Special Concurrent City Council and Redevelopment Agency Meeting February 2, 2009

0:00:01good evening I'd like to convene the special concurrent city council and Redevelopment ageny meeting for the city of Elo for February 2nd and ask for the roll call council member Chang here council member Lyman here council member Jones here mayor proam Aon here and mayor Potter

0:00:23here and council member Jones will now lead us in the pledge please join me I pled 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 and now call for staff

0:00:54Communications um I'll wait I'll take the council Communications uh first because agency member Bill Jones has a report out from closed session from the last time we met yes like to uh report out again on our uh closed session after last meeting and that is the Redevelopment agency

0:01:16board provided staff and legal counsel with Direction on how to proceed with the subject matter a letter to the Downey Street Publications or Productions excuse me uh has been developed by legal counsel and it uh has become public if you're interested in that it's either on the website or uh

0:01:38contact the uh city clerk she'll be able to get a copy of that letter too for you and the uh Redevelopment agency board further appointed an ad hoc subcommittee of agency members Lyman and aelson to meet with Downey Street Productions thank you thank you and we had just been

0:02:00in a special meeting of the council to conduct interviews for our boards and commissions and we are very pleased with the many talented and well-qualified folks that came out today to speak with us I would like on behalf of the entire Council to make the following um

0:02:14announcements of the following appointments for our design review board we have appointed rodia low and to the park and wreck commission lesie Goldstein to the arts and culture commission Diana bandari and kakati Lynn and Ed Franco we are going to also reappoint

0:02:40Marty Kal kisi to the economic development board and wanted to confirm the appointment on the committee of Aging of Caroline nun um with that I'll ask if there are any announcements from other council members council member abson yes um I wanted to um do a report under AB

0:03:051234 of um variety of things that I attended I actually attended um four meetings in a space of two days so I was um moving from one to the other very rapidly but um I was at the league of California cities and I attended the policy committee for uh community services and also for

0:03:30administrative Services I'm the vice chair of the community services committee and I also attended the training for um Mayors and council members all of that was held in Sacramento um at the same time I also went in the evening to uh the contracer Transportation Authority so it was a

0:03:49busy busy day of two two days um anyway uh one of the things that I got while I was there was um that I thought would be interesting to the the group was parliamentary procedure Basics relating to the League policy committees and it's kind of a a nice little uh synopsis of

0:04:08parliamentary procedure that I think works here so I thought I would give it to the city clerk and it could be distributed to everybody um then um and I just wanted to mention on the community services committee we had a report from the California Commission on Aging and um

0:04:29then also um let's see I wanted to report that on the uh administrative Services committee we had a report on the new FPC gift rules um and also from the California newspaper Publishers uh who are proposing some new legislation um uh for the upcoming term there actually is no bill or anything

0:05:00yet so um then um I also went separately to um uh various meetings on ab32 SB 375 um which both deal with um climate protection and um I went to a series of meetings on that I went to a briefing um sponsored by the mayor conference and the Contra Casta Council and the East

0:05:35Bay Eda it says here not sure who that is actually but it was held um over in Walnut Creek um and they they did a um a presentation on the details of that legislation which is already passed I um then um let's see here I'm trying to figure out how to organize this a little bit

0:06:00better um I then received um I I'll go over some of the details of that when I get to my other report later but I also went to a um a seminar on uh the Bay Area economic Outlook um on uh January 29th that was sponsored by the um Association of Bay Area governments

0:06:24and they talked about the status of the economy uh at the state level and in the Bay Area and it was pretty similar in both cases and um the news was that we should not expect any recovery before the end of this year 2009 but hopefully by the beginning of next year um things

0:06:47will start to look a little better I did get a a a very thick PowerPoint presentation uh which could be uh copied and distributed I don't know if anyone is interested in that um that has a lot of charts and everything about um various indicators is anyone interested in it or do you

0:07:07want to save the trees you I I can just borrow it maybe or pardon I could I just borrow it and give it back to you sure yeah unless somebody else wants it and then we'll make copies anyone else okay okay and um so um let's see what else I think I got through everything except for

0:07:30one thing uh which is that I went to a um seminar on Transit oriented development that was sponsored by the local government commission and Chang was also there and uh in fact received a copy of the S SP 375 bill um so that is really the Hot Topic in a lot of uh

0:07:50meetings that I go to right now and um I'll get some to some of the details on that in one of my um reports later thank you okay thank you Mr Lyman no ch um I I did go to a new council member training for uh that was held by the um kasta mayor's conference over the weekend and

0:08:12got to spend a little more quality time with our fellow Contra Casta electeds and was very very informative giving getting us good background on all the their Special Districts out there and um and just you know complimenting uh my knowledge of of what's going on in our

0:08:28County great thank thank you I also spent two days at the uh League of California City's uh mayor and and council members training great um I attended that conference as well in Sacramento and in addition um I have been asked by principal Ryman at elero high school to

0:08:49make the following announcement that um elero high school is going to be celebrating a grand opening and the festivities will be on February Friday February 27th beginning at 8:00 P.M and extending all the way through the day on Saturday February 28th starting at 10:00

0:09:08a.m. and it will include tours of the new school and there's a flag ceremony and ribbon cutting including the marching band that it's going to begin at noon and the attendance of the city council of Elso is greatly appreciated so I hope you can mark your calendar

0:09:23again that Saturday February 28th at 10:00 for that event the um School tours will continue through 3 pm and then there's a couple of films and dinner and it just sounds like a wonderful event if you haven't been up at the high school to visit this is a great opportunity uh

0:09:41to do so and appreciate all that the community has accomplished in addition I hav a noticed that the elero city hall Art Gallery um reception for the new show will be held Saturday February 7th from 2: to 4:00 p.m. and the show consists of superb black and white photographs by Ed Kenny

0:10:05and elero residents and they are on the subject matter of Nova Scotia and also Doug wag Wagner's pastels warm the heart and soul their snow scenes so they're very beautiful there's some examples of the work so please join us at City Hall uh this Saturday February 7th from 2: to

0:10:28okay with no other Council announcements for now we'll move on to staff announcements or Communications good evening mayor city council members and elero residents my name is Melanie minz and I'm the city's uh Environmental Services div division manager I'm here tonight to announce

0:10:56proudly the uh initiation of our new and improved residential recycling program um in your packet you have a couple of handouts and residents will be receiving these shortly one of them will be will be mailed out this week and it is a special bulletin announcing the

0:11:15program uh contained in this bulletin is information about what residents will be able to put in the new gray carts uh it explains why the program is being changed which is essentially to make it both easier for residents to put out their recyclables and to expand the

0:11:30capacity um so that people can recycle more and a wider variety of items so that'll be coming this week um also when the carts are delivered which is beginning February 16th which is a Monday um residents will also receive a laminated um information packet inside

0:11:48the cart this importantly contains information about where the carts should be placed um on the regular garbage and recycling pickup day um so both of these will be coming we're also doing a press release so people will get information via the newspapers um and on February 28th which

0:12:05is a Saturday we'll be doing a demonstration and hosting an open house at the recycling center so that residents can come troubleshoot any issues that they're having ask questions and get a demonstration about how to conveniently move the carts I think that is um I could go over

0:12:22a little bit of the benefits again um they're 64 gallon they actually are going to they double the capacity for residents and they actually decrease the footprint of what's going to be out on on the rideway um currently the two bins are 36 gallon capacity combined and

0:12:37these are 64 gallon um we're going to be taking any hard plastics or food containers we're also going to be taking plastic bags but we ask that the plastic bags be contained in another plastic bag to not um jam up the the recycling equipment um and again it's all on here

0:12:54actually another thing um on the top of your cart on top of the gray cart will also have information information uh permanently on the cart um indicating what can be put in it and what can't be on February 28th also which is the day of the open house the Saturday we will

0:13:08also be picking up the old bins for those that don't want to keep them we encourage people to keep those bins and to reuse them in any way they can um a good way is to maybe store your household hazardous waste in preparation to be bringing it where it needs to go

0:13:21alternately if you don't have the space or don't want it uh it it should be put out on February 28th and we'll pick all those up so again the carts will be delivered beginning February 16th it'll take 2 weeks to get to every resident every rate paying resident and I can

0:13:35take any questions and answers now or people can call the recycling center and the Environmental Services Division at 215 4350 they can also visit the website and they can get there from the homepage or they could go directly to EC environment. org and finally again you

0:13:53can come to the open house on the 28th any questions Melanie um I believe an earlier presentation was made that uh quite possibly the new recycling program will eventually take styrofoam and bubble pack although I know on this for this round it's not allowed but is that still

0:14:17the program and maybe when is that coming on and currently we do take that up at the recycling center at the top of smid Lane so we'll take uh styrofoam and the bubble pack um as far you know that's a good question in the cart um you know probably not not in the

0:14:34cart because the cart will actually be going all together to be sorted elsewhere whereas we actually find the destinations for the uh styrofoam and the bubble pack including people can come to the recycling center to pick it up so we're kind of trying to separate

0:14:47items that will be reused from items that'll be recycled so in the gray cart is items that will actually be recycled and reprocessed into new um materials um those can actually go to the recycling center and we're looking one of the reasons we're doing this program is also

0:15:02to expand um what we accept at the recycling center for reuse yeah one of the Flyers says you don't take we're not taking those as of now right so we do take them at the recycling center but not in the bins great thank you you're welcome question about um in the um

0:15:22flyer that you gave us a copy of it shows where to place the bins are they supposed to be in a particular order they don't need to be in a particular order the important thing um is to not block the sidewalk um to make sure that they're putting away that they don't

0:15:39roll down the hill um and the reason that we ask them to be placed apart is because our new trucks are going to be able to use the automatic arm to pick them up which will be saving of course the backs and knees of our recycling drivers so they don't need to be in a

0:15:53particular order they just need to be separated enough that that would be that the that the truck can maneuver to get in there so I can't tell from the picture but is there like an arm that the um truck reaches under on the bin yeah you can kind of see on the green

0:16:08one and the gray one you can see a little like metal bar okay so do they need to be turned a certain direction yes and um the bullet point on that same photo says that place all carts on the street so the wheels are against the curb and the numbers on the front of the

0:16:21cart and that'll put it in the right position for The Operators so okay so there's just two wheels uhhuh so there's just two wheels and then there's the numbers and the numbers should be facing the street okay thank you you're welcome a quick question about U multif

0:16:37family um housing and and those who are in apartments and how their equipment is going to change or not it is and in the next few months we're going to be doing uh more Outreach to them their equipment is currently like big commercial bins um we actually uh in the weekly report you

0:16:55get you'll be getting this week we actually have seen a 60% increase in their participation and a 15% increase in the participation of businesses we've ordered we've actually had to order 30 new um bins for those and we have a grant to do additional Outreach which

0:17:10will be probably starting uh kind of early summer thanks so we want uh the same convenience that we're providing single family residential where there's going to be the combination and District uh working to increase participation rates and the amount that people is recy

0:17:23are recycling will we look at all types of residents and businesses great thank you two quick ones uh what weight what card stock is the laminated card is it going to be a good weight stock that people will be able to use it in the last for years or is it going to be just

0:17:42laminated paper I think it's laminated paper but it's thi a thick L it's a it's a thick piece it should be able to be used for a long time um and then on the the mailer that that would be mailed out to everyone um there is a sentence that talks about about when the cart gets

0:17:59folded just put it out to the curb at the same time as your garbage in yard waste carts um implying that it should be linked with the guard the green waste bin which is every other week but everything else you read suggests that you could put it out on any blue pickup

0:18:15day or you know garbage pickup day as well so that's a good point I'm glad you brought that up they can go out every week so like your garbage however because they're so much bigger we appreciate if people only put it out when it's full and that'll do many things it will make it so you're only

0:18:31having to pull it out um less often but also it'll make it so that our routes are a little bit shorter and we're not having to make so many stops which will save fuel it'll save time it'll allow us to continue to expand our operations so again they're bigger if they're not full

0:18:45and you think you could wait another week or two go ahead but we will be running the routes every single week so we'll if you if they're out we'll pick them up and and to that end I asked this last time when when gu was presenting this to us um so I want to call to everyone's

0:19:00attention that there is if you are elderly or disabled and can't move your cart that there is a phone number that you can call to get assistance to get your card out which would uh support what you just said about filling the card up before it's pulled to the curve

0:19:15absolutely thank you and that's both if you're elderly disabled have a different hardship uh we have a current program where we do that and we would continue that program so people should again call us at 215 4350 if that they if they'd like to request that service well thank you so much for

0:19:33providing information on this important topic and I know that these changes will take a little bit of adjustment but they're all in the spirit of getting us to our goal of recycling more material in our community and I am very impressed with the many ways that you are reaching

0:19:50out to get the word out both through the website the mail the placards and the flyer so we appreciate your efforts and I'm looking forward to the transition great thanks and we look forward to receiving feedback so we invite residents to definitely give us that as

0:20:03we troubleshoot okay than thank you if there are no other staff Communications we're going to now move on to item three oral Communications from the public this place on the agenda is reserved for comments and inquiries from the public regarding matters on the agenda and matters which do not

0:20:22otherwise appear on the agenda all persons wishing to speak should sign up with the city clerk remarks are limited to three minutes per person when you come up to the podium you'll see three lights you'll see a light turn green up here and when it turns yellow you'll

0:20:35know that you have 1 minute left and when it turns red you'll know that your time is concluded comments regarding non-agenda and consent calendar items will be heard first comments relating to the presentations will be he heard during the during the presentations comments

0:20:51relate related to items appearing on the public hearing or public matter portions of the agenda are taken up at the time the city council deler liberates each action item individuals wishing to comment on any closed sessions scheduled after the regular meeting May do so

0:21:05during this public comment period or after the formal announcement of the Clos session our first speaker is Ken burnt they can't see the lights council members good evening uh bill I think you probably uh my timing is not too great tonight but I have been trying to get information from the city

0:21:38since October with no response and I found an editorial in the Contra costic times just recently that pointed out what our President Obama has to say about uh telling telling people what you know if you will this comes straight from the chief executive the Obama

0:21:59Administration new policies signal a recognition that disclosure of public records is an essential part of our government a democracy requires accountability and accountability requires transparency Obama made clear that secrecy would not be tolerated the way to make government accountable is to

