work with the software programs that we have implemented to help us identify everything throughout the city. So just a quick overview on the vacant property ordinance. Currently, there is no registration requirement for vacant commercial buildings or lots. The proposed ordinance requires property owners to register their vacant commercial building or lot with the city, comply with the Stockton Municipal Code, maintain that property, and the property owners may be subject to fees or fines or abatement costs if the property is not maintained. or in compliance with the SMC. So onto the proposed fees. The first year would be $250 for a vacant commercial building and that fee would stay the same for subsequent years if they stayed in compliance with the Chapter 15.32. The second year would be $500 and this would be registration component would be if they were found not to be in compliance with 15.32. The third and subsequent years, if not in compliance, are going to be at $1,000 every year. And then for the vacant lot annual fee, that is proposed at $250 per year. So our recommendation this evening is to adopt an ordinance creating Title 15, Chapter 15.34, vacant commercial property and vacant lot registration. Two, approve a resolution to amend the 24-25 fee schedule. And then finally, authorize the city manager or designee to take all appropriate and necessary actions to carry out the purposes and intent of the ordinance and resolution. So with that, our presentation is over, so we're happy to answer any questions or whatever you like. Okay, starting with Council Member Blauer. Thank you, Mayor. So this is another one that I'm glad to see here. I know Ledge, we worked on this for quite a while and kept coming up against the issue of, you know, we wanted to do this a lot sooner, but we kept being told that there wasn't enough staffing. And so I know we got to October and it sounded like things were looking a little better. So we're feeling good. We've got the staff that can do this now and implement it. So you feel we're locked and loaded? Hey, tomorrow, once it's passed, it's again another hit the ground running, putting our heads together again within our department as well as with other departments to get this out there. That's wonderful. That does take me back to the presentation we received at the last meeting. I know, I think you currently, there's 17? Correct. And there was a proposal to add 24, I believe. No, so with that, with our budget proposal, we're actually going to be requesting four code enforcement officers as well as two office specialists. When we talked about that larger number, that was like in a perfect world what that would look like in order to effectively address all areas of the city. So, yes, you'll see a different number when it comes to the budget season time. Okay, and then just another question I kind of had from the last one. I think that... neighborhood services section, I think the number was like 4.3 million. In revenues? In revenues. So if you add more enforcement officers, will that number, I mean, I would assume that number's gonna go up? In theory, yes. If you have more code enforcement officers out on the street, so your boots on the ground, that are being able to proactively address violations or even respond to more complaints, Essentially, yes, you would be looking at a potentially higher revenue number. Thank you. Vice Mayor. I want to thank Councilman Blauer for triggering me because there was 41. That was what was in a perfect world. That was crazy. You know, I just want to go back to what Albert from my district had got up and said about acknowledging the good things. And, you know, while we take the good and the bad, I just want to acknowledge that Mayor Fugazi brought this up I don't want to say decades ago, because that will sound crazy, but while you were on council the last time. So when we were running and I said to her, we're like, why are all these buildings like vacant? You know, it looks like a ghost town. And she brought up the ordinance, asked her to send it to me. We got it at the ledge committee and we went into it. And I think that, you know, we are at a point where we are working very aggressively to clean up our city, make our city beautiful, and want to invite new business, but also make some accountability for those who aren't doing anything with their buildings. I have some questions. How do we determine the fees that were to be assessed? We did look at other cities. I'll name off a few here. Give me just a second. And can you go back to that slide, please? Oh, yeah. So some of the cities that we did review and look at were Alameda. We did look at Los Banos, Richmond, and also Montebello. So some had a consistent fee, like every year maybe they only charged $500. They didn't have that incremental increase if the property was not in compliance with the code. So now, and this is for commercial? Correct. So let me just see if I understand this correctly. There's a commercial building that's vacant. And if it's vacant for a year, we give them a $250 bill. This is for the registration component. For the registration. Yes. You'll get into the, is there another component to this presentation or no? No. This is just to adopt the ordinance and establish the registration program. So I guess, city attorney, I know that we're doing vacancy ordinance and then we're exploring a vacancy tax later, right? My understanding is that those are going to be two separate conversations. Yes, separate, yes. Okay, so for the vacancy ordinance, and this is what I'm trying to understand so I know what I'm doing here. So Newberry, building, been there for decades. If it's not open or doing anything, would that be the vacancy tax or would that be the vacancy ordinance? It's the vacancy ordinance. You cannot have a tax. It has to go on the ballot. Yes. No, but in terms of, you know, I don't think $250 is enough. Right. So I'm going to let my code. For example, you have a... And maybe I'm wrong, but you have an out-of-town person, comes, buys a building, sits on it, refuses to do anything with it, or the Walmart folks who have that land out there, maybe that's a different issue too. But just sitting on it, you're going to decide what they do with it when they want to. No. People should either open it up for business, sell it, or rent it out, or donate it, or do something with it. But to just sit on it and get a $250 bill just doesn't fix the issue. And if we're looking to, like, be open to suggestions if we want to increase those fees, right? This was just kind of our baseline. So if we're looking at, you know, if we want to charge someone more than 250 in that first year, if they're in compliance, we can have that discussion. Yeah, I was thinking that there was going to be some, like, one of these tiers would be like 25,000, 50,000. I mean, I think being compelled, people have to be compelled to do stuff, right? So, like, we'll give you a chance to do something with it. I mean, there may be instances where maybe there's a process to engage with the city around why it's vacant, right? But to just simply squat on, to simply just have a business there that's preventing the city from progressing its development or other, you know, community from participating in things that they want to see in their community, I think to me is just not right. Council Member Enriquez? Yes, thank you Madam Mayor. Thank you again for the presentation and I just want to just thank Vice Mayor Lee and Councilwoman Padilla for being on the committee for the work to just get this initial conversation started. I know to what the Vice Mayor asked about what other cities you looked at. Why those cities? I mean, you know, just in terms of initial background, I know this is just the initial stages, you know, but just in terms of the