0:22:20make it transparent so that all the American people can know exactly what decisions are being made and how they're being made and whether their interests are being served in governments from City to the halls of the White House there has been a constant attempt to find language and

0:22:37a public record Law to justify secrecy Obama seeks to reverse that attitude freedom of the information act should be administered with a clear presumption in the face of Doubt openness prevails government should not keep information confidential merely because public off officials might be

0:22:59embarrassed by Disclosure because errors and failures might be revealed or because of speculative or abstract fears nondisclosure should never be based on an effort to protect the personal interests of government bill you took a step ahead of me tonight thank you very

0:23:18much than thank you thank you EXC sorry you can sh next p v [Music] I'm Peter Lal and I think I'll let myself be inspired by Ken and therefore I'm asking to find out uh how much it cost us on attorney's fees and the consultant fees to write this letter that went to the Downey

0:23:46Street Productions do I need to do it in writing or I'd like to get an answer sometime let's find out uh now today's agenda largely deals with the financial crisis I'll hear from the school district and about the uh uh utility tax now El Cerito may not be any worse than

0:24:05most towns in California in lacking responsibility or accountability um but this is where we live and this is where we have to do something about it now uh our mayor's colleagues state employees are taking a 11% cut in earnings to try and align expenditures and

0:24:29income and uh but nothing like that is happening in elero and I don't see any this is this is what I find you're talking about the financial crisis and there seems to be an agenda item missing so I'd like to comment on that uh our captain City Manager on in this Sea full of icebergs

0:24:53so we on a Titanic with everybody else uh seems to be proceeding ing without reducing speed uh with no regard for safety except that he seems to make sure that there's space in the lifeboats for the crew passengers children women be damned now uh it's not Scott's fault

0:25:15he's of course doing exactly what is expected of him by what used to be the old call the old Council now there's two new members and other than pointing out this lacking agenda item I'm just curious to find out today and the coming agenda items to what extent the two new

0:25:34members on the council uh will fulfill their promises to heed The public's interest because I felt it wasn't heeded properly in the past thank [Music] youer Al Miller Al Serita I'd like to comment on two things on the uh con ENT calendar I'd like to encourage you to

0:26:00support uh for the West Contra Unified School District's efforts to seek depth forgiveness from the state of California and I would encourage all of my fellow citizens uh especially those registered to vote to write letters to our assembly woman Nancy Skinner and our new uh state

0:26:19Senator Mark desier encouraging them to support the Forgiveness of this debt uh the other comment I have is in my role as chair of the uh ELO Street uh citizen Street oversight committee uh it's item 5H on the consent calendar I just wanted to give a public face to the fact that

0:26:42uh the street oversight committee consisting of myself Lynn Kessler Arlene Roberton Thomas Miller and Elizabeth ozilook uh met January 26th and did our first review of the expenditures of the tax supporting the street repairs uh you have a packet in your packet and there's

0:27:04in the public packet so I'll just read part of it uh before I do we're at a little disadvantage not disadvantage it's just a little confusion because like anything Financial we're on a a uh fiscal year rather than a calendar year so here it is the start of the first

0:27:24calendar year after the year in which the work was started but we're only talking about the fiscal activity that took place through 30 June and was audited uh along with the other uh City Financial efforts but be that as it may and there wasn't much Financial actions in the

0:27:45street committee and then a lot of effort in the street but most of it took place after June 30th anyway I want everyone to know that by a unanimous vote the committee found that the expenditures were for an appropriate use of the pothole and local Street Improvement maintenance transaction and

0:28:02use tax the committee is hereby reporting their findings to the city council and to the citizens of the city of El Sero pursuant to Section 2.04 320 C of the ELO municipal code and in closing I would like to acknowledge what I consider above and beyond the staff

0:28:24support uh from we received from Mary Dodge and Jerry Bradshaw they were both here till after 10:00 that night helping us understand the process the routine uh how to understand audit or talk uh and uh answer the rest of the questions that we have so thank you very much excuse Al

0:28:47excuse me just a followup have you uh scheduled the next meeting yet uh we have not scheduled the exact time tenative schedule to have a kind of a midyear uh status review maybe in May uh and then at the end of the fiscal year when the budget gets uh submitted to the

0:29:08city and not the budget the audit of this fiscal year we'll have the final review and uh to see if we agree or don't agree thank you very much thank you no other speakers other than two for the for item 4 a presentation okay well then why don't we move on to item 4 a

0:29:33West country cross Unified School District update on the plan relocation of the portala middle school just before we get started I want the folks who are here to speak on this item um I'll introduce that we'll have a presentation by the school School District some clarifying questions from

0:29:59the council then we'll open it up for comments from the public wel thank you madam mayor members of the council and uh city manager and staff um I'm Bill Savage I'm the engineering officer with the West Contra house Unified School District and I want to introduce the newest member of our

0:30:15leadership team at the district and he's assisting passing out uh some of the uh presentations Mr Bill Fay associate superintendent for operations for the district and he comes to us from the Los Angeles Unified School District most recently uh we have a little bit more uh

0:30:30broad presentation than just on the relocation of portal Middle School this is just to give you a kind of overview of uh things in the district and specifically how they relate to the city of elero so uh if you could I want we want to just give you an update on the

0:30:46school consolidation uh the staff recommendations and focus on schools that would have be Consolidated either in Els Sero or that would have impacts on schools that are in the city of Els Sero want to just take a second to talk about some of the financial crisis impacts on our school

0:31:04construction program then I do want to uh review with you the portala project at Castro and uh some of the discussions related to Temporary relocation of the school give you an update on Elser oh high talk about the Fairmont property sale and just cover briefly The Joint

0:31:20use projects with the city um I I don't need to tell you I think you were all most I think all the council members were there for the really great meeting that we had with all of the city councils and city managers and the Schoolboard members and you heard the basics but for the public

0:31:39the school district is faced with a serious structural deficit and the need to uh consolidate we have declining enrollment many many small schools in our district and as much as we value neighborhood schools uh unfortunately we are financially unable to continue to

0:31:56operate schools that uh have very very low enrollments and so we have a huge need to reduce our operating costs and also to deal with what's the real fundamental structural deficit in our school district and that is uh long-term employee uh health care and benefits for

0:32:15our retirees and reducing the district's long-term debt which stems back from the bailout uh in the at the bankruptcy in the early '90s so with background the superintendent began the discussion with the board in November of 2008 we've been through a very lengthy series of public meetings

0:32:35the board's adopted criteria for closure and consolidation of schools and we've received input from consultant teams and there's a variety of information that's available on the district's website if you click under School consolidation there's a huge huge background uh

0:32:51material related to enrollment projections demographics costs Etc and that that's all available staff recommendations were presented last Thursday night at a special public meeting and they were actually uh reviewed again tonight we just came from a meeting of the school board to review

0:33:11the those recommendations and there'll be a public hearing on February 4th at and it's going to be held at uh penol Valley High School just because of some of the issues we're having currently related to uh transmission on public television which is down in the city of

0:33:27Richmond and so we can't get our transmission out of laavan Dean so it'll be held at penol Valley high school and the final board Action meeting will be held on February 11th Wednesday and that's at the Richmond Civic Auditorium just briefly to cover with you these are the staff recommendations

0:33:45for school consolidation in the west contra cost Unified School District and they're divided up in two years uh two phases if you will first phase as you can see Elsa brownie Castro Lake Shannon Adams Middle School and then two sites which are already not uh not active

0:34:02schools but are other District sites where we would see some operational savings by closing them down the SE view uh Ed Center and the furniture warehouse and then in 2010 and 11 Olinda Elementary nram with an alternate for Grant Kennedy High School gers continuation High School North Campus

0:34:21continuation high school and then both of the adult education centers uh Alvarado and Sarah I wanted to just focus for a minute on some of the schools that would have impacts for city of elero obviously one of the biggest ones is castor Elementary uh the board has been

0:34:39reviewing and considering Castor Elementary it's a very very small school U and very difficult for us to to maintain as a viable Elementary School with that size and so the enrollment uh was a key factor in that decision and and the fact that the board has already

0:34:58approved the project to relocate the portal Middle School in order to maintain a middle school in the city of elero to the Castro site Adams Middle School while it's not in elero a closure or a consolidation of Adams Middle School will have impacts by uh students will be uh reassigned to

0:35:17other schools like portala or K8 for example that are in elero and so Adams was added to the closure list we've we've just uh had a most recent uh engineering analysis on Adams Middle School indicates that we have some very serious uh seismic issues at the site

0:35:37which could lead to potential building collapse and so we're uh using that uh looking at that in the in light of all of the other issues that we have to face and it ended up you know looking like a an appropriate candidate for consolidation so it is centrally located

0:35:53the students would be would go to the other four middle schools that you you see listed here and there would be a K8 option which is being proposed for Mira Vista Elementary School primarily because of the size of the site we have a large that's our largest Elementary

0:36:08School acreage the entire district and so there is some possibility for us to uh do that at Mira Vista Kennedy High School in the second phase of consolidations would certainly impact Els Sero in that a large number of our students who uh are in that attendance

0:36:27area would go to elero High the new elero high has additional capacity in the main buildings that are completed that can handle 3 to 400 additional students and so we're anticipating that the closure of Kennedy High would take advantage of that available capacity and

0:36:43then the proposals that are out uh for the board to consider are to create a what's called an education center if you will at Kennedy where we would Place uh one of our largest Charter Schools leadership public schools high school Charter both of our continuation high

0:36:58schools and our uh adult education uh facilities so it also allows all of these options are in in addition to just consolidations we are looking at some potential property sales but wanting to wait until the market is a little bit better is probably uh pretty smart but

0:37:23we are looking at and we are having our properties assessed at this time but we're proceeding with that and that'll be a component of our overall debt relief as a part of this also next slide I just want to take a second to remind everyone in uh on the council and I

0:37:38don't think you I know everyone's just consumed by financial crisis but the bond program that we run and manage for the West KOST Unified School District is not immune to the crisis that is sweeping the the nation and the state uh currently for example the the funding

0:37:56that we were proportioned on December 10th $10.9 Million by the state allocation board was frozen on December 17th by the action of the pool money investment uh board in Sacramento so those funds are not available to the district the resolution of that is not clear we're trying to develop different

0:38:15scenarios for the board you know a you know a near-term near-term thaw you know a longer term thought we have money in the bank it doesn't impact us yet so it's really cash flow issue but if it continues and there's a continuing freeze on bond funds it'll significantly

0:38:32impact not just the district but every agency in the state that has any kind of construction or Bond program also it's the assess valuation in the West Contra Unified School District is falling for the first time in anyone's memory and we're waiting for the sort of the news this summer but

0:38:53that creates issues related to our bonded indebtedness when we sell Bond when we go to the voters for voter approval under the terms and conditions of Proposition 39 one of the pieces of the law is that you cannot exceed 2.5% of your assessed valuation as a limit on your bonded indebtedness and so

0:39:15the the AV assess valuation is going down our bonded inde indebtedness is going up and these two lines is not something you want to see meeting on on your financial papers so we are uh taking an item that we're hoping the board will approve tomorrow night for a

0:39:32waiver of the uh debt limit from the State Board of Education to about 3.2% uh of uh assess valuation and right now we have sold 1990 million of the $400 million of measure J bonds so we have 210 million outstanding approved by the voters if we were to go if we were

0:39:53to sell all the way up to our current limit we could only sell $40 million in bonds and we have projects like ELR high deanza high school is already partially demolished the next contract that we need to let is going to be in the 80 to 90 million range and we think it would

0:40:12be prudent to have 80 or 90 million in the bank when we let that contract and so we're facing some serious challenges in terms of cash flow and liquidity looking at the market and not seeing a lot of certainty as we go forward in addition you know when we when we sell

0:40:27our bonds and we put them in the bank as any agency does they stay in the bank and we disperse from them but while they're in the bank they draw interest and we project that we'll get a certain amount of Interest over time for the first two measures in the bond program

0:40:39measure M andd we far exceeded our interest projections and brought income into the program that way our current projections for measure J were based upon those earlier measures and they now look overly optimistic given the the status of interest rates throughout the

0:40:56country so we're reassessing in real terms some of the cash that we have available to fund our programs so sorry to go on a kind of a Down note here but we'll get back up and look at some of the projects that we have going I want to just switch gears to Portland Middle

0:41:12School I want to remind the council and the public why it is that we are engaged in the process of trying to relocate portala middle school and the fundamental issue and I've listed all of the uh engineering and GE geology and geotechnical reviews and structural

0:41:28reviews that we've been through fundamentally the Castro site as a Public School site I'm sorry the portal site is not appropriate it is situated on historic landside debris it has other issues related to the site which make it from the long-term standpoint not

0:41:48appropriate it could not be a Public School site if you tried to buy it today as a Public School site for the for that reason and so we have gone through a lengthy analysis and have finally ended up with the California Geological Survey and the division of State architect who

0:42:05have essentially concurred with the findings of our team that there is a earthquake induced Landslide Hazard at the site and that there is a potential risk of student safety that must be corrected and so with that background next slide we have gone through a very

0:42:22lengthy process as I know everyone here is aware and many who have been a part of it uh or have seen or been a part of various you know elements of it the Castro site was identified finally as the preferred project in early 2008 we've finished the environmental impact

0:42:39reviews the board has adopted the final eir in December there is a legal challenge that's been filed by the neighbors and the district is responding and we believe the suit is without Merit and that we will proceed unfortunately we're not really willing to take the risk to begin design

0:42:59work pending the resolution of that lawsuit and so uh we see right now A 2 to threee process to complete the construction of the Middle School uh at that site next slide just briefly for the council and everyone else and the public this uh slide shows the proposed

0:43:18site development at the Castro Middle School site and you can see that we anticipate renovating and keep the existing L-shaped buildings the two main buildings in the center of Campus uh there wonderful period architecture you know really great and I think refurbished they're just going to be a

0:43:36gem and and really reflective of the neighborhood school that that is uh demolishing all of the portable buildings on site and demolishing the kindergarten building that's down below the L-shaped main building and then building tucking into the hillside the gymnasium building so the bulk is

0:43:54reduced to uh so that there's no view impacts on neighboring property so tucks into the hillside the administration area is up on the upper level and kind of gives you the eyes on the courtyard if you will a two-story classroom building with a library on the rear edge

0:44:10of the site and then demolishing the existing multi-purpose building and building a new multi-purpose building Band Room on the upper site adding on-site parking so we can try and continue to do what we can do to relieve uh congestion in that uh area area and just I want to stress as much as I can

0:44:30no construction on the park the park would be maintained we would respect the boundary that you can see along the uh North uh western edge of the site uh area the city's uh Rec Center building would remain we would come to the city and work with the staff and the council

0:44:48to develop uh some guidelines and Joint use uh procedures so that our students could use the fields during the day as part of their physical education program and we would reciprocate I I would assume that I would hope that the uh wonderful after school program that's

0:45:05now run at the portal of jym could could be run at this site also the city program that that's now run there next slide please there several of our board members have come to us and said if this is an unsafe site why are we not moving our students out of portala Middle

0:45:23School immediately and in fact they've asked us same question frankly about why we're not moving them out of Adams Middle School immediately and so we have looked at two different options for the board uh to do that and uh the two options are the lower pad at portal of

0:45:40site and the elero high school temporary campus and I want to share those with you right now on the portal of site the the heavy dashed line is the mapped toe of the slide of the historic Slide the lighter dash line that follows it is what is recommended by our geotechnical

0:46:00Engineers as a uh as a slide safety setback if you will a 50ft setback for uh safety of our students in addition you can see a ghosted heavy line a Gray Line running along the top edge of the campus and that is the line that demarcates the California Department of

0:46:21education's boundary for uh EMF exposure limits recommended EMF exposure limits of 1.25 migus and so we're trying then this is due to the pg& substation and the uh power lines that run uh adjacent to the site so working with those constraints this is a layout that would accommodate

0:46:45nearly every program element obviously the exception no gymnasium no Fields Etc but would accommodate our educational program elements on theow lower portal of site next slide please the uh second option that we are looking at would be to relocate the school to the temporary campus at elero

0:47:07high after the partial removal of Modular Buildings at the back area of the current temporary campus so essentially the buildings that are now along the rear fence of the kaloa neighbors would be removed and we would refurbish the asphalt there and put in essentially play courts if you will for

0:47:27physical education to create some more opportunities and also to create another way for students to get from the from the high school campus over to the stadium without walking through the main sort of uh main drag if you will of the temporary campus I think everybody's

0:47:43who's been on site knows when you walk in the first gate you kind of got a clear shot in there but I think we were looking at a way to create options for partially for student safety and just to keep the campuses a little bit separate where students could have another

0:47:56access route this we're going to remove this would remove some 20 plus buildings and get the campus down to a more appropriate size for a middle school and so this is the option that we're looking at at that site and next slide please couple of comparisons of the two um for the

0:48:15temporary campus at elero clearly the lower clost option for the school district um we estimated the cost of this option at about a million dollars the buildings are already in place minimum amount of work required we also have full program facilities in that we

0:48:31would anticipate that the middle school would be able to share on a temporary basis the gym facilities with the high school minimal construction on the site we are very clear and we've heard loud and clear from our meetings with the staff and our neighborhood meetings that

0:48:47there would be issues related to Traffic parking additional buses drop off issues uh in neighborhood impacts and we've definitely heard that we also would anticipate that we would need to reopen the environmental impact report for which so what we're looking at is we did

0:49:07an eir for the portal relocation to Castro we referenced this option actually in the eir as one potential option we would essentially tear off of that previous report and do a supplemental report of some kind to address those issues if that was what was selected by the board for the portal

0:49:25lower pad it's a higher cost option we do have infrastructure in place we have fire hydrants sewers water electrical service all in place from when the Ken Kensington campus was there so it's not the highest cost of if we were to go in an undeveloped site and do it it would

0:49:43be higher so this is sort of mid-range I think we estimated about $3.7 million for this option we believe that it's categorically exempt from SQL we're just relocating the students on another area the site but it does have fewer amenities for us and for the students clearly we'd need to uh work

0:50:02with the city to try and keep some recreational and and PE opportunities open at Ser Vista Park and at the rec center if we did that so just wanted to provide you with I mean I think we recognize neither one of these is um is without its problems and so just wanted

0:50:18to put those out as a kind of comparison for you as we as we go through the same process next slide I wanted to just hit on a couple of high notes uh elrio High School opened on January 5th in its new campus and the gym facilities have been in use since September the Performing

0:50:34Arts uh Center will be open in February and uh I think everyone is uh in love with the campus still uh you know we're still in the honeymoon period so uh the staff is uh excited and everyone we've talked to is very very pleased to be out of the temporary campus and have a real

0:50:53home again I even talk to the cust who came to me and she said you know I just feel so much better having a real building to take care of you know I mean it's really amazing I know you guys must feel the same way about this wonderful building we're in tonight so and this is

0:51:07an aerial photo just to remind everyone what it's a very very tight campus this is a 17 acre campus and the state recommends over 40 acres for a high school this uh what you see on the roof is our photovoltaic system we're generating about 45% of the school's electrical needs with the building

0:51:26integrated photovoltaic system that we have on all of our roofs and uh we're excited by that and I just think it's a really nice image for the community as we go forward next slide want to take a second to cover the El stre oh high Fields project and we are in design on

0:51:44the fields and for the area of the soccer fields where they used to be or where the temporary campus is now located we have obviously held off until the board makes it decision on potential relocation options for portala we're doing any work but we have met with uh

0:52:02Community groups and with elero athletic groups to develop the field configuration including a full competition baseball softball and soccer fields and uh the beginnings of the restoration of the tennis courts that are part of the city district um uh Recreation at the site currently there

0:52:22are no funds available to upgrade the football stadium the foot the main stadium and so the project that you'll see I'm going to show you uh is just for the first phase of the work but it because the stadium and the track are so unusual in their configuration we have

0:52:39to redesign the track in the final configuration so it was kind of tricky to do the phase one design that would then be executed first leaving it in the correct configuration to accept the new track Etc so and you'll see what I mean when I show you the drawings this is the

0:52:54phase one one field project for ELR High when all the temporary campuses go away the proposal is a baseball field softball field soccer field in the center and then eventually six tennis courts we may be able to get five in in the first phase we know we can get these

0:53:10four that are shown here access road down the center for emergency vehicles into the stadium eventually some additional hardc Court basketball additional parking uh on site and so that's the proposed phase one the final configuration is on the next slide and that would be to redesign the

0:53:31track into an an international broke back track who was at the last man I think the bill Jones was there I can't remember the exact name there's a specific kind of track this is a very compressed oval by the bank of up kaloa and the bank down onto Ashbury and so we

0:53:48have an unusual configuration but we are assured by our designer that it can meet our standards and so that would be our full phase and you can see the last two uh tennis courts down there at the bottom we uh Switching gears on the Fairmont property sale as I think the

0:54:07council will remember they the board and the council have both approved the sale of the senior center and asphalt areas uh at the Fairmont site to the city and it it was put on hold frankly during the discussion about relocation of portal in Middle school we think it's probably

0:54:27appropriate and we met with staff two weeks ago I guess and discussed that so uh we're completing the transaction getting attorneys uh ramped up to review the final documents and we anticipate spring or summer completion of that sale finally I just wanted to take a second

0:54:45to talk about our joint use agreements we have a districtwide uh I'm sorry Citywide joint use agreement with the district that covers all of our different sites and several of the sites that we use of yours we have a a really successful program from our standpoint in terms of

0:55:05the use of the pool Ser Vista Park after school programs at all of our sites and it's just an amazing uh wealth of programs that we get from our association with the city the SRO program at elero high is is uh has been very successful in creating a a strong campus presence for the police and

0:55:28building relationships and trust and it's really enhanced Community Safety and Security uh immeasurably and we really owe a debt to the elero police department for the great work that they're doing on that site and with that I want to thank you for the strong partnership for our kids and I can take

0:55:45any questions if you have some okay thank you very much Mr Lyman you want to go first uh sure um you answered one of my questions in your presentation about the how soon would the U football field be upgraded to an all weather field um but it does raise the question about funding for

0:56:07some of the other projects that you did highlight uh is the portal of funding in Jeopardy or is it U something that has been allocated and is available to move that project forward well it's the the money is assuming that we can go forward with our uh Bond sale and the debt limit

0:56:24way the project is funded and the funds are uh Incorporated in the overall budget for for about 48 million of the measure J local bond funds and $12 million of State funds so if we went to the state today and tried to get $12 million out of them no we wouldn't get it but we

0:56:44would go through a normal application process for the hardship funds for that and I would anticipate that by the time we did that I would certainly hope that the economy was in a better shape and in a year or so than it will be and it is now so I think we're we're imagining

0:56:59that we would be able to get those funds yes and maintain the 2 to three years schedule that you proposed yes um my next question is uh is the Porta interim configurations whether at the current portal of site or on the high school sufficient to take the reassignments of

0:57:18students from Adams Middle School well it's a it's a really good question and it's actually something that the board was wrestling with tonight um the portal site uh at Castro is designed for a maximum of 600 students and that is lower than the recommended size in the board's adopted criteria for

0:57:41school closure but to be frank it it stems from essentially the district wanting to keep a middle school in elero and this was the only site that we could do it at and we looked at what was frankly then if that's the only side you can do it at what's the maximum size that wouldn't

0:58:03create unmitigable disruption in the neighborhood and so we tried to structure it as large as possible it essentially meets the current enrollment of portala it doesn't allow for expansion but it keeps a middle school in Els Sero I mean this is a this is a pretty delicate balance and I the board

0:58:22was actually just discussing this issue tonight frankly and um so it's I long that's the long answer the short answer is no there's not really a lot of extra capacity at that site that to be able to handle additional students from the and and that concludes from Adams I'm sorry

0:58:41that concludes my comments thank you or questions go ahead yes I have a couple of questions um at ELO high school I'm remembering that uh there are a couple of extra- large Portables over by the track of the football field and in fact maybe even on it I can't remember they're inside the track

0:59:04and on the grass around the light right so I'm wondering if Porta were to move to El stre Ohio on a temporary basis if that would mean that there is still no football field track I would guess you know what I'm asking yeah I do I understand what you're asking my guess is that we would

0:59:23probably leave those buildings in place those are what we call in the trade triple wides and um they're they're the largest modular building that's approvable by the state on a temporary basis and what they are is essentially uh multi-purpose from cafeteria substitutes and so they serve that kind

0:59:42of function my guess is we would leave them there and as you know part of the track is paved now so it's not even a functional Earth Track as it goes around there and that part of the paving is right there with those portable so my uh next question has to do with my concern

0:59:57about um the um what I'll call the PE needs of both portala and elero high school my assumption would be that the elero high school gym is being used most of the day pretty much most of the day and most of the night how about right uh because every time I've been over there

1:00:18recently there's a bunch of people all over the place uh taking advantage of those wonderful facilities um so I'm not sure how we would fit more kids at the portala level into that space that's my my number one question on that uh can you answer that I'm not sure I have a really good answer for

1:00:39that so because I heard you say that they would use the same I I I think it's going to be a scheduling uh issue and in the interaction of the two sites and and how they work together will be complex and difficult because uh because having had a a student at the

1:00:56school the the three full years of the um building project who um had none of those facilities um I I saw some of the downside of that and maybe I could just comment on what I thought some of some of it actually I think could have been handled uh in a better way uh and that

1:01:17is the use of other facilities for example the use of um Harding should have been a it should have been more flexible so that um I I'll just so for example when elri oh high needed to use Harding uh for performances and so forth they were had to be out of the space before hardly the

1:01:42students had finished performing and there was no time to sort of you know congratulate the performers on work well done and so forth because they were treated as Outsiders on on the space so I guess I have some concerns that the um I suspect that's in theuse permit I don't really know that

1:02:03for a fact but is related to the facilities use if all if in fact any of those arrangements um occur at any site really that those um um Arrangements be dealt with in a better way than they were dealt with for elero high because it really I think did negatively impact

1:02:25the ability of the students who are attempting to do normal school activities to in fact accomplish them and could have been handled a lot better because in fact for example Harding Auditorium is rarely used at night far as I can tell and I go by there almost nightly so um I think that the the

1:02:44school district would have to should look a little bit further than just elero High um but also at other other sites in the area for some of those facilities and should make sure that both El Street Ohio students and um portala students have com you know more more adequate um access to all of the

1:03:09facilities that that uh really make up a total curriculum for the students um having said all of that uh I'm really concerned about the traffic at elero high school it's already pretty severe um so the idea of bringing in a bunch more students is really hard for me to

1:03:31Envision uh on those very narrow streets um so I'm very concerned about that and um I um you know obviously Porta can handle Porta because it already is and um so that I understand that there's a cost but it just seems like functionally that's a lot better site um in a lot of

1:03:54ways than the elero height site uh even unless I'm misunderstanding something about that um so anyway I guess I'll stop there for now so um we're going to be asking clarifying questions and we're going to be able to get a chance to hear from the public and there'll be some

1:04:13discussions Mr Jones you have a few questions sure U given that we'll come back for General discussion I just have two questions uh just want to clarify something you indicate that under the elero portala uh scenario we will have elero 400 more from Kennedy and 600 more

1:04:35from portala is that correct or a total of a th000 students more than what's there now well that's an interesting way to put it um the uh the conversion of uh of Kennedy High uh if it was closed is a second phase change that would not happen until 20 0 but it certainly would mean more

1:04:57students at Els ohigh and you know I think that's correct we have we would have to look there would be a th more 400 yeah about a, more 400 from Kennedy High School 600 from portala put placed on the Elso High School site sir okay thank you second of all um is there any under the Castro

1:05:21should the Castro project go um is there any City facilities that will be demoed the tennis courts not that I know of not even the tennis courts no we're not planning on taking out the courts or the anything in the Park area the tennis courts are between they're between uh

1:05:45camon and and Cam Cameron yes we're not planning on expanding into that area you want to go back to the side yeah if you you could so you can see the you see the tennis courts right at the top right under where it says classroom two story stay yes thank you appreciate it m