benchmarking research, what from these cities stood out, you know, why not? the 10th largest city, cities closer to our size and make up. Go ahead. Yeah, Matt Van Fleet, Code Enforcement Field Manager. So we just connected, we networked with other industry leaders, you know, in the field that do the same work we do. And we worked with them on what cities they were looking at, how they looked, how other programs looked in different jurisdictions. So we didn't, HANDPICK WE KIND OF JUST WORKED IT OUT WITH WITH DIFFERENT INDUSTRY LEADERS SO THAT'S KIND OF HOW WE SETTLED ON THESE CITIES YEAH AND I YOU KNOW AND I AGREE WITH WITH MY COLLEAGUES HAVE SHARED JUST THE INITIAL FEES SEEMED A LITTLE YOU KNOW MINIMAL FOR ME YOU KNOW I WOULD HAVE THOUGHT SOMETHING HIGHER WHEN I FIRST SAW THE PROPOSED FEES BUT WHICH IS WHY I ASKED THAT QUESTION ABOUT WHAT OTHER CITIES SO IF THE 10TH LARGEST 12TH LARGEST 13TH LARGEST CITY SIMILAR TO US or higher than, you know, I would be say, oh, wow, we are similar in size. They're charging 3000, 5000, $8,000. And then I believe, colleagues correct me if I'm wrong, I wanna say maybe the third, fourth week of January, we did get a report of the vacant I know there were vacant buildings but I don't know if there are vacant commercial buildings but similar to what we did earlier about the moratorium to get an assessment of how much is in each district it helps us when we get to inform our constituents to say this is the amount we had before we passed legislation and then afterwards after we started doing the enforcement and then this is the change and that's helpful because then we can let our constituents know we've had X amount percent decrease thanks to the work that we're doing and we get to again highlight the good that we're doing on council for our people so if that's not out there yet and if it's already then my apologies but if we can get that that'd be very helpful yeah so you're talking about identifying all of the day so that's work that's actively being done right now and that's going to be step one should this pass is going to be just the identification product process we're gonna work together with the building division and with the fire department and economic development and work that out and figure out how we can get an accurate number on what the problem is thank you and then my last question again just for transparency aspect once if all goes well with this and it does move forward just make sure that we have a proper timeline that way again we can just inform our constituents thank you councilwoman Padilla Thank you, Mayor. Just to echo my colleagues, I know we all have vacant lots, vacant properties, and I, too, thought the fees were quite low. I have a vacant lot in my district that has been there 10, 15 years, just has a fence around it. Nothing's been done. People ask all the time, what's going here? What's going on? So I most definitely would like to see a higher fee increase. Thank you. A couple of things, too. When we talk about enforcement or compliance or review or inspection or whatever it is that we need to do, that's what this money can go towards. I realize we have code enforcement that will go out. And I know they charge like $500 for one board that gets put up. I mean, I don't know. I'm just throwing that out there. But I know that there are costs associated with it, and that goes on the tax bill. And then guess what? They write it off as a tax deduction anyway. But the thing is, is you want to have a building in our city, like you have to be responsible for it. And if people buy a new building, you know, you've got six months to pull a permit or have a plan or something for that building. You can't just buy a building and have it be derelict in our community. And so, yeah, 250 isn't going to cover much there. That's why I think that we need to have it be higher. But I also hope with the AI that we just drive around where these are. We know grass because of the rain. We've got high grass on these vacant lots. We've got people living on these vacant lots. I mean, we talk about Columbus Park in a vacant lot. And then the question comes up, where are they going to go? Well, St. Mary's has opened up the pathways. We've got the navigation center. I mean, we've got a lot of things that are about to open for people. But owners need to be responsible for their properties. We've got to be responsible for our animals. We've got to be responsible for being a productive member of our community. I think of the Molly Wurzel Act. If you have somebody in your neighborhood that isn't doing what they're supposed to be doing with their property, the neighbors can bring a lawsuit up against them. But we need to take that first step. How many vacant buildings do we have right now? We don't have an exact number. I thought I saw a number somewhere. So we submitted it around the bench. So that 250 number came from... research from 2022 so i i wouldn't put any um weight on that number out of this time so again with our partners in the other departments we'll we'll be working on identifying um a more concrete number additionally with the help of our ai tools okay so i was trying to pull up this calculator but it's not working right now but but you know even if you just take this number and instead of it being an annual number you make it a monthly fee $250 a month for the first year is $3,000. $500 for a year is $6,000. And $1,000 for a year is $12,000 if you multiply that by $250. I mean, that's significant revenue, right? So I would say just in tweaking it, maybe instead of a bigger annual fee, like $1,000 annual, it's $250 a month. And then that would equate into, and we can do the math and see what that looks like, but I'd be interested in seeing that. Okay, we have public comment. Mark Stebbins isn't here. Oh, here's Dr. Cooley. Oh, no, Mark Stebbins. But yes, Cooley. Good evening. I didn't plan to speak, but this is an interesting meeting I've noticed. Very polite, so thank you. This is for court enforcement. I have a property that's... active and running, but the neighbor invaded into my property. What is my right? Code enforcement. They're not going to answer your question. Through me, they can answer your question. So when you're done commenting, I'll get an answer for your question. I'm ready for an answer. You don't have any more public comment? No, that's just it. So staff, how would that work? So if I understand correctly, it's just they're encroaching on his property in some way. I don't know if that's just the people or the structures or what the case is. Most of the time it'd be a civil dispute unless it's like people actively on the property and then it would probably be a PD issue and a trespassing issue. But if he's talking more about like fences or structures on a property, it'd be a civil dispute. Yes, and I'm going to interject here only because in talking to the police officers, they said if property owners have a no trespassing on there, then the police can go and remove anybody that's there because we have buildings downtown that people are breaking into, burning fires in there to keep warm. That is just a nightmare ready to happen. But if there was a no trespassing, they just go in and out you go. That's correct. Yeah. So no trespassing works. But you got to do it every month. That's the bad part. Depending on the type of property. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Next public comment. Gwendolyn Daly. So my husband and I, we lease one building at 914 North Center Street. And on the 7th of this month, we're going into escrow for our second building at 922 North Center Street. 