1:06:08ch um I don't have any clarifying questions I can wait thank you okay um so I understand that the Kennedy High closure is slated for 201 um 10 11 yes that's correct but that the Adams would Clos in 2009 and 2010 yes ma'am so my question is whether you had considered

1:06:31um making use of the Castro site which also closes in 200920 to house some of the Middle School functions that are currently being served at portala and another part of that is whether you've considered using Mirra Vista immediately to house some of the 78th grade uses that you plan and

1:06:52envision at that campus for a K through 8 we have considered the the option of using the Castro campus for a temporary uh portal uh relocation but given that we're already being sued over the perceived impacts related to just having a functional school there and that's one piece and

1:07:21the second one is that from my standpoint is the who has to build it having a functional School site on a site that you're going to be doing major construction on is just creates more cost and more time and more headaches from the construction side so you kind of like get in the way of yourself if

1:07:40you will uh by doing that but we have definitely thought about it and try and considered it looked at some of the pros and cons I'm I'm imagining that we would meet some pretty significant resistance from that neighborhood if we did that well I'm I know we're going to get

1:07:55to further discussion and we may hear from the public as well but with the plan to close portala in this phase I'm assuming you need a place for the Middle School to open in August of 2009 yes and and just let me make sure the board has not voted to close portala

1:08:16or to temporarily relocate the school at they have not taken any action on that staff has prepared options and we've uh heard requests from our two board members on the facility subcommittee of the board and prepared options for them to review discussed the various

1:08:33approaches with them but we have not taken an item with the bo to the board related to Temporary relocation at this time no but you have a plan to make a decision this week on the school closures on consolidation that's correct and then that was my next question when

1:08:45do you think that the decision on the relocation of poro would occur I would anticipate that it probably wouldn't occur until sometime later in the spring um just given what what we know about the calendar so what I was going to comment on was that if that decision is delayed and you plan to

1:09:02open in August it's likely that it would be very difficult to complete your SQL process and knowing that you already have a challenge I would think that that um aspect of moving to the castra site might be a substantial not just a convenience but also a cost benefit it it could be I mean it

1:09:23probably in some ways the you can see some of sort of the conundrum here because the easiest approach from the environmental review standpoint under SEO would be to just move down to the lower Pad but it has it it obviously the further we withhold the decision to go

1:09:40the harder it is to meet an August deadline and we'd end up moving in the middle of the year or you know around a holiday kind of thing so so it's possible that the board can make a decision about um closing portalet at a different time than this Academic Year it's possible okay all right so um I

1:09:57know that there are a number of people who'd like to speak on the issue so if we could have the first Speaker Joanna Pace good evening Council and congratulations on your new building it's an inspiration to those of us who've been uh part of the process the long process to get a new Middle School

1:10:22here I I want to um introduce myself I'm Joanna Pace I'm the uh eler resident mom of a sixth grader and I'm the president of the portlock PTSA uh just to clarify to start with um keep in mind that in our school district of tens of thousands of kids that serves several municipalities that that uh

1:10:43we're not talking about keeping just keeping a Middle School in El reader we're talking about keeping a middle school in the elero attendance area El uh portla serves uh seven feeder schools currently um Washington and Point Richmond students come to us uh stge

1:10:59students in Richmond come to us uh the Kensington Hilltop school students come to us and Fairmont Harding Madera and cter students in elero come to us so uh it's a much bigger issue than just do we get a middle school here in this town uh but it serves the entire Southern

1:11:16portion of the district um the all their 11 to 14 year olds um this has been a very uh long process for us going to the meetings uh trying to advocate for getting a school built and I just want to speak to you on behalf the parents at Porta that um we uh we want to get our

1:11:36new school built and um uh it's been a very long process um the when I became PTA president this year I thought I was just going to run a PTA but very shortly uh it became clear to us that we need to become big advocates for the rebuild and uh we've done that and then very shortly

1:11:56after that it became clear we need to be big Advocates to be sure our school didn't get closed and the whole school CL closure process has been very painful to watch uh what's happening to our larger School community and um and then very quickly after that suddenly with

1:12:11the new uh Schoolboard members we had to uh get uh wise and help to the relocation um movement uh if you will and um uh we've been parents have been attending many meetings and advocating to get our school rebuilt to keep our school open and now to find the safest

1:12:33alternative for our students in the very near future um the subsequent reports have come out recently um tell us that um safety is definitely a very very valid concern and we want to um be sure our students in a safe place we UND we in the PTA uh we have not taken an

1:12:52official position it's all come up very quickly um and I can just tell you on behalf of the parents who contact me there are many many parents who are very concerned about the seismic safety and there are many many parents who are concerned about the very real daily

1:13:07concerns about safety of adding uh a thousand students to Ashbury Avenue um we look forward to working with you we've um we've heard great things that down at the up in the middle school about the um the police officer who works with uh with the high school um we

1:13:23we want to work with uh City Resources with you on building our relationships um it will be a tough uh three years and we'll hold the district's uh feet to the fire about keeping on schedule um we look forward to the day when we're in a beautiful new site like this um and I

1:13:41keep telling my daughter you may be in portable middle school but you'll be in that beautiful high school in a few years so I'm happy to answer any questions you have about the PTSA or about the school population at Port and I imagine we'll be meeting some more

1:13:55I look forward to maybe using this as an excuse to make a bigger Citywide effort for walk to school day for example um some alternate Transportation um creative ideas we're going to need them thank you thank you David Miller good evening council members my name is David Miller I am an elero

1:14:21homeowner former member of the ELO Economic Development board and currently president of the Madera Elementary School PTA I would like to respectfully encourage the city council and staff to support and actively facilitate the proposed relocation of the portal portala Middle School to a Castro school

1:14:37campus and as we just heard from Mr Savage that's coming up for a vote within the next week this move would be good for our children and good for our community besides the obvious benefits have increased collaboration in such as after school enrichment programs that

1:14:51are great resources for families in elero and other communities a new Middle School would also have facilities and Community Resources that would enrich the lives of our families and our community as we are already beginning to see with the new high school and the

1:15:03joint use programs that Mr Savage explained earlier for many residents and prospective residents schools are at the heart of the communities in which they decide to live the benefit of good schools is not just academic they are Financial as well better schools can

1:15:18influence home prices and stable and growing home values and the property taxes they generate have never been more important than they are right now they also influence decisions as to where people locate their businesses and where people choose to spend their money and

1:15:30generate sales tax for the community do not watch from the sidelines as elero risks becoming the only city in our area without a public Middle School please support the move of portala Middle School to the Castro campus thank you thank you Al Miller El Miller El Sero I moved to 625

1:15:56Ashbury Avenue in 1979 as most of you know that is directly across the street from the old and now the new ELO high school during the construction period uh the Demolition and the rebuild of the new High School uh those of us that live near the urea Ashbury intersection uh north of the Lincoln

1:16:22Street had a reprieve because the main entrance to Camp could you put the slide that shows the portal and Middle School temporary relocation DCS temp campus backup because uh the temporary access to campus was moved just south of Lincoln right where the blue buildings

1:16:43are now that the new high school as but even when the main entrance was down there and all the kids were being dropped off there cars were stopping in front of my house let cars out let kids out and cross the street that the line of cars was that long I can't imagine putting 1,00 or 1,000 or 900 or

1:17:09800 more students with the buses in uh this might be the only solution that they face but please don't let them do it without conducting some type of traffic and safety problem and a suggestion I would like to make is if they're going to make this the port temporary instead of having the

1:17:32portala entrance here and the elero entrance all along here maybe they can put the portala entrance down here just to separate these entrances and try and deal with the separation and the traffic and the drop off the most uh unusual thing the years I've lived in El oo is that none of the

1:17:54students at Oso high school has yet been hit by a bus a car a bicycle or anything I don't know how much longer that's going to go on if we're going to double the traffic in there I know it's so like Keith obman says it's the worse worst and worsest uh but we need to look at all

1:18:15options if we're going to pick the the best of the worst thank you thank you no other speakers for this item okay so thank you everybody for your contribution and um Bill Savage I appreciate your report um I I know that some of the folks have the council members have other comments um and we're

1:18:35going to open it up for discussion maybe I'll make a comment first because um even though Mr Jones and Mr Chang formerly went to ELO high school I'm the only council member now with the distinction of having students in the district I have two daughters over at elrio high school and one one of

1:18:53the things I want to say is that there seems to be a little bit of a dislocation between the activities of the facilities group and then the people doing the educational programming and I want to um describe the situation and explain a little of my frustration personally and those that

1:19:12have been shared by other El Sero High School parents and that is that um the construction and the school closures are consistently depriving the kids of their physical education facilities portala has not had appropriate showering facilities for years and it's very difficult for the

1:19:32kids to participate in PE and yet at the very same time the district continually restricts the ability for the students to receive PE waivers for doing Fitness activities outside of school and also at the high school won't give PE credit for participation in extracurricular Sports

1:19:51even though sponsor sped by the high school so my message is Please be aware that when the facilities for physical education are compromised by the needs of the district to balance its budget and to um achieve these economies of scales that adjustments need to be made

1:20:10in the educational curriculum that allows the students to continue to get the fitness that they need and um I've talked to individuals about it but since you folks are here and Germain I think to the site planning and when I look at all of these options I can see that um

1:20:30we're going to have major compromises on physical fitness and we've talked about the opportunities with the elero facilities and I know that our staff is open with the swimming pool that we have and some of the other Open Spaces that can be shared to provide those better

1:20:46facilities okay with that I'm going to let Mr Lyman begin his discussion points mayor thank you you for allowing me some time to compose my thoughts um I am uh we we've you've come before us tonight with three issues uh the relocation of the Middle School the closure of Castro school and and the

1:21:10rebuilding of the middle school at uh Castro only one of those issues was a public discussion item prior to November so I guess my first point and Mr s it's not to you unfortunately but I know you're the messenger Mr Fay as well um a process for considering closures of

1:21:33schools and now relocation of a Middle School uh conducted in over a 60-day period is does not seem like much of a process and uh it it seems to be status quo for the school district and it's unfortunate uh but maybe we can um change that going forward another point that I want to make is

1:21:55that on Saturday in Jan January the the 1 U I think it was January 10th when all of the communities and the school district met there was an overwhelming uh sense from both the elected officials and the public that spoke that we support small schools and neighborhood

1:22:14schools so the uh message that we continue tonight is that small schools are better learning environments and something that really does need to be uh carried forward and I do believe uh that the that the U school district is committed to that um with their continued consideration of only a 600

1:22:36student Middle School in Els Sero elss Sero has been supporting the school district's measures overwhelmingly as they've gone through many campaigns uh and many fundraising efforts in in our city so so we Els Sero truly does deserve and does appreciate the district's commitment to continuing

1:22:59a middle school in elero it's critical for us to have that type of continuing education inside of our city boundaries and i' look forward to the rebuilding of the middle school at the Castro site with regards to the relocation I want to build on uh comment that Mr

1:23:23Miller the second Mr Miller Al Miller made uh with regards to uh students safety as they cross the road on Ashbury and as we add a th uh students which may be approaching a th000 vehicles um the million dollars that it takes to put Portables at portala is the small price to pay for one

1:23:49life with regards to the closure of of of Castro school um clearly uh that's something that the school district is taking upon themselves and and uh is something that fits with the rebuilding of a middle school in elero um with that thank you chair thank you mayor thank you Miss zson okay um I

1:24:12guess I have one question before I start my comments um and that is about the Porta Middle School gym um I I have five kids who have attended um Harding portala and El Ohio the last one graduating in June so I have a lot of history at those schools um and I remember the year of the 89

1:24:34earthquake I had a a child at portala and uh that the portala uh gym had to be closed because of earthquake safety but what I also remember is they did a lot of seismic work there so my question is um is that building safer because of the seismic work I mean there are crossbars put in

1:25:01uh all kinds of things done it was closed for I think about a year can you answer that question it's definitely safer with the seismic work done if if part of your question if a followup to your question is would we continue to use the gym if we relocate it out of the

1:25:19site I think staff's and I'm not sure if you were going there no where I was going is if you were on the site would you use it well we are using it while in the lower site well that's what I meant yeah okay um I think our recommendation frankly would be if we're going to

1:25:36relocate for safety reasons we need to relocate and not use that gym it's clearly within the identified Landslide area of the site seismic retrofit is not going to do anything if the ground is moving down Hill so that may not be the action that the board would take but that would be my

1:25:57recommendation from the construction side okay so you think that um I mean in other words if you're going to do it do it okay don't do it halfway um so I guess the so on to my comments um I guess the concern that I have about putting uh a really enormous number of

1:26:19students at the Els streo High site is a significant one and I think that um we need to be able to provide an adequate level of um education for the students in this enrollment area that we're discussing and I think that includes PE because I think PE is an important um backbone of the educational

1:26:47program it um gives students a lot of what they need in order to be able to perform um academically also I've read a number of reports that say that and um the um the students for a number of years at Els ohigh have not had that and um there need there gets to be a point

1:27:11where we really need to say that that is an important thing that that is a requirement of the educational system um and therefore it's it's not okay to um say that kids are going to share a gym which when it really means that somebody's not getting to use the gym

1:27:30that should have been able to use the gym and I I would like to associate myself with all of um mayor Potter's comments on on that subject um because I I I also I mean I completely agree about that so that that that I think is a very important thing I think that um more

1:27:52work needs to be um done to make sure all of those needs are covered operationally um I'm con and um I really am favoring uh while um the uh Castro site is being developed for use um as portala uh that the students remain on the lower field at at um at at what is now portala

1:28:22and that um I'm I would like to see the city of elero um work towards um enabling the school to use Sero Vista Park um for recreational and PE needs and that we work together with the school district to do that I think that's something that we can um do I I believe if I remember

1:28:47from having been previously on the Planning Commission that we have an agreement with um um um Prospect Sierra School their students also use it so I don't think it's fully available but I'm but I'm sure that that can be worked out um so I I think that's something that we can

1:29:08work with the district to do I have a um significant concern about security um of the students I I mean I already have a concern about the security of the students um and think it would be a good thing to have an SRO program at Porta even now so I would especially like to see one um in this

1:29:33program that's being developed um the um um I I think there's some inconsistency between bringing the students from Kennedy and bringing the students from portla to Elser oh high I think it doesn't um pencil out um in any way shape or form because that's just that's too many students in

1:30:00for for that amount of space um and um I I think that that needs to be um timed in a better you know the timing of that needs to be worked out so that um and it would seem to me that the thing that needs to happen is that uh while portala is being um uh developed which is if I understand

1:30:26correctly is partly a a remodel and partly a building of new buildings uh that um you know that we don't have two things uh happening to Elser oh high at the same time um I I just think that won't work I'm not sure if I covered all of my thoughts on the subject but that's

1:30:49certainly a start I the other thing is that I would particularly like to associate myself with the comment about the um um the sort of wall between the building program of the school district and the operation of the high school they don't seem from my point of view they don't

1:31:11speak to each other very well so I think that some attention to that would be really helpful I'll stop for there okay thank you Mr thank you thank you I like to talk uh first of all on the uh portala Portables and uh want to start though by saying Mr F Mr Savage this is business

1:31:33it's not personal uh so I'll be uh even though they may be blunt it's not personal although I got to say uh Mr Savage I'm not going to say anything that probably hasn't been brought up before okay um portal uh Portables at elero is is is not a good idea it it makes no sense um

1:32:01we have just finished a beautiful school at elero high it is beautiful but it's not finished you have to take the Portables off the play area give the high school backets activity areas give the community back its activity areas if you leave the Portables on the elero that'll

1:32:23mean that that campus and three years is optimistic I'm looking at four or five minimum uh you're looking at N9 or 10 years that Portables have been on that uh school campus 9 or 10 years uh the school needs it needs its uh play areas back uh you're proposing a tremendous

1:32:46increase in numbers of students that also translates in probably doubling the staff that's needed and I don't know where you're going to park where you're going to put them um given the fact that the close proximity of the school to Bart and the Harding School the people there are already

1:33:12putting up with a lot of traffic the traffic that goes from the high school to San Pablo Avenue uh will take take one of the main streets Lincoln they're already asking where we going to put them because Bart people are parking all the way up uh on Lincoln and Beyond you have the school coming down

1:33:37almost to Alba Marl Street in some case depends on the event sometimes it goes past there um the impact on the community and I'm that's why I'm speaking on this is the impact of the total community is not acceptable it has to be taken into consideration the school board cannot ignore what's going

1:33:59on in the community it cannot the impact is too much um as far as saving money on uh by locating at elero instead of portala I'm taking it that there is still a relocation budget in the portala uh construction budget therefore the money is already there to the point that we can get it that the

1:34:31district can get its hands on it now excuse me um so there is money there is money there um I even though it sounded like your figures we're going to show close to $2 million savings I don't think you're going to come anywhere close to saving $2 million do by putting them

1:34:53there uh certainly just dollar-wise certainly the inconvenience wise uh Community impact wise uh that's a small price to pay uh in my opinion you have a $100 million over $100 million state-of-the-art school there but if you put Portables there and and uh continue

1:35:17that it'll be $100 million mess in my opinion and then also I'd like to ask uh don't need an answer and maybe we'll have our uh I might ask the City attorney to look into this I'm not even sure that uh the combination of an elero portala school on the elero site is part of the uh

1:35:39measure Bond measure of whether you can you can actually do that with with the measured money uh you did say it was a tight you showed a picture of the new campus and it's a tight uh site it's 17 Acres you need 40 acres then I don't know why the school district is even contemplating putting

1:36:01another school which is what portal it would be another school on that site uh there's plenty of room at dejon they have capacity within their new school classroom capacity they also have a lot of Field capacity they can handle Portables down there and uh they can

1:36:20take uh a good share of the Middle School people um I you said that a a decision may not come till April and that that concerns me um because then I don't know if you have enough time from April to August to set up uh a uh the number of Portables you'd need for 600 people at portala and I

1:36:49know what's coming next the board will try to then call for an emergency uh measure so that you can put him in elero and I want to let you know that just because they wait to make a decision until April is not an emergency uh I like I said I I think your three years of development it's

1:37:12it's nice it's a dream depending uh what you have to go through there and I'll just finish I think by saying that um the state agencies that you showed the uh DSA and the geological study from the state um it is a tough site portal is a tough I would like to see portala stay

1:37:33there I'd like to see a decision a solution made and I think there is one uh in fact there is one but it's uh according to the the people have studied it that's the cost uh this probably prohibitive I I don't know I I still say I guess I hold out for a solution there but the two

1:37:55agencies that you that you uh cited uh DSA and the geological they're state regulatory uh departments their role is not to problem solve the role is to uh determine given the current guidelines and the current criteria whether uh a school could be built there but you

1:38:16don't go to DSA you don't go to the geological Department there and ask them hey we've got this situation can you help us find a solution as you know you've dealt with DSA a long time they will not help you with a solution that's up to the district or or whoever so um I think

1:38:33I'll conclude my comments there thank you very much okay just um briefly wanted to say it's it's just such a really hard place to be in um I went to Castro and I also went to Adams and um and my feelings are that you know we definitely need a Junior High in our

1:38:57campus in in the the city boundaries and um and and I guess I what I wanted to ask was if the district was working with um the County Public Health Department who just got funding from the state to do safe routs to school planning for the two for I believe both our Junior highs were up

1:39:20and listed as um sites to do some work for that grant funding and that it seems like a Hu you know huge opportunity to piggy back off of those fund funding sources and to really come up with a good solution that addresses you know I think you know independent of kids not having the

1:39:39school uh School Playard space but you know getting kids back into walking and biking to school and um I compliment the city of El or El high school for their mountain biking team that I think just started four years ago and it's you know they are I don't know how they their

1:39:56curriculum or their requirements get met or not um sounds like they don't um but they are using our Bay Trail our lony Greenway and just you know really making use of the city's facilities and maybe that's something that could be expanded okay so um we're almost at 10:00 and so

1:40:19I want to try to bring this to closure but first I I want to say that the school district has many decisions to make and they have difficult decisions and the three decisions coming up as Mr Lyman indicated are this which schools to close whether or not to close portala

1:40:36in the Academic Year 200920 and then whether or not to relocate and where to relocate portala um the city council appreciates the opportunity to have this open public discussion on these very important issues and we also would like to participate in the Democratic process by

1:40:56attending school board meetings so I've been taking notes and I want to run by for the council a few of the things which I think that I hear agreement on and um I don't want to invite a lot of discussion on these issues if anyone objects to the things that I've

1:41:12summarized just let me know and then we'll move on to the next one and try to find the areas where we have concurrence so that we can be um speaking on on behalf of this entire body does that sound like an okay plan okay the first thing is that elero is committed to continuing and

1:41:31strengthening our partnership with the school district in terms of Afterschool programming shared facilities and particularly at Sero Vista Park yes okay um second we support the school resource officer program at elero high school and we support that program at any future middle school

1:41:52facility mhm the city is committed to developing safe facilities for grades 8 6 through 8 in Els Sero um this one gets a little trickier the council prefers not to have the Portables of portal Middle School located at the high school and then related to that for Els

1:42:16serito High any changes in enrollment that exceed the 1600 student capacity of the high school would require um a traffic and parking analysis and evaluation of other community impacts uh mayor is is it 1,600 or is it a u is that the threshold for the high school I understand the design capacity

1:42:40of the existing high school is600 they're only 1,200 now so um it makes sense that 400 students could be brought there under the existing environmental analysis and my point would be that under these scenarios we're talking about substantially more numbers than

1:42:55that so once we exceeded the 1600 we would expect that that traffic analysis would be done I agree with that yes okay well I was can it be modified to say if it exce exceeds it by 100 new students or just one well I think it could I would be in favor of giving some space

1:43:17there okay um I wouldn't 1600 1600 it it's no different than saying okay we'll make it at 1610 I mean we have to draw the line somewhere it was designed for 1600 let's go 1600 okay or um student the boundaries could be changed would be an alternative for the purposes of just

1:43:40finding concurrence and approximately where we are we think that if we're going to go beyond what it was designed for we should look at the impacts so the final point that I heard relates to the PE program and the council believes that physical education is an important

1:43:57element of our academic programs and we ask that the district review the physical education requirements and procedures for all schools with substant substandard um facilities yes um what do you call athletic facilities thank you so those were the points that I

1:44:17heard in common and if we can all agree on that I think that um we can share that message at the February 4th meeting and with others in the community yes okay I so appreciate you coming to present this um to us tonight and I've appreciated the discussion I think that um the members of the

1:44:39community appreciate it and I also would like to thank Joanna Pace from the portal of PTA for her testimony tonight thank you we're going to now move on to item 4B which is a presentation on our um video surveillance ordinance update from the police chief Scott

1:45:05Kirkland and Commander Mike rean thank you for your patience work good evening mam mayor distinguished council members this evening we will be providing you with a brief overview of the city's video surveillance order ordinance as well as some information on progress to date on

1:45:31implementation of that ordinance M microphone the mic's joining me this evening will be detective uh Corporal Susan Garmin and detective Gilbert Tang Susan's been with the investigations unit for approximately 2 years now and aside from her invest investigative duties she's

1:45:51usually the one assigned with special uh operations or projects that come to the investigations unit uh Gilbert has been with the investigations Unit A little over four years and he's assigned as our financial crimes investigators uh initially these two were uh drafted based not only on their

1:46:07investigative experience but as on their patrol experience as well as responding to these type of events before we get started I wanted to take this opportunity to point out that while the vision for this ordinance pretty much resided with Chief Kirkland in the

1:46:20Police Department we received a significant amount of help from other uh City staff members uh Scott Hannon Miss pinkis and Susan era from the city manager's office Mr woodr from the city attorney's office as well as Lori chabinho and Dwayne dlman from the Community Development Department

1:46:38provided a lot of input as we crafted this ordinance and brought it Forward some dates of interest uh the idea for this ordinance pretty much came about in 2006 and early 2007 as we started to see an increase in crime in our uh business community that we thought could be addressed by this

1:46:57ordinance we began to do some uh some thought uh some thoughts on the ordinance and wanted to reach out to the business community and see what they had to say about it so in early July of 2007 we scheduled three meetings with the business Community to sit down and

1:47:12discuss our thoughts and what we thought this ordinance uh should entail and to hear what the business Community had to say about what they thought about the ordinance we moved on to a council studies session in August of 2007 and eventually the ordinance was brought

1:47:28forward to the council it was enacted in October of 2012 the uh take effect date was October 31st of 2007 and the businesses were given one year to come into compliance with the ordinance which made it October 31st of 2008 there's actually three resolutions one ordinance uh ordinance uh 2007 6

1:47:51which ened section 6.9 of the video surveillance U act what this does is it establishes which businesses are required to have systems by the ordinance as well as locations to include strip malls it identifies minimum coverage standards and it also set the or provided us with an

1:48:07opportunity to set the technical standards for the systems it established it a fin uh established a financial assistance component to help the businesses to fray the cost of these systems and it set an appeal process for those businesses that felt that they shouldn't be included in the

1:48:23ordinance as I said earlier provided for technical specifications uh the police department conducted a lot of research with uh vendors industry experts uh to determine exactly what we wanted to have out of these systems we knew that from our experience what image quality we

1:48:40needed when we needed to go to court to try or to go to the DA's office to get a case filed and eventually to show the evidence in court to secure a conviction and so as well as was going out and talking to the vendors and the industry experts we actually went and looked at

1:48:53systems that were in operation that provided the quality image that we needed for our purposes we coess that all together and that's how we came up with the technical specifications they're due for review every two years so that we can keep Pace with changing technology and every two years we'll be

1:49:09coming before the council for any changes that we feel are warranted the video surveillance system Loan program uh this resolution allowed community vment to loan money to uh small businesses here in our community that loan could be up to 50% of the cost of the system and it was repayable in

1:49:29four installments however payment for each year would be forgiven if the system passed the yearly uh inspection by the police department to ensure that the system was running as it should so in essence this loan is the loan is completely forgivable over a 4year span

1:49:44as long as the system continues to pass the yearly inspection now I'll have detective Corporal Susan G talk about our community outreach after sure good evening uh after the initial concept for the camera ordinance was set out we with the city got together and made a concerted effort to get

1:50:12information out to the business community and citizens in elero uh we invited the Elso businesses to three information meetings they were held in July of 2007 and at those meetings we gave them information about the camera ordinance proposal and also solicited feedback from them regarding their

1:50:31concerns we had uh Chief K Kirkland met with the Chamber of Commerce and provided them with information about the proposed ordinance uh they supported the ordinance put an article in their newsletter and then sent out letters in support of the ordinance uh we sent out

1:50:44press releases to the media and numerous articles appeared in local periodical about about the proposal and then Chief Kirkland also did interviews for several TV and radio news stations regarding the information we also consulted other cities and vendors and Technology

1:51:01experts to come up with the guidelines for the ordinance what we found was that no other city was really doing this so we were kind of challenged to come up with some specs and that's where we kind of relied on the industry experts we met with innumerable people and really had

1:51:18to learn a lot um after the ordinance was passed we actually went out and hand delivered information to all of the affected businesses in Els Sero we met with the managers and owners established a contact person at each business and provided them with some information

1:51:34about what the guidelines were and what they needed to do to get into compliance we held a business assistance meeting at Community Center in May of 2008 and at that we again gave them some information tried to help them find out what steps they needed to take we coordinated

1:51:49contact between the businesses and the vendors we actually solicited vendors to give us some information to see if they could meet the minimum standards required on the ordinance and then any business that was able to show that we placed them on the city website so that

1:52:05business owners had a group of people they could look to who could actually provide the product that we needed after the initial contacts were made we continue to work with the businesses providing them information reminding them them of the October 31st 2008 deadline and then doing inspections

1:52:23and everything up until the completion of each project unanticipated complications uh despite going to each business numerable times we found that often on our second third fourth eth visit with the same business they no longer had the same management people we had met with

1:52:40previously no longer worked there the company had been restructured so we often found that even though we had gone out there and made an effort um we often kept starting from from Square One um it's because the concept was unique we found that there weren't any universally

1:52:56accepted standards so we had to do a lot of work to try to come up with guidelines from the industry that met the public safety aspect that we were looking for also because it's novel when we were working with vendors they really didn't have any application that met