922 has been vacant for a while. So the owner decided to sell that to us. And we're happy about that because our first property we're buying together as a married couple. So, but... Code enforcement had got me in a jam with the building that we're leasing. I applied for a facade grant with the Downtown Stockton Alliance. And inadvertently, someone who was working at the economic development had listed that we had a code violation. Never had a code violation. Never had anything. My husband keep it all up around there. And so I couldn't get the $25,000. I got just a little bit of it. Because even Mr. Huber, Mike, he wanted to come in and fight for me. But it was too late because all the money was out. So what is in place for even to check and balance for code enforcement? Also, too, do you talk to... the owners to give them a chance. It's $250. Boom. Do you get a warning shot? Because we've never gotten anything. We never even knew it had I not applied. So with the owners, and then it's a lot of red tape through the city to even get anything done to help you through opening up your businesses. Is there any way that we can do that when we're at a year or less than? Because a year might seem a lot of time, but it really isn't when you're going through a lot of red tape. Can you kind of give us a little bit when the vice mayor say, give it more? I'm like, $250. That's a lot for us. Thanks. Yes, and I would say with that, we're talking about these chronically vacant buildings that we have in this city. And that's why I said having a grace period. If you acquire a building and it's vacant, that doesn't mean you've gotten the permits, but you have submitted plans for what you want for the building to the the permit center or the planning department saying this is what our vision is, this is what our hope is. They set a meeting up with you. You go over what the costs are. I mean, there are things that we could be doing in order to assist with that. We just need to make sure that it is written out and communicated to the community. Any more public comment? That concludes public comment. Okay. Vice Mayor? Yeah, I think to that point, too, I think, as the mayor said, we're talking about those that are just chronically vacant, right? I do want to point out that the mayor has made it a priority in talking to staff to address some of the, and I know the city manager is working with the team to address some of the permitting, licensing stuff to kind of clean up. that process that has taken some time. But, you know, we're talking about those who have no intention in doing anything with their buildings and they're not in any part of the process with the city to do anything for their business. So, hearing no more questions and no more public comment, I declare the public hearing closed. So, what is the pleasure of the council? I mean, I think given all the comments tonight, I would say, you know, I think we should refine the fee, right? And I think we should take into consideration the comments around, you know, those who are actively trying to work with the city to get their businesses going, but yet it's still vacant. And then come back with a very clear plan. Again, I would just suggest for those, again, that are chronically vacant, have no plan, not doing anything with it, that we consider the proposal. two hundred fifty dollars a month five hundred dollars a month for your two thousand dollars a month for your three uh... i did the math that seven hundred fifty thousand for first years uh... if we have two hundred fifty taking buildings one point five million and three million dollars in fees depend on what we get about the vacant lots vacant lots this would apply to again for those that are not in any part of a process with the city to actually get their businesses functioning and operable. Is that a motion? Oh, that's a motion. Oh, I would add to that. Give them an opportunity to sell it, donate it, or these fees, right? Can I do that? Okay. There's a motion. That's my motion. I'll second. Okay. Lori, is that all copacetic? Is that okay with everybody, agreeable with everybody, or do you have any questions? that needs to come back to the council okay council members please vote motion carries 7-0 okay we're on to the last item of the night sorry it's been a long day so item 16.2 adopt an ordinance amending Stockton municipal code and we get to the next page SMC Title I, Chapter 1.08, Section 1.08.010, amending Title I, all the way down to the meat and the potatoes, establish a hardship waiver process and resolve inconsistencies in the code related to offenses deemed as infractions, et cetera. Good evening. The purpose for this is just to present our proposal for an ordinance amending the Stockton Municipal Code Title I and establishing a hardship waiver. The Stockton Municipal Code, specifically Title I, currently defines violations as misdemeanors unless explicitly stated as infractions in the code or by state law. This has led to discrepancies between the SMC and the California Government Code. Government Code 36900 mandates a hardship waiver process enabling individuals to request a reduction in fines if they can demonstrate that a full payment would impose an undue financial burden. SMC 1.32.050, which addresses fines for administrative citations, does not differentiate between infractions and misdemeanors. So what we're talking about, the municipal code, any violation of the municipal code is considered a misdemeanor unless explicitly stated that it's an infraction. So that's kind of what we're talking about. So the proposed amendments would be to Title I, Chapter 1.08, Section 010. An amendment to Title I, Chapter, it's 1.32050. And an amendment to Title IX, Chapter 9.64, Section 090. So for our proposed fees, violations of a codified state or municipal non-building or non-safety code infraction, for a first offense would be $100, for a second offense would be $200, a third and subsequent offense would be $500, and then for violations of a codified state or municipal building or safety code infraction, for a first offense would be $130, second offense would be $700, and a third or subsequent would be $1,300. I have a quick question on that. So what if it is a tenant of a property? Does that go to the, it goes to the property owner then, correct? Sorry, give me one second. Because a tenant might be, have a hardship, but the property owner doesn't. But the property owner could say, sorry, it's your responsibility. So one thing that I think is useful is to explain only a select number of violations in the municipal code are considered infractions. And so if it would be helpful, I can kind of go over just a brief list of what those look like. It's not long. So for non-building and non-safety violations, it would only be for taxis, pedicabs, placing handbills on vehicles. removing or defacing legally placed signs or posters, water conservation, and unpermitted wireless communications facilities. So none of this would probably be like tenant cost. For building and safety violations, you're looking at abandoned vehicles that are not cited under our abandoned vehicle abatement program, so cited other than that, illegal dumping, obstructing sidewalks, tree height trimming adjacent to the street or sidewalk, barbed and razor wire height, and historical structures. So certificate of appropriateness and maintenance type items on historical structures. So that's the entire list of what we consider infractions in our municipal code. Everything else would fall under a misdemeanor. So you're saying that the items you just said could fall under this 100, 200, 300? Can you repeat that list? I want everybody on council to hear that list one more time. Yeah, so for the... top, the 100, 200, 500, that would be all non-building and non-safety violations. So it would just be violations related to taxis, pedicabs, placing handbills on vehicles, removing or defacing legally placed signs or posters from fences, walls, and buildings, water conservation, unpermitted