1:53:11these guidelines so we had to kind of help work with what they had to find something that would provide what the city needed uh big issue was that many of the businesses procrastinated for a variety of reasons the way people procrastinate in general uh we kept working with them and suddenly when the

1:53:28deadline approached uh a bunch of people all jumped on board at once that overwhelmed the vendors that were working with them because it was a relatively small group and they weren't able to provide the service in the time span allotted it also was challenging for those of us doing the inspections

1:53:43because there's a limit to the number of hours in the day and also because it was such a novel concept we ran into a lot of issues with um installers who despite our repeated meetings and information relied on doing something that they had done before rather than actually

1:54:00providing the product that we were looking for now so we actually had to go out often and kind of help them tweak and readjust what they had already installed for a different purpose to meet this public safety need uh departmental commitment as you can surmise we spent considerable time

1:54:16trying to make this implementation of the ordinance successful um we met with a lot of vendors a lot of Industry representatives and experts most of us knew nothing about all of this technology before we got into this so we really had a steep learning curve and as

1:54:33I said since no other city was doing this we really had to work to come up with some standards that we thought would really provide what we needed without being overwhelming to businesses uh we trained with a lot of vendors and found that most had little that overlapped in way of technology or

1:54:48products we spent a great deal of time doing the Outreach efforts we found that there wasn't one business in town that needed one meeting to get started and some required at least a dozen before they even started the process of discussing the ordinance um and then

1:55:03once the actual installations began we did numerous on-site visits we met with uh vendors before they gave bids we met with people when they did the actual installation and then did dozens of meetings after that just to make sure the final product was something that

1:55:17meant that Public Safety need and and uh complied with the ordinance good evening Madame mayor city council members during our research of um this the city ordinance for the camera system uh we discovered the following businesses would most benefit from having a uh system installed in business

1:55:50first we have banks these are your basic uh saving and Loans institutions uh next we have our check caching businesses these uh business conducts um caching checks and making loans to their customers um next we have convenience stores these are the gas stations that

1:56:14sell uh consumer goods also uh next we have fire arms dealers these are businesses that are licensed to sell firearms um off sale liquor businesses these businesses are licensed to sell liquor for the consumption off premises uh next we have secondhand dealers these are licensed Pond Brokers

1:56:46and uh coin dealers uh next we have carry out food and drink establishments uh these are the businesses that sell food and beverage in disposable containers for consumption on or off the premises last we have uh strip malls and parking lots strip malls consist of

1:57:12properties with a building or a series of buildings containing a mix of four or more commercial establishments um businesses that are required to install cameras must um include their parking lot compliance to date so far um three out of six banks have been completed two

1:57:41are in progress uh check cashing business two out of five have been completed and we have three in uh process convenience stores they are all completed the firearm Steelers there are also all completed off sale liquor establishments uh we have 14 out of 15 completed and

1:58:06one in progress secondhand dealers they are all completed uh carry out food and drink establishment 22 out of 42 have been compl completed and 17 is in process uh strip malls and parking lots four out of nine um have been completed and we have five in uh process I would like to note that the

1:58:35majority of the businesses that are in process they do have camera systems installed but have not uh they're not in full compliance um some minor issues may just be camera angles or um addition additional hardware for memory space and we are working with them daily to get them in

1:59:04compliance uh video surveillance system Loan program I had uh opportunity to speak to Dwayne Dalman last week and to date we have 18 loans that have been completed um currently there is 13 loans in process and Dwayne anticipates that five of these 13 loans will be completed

1:59:28sometime this week with checks being issued to the um owners um like Commander Regan stated earlier one quarter of the loan is Forgiven each year when the businesses camera system passes their yearly inspection Dwayne uh told me that um we are within budget with the money that's

1:59:51set aside for this uh Loan program um we are also working with businesses that are not required to install cameras but elected to install them themselves and they are also eligible for the Loan program thank you for your time thank you as we finish the the next steps that

2:00:17we have are completing the businesses that are in process as detective tank stated we've got approximately 20 or so outstanding businesses that are in various stages of compliance we want to go ahead and get those completed I anticipate that there may be as many as

2:00:33two businesses that we have to refer to the city attorney's office and so we'll be working with uh Mr Woodruff to to deal with those businesses accordingly we we plan to make uh maintain our contact with the business community that we built over the last year uh we think

2:00:49it's very important that they know that we are here to support them as they trying to keep their systems up and running uh one of the things that we uh do a lot is contact the vendors on the merchants behalf to make sure that the vendors are doing their part and keeping

2:01:05the system up and running and keeping it uh in compliance with the uh ordinance we'll be working with any new businesses that come into into town that would be fall under this ordinance uh shortly we'll be getting our yearly compliance inspections from those businesses that

2:01:19have already had their systems up and running for a year and as uh this year closes we'll be refunding our technical effects and looking at exactly how they're laid out uh we've received some inut both from the business community and the vendors on how we can tighten up

2:01:34the specifications uh to make it more apparent exactly what we're trying to achieve that's our presentation for now we'll uh Endeavor to answer any questions you may have either about the ordinance or the compliance to Mr Jones yes hi um thank you for the report it's really good it's on time and

2:01:56uh I think we're all very interested to see how this is going since it seems to be treading u a new water um I had just three questions um why are three businesses not in compliance do you is there any particular reason for that um there's no I mean excuse me in compliance are in

2:02:25process there's it looks like to me if I'm not there's one Bank where is it One bank and three carry out food it looks like that either are not in compliance uh or in process I was just wondering why that may be well one of the banks is a national concern and we're having to to deal with folks back

2:02:50east and trying to get this we're trying to deal with people back East Express what it is we're trying to achieve and much like some of the other businesses this particular Bank waited till the last minute and then all of a sudden decided that they were going to have problems coming into

2:03:07to compliance because they are managed locally we are working with that bank they have uh filed a letter with the Department expressing their intent to come into compliance with the ordinance but we no doubt uh request an extension uh to order the equipment and get it

2:03:24installed this is what we're seeing in in most of the businesses that aren't uh now in compliance is they waited till the absolute last minute we did indeed inundate the vendor pool in our area as well as some of the equipment pools and uh some of the vendors are also finding

2:03:41out that it's not as easy to comply with the ordinance as they thought at first blush by just skimming the specifications our spef specifications are not rocket science however they are very exacting because of the image quality we hope to to get from the system and use in prosecution okay

2:03:59the ask the bank to use their bailout money will be in good shape then um um it surprises me that 18 businesses and I'm glad they did they 18 businesses um took out uh or participa in the Loan program but I was surprised I thought there'd be many more since they they can get a refund over the

2:04:22period of time for the system any comments on that I I think some of it has to do with those businesses that are still outstanding I would say at least 50% will also be applying for the loan okay uh the loan was was pretty exacting uh toward smaller businesses we weren't trying to

2:04:42finance Starbucks security system we wanted to make sure that the small business concerns in our Community had at least some help in applying this technology good appreciate it and last has any of the systems been used to an investigation of crime yes but not in

2:05:00the way you might think uh we used a neighboring business uh we use their video to confirm something that happened in their neighbors's business while the uh there was video of the crime occurring in the the actual victim business it was very poor quality and they're not required by the ordinance to

2:05:17to have a system how ever the suspect was also in the neighboring business and we got excellent quality video of that person we've used it to uh solve or not necessarily solve but uh further our proof in some property related crimes uh I'd love to be able to tell you that we

2:05:34had some heinous crime and the and the camera system helped us solve it but not only is uh our part one crimes down throughout the city but I just don't see the same numbers of calls for service in these now unfortunately based based on the way this is played out I don't have

2:05:51a date that I can say from this date until this date because all the camera systems were operational I know that or I can infer that the camera systems had this effect uh the the uh camera system coming on board has been sporadic it's been kind of all over the place and so I

2:06:09don't know that we have enough data right now to make any hard statistical claims one way or the other okay thank you yeah um what happens if somebody does not come into compliance they can uh be fined either through the citation processor via the city manager up to

2:06:29$500 a day thanks for the good work yeah I just wanted to confirm that you're just beginning your first round of annual inspections so we don't have any um numbers on how many people have passed those and will be forgiven for a portion of the loan is that that's correct I I

2:06:49don't anticipating us beginning our first uh set of yearly compliance inspections till probably sometime in September very few businesses got ahead of the curve saw what this meant and put their systems in early however most of the systems waited or most of the the

2:07:06businesses waited until the last moment okay what's the life cycle of this equipment it's supposed to be in excess of 5 years however some of the equipment is new enough that I don't have a a proven answer yet it's it's suggested that this equipment will last at least 5

2:07:26years and in some cases depending on the maintenance level even longer uh however I don't uh the network uh video recorders is something that's only been out within the last year and I don't think that we're going to be able to establish a proven track record with

2:07:42them for some time did any businesses say this was too oppressive or affected their business in a negative way uh I haven't had I've had some uh Merchants initially B at the the cost of the technology I haven't had any uh Merchants expressed to me that they couldn't do it because they felt it was

2:08:01bad for their customers um on a you made five trips to each business apparently 400 trips 80 businesses that's about roughly five um that's a tremendous investment in a relationship um additionally we made tremendous investment in you're learning this process are there

2:08:21any plans to uh transfer that knowledge to other staff members so that we have secession and and Legacy knowledge that stays with the agency so how are you dealing with with transferring this knowledge through internally initially it'll start with the investigations unit

2:08:37as the other investigators uh we can start taking them with us when we're doing our compliance inspection so that they can start to understand the technology also as the systems get used by our Patrol officers because these systems are designed so that our newest

2:08:50patrol officer can meet up with the business's newest employee and go down a cheat sheet and operate the system we we're hoping that as that interaction occurs more and more of our people will be brought on board merely unfortunately by trial and error but also but by

2:09:05having the the cheat sheeting working through the system on their own thank you job well done thank you any comments um I just a quick question about so how long does footage get retained is it for a year or for the lifetime the uh specifications require 30 days okay uh

2:09:25some uh some businesses based on their own corporate needs uh hold it longer but the minimum time is 30 days okay thanks just a quick question um I'm surprised that a national bank would not uh already be able to meet our requirements are most of the sticking areas then on the resolution of the

2:09:44video uh not only that the banks are have been uh nationally governed by the FBI standard which allows them to use black and white footage and a lower frame rate than we require as well as a lower resolution rate than we require okay so while they have always had to

2:10:01have systems based on the the national requirements those systems don't meet our specifications and my last comment is I'm wondering if you're exploring ways perhaps through our business license process or other um ways that we do business to help ensure that the

2:10:17equipment that's installed is maintain and retain when businesses turn over it I'm not sure how we'll work through that but we will uh I can see a problem with a business leaving a particular location and the next business that comes in is either not required or doesn't opt to

2:10:38maintain the system um however we will try to keep an eye on that and work our way through just like we're going to have to work our way through being notified when new businesses down of town that do do meet the ordinance requirements and so that we'll have an opportunity to go out and

2:10:53meet with them so um Mr Hannon I think that it this is one of those cases where interde departmental coordination could be helpful and the council is certainly interested in any ideas for changes in the ordinance or our policies that could facilitate helping this go more smoothly

2:11:10it seems like um it's efficient to keep those systems in place when businesses change over okay well we really appreciate the update we're excited about the program and glad to um hear of all your efforts to get it off the ground and to keep it running thank you very much

2:11:29thanks uh Madame Mary move that um we extend this meeting to no later than 11:00 um is there a second if you'll take off the no later then I will second it we have some important still to do extend the meeting to 11:00 I'll second it all in favor I opposed okay motion carries um

2:12:00is there a note no it's just say so I'm sorry I didn't ask for a public comment on that presentation are there any speaker slips no speakers mayor Potter okay well that's great because we still haven't gotten to the consent calendar and so I would like to move on to item

2:12:16five which is adoption of the cons consent calendar items 5 a through 5H is there a motion move adoption of the consent calendar second all in favor I opposed uh I just want to point out that the with the approval of the consent calendar we um passed a condemnation of a congratulations to

2:12:38Sergeant Steven bini for his recognition from the Richmond Elks Lodge as police officer appreciation program and that program will be held on February 11th and um we want to congratulate him for that recognition okay we'll now move on there are no public hearings but we have a couple of

2:13:07policy items um and item 7A relates to the East Bay Municipal utility District's collection and distribution of the water utility users tax which was approved by the voters of Els Sero on November of 2004 and we'll have the staff report now good evening Madame mayor and members of

2:13:27the council I'm Mary Dodge the finance director and I'm here tonight to discuss the Eastbay Municipal Utility District East Bay mud easier to say collection and distribution of the uut on water and to request Direction on the collection of the uut due from current and prior

2:13:46years so the reason I'm here tonight is because Eastbay mud has not collected this tax since it was implemented in the early 1990s unlike the way uut has been collected on electricity gas and telephones Eastbay mud required that the cost um include an administrative fee

2:14:06that was somewhat excessive in 1992 the city of Els Sero received a proposal that included $95,600 of 35% in uh in November 2004 measure K was passed and the city once again um R reaffirmed the uut and in November 2007 we started negotiations with Eastbay mud to try to

2:14:39get the tax collected the negotiations did not go very quickly because once again East pay mud sorry I'm having a throat problem once again Eastbay mud wanted us to have a large administrative fee and they didn't quite understand the concept of direct costs versus shared costs we um

2:14:59presented them um different explanations and different examples of how the direct costs had to be only cost that they used to do our bills and not to send their trucks out to get their things processed and they still came back with a um almost a 40% administrative fee

2:15:18we then negotiated at this time we have a $22,000 one-time admin fee for them to do the computer processing and 4% of revenue for the ongoing fee with a um annual fee revenue of almost $300,000 this translates to approximately $112,000 a year in administrative charges a significant

2:15:42thank you a significant improvement over the 35% okay and according to East Bay mud the ongoing implementation of their new CIS system will make it so that it'll be January 2010 before we will be able to have this um charge this tax show up on their regular bills between now and then

2:16:05we have uh a few different choices that we're going to have to consider um at this point in time East Bay l going to be the only agency that requires an administrative fee in all of the other a agencies the cost is built into the structure and we have found that uh the proposed method

2:16:30that we are receiving from them is similar from other agencies also San Pablo and Hercules have similar ordinances and they have been unable to collect this revenue and they are kind of looking at us for a little bit of direction on how we will proceed with this and they could also be um potential

2:16:50split costs in the um the onetime set of fees so we do realize that we will need to have customer Outreach and dissemination of information and that uh we were going to work we will work with Eastbay mud and make sure that this is provided to the service users and

2:17:10customers in the most efficient way in the meantime we do need to determine whether or not how we are going to go about the collection of the current period as well as the uh legally authorized threee three years back there are two different methods that have been proposed to us one of

2:17:32them is a third party billing process where the um they would we've been working with eBay mud and they have found a couple of different billing agencies where they would prepare and mail the bills and and do the collection for us and they have proposed at attachment one we have uh

2:17:52some collection um and some cost estimates on how we would go about that um on our attachment one it does show that for two threee periods we're still going to have the $300,000 Revenue estimation it consists across the board but for every year that we go through

2:18:17there's a $50,000 loss in Revenue because of um closed accounts and um shut offs moving and all of that so um the revenue does decline as we go forward and if we choose to go back for each year that we choose to go back for each payment that we choose to make billing we choose to send out there's an

2:18:41$8,000 cost in The Mailing and the structuring of the bill so for them to do this this interim period it has a one-time cost in computers for $50,000 and then an $8,000 cost for per mailing they will be collecting all of the revenue and they will then be on a monthly basis they would be transmitting

2:19:05it to us which is the same method that will be happening ongoing only there won't be a secondary billing process and also um some of the calculations that we have in here um the annual bill for the average bill um for a resident would be um $30 per year and I need to find my attachment

2:19:57one okay if we choose to build for one year we have anticipated a $230,000 estimated Revenue if we choose to go back 2 years then we have the $468,000 um and every time every year that we go out we have reduced the amount of money that we're receiving but we are also being able to collect and

2:20:21get the process established it should make it easier if we go out further and do this on a on the regular basis another uh another option for the interim period would be to include the uncollected utility user tax on the property tax role there would be some significant difficulties in doing this

2:20:46because it would would be on more of a method of um property ownership basis instead of account name and there could be some issues in regards to the responsibility of uh who's has a responsibility for the payment because this method has some of these issues we

2:21:04have not considered it really feasible and do not have costs at this time but could find them if it was directed by the council also as discussed with the council at earlier times there is a 200,000 Assumption of this Revenue in our budget if this revenue is not collected at this

2:21:24time we will need to have budget reductions and with the state of the economy at this time it is not what we would like to do to add another $200,000 loss in our Revenue it is always important to collect taxes as instructed by the voters and the current economic

2:21:43conditions make the opportunity and timing of an agreement with East made be mud so much more imperative so in order to recognize the revenue billing during this interim period we're going to need to have all or some of the Billings done by year end now in the report it says year end June

2:22:0330th but actually I think it could be June or September 30th would be the the latest that we would be able to send the bills out to collect the money by in for this fiscal year so direction is requested from the council on the interim Solutions presented and on the

2:22:19appropriateness of the proposed 4% administrative fee and those directions are listed below and they are should the city direct East bayad to collect the uut for fiscal year 2009 utilizing a third party bilding agent prior to standard implementation in January 2010

2:22:39and should the city direct East Bay mud to collect the uut for January for fiscal year 2008 Andor 20 2007 and if yes to one and or two what's the desired billing frequency and is the city council comfortable with the proposed administrative fees proposed by East Bay

2:23:00mud and recommended by staff for the inter period And in the future thank you very much are there any questions I just have to Qui okay uh Maran no reflection on the city staff but I'm just wondering if you know this why does it take one year for them to implement a simple computer

2:23:26collection why does this start at 2010 not at 2009 three well when we first started this I actually felt a little bit the same way I thought we're going to put an 8% uh subtotal on their on their bill and during this implementation period it shouldn't be that difficult to do and

2:23:47and the more we have discussed this and the more I have found the programming involved in being able to do this I can see why they are are hesitant to have this programming gone go into this Legacy system that they have that they call a house of cards that they feel

2:24:03would not be able to handle and they don't really want to do the programming on this but but one year I I understand it may be involved but you know we're next to Silicon Valley they've invented these things one year 12 months for the implementation of their new system as

2:24:20well well it says going we're we're at the beginning of 2009 and it says they won't want to put it in until 2010 and I'm just wondering why the one year there is an 18-month implementation period that they have going and and uh I don't know for a system this size that

2:24:35that is also um that unusual I know that when they did the one in conquer it took well over a year when you had the system and this is one of the reasons why we do want to try to make these decisions now because they're at the phase where they would be able to take our um requests our requirements as

2:24:54we've established the protocol they would be able to take these and incorporate them into their programming which is why the ongoing programming costs are $22,000 and could potentially be split between um San Pablo and Hercules our onetime costs are 50,000 because we're

2:25:11utilizing their old awkward system and that $50,000 is not to exceed number there is a possibility for it being lower and there is a possibility for it being um split also by San Pablo and Hercules okay second of all uh are you satisfied that and I'm sorry this

2:25:30normally something I'd call you on the phone but I wasn't able to are you satisfied that the car uh scope of work is complete it had a you have a list of the scope of work in the back does that satisfy everything we need as far as accounting and interaction with them and

2:25:46yes it does we've been we've gone over this um significantly we were hoping to have we have a d a draft contract in the works but there's still some wording that we needed to go back and forth on and and with this meeting coming up we wanted to get started on the direction

2:26:01we will bring back the contract but we wanted to at least get this in front of the council as as soon as we could so we did collectively draft up the well she presented it to me but it is the scope of work that we have been discussing for the last few months thank you any other

2:26:18questions one of the one of the items you're asking us to consider is how frequent to send out the bills I'm assuming that's for 2009 and not ped bills since P bills were passed what would um so really we're talking about potentially sending out a bill for 2007

2:26:33a bill for 2008 maybe that's combined a bill for some portion of 2009 if you're asking us the frequency to send it out over a one-year period um the scope of work that bill was just talking about talks about potentially doing it twice when would those two bills go

2:26:49out these are part of the um directions that we the things we need to determine at this time these bills could be if we're essentially saying that we have a a a $30 per houseold cost if we wanted to bill for the current year and two prior we could send out a bill as as

2:27:12quickly as next month or the month after and I called today to confirm with them how quickly could we get this data out and on the ground we could send out one um maybe as of March 31st with whatever Back pill filling period We felt was appropriate so as to Bill what we need

2:27:32to but not be too owner as on the on the service users um we could split that time frame into two periods and then have one say June 30th that included up to the whole fiscal 2009 um it it seems to me we want to make sure that we have at least our minimum $200,000 that we have in the

2:27:57budget um but I also think that it might be easier on the service users if we completed the back billing portion before they start receiving the bill for the current service there in January 2010 okay well maybe we can talk about the details of the frequency after we've

2:28:16made the decision on the first two points to that to that end chair uh mayor the table you have in your agenda memo says year 2009 is that calendar year or fiscal year it could be either but what I think I'd like to propose is that we consider everything in here on a

2:28:35fiscal basis but actually we had we had discussed it with them somewhat on a calend year basis since we're beginning service on the um on the new uut the ongoing basis in January so that sort of Lent itself to a calendar concept but we can do this on a fiscal year basis um

2:28:57they have the ability to get the data out of their system pretty much so in any manner we want they will be taking it out of the system and doing it in essentially a mail merge concept and then utilizing the third party Billing System so while they can't put the new

2:29:12um percentage in there to send it on their Billing System they can get it out of the old system in about any manner we want so this is a related question if we um have budgeted in the 2008 2009 fiscal year $200,000 Revenue what happened to the shortfalls in the fiscal year

2:29:33preceding that um 20072 2008 when none of that was collected none of this money has ever been budgeted for the city of elero or for San Pablo Pao or for Hercules um because the um water district was so hesitant about collecting this and water districts all over the place were very hesitant about

2:29:59collecting this um many agencies basically um gave up trying to do it it wasn't until uh legal case few few agencies resued I think most notably it was a Marino Valley and then Los Angeles and uh Modesto is another one I've heard of and our City attorney knows more

2:30:21about those that once the uh the agencies the water districts pursued and basically the agencies won and they were told they did have to collect it and only for a direct cost not a service administrative fee did agencies such as ours decide it was time to go back and

2:30:41see what we could negotiate and the cases didn't say at um what responsiveness they needed to do that they did not say what what at what level they needed to do it and so we have done some research and found a few other agencies and um that are currently have um agreements structured and

2:31:04there's um a little bit of a range but essentially some they're still struggling with the concept of it's a direct cost and not a service fee uh the agencies also provide billing services for other entities such as sewer agencies and I think the concept of collecting for a a tax as opposed to a

2:31:26fee and direct costs only is one that we have have worked hard to communicate with East Bay mud and I think is is kind of a philosophy that has gone over with other water districts there any other questions for U Mary before we go to the public comment I have a question question um

2:31:47what happens if we send out a bill and um somebody doesn't pay it well we will uh receive protests um I understand that with pg& in my little efforts at learning more about uut we have only one actual person who is a real protester on the utility user tax I didn't even

2:32:07realize that we had one um and and then we have to turn it over to the City attorney and determine what side of actions we would take fourth f who did protest but I guess my question might be a little bit different we didn't do this so there would people would would

2:32:25receive a bill correct correct separate from the utility bill it would have um Eastbay mud's logo on it it could have our logo on it it would State and and I would uh we were already discussing different ways that we would send out information to the citizens ahead of

2:32:42time to let them know what this was for what it was about why it was happening now so there would definitely be some Outreach um to let them know what was coming but there there and there could be certain ones who would pay and we'd have some aging issues on ones when

2:33:02they're 6 months old what type of collection efforts do we do we choose to take but at this point those would be um consistent with the process that East Bay mud uses and we would want to make sure that we were on board with their colle ction procedures so I have another

2:33:18question you said it would be a $30 per per per household but is that average or is that that's average that's average so some would be more some would be less correct and that's a single family home okay thank you okay um thank you any speakers Peter laal I'm Peter Lal first two questions

2:33:44uh we try and collect from the school district or is it exempt School District okay uh you mentioned second question you mentioned $30 per household uh are there businesses that use a lot of water like restaurants have you calculated how much it'll cost a restaurant I do not have an average okay

2:34:08now uh four years ago uh call of 204 uh certainly try to convince as many people as I could uh not to vote for George W bush we wouldn't listen to and I also was treasurer of a group that we tried to convince people not to vote for the uut tax telling them not that the

2:34:30money couldn't isn't needed but it you can't trust this city to spend it wisely but the gal voters voted it in because they believe this is just a continuation of a wellestablished uh tax where well uh we know that money for water use was not collected and so today suddenly staff wants to go after

2:34:55the money um and in this vein staff can be collected to go you know to read all the fine print and it opens up a Pandora's Box in the future if all uh surely at some stage internet will not be protected by feral law and that's another another source of funding and so on and so on

2:35:16um I expect you to vote for this and actually I'm delighted because what the Gible voters of this town need is to be woken up to the wastage that is going on and for instance sitting in this wonderful wonderful structure when there's so many other things we need with it's water

2:35:36feature outside so you'll just make it easier uh to try and defeat some future taxs so go for it three years back how many years you want and uh uh maybe voters get angry enough we'll even have a referendum and rein the tax like that so go for it thank you thank you next speaker no other

2:36:09speakers Mr burn please come and speak and fill out the card when you're done thank you looking here this is I only got this tonight so forgive me um does this mean when it says should the city direct East Bay mud to collect uut uh for 07 and 08 that you're going to go back the Year

2:36:34yes this taxes were never collected and we're considering whether we should go back to collect them um and I just heard the lady say that you're going to change the billing form I don't get a bill now for my utility us ta tax it comes out on on the bill itself there going to be a

2:36:50bill sent out now for your utility users tax for the water when you sell your house you're supposed to disclose every lean against your house the truth and lending or whatever uh if somebody doesn't know that they have been charged for that are they liable for letting the person know when

2:37:12the person buys or is that person on the hook there's a lot of answer all I'm saying is it may be a good thing may not but I think you should get all the answers before you rush to judgment if you will I know that I I sued the city twice a couple years ago on this very

2:37:30similar thing and I won and uh when we got the check the city said to me don't spend it CU we're going to pass the utility you hadn't bother going to a vat before we're going to pass the utility users tax and then we're going to when it's passed you're going to give the

2:37:45money back to us and the judge who said that I was right who now as a superior court judge said no you can't make a tax retroactive so I'm thinking now does that follow through to if I'm going to buy a new house that I have to pay all the back taxes that the owner hasn't

2:38:07paid uh you can't declare I don't know uh but her ruling was you can't pass somebody's taxes on who who doesn't know they're being taxed I just think there's a whole bunch of problems on this and I think it needs a lot more study thank you thank you excuse me I would like for the City

2:38:28attorney to please comment on the issue of the lean um really this is going to be worked out as I understand it with East Bay mud's billing process if somebody gets a bill if if the council decides let's say you want a bill for $2,000 7 and the bill goes out and somebody says

2:38:48I didn't live here in 2007 they contact East Bay mud East Bay mud has records of who was the who was whose name the account was in in 2007 and they wouldn't have to build that in fact they probably wouldn't be build for that amount anyway because he beut should check the file to

2:39:04see that whoever was living there in 2007 was not the current occupant and so you're not going to build those people for for usage that uh for tax on usage that that they didn't Inc because the tax follow the user not the land exactly okay thank you I had a question uh from Mary uh Director of

2:39:25Finance it's my understanding that we sent out in 2009 there'll be a third party bill sent out after that it's Incorporated in the water bill correct it won't be incorporated until sept January 2010 correct so we're talking about one year we get a separate bill

2:39:45and then once once 2010 hits it'll be incorporated into the regular Bill like all the other utilities okay thank you okay so um we don't have any more speaker slips and I wanted to bring this back to the council for discussion but to remind everybody that the utility

2:40:03users tax was approved by the voters in 2004 so what we're talking about are taxes on all the utilities that were approved in 2004 for which we have been receiving on bills such as our electricity and our Comcast and whatever other services we use related to telecommunications but we never included