wireless communications, and sorry, unpermitted wireless communication facilities. So that's the first list. The second, the 130, 700, and 1300, That's related to abandoned vehicles, with the exception of those cited under the AVA program, illegal dumping, obstructing sidewalks, tree height trimming adjacent to street or sidewalk, barbed and razor wire height, and historical structures. So those are the safety ones. So that's the second part there. So those are the ones that are charged these new fees, and those are the ones that would... you could apply for a hardship waiver if charged these fees for these violations. So if you're illegally dumping, you can get hardship? That's the thing. So it's state law. So that's why we're making all of the changes we're proposing here, just to come into compliance with state law. Yeah, because that's not enough. Yeah. Just saying. Yeah. And useful to note, the amounts that we listed are the maximum allowed by state law. So Caltrans has been struggling to clean up our freeways, right? Maybe they don't have enough staff or they're too busy doing other things. Could they be subject to these fines, too, or no? Caltrans? Or the state or somewhere. I mean, whoever is responsible for cleaning up the freeways. I would probably defer to the city attorney's office on that one as to whether or not we could. She stepped away. Okay, hold that question. We've asked that question. Did we? But anyway, continue. Okay. I feel like illegal dumping should have its own category or something. I mean, and so the first fine, the first fine for illegal dumping is $130. Because, I mean, you go and dump your refrigerator and couch on the side of the road, it needs to be way more than that. Yeah. If somebody does it in front of your car. That's the requirement. Yeah. So that's... Through our research with the city attorney's office, that's the maximum allowable. Really? Yeah, for these particular offenses that are considered infractions in our code, that's the maximum allowable fine that we can charge, and they are able to apply for a hardship waiver. Hold on. Let me ask the city attorney. So we can't, as a council, I mean, just in addition to this, create a policy or ordinance or rule that if you dump your... your couch or whatever on the side of a business or the street that we can't impose a larger fine than $130? John. He's here and he'll answer that question. Because we need to find a workaround. Is it $130 an item or something? I mean. My apologies. I'm trying to find our current legal dumping ordinance. to see if that has... That's okay. While you do that, let me just say, because the public's watching and I want this to go on record. I mean, like, there's some people that have, you know, more self-awareness than to go and dump their trash on the side of the road. It's really counterintuitive to our efforts in cleaning up the city if people can just go and dump furniture and trash and whatever they want on the side of the streets or businesses. So I think one of the biggest challenges in my district, I can't speak for the others, but people are just... pulling up to businesses and dumping tons and tons of trash. And there should be a severe penalty for that. And it should be a misdemeanor. It should be a crime. And I don't know if our city attorney was there or not when we talked about illegal dumping. And I said I wanted a $10,000 fine. But I was told, oh, the state won't allow that? I think the state already has some pretty high fines. I think it's like $10,000. I can't remember if it was 10, 20, 30 maybe, something like that. Yeah, because if you can find $1,000 for littering, I mean something out your car window, and you're dumping a truckload of stuff, I'm sorry, $10,000 and $100 of community service picking up illegal dumping stuff. And the mayor makes a good point. If it's $1,000 to throw something out a window and $130 to dump a whole truckload of trash out of business, it's kind of crazy. It doesn't appear that illegal dumping is on the website yet. I think the answer to this, and Code's probably going to go nuts here because we did not discuss this ahead of time. The city of Stockton as a charter city is not necessarily required to follow state ordinances unless they relate to matters of statewide concern. Typically, we have the ability to make our own municipal decisions. So, to the extent our incoming or current illegal dumping ordinance already has higher fines, I think we could keep those in place. And this ordinance has language in it that unless otherwise stated. This is just to bring our current default fines to make them consistent with state law. But again, as a charter city, I apologize, I can't pull up the current dumping ordinance. So what we need to do is have an addendum or a little A next to it that says go look at this over here because we need to be able to have more teeth in that. So you might think that it's only $130, but wait, there's more. And we have another municipal code that we can slam you with. Yeah, so thank you for providing this. The illegal dumping code 8.140.060 punishes illegal dumping fine of $1,000 for the first violation, $2,000 for the second, $3,000 for each subsequent violation. So again, that's something that was recently enacted. alleged committee you guys can revisit it but as as far as this is this is really just to get our our default fines uh to be consistent with with the state as a as a charter city uh i think we can we can safely advise and i i guess if if if lori if the city attorney uh disagrees with with my analysis here she can feel free to correct me but as as a charter city we we can go above And I think it is delineated in this proposed ordinance that these are subject to other areas in the code. Okay, wonderful. Thank you. Councilwoman Padilla. Vice Mayor Lee, if you can just make a mental note for the ledge that we're – going to agendize those fees for illegal dumping? I was going to say, I think we're all on the same page, at least what I'm hearing in this room. I don't know that we need to go to ledge. I think we can ask staff to come back with a policy that incorporates the fees we're asking. And community service. Yes. Okay. Okay. Public comment? We do. Alberto Gonzalez. We, sorry, sorry to interrupt. We didn't finish going through all of the slides. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Darn it, darn it, there's too many pages. Okay, three more slides. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Three more slides. It'll be really quick. So one of the other items that was listed in the state code was the That commercial property owners who fail to remove visible refuse or prohibit unauthorized use of the property within two years of a prior violation of the same offense. And the charge is $2,500. So that, I believe, is all of the new fees. So then the recommendation would be to adopt an ordinance amending Title I, Chapter 1.08, Section 1.08010. To update the municipal code to reflect the current limits of allowable fines for certain violations of the code considered to be infractions and ensure compliance with state law by requiring the city to establish a program for qualifying persons, the ability to request a reduction of fines resulting from violations of infractions through a hardship waiver request process. And to amend Title I, Chapter 1.32, Section 1.32050 to clarify that fines for violations considered to be infractions shall be leveled in a court levied in accordance with title one chapter one point zero eight and then to amend title nine nine point six four point zero nine zero to correct an inconsistency for the allowed height of barbed wire a violation codified as an infraction within separate chapters or sections of the municipal code to adopt a resolution approving an amended an amendment to fiscal year twenty four twenty five fee schedule relating to infraction violations and to authorize the city manager or designee to take all appropriate and necessary actions to carry out the purpose and intent of the ordinance and resolution. Now we're done. Okay. Thank you. Public comment. Alberto Gonzalez. So when I seen the fine, I was like 130. I'd rather take the fine than go pay at the dump site, but I guess I got the answer when he said that it was just, I guess it'll be more if you're doing illegal dumping. So that was my question. I'm like, for $130,000, I could go through a whole load. I'll pay the fine versus going to pay what I have to pay off Lovelace. That was it, but he gave me the answer. Thank you. That concludes public comment. Okay, bringing it back to council, but I've got to close the public hearing. What is the pleasure of the council? i want to make a motion to approve make a motion to approve this but with the caveat that we come back with a stronger policy and fee on the illegal dumping and also just publicly say that crime stoppers does pay for people who report people illegal dumping so there's a motion to prove we have a motion and a second council members please vote blauer was the second Motion carries 7-0. Okay, moving on now. We have the city manager's update. Yes, staff, you can go home. Sorry. Good evening, mayor and council members. I'm pleased to present the city manager's report highlighting the key activities and initiatives undertaken by the city manager's office over the past week. This report provides an overview of progress on city operations, public safety updates, infrastructure projects, and community engagement efforts. Our goal remains to enhance efficiency, accountability, and transparency while addressing the needs of Stockton residents. I look forward to working collaboratively to ensure a continued progress for our city. So the City Manager's Office worked on various issues of constituent concerns with Council Members Padilla, Blauer, Enriquez, and the Vice Mayor and Mayor. We met with HR and RGS, which is Regional Government Services, to initiate an agreement to conduct payroll audit and conduct payroll training. We met with HR and Robert Half to initiate an agreement to conduct an audit of Tyler Munis' system to correct payroll errors and update the timekeeping system. HR, ASD, and the City Manager's Office took appropriate steps to transition the Payroll Division to Human Resources effective March 10. ASD, Administrative Services Division. We work through the procurement process to find and select a recruitment firm for CFO and ACFO positions. Working on finalizing scopes of work with consultants to provide immediate service and resources to the department. And we're wrapping up on the transition of the payroll function into HR. With community services, we're working on the design of new library website. We completed the install of new library self-check machines, and we opened Lewis Park and Misty Holt softball complexes for the season. We also did a District 6 development presentation for the Vice Mayor. We presented the Vice Mayor an in-depth look as to where District 6 is and the potential impact area for future development. This involved EDD, OPDA, CDD, and the City Manager's Office. We are initializing and initiating the prep for the District 4 presentation. Encampment cleanup, Public Works staff removed 14 truckloads of debris weighing 27.9 tons from Mormon Slough and Commerce Street. Neighborhood Betterment Team, the NBT cleanup, On Saturday, March 1st, the NSS Neighborhood Betterment Team held a community cleanup event at South Airport Corridor, which is at 2244 South Airport Way in District 6. The event was well attended with 188 participants counted. March 2nd through the 8th is Women in Construction Week. This week recognizes and celebrates and promotes the role of women in the construction industry and has been celebrated since 1998. Also, the Stockton Fire Department and the Alyssa Ann Root Burn Foundation wants to invite council members and the public to its event this Friday, March 7th. Stockton Firefighters Local 456 has been involved with the program supporting kids suffering significant burn injuries. It's a really good opportunity to become familiar with the program and to support our firefighters. It's going to be at 5 p.m. and leaving no later than 6.30 p.m. at Stockton Firehouse number two. I'VE GOT MORE INFORMATION IF YOU NEED THIS ALSO. ALSO THE STOCKTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE HAS PLANNED A MARCH SHAMROCK TRADE SHOW MIXER MARCH 6TH AT THE UNIVERSITY PLAZA WATERFRONT HOTEL. IT IS FREE TO THE PUBLIC AND I ENCOURAGE COUNCIL MEMBERS TO ATTEND. WE ALSO ARE WORKING DILIGENTLY ON THE ONE VOICE TRIP COORDINATION WITH NOT ONLY COUNCIL MEMBERS BUT WITH SIGNIFICANT STAFF. to go back and try to bring back resources to our city. We're also researching strategies currently on the city county tax sharing agreement which expires July 31st, 2025. We initiated internal meetings to discuss annexation strategies specifically regarding LAFCO and fire district detachments. EDD performed a successful business walk in District 5 and 6, Martin Luther King Boulevard, engaging approximately 50 businesses regarding existing business support programs that are available. That concludes my report from the city manager. Thank you. Oh, thank you. Excellent report. Very informative and good work. So bring it back to council for council member comments. Go ahead, Councilwoman Padilla. Okay, thank you, Mayor. I do want to give a shout out to Sergeant Patrick High because he was involved in the cleanup of the seven and a half tons of trash throughout our city. There were various streets and I did post that on social media as well. I do want to thank those nonprofits and those individuals that do volunteer and give their time to the unsheltered that does go noticed i just wanted to make sure that i acknowledge that i appreciate the comments the public comments with regards to not always talking about the negative of our city and to really see what is happening um you know with this council within the first 60 days we got a notice from our chief that crime is down It almost seems like daily or weekly we get notices that crimes that have happened in the past are being solved. With regards to street light visibility, you know, the initiative the mayor brought up, the purpose of that, and I think we talked about this before, visibility makes it harder for those criminals you know, to hide. It's easier for people to see potential witnesses and identify them. So light does definitely deter criminal activity. This week, Thursday, March 6th at 4 o'clock, I will be chairing Ad Hoc Homeless Committee. We are going to have a couple of presentations, so I encourage everyone to come. City of Stockton hosts many activities for our youth and during spring break for Stockton Unified as well as Lincoln Unified they are accommodating both districts so I encourage everyone to look on the city website because they are holding activities during spring break so check out the web website to get that information Let me see, let me see. I think that's it. I'm good. Have a great week. Thank you. Council Member Enriquez. Yes, thank you, Madam Mayor. Yeah, I just want to just give a shout out to everybody who came to our meetings today, everyone that's listening in, and to my colleagues. A lot of big wins tonight. uh here in district four i'm excited that our interim city manager uh steve colangelo is working to get district four presentation ready and i want to thank the vice mayor for uh inspiring many of us to kind of seek out these district-wide presentations for our constituents um i want to share that i have my upcoming mornings with mario on december march 15th at 10 a.m location to be determined but that will be posted on our city website which is a coffee chat and we bring in folks to just come and chat about the district. You all have seen online that we've been doing a lot of work, fixing potholes, getting abandoned cars out of the way. Small steps, big impact, but it goes a long way for that constituent that does reach out, that does utilize the Ask Stockton app. So please utilize it. It's literally my best friend because I use it all the time. And it's really great and refreshing when we have constituents that call us and say, wow, you're answering my phone call, you're listening, you're following up. And it's not to take away from past folks, but it's really inspiring when they really feel that government is tangible and that we're actual real people that are actively wanting to do work for each other. And then to see the result of it is really not just rewarding, but it's showing that we were selected and voted in to do the work. And that's what we will continue to do. If you haven't seen, please follow Mayor Fugazi's Instagram. She is promoting the Youth Advisory Commission. So we need our young leaders to step up. Please apply. Applications are open. And that goes along with all of our boards and commissions. You know, one of the things that I know I saw the most when I was in the Measure W oversight committee last year is that if we don't have people stepping up in our community, then we cancel our meetings, right? And that takes away the business of what you all are seeking to do the community so it's really heartbreaking when I see canceled meetings due to lack of quorum so again please go on our city website that we have a few vacancies so please volunteer sign up and then if you have any questions about your district please reach out to your council members and we will be more than happy to share what is vacant and what is not this Saturday we've had I'm so happy that we were able to recognize Arbor week And this Saturday, I know myself and Mayor Fugazi will be planting a tree at Victory Park in my district at 10 a.m. at Victory Park. So we will love to have you join us. And that is all I have. Thank you. Vice Mayor. Mornings with Mario. That's why I had to hire a content person to keep up with this guy's social media. But I want to say, first of all, just to all my colleagues, I'm really proud of the work that this council is doing. uh... i promised with truth trust and transparency that also uh... relates and pertains to the work that we're doing right and we're feeling we have to acknowledge that we're struggling and we're succeeding i think it's all one in the same i want to acknowledge that it is women history month and we have some amazing women that work for us in the united city attorney our city clerk our mayor uh... the other council members uh... you know uh... so i just want to acknowledge that we have a lot of strong women in our community doing a lot of work. Some are here tonight and have been here through this whole thing. Earlier there was a comment from the NAACP president about comments online, and I think the confusion that people do is think that this is going to be politics as usual, where we're going to call up our friends or go to other council people's districts and have meetings with community leaders to go and attack them at council and line them up out the door. That game is over because transparency means we have to be accountable, and I'm going to call that out too. And, you know, what I love about my constituents is they actually film people when they're in public doing the dirty mess, and then when it comes here and spills over into our business, it's to confuse the community what's happening. I'm a member of the NAACP, and the president's upset that I reminded the community that his wife was involved with irregularities as it relates to finances. And so when we get... to be an honest and hold each other accountable. It's uncomfortable for people to be reminded that preschoolers shouldn't have to wonder if their staff are stealing from them. But when you use your position to come in front of the council and the community and like lie or use an opportunity to muddy the truth, the truth will come out when I have my time to do council comments. So we are, now that the NAACP has fixed their link so members can join, I'm encouraging everybody to join because change and leadership is needed there so that way we can address the needs of our community the other thing is after taking office you know i did ask staff to put together a comprehensive presentation on the districts i want to be very methodical about how we approach the work ahead uh... you know i appreciate that my colleagues in the community acknowledging uh... some strategic oppression or some challenges that have been created in our community for decades and i love that the mayor and his council's been committed to working with me at working through that. I want to just acknowledge the city manager, Stephanie Acasio did a phenomenal job. Every single department head, I want to thank them because they pulled together an amazing presentation that I will figure out how we can make available. I would love people to see it. I was able to look and see how there's some developers building $500 million projects in my district and donating $200,000 to the community. I don't understand that. So I'm scheduling meetings with them this week in Orange County to have that conversation. uh... i do want to say that you know we have another meeting soon and i want to thank my commissioners who attended uh... that meeting to see the presentation because having community involvement is important what we're going to do then is come back to me with staff start to throw out ideas of what we'd like to see uh... in our district and then from there uh... me my commissioners and the staff are going to go out to the community hold a forum so that maybe can bring the community and have a exchange of uh... ideas of what the future of the district looks like And then after that, we're going to schedule a meeting with the development community and invite developers from outside of Stockton, outside of California, outside of the United States to want to come in, do business in Stockton, because Stockton is open for business and we want to make sure that we get the best deal for our district. I want to say that I sent a request to the mayor, an email, asking for things that I would like this council to do a study session on. I think it's really important when we look at matters like what the city manager brought up that right now there's a 80 20 property tax split with the county we're not getting our fair share so we're getting ready to go and renegotiate that because we got to up the city bag there but i do think that we have a very successful real estate in development community here i do think that we should do a study session on impact fees permit fees development extraction fees affordable housing fees property taxes on undeveloped land transfer taxes and special assessment districts and community benefit agreements because to have a development team build a 500 million dollar warehouse in my district when we know that there's environmental challenges and give two hundred thousand dollars to the community it's absurd so I'd like to ask my colleagues to support a study session on that do we need to do that right now or can I wait to the end I'm almost done okay a date certain of because In a month or two. 60 days. 60 days. Yeah, that's wonderful. I co-sign off that. For a study session, we need a vote. The mayor can do it. The mayor can do it. Never mind, you sign off. I got it. Thanks. Okay, I do want to remind city staff that on January 7th, we requested a study session, two study sessions. This was before you were in this position, but it expired on February 1st. 21st and we've not had that it's one on procurement and amendment agreements and like understanding what the economic development team how they do that and then the second one was on what was the second matter it was it was for for the study session was on that and there was one more oh on the ASM global matter that was that and then I can't remember the second one, but anyhow. Staff can go back and look at the notes from the seventh, but just whenever we do give a timeline, we need to stick to that, and there was no request for an extension. It was 45 days, that's expired. I do want to give an update as chair of the audit committee that I recently posted online a video, just it was a little clip, but I really love that people in the community come out to our committee meetings. Councilwoman Padilla's doing a lot of work on the homeless. uh... we're doing a lot of work in legislative and then you know uh... the audit committee we did audit two things one was asm global as you know that was the contract that was pushed through that by the previous council and i think in that meeting it was explain that they were doing a really great job and we didn't want to lose them what we found in our audit committee was that right now the city's over three point five million dollars in the red uh... in all of our facilities seven out of eleven facilities are in the red uh... and three over three point one million dollars is from the ASM Global managed facilities. I did have a meeting with the director today and Tina from our team here. That's over $15 million in taxpayer money going to keep our lights open in these facilities coming from our general fund. There's a concern there. The conversation today was we have to turn that around. And so that is something that we put out there. And the second thing that we audited was ASD. And I want to thank the mayor because when i found out that there were some irregularities in the payroll department i immediately went to the mayor and then we engaged city staff the city manager and our hr team has done a phenomenal job at stopping the hemorrhaging making sure that we understand the impact to the city's budget to our city staff some staff getting a ten thousand dollar over payment on their payments uh retirement stuff that could lead into excess fees So I appreciate the transparency in us showing you that since 2022, there've been these challenges happening at the city as it relates to payroll, hundreds of thousands of dollars of penalty fees, and we are fixing it. So I just want people to know that you don't see everything that's happening, but I do want you to know that we are addressing that. So thank you, Mayor, for putting the team together to do that. I have a beautification event at a park that I'll be attending on March 15th from 9 a.m. to noon. It's the William Long Park at 4535 Woodchase Lane. Please come out. Let's clean up our parks. Get your friends, family. Let's make it a fun day. I'll be there. And I want to thank the police department for starting community meetings in Sierra Vista with the police in our community to have conversations about public safety because that's something that hasn't been happening there. And we're doing that as we lead into the police substations. The last thing I want to say is that I did go on my Facebook and across all of my social media this weekend saying that a council member should resign. And let me just be very clear about that. We have an obligation to model behavior for young people, for our community, our staff. We've been holding our staff accountable. When I tell you the pace that these people are working at now, the long nights, weekends, day after day, putting in work to deliver on our commitment to our constituents is something that we have to be accountable to. And I take a lot of pride. When I first started as the vice mayor, I was told, you know, vice mayor, you just go. The only thing a vice mayor does is just chair meetings when the mayor is not around. I think every leader has to decide how they hold their title and how they hold their responsibility. I don't look at me as just a meeting person. I look at me as a leader who's earned trust and who's going to stand on what he said. I have watched council members up here throwing tantrums, leaving early, not coming, not calling when they're not coming. When you don't show up, you don't show up for your district. And when you're a neighboring district to mine and the trash in your district is filthy, I'm going to hold you accountable if you don't have the political will to do your job. The second thing is that our officers, and I will tell you, I was going to say this tonight, but there's so much that our officers have done in catching murderers, people who've killed families. They're doing a phenomenal job, and as somebody who holds our police accountable, if we had bad police, I'd be the first one out here demanding resignations, terminations, whatever. This department is working overtime to create a culture of trust. to create a culture of education and awareness and enforcement. So for them to get slammed online, for our chief who's doing a great job to be demanded that he resign because a council member doesn't get his car towed when he gets pulled over for driving illegally, I think is unfair to our police. And I'm not going to stand for that. I'm going to stand with our police department who's doing a great job. And I want to tell the public that... When you demand the police to take your car if you have no insurance, be careful when it's your car because then when that car gets impounded and they don't use the discretion that they gave the councilman, then if you can't afford to get your car back, you lose your car. So let's be very clear. The police did their job. They cited the person, but the responsibility of having license, insurance, registration current, not two years late, not having excuses, is to each individual who holds registration. So I do want to say that to our police department, oftentimes I share... Clips of what's happening in the city that relates to police. And I do have 8 million followers and they all have a life of their own and they say whatever they want. I just want you to know that. I'm going to stand with you when you're right. I'm going to hold you accountable when you're wrong. And our police department is doing a damn good job of cleaning up this city. And it's going to get even more aggressive as we start to address public safety needs. So that's my council comments. And I do want to say one last thing. every single person that comes in here no matter what you say whether I like it don't like it whether you're mad at me or happy with me whether you say something that I agree with or not thank you for coming and keep coming and keep saying whatever you feel because that is your time and I am it is not a I don't feel any type of way when you say what you say I enjoy that you actually took the time to come down because we all love to see you thank you council member Blower thank you mayor um I'd like to start out with a quick report from the California League of Cities Central Valley Division. I serve currently as the first vice president. Minnie Diallo is the president. And I met with her as well as staff. For those of you who don't know, Steven Qualls, who was our long-time public affairs manager for our district, retired last year. In fact, when you guys were at the AVA, when you were doing the press conference, I was actually in Modesto with President Minney and staff, and we were doing interviews. And so I'm very excited to make the big announcement for who the replacement is. We hired Marlo Livingood. Oh, wow. Great. So, yeah, I think that's great news. I think it's good for Stockton. You know, she, of the people that we interviewed, she had all the goods, and I really liked that she had, you know, all the local connections already. So good news there. For those of you, just a quick announcement. The general membership meeting will be on Thursday, March 20th, and that will be at Great Wolf Lodge in Manteca. Starts at 6 o'clock. Let's see, other things I just wanted to hit on. I want to thank all of the members of the public that came out to the Seaford Center, let's see, on the 20th for the community planning meeting for the Groupie Park Pickleball. That community engagement is just so important. You know, I liked what I saw with the report on Columbus Park, seeing all those people get out there, the people that are actually going to use these parks. So I just thank the public that has the passion to get out and support GIVE US GUIDANCE, PARTICULARLY THE PEOPLE THAT ARE GOING TO USE IT. WE HAD PROBABLY AT LEAST 30 PEOPLE AT THAT MEETING, SO IT WAS GOOD. I WANT TO THANK CITY STAFF AS WELL THAT CAME OUT TO THAT, AS WELL AS SUPERVISOR PAUL CANAPA. HE POPPED IN, SO I ALWAYS APPRECIATE PAUL BEING AROUND. LAST WEEK WE HAD THE ROTARY READ-IN. I SEE WITH KUI KEY IN THE AUDIENCE, I HAVE TO MENTION THAT. Rotary Read-In went very well. I think Councilmember Enriquez did that as well. I'm not sure if any of the rest of you did. If you didn't, I'd strongly encourage next year. You do it every day. And you benefited, Councilmember. It's a wonderful event. I think literacy is just such an important thing in our community, and to do this year after year, Just applaud the Rotary for doing that. And I really enjoyed this. This was my second year of doing my wife's first grade class. So it was very, very fun, very good event. And then finally, I'd just like to congratulate all the award recipients at the Italian Athletic Club's 57th Annual Law Enforcement Officer of the Year Awards. So we really appreciate all of those officers and all of the things that they do. Very impressive group, and it was a good event. And that is my report, and I think we might be done before 11. Doubtful. Councilwoman Fonse. Thank you, Mayor. Before we conclude tonight, I want to take a moment to recognize the incredible men and women of our Stockton Police Department. This past week, I had the privilege of attending the 56th Annual Italian Athletic Club Officer of the Year Awards alongside Mayor Fugazi and several of our other colleagues. and honestly it was an honor to celebrate them for their outstanding work for officer mark sankey eric hughton and officer stephen young their dedication bravery and commitment on keeping our city safe do not go unnoticed again i just want to personally thank them for their service and additionally i also would like to express my appreciation for um the Aspire School Superintendent Tony Salina for promptly responding to a constituent concerning regarding an excessive noise coming from the PE activities at their local charter school. So I appreciate his willingness to work with the resident and find solutions that will work for everyone. And then again, I just want to wish everyone a restful night. Thank you. Council Member Villalpudo. Yes, thank you, Mayor. Thank you, community, for coming out. Let's see. I was to report that Friday I was going door-to-door on MLK, hitting business owners about some programs that the city has. One example is the stock food produce infrastructure grant program that we have. So, for example, if your produce or anything that's cold is not working, The city's over here to help you out and get that fixed. I was also talking about the window program. So a lot of those businesses, if you have a window broken, the city comes right now. It's $800 to pay up for you. So if you buy it, show them a receipt, you will get your money back. As well, Ms. Daly, when you were talking, I will talk to you about information about signs and infrastructure. The city has a program right now that pays 66% of it. So I could give you a little more information that we do. I had one more thing on here. I just lost my point. What was it? Yeah, just re-event Stockton. Sorry. This is Saturday, I believe. Vice Mayor did his on Friday, I did mine on Saturday. We were talking about the community, what's going on in our part and what's coming in the future. I wanted to give a shout out to Ms. Thompson from Reinvent Stockton for having a great event. It was very informational. All her staff were very great. Community came and they asked questions, I think they answered. So city manager, I have a lot of things on my plate that I need your assistance, that the community is asking that we help them out. But that being it, thank you everyone. We had a lot of wins, a lot of good things are coming in our community. And today was another example. So thank you, good night. Okay, my turn. I'll try to do it in eight minutes or less. So I just want to say that I appreciate this council so much we might not always agree all the time on how to get there but we all have the same goal in mind I think the public is also on that same vein again we might not always agree on how to get there but we all want as we've said a safer cleaner Stockton I also want to talk about some upcoming events. So there's going to be an international rally. It's a night rally, Thursday, March 6, 6.30 p.m. at Bear Creek High School. And what's amazing about this, I'm bringing kids from my school there because they're doing performances, displays, cultural exhibits, highlighting our diversity. Stockton has been known for on a positive note. And also the importance of inclusivity and unity. So I'm going to be there. Like I said, it starts at 630. Definitely. I'm excited about that. It's one of my favorite events. And they were practicing this week all in the parks. No, it's fantastic. You should really try to go. Yes, and then Arbor Day at Victory Park used to be my district. I love that area. It's not far from my house. I live closer than you do. Just saying. But definitely, there's so many good things. There's a cleanup, several cleanups happening. I know one is happening at Kennedy, which is a county, but they really are. People are out there volunteering in our community. I want to... talk about the promotional ceremony for the Stockton Police Department. Wow, nobody laughed at my jokes, but that's okay. It was a very amazing event to hear the work of our department and this forward movement motion that we have, the solving of cases, the arresting of, of those suspects in those cases to help families get a little bit of closure. Now we have to make sure that if they are guilty that they are held accountable for that. I didn't eat the prime rib at the IAC. My compadres did, but there were five of us there, and our officers, we had a CHP, the Sheriff's Department, and then our officers, there were nine officers that were recognized for heroic, absolutely heroic acts in this city. And July 23rd, 1850 was when City of Stockton was officially incorporated. I know that Chair Canepa's gonna come and talk about the county and their 175th anniversary. Well, whatever they do, we're gonna do better. I'm just putting that out there right now. We do have a meeting in July, July 15th, I wanna say. But I would love to be able to do something to celebrate the City of Stockton, the largest city in the county. And I want to thank everybody for the outpouring of love and prayers and concern about my father. My father underwent a very serious surgery. I'm hoping he gets to come home soon. He's being taken care of, well taken care of. But I really appreciate all the people that prayed for him. I do believe in the power of prayer. And with that, oh my gosh, it's 1055. I still have things to talk about. No, I don't. Let's close this meeting. Adjourned at 1055. See you on March 18th, 2025. Good night. Oh, it's 1056 now.