2:40:26in the East Bay mud bill so tonight we have the opportunity to go back and look at um collecting those taxes which the majority of the voters approve we collect to use for those things specified in the measure and um the staff report nicely outlines the three questions that we need to answer and the

2:40:47first one is should the city direct East Bay mud to collect the utility users tax for 2009 utilizing a thirdparty billing agent prior to the standard implementation which will be in January of 20110 I'd go along with that yes okay I also support that um so mayor the

2:41:11however my clarification question was directed to that are we talking about the six-month period from July 1 2008 to December 31 2009 in that question or we just talking about the calendar year of 2009 going forward well I know Mary suggested we think about it as fiscal

2:41:30years but since the implementation of U East Bay muds billing is going to go into effect in January of 2010 I was going to make a suggestion that would break um the three years into into three equal parts and we would have three quarters this year to bill before

2:41:51the um January 2010 automatic billing took place so I guess you can think about it you can break it up in either way but we still are still what Still Remains is that in January of 2010 we should be able to rely on having Eastbay mud do regular collection so we need to figure out a

2:42:14way to collect from December 2009 possibly as far back as um Mary could you clarify that what date December that we start at would that be June of 2007 or six if we're going back 3 years legal I'm looking to our to our City attorney uh at what point in time did

2:42:41the three years back clock start and well it would be 3 years from um the time of the most recent usage so I mean so if you were basically sorry that wasn't very clear but I'd say really be 3 years from now um would be the the um the period to look at um I was just going to say one thing which

2:43:10isn't a strictly illegal issue but I wouldn't necessarily count on Eastbay mud actually having its its new Billing System in place in January 2010 um it may be that this interim billing um system is going to have to extend for some period of time longer into 2010 before they're actually able

2:43:31to implement their their system which will put the uut onto the regular bill um I was also going to say that the council may also want to consider whether or not you know you have you you could bu Bill back for the previous three years but you're not required to

2:43:46you could decide one year two years or all three years just to clarify that issue and if we were considering now since it is um early February if we wanted to consider the prior periods as in calendar periods my only reason for considering calendar periods on that was

2:44:06just for simplification to be able to have sometimes uh timelines in our head okay I I think simplif is a good idea so mayor we're actually considering this potentially we're considering this for the 36 months going back to February 2006 plus the the 10 months going

2:44:28forward from now which we have the which we would want a system for collecting so it's it's not just a 36-month period that you potentially are considering it's as much as a 46-month period okay so we can't that's that's correct only go back 36 months no matter

2:44:47how we count it but we have 10 months going forward right 10 months going forward we just can't collect more than 36 months if we're going to go that way but that's the next issue yeah let's talk about that one so how far back do we feel it's appropriate to go I okay I good conscience uh we cannot

2:45:08collect from our residents two years back um this is an East Bay uh mud problem not an elero problem um we have a an agreement we should just go forward and collect from here on out 2009 I it it doesn't make sense to me to go back it isn't fair in my opinion to

2:45:34go back and ask for the tax we should have collected it if if we wanted to collected from 2004 we should have collected it my feeling what was the data the court decision that um clarified the legal aspects of this issue I believe the Marino Valley case the first one was

2:45:51in 2003 which established that the like a a water district like East Bay mud would be required to collect it and then there was a subsequent decision in 2004 that clarified about um that they could charge basically direct costs for collecting so it's in that 20032 2004

2:46:08period I uh would like to make a motion that we extend the meeting by 15 minutes to 11:15 second all in favor I motion carries okay well I I disagree with that I think that um I'm I'm upset that East Bay mud has not fulfilled their obligations and they've had ample

2:46:32warning 2003 2004 they have known and it isn't our problem but it has become our problem because the voters approved this tax and they expected to pay it and they and it wasn't col collected and so now in good conscience we need to collect that tax now what there there could be some

2:46:52validity to not going back the entire three years because there's diminishing returns for our our efforts and we're paying onetime fees we're paying administrative fees but I um I would not support anything less than at least collecting the 2008 amount okay I maybe the proper uh action would be to

2:47:14ask the city um attorney what it would take to go after East Bay mud they're the ones that refused it we asked them to we continually asked them to collect it and they came up with some bogus um costs with the intention of trying to scare us away that the cost would be too high um

2:47:35when we had the users utility tax issue before um the city thought it was right based on legal um uh advice and we were part of a lawsuit uh with many State uh many cities in the state carried on by the uh League of California cities there was an eventual Court uh settlement the court at that

2:48:01time did not order the cities to go back and repay the citizens for 10 years of taxes that we collected we thought we collected correctly but instead just uh issued the ORD as of going forward forward order and I think that's the way we should handle this here we're finally

2:48:21getting an agreement to go and and uh collect the tax we should take that go forward and collect the tax if we really want the money back from those then I would suggest that we ask the City attorney to do some research on this to go after Eastbay U Municipal I don't

2:48:39understand how they can say they don't have to collect it when we had a decision in 2003 to go forward and collect it I you know I can give you the like without even doing any research I can just tell you that aside from the legal issues it it's potentially into the hundreds of

2:49:01thousands of dollars in litigation costs and bear in mind that espay mud has a litigation budget annually that's a couple of million dollars um you you could expect them to to fight that so we enjoined other agencies with us um it might help it might help I I I this is

2:49:20only partially legal point but I I will sort of bring it up anyway is that if you think about the fact that the way this is all played out that billing for 2008 um makes sense in terms of the structure of this because the way that the tax is going to have to be done on

2:49:37this interim basis is it's going to be based on getting data from East Bay mud on what they had built for some previous period of time anyway and then billing um for that separately as long as this interim period goes on and so there's a degree of sense for you know back at

2:49:53least you know as as as as Mar Potter suggested going back through 2008 to collect back the amounts that that were lost just on the idea that we're now at a point where we're we're close to an arrangement with East Bay mud and and we could sort of treat that as we're doing

2:50:07catchup billing for the previous calendar year but that's I mean I said that that there only partially a legal opinion okay okay I'm unfamiliar with the um legal action you referred to with the league of California cities I'm wondering can we get clarification on

2:50:23that the uh I'm sorry the legal action referred to in the league of California cities am I'm familiar with it I'm not familiar with that either no what I no what I was referring to was there was a 10-year uh Court battle over users utility taxes we were relying on legal

2:50:43opinion of which part came from the league of California cities they helped my understanding they helped fight the battle on that one correct or incorrect I I um I in terms of the the the the Marino Valley case which is sort of the most recent published appell case on it um there may

2:51:05have been some Friend of the Court briefs filed by the league but I I don't I'm not familiar with the league being a regardless there was a 10year battle the courts ruled against the cities they issued a a judgment part of that was a going forward in my opinion

2:51:22or what would amounted to a going forward issuance and um so that's what I'm referring to but so that this that told us we needed to go to the voters and get the approval and we did that and we had overwhelming support to collect this tax to fund the services of the city and we

2:51:43didn't get that that tax revenue in the citizens still expect us to fund those programs and especially in today's Economic Times it's important for us to carry out the will of the voters in that regard if I'm I'm sorry just to clarify when if I understand now what you're

2:52:02talking about council member Jones that that was a 10-year battle over um the the series of proposition 62 and proposition 218 and basically what happened was in the interim period between those two initiatives um several um many cities passed taxes without going to the voters because there was a

2:52:21lack of clarity then there was a long battle after prop 218 passed and finally the court said for that interim period where it was unclear whether or not prop 62 was valid you you you most cities were advised to then go back um and at as a at the end of that 10year battle

2:52:39get voter approval to authorize the previously approved taxes which is what Els Sero did with the correct but the court did not where I'm going at my the reason why I even brought it up the courts didn't say go back cities and pay all the money that you collected they they didn't say that

2:52:57no they didn't okay that's what I'm trying to use I don't think it's right for us to go back 2 years and collect taxes that we didn't that we didn't collect there were other ways we could have collected this tax but we we didn't uh okay right wrong indiff that's my

2:53:15reasoning for not wanting to go back to question of what he said well Greg has had his hand up for a yeah mayor I'd like to explore a proposal that might move us forward uh but it does involve a question to Mr Hannon um I would like to propose that we bill every six months

2:53:30that we consider in issuing an invoice at this time for the last 6 months because we did in our budget rely on Revenue during that period to fund some of this year's uh Services we do not have budgets relying on these these taxes in uh fiscal years prior to the

2:53:49fiscal year that we're in so I would propose that we collect three or four times depending on when East Bay mud does finally uh submit it that we do it over a six-month increment which is consistent with the proposal that East Bay mud proposed and um the real question I have is if we elected not to

2:54:08collect the 6 months from July 1 2008 to December 1 2008 um that's approximately $130,000 is that something that we could uh budget around can I just say that I noted a 133% drop in sales tax revenue so I'm just going to say that it's going to be really difficult I think that's the the

2:54:34answer I expect I I certainly think it's going to be tight um and Crossing off another 100 to 150,000 probably close to to 130 as you said is money we have to find somewhere else so so I respect Mr Jones's opinion and I believe that if we were billing for the 6 months from July

2:54:531 2008 to December 31 2008 that's not that's consistent we would wait till now to issue those those bills and we are did rely upon it in our budget that invoicing for uh taxes prior to that date I think is excessive and and and I would not support did I hear a motion embedded there um

2:55:19I'm exploring it and if there if you would like me to move that into a motion I would gladly do so yes yes please um I move that we um consider sixth month billing and that we issue our first billing for the period of July 1 2008 to to December 31 2008 at this time second

2:55:44all in favor I opposed no no motion carries 3 to2 we'll now move on to item um 7B which is a Redevelopment agency item excuse me there's a uh before we leave there there's a there's a question four oh question four number four on the [Applause] back any thoughts on whether the

2:56:24council's comfortable with the proposed administrative fees by East Bay mud and recommended by staff for the interim period we had testimony that it was consistent with the other utilities so I would support it I move I don't if do any want a motion or what just a nod of

2:56:42heads I'm comfortable with the ad administrative fee yeah agreed okay I you know sort of been trying to sit here and stay out of it but I I mean I feel really compelled just to make a comment um I know you already acted that I think I'm leaning a little bit towards

2:57:00where council member Jones was going and I think it's important um and I appreciate the efforts of our finance director that who has tried to create a relationship with Eastbay mud but I think it's really unfortunate I believe having done this now for a year and a half with them let

2:57:14alone 15 years with them this is a tactic and that it's in their political best interest to drag their feet as much as possible and it's cost us 15 times 300,000 um it's cost a lot of cities you know litigation and lawsuit uh lawsuits to compel the water districts other than

2:57:39Eastbay mud but including Eastbay mud when we talk about their their billing systems and their inability to collect this tax I mean I I I just feel that need to concur that it seems absurd in 2 uh nine that they can't program this um but having said that we have tried

2:57:58everything we can from meetings with legal staff uh and I think uh Mary's done a great job beating them down with research that's taken us a year to show their costs and how unreasonable they've been over time but we we put them on notice I believe in November 2007 that

2:58:18they needed to get going they never disputed they they were required to collect the tax I mean they said that then so I just felt like it was important to be on somebody to be on the record as staff saying it is very disappointing not the action you're taking I I certainly appreciate it and I

2:58:34appreciate um council member lyman's understanding of how it impacts this year's budget but I do think the experience has been really bad from a staff perspective and it's just unfortunate for the cities involved because our voters did act and you know I guess to their credit it's worked well

2:58:55I think there's nobody who no one would disagree with you here and if you have the opportunity to convey our frustration and dismay please do so so does that conclude the input from the Council on that item yeah I'll now turn it over to um board chair extend the meeting till

2:59:1611:30 but no later um let's move this to R development agency chair Jones to address item 7B and then we'll take up the issue of extending the meeting okay we have a staff and do we want we better extend now it was only till 11:15 um so I heard a motion is there a

2:59:39second to extend the meeting to 11:30 I'll second it mve and seconded on the motion all those in favor I opposed motion carries thank you okay um good evening chairman Jones and board members I'm Lori Travino the Redevelopment manager um we're here tonight to request that the board

3:00:00approve the necessary actions to complete acquisition of a property that's located at 11600 San Pablo Avenue including a promisory note to the seller that's secured by a deed of trust on the property the property in question is a one .2 acre parcel that's located on

3:00:15what is often referred to as the Mayfair block Mayfair block keep going um which is bounded by San Pablo KN Kerney and Hill streets and is adjacent to the delor BART station it's owned by Mr George Valente and has been for many years the agency owns the remainder of a

3:00:32block of the block including a small small parcel that was recently acquired from the mckillop family over the last 15 years there have been numerous attempts to develop the maart Block in including proposals from CFC for a joint development of the block and the BART owned property in both 1995

3:00:50and 2001 and the more recent proposal on the May on the Mayfair block only by the Olsen company when Olsen abandoned their project in 2007 Mr Valente put his property back on the market and uh the agency had listed the Del Norte area in general and the mayair Block in particular as a top priority

3:01:10for development both in 2003 and 2008 so the property has been on the market since 2007 but the um developers developers have been unable to coordinate purchase of the entire block this is in large part um this is a large part of the reason that the agency purchased the mckillop property um in

3:01:302008 the agency purchased that piece of property at the asking price which was equal to what Olson had had agreed to pay for that property with that purchase fent's property is the only uh privately owned property on the Block this property is essential to development of the Mayfair

3:01:48block and important to the potential development of both the BART owned property and possibly even Redevelopment of the target site from the earliest uh development proposals of the Mayfair and Bart properties the inability of the agency or a developer to control the Valente

3:02:04property has really hindered projects most recently um developers have used discussions with Mr Valente to try and leverage um discussions with the agency while proposing infeasible or undesirable projects and that's really been a process that has wasted a lot of

3:02:19time and energy for all part for all for all parties acquisition of the remainder of the Mayfair block would give the agency a much stronger hand in influencing direction of development in the area the terms of the deal are as follows the purchase price of the property is

3:02:363,333 750 which is slightly higher than the apprais value but lower than the price that the old company had agreed to pay for the property the agency would pay 20% of the price now and execute a promisory note to Mr Valente for the remaining remaining $2.66 7 million

3:02:55which would be secured by AED of Trust on the property the promisory note would be paid um with 15 annual payments of $288,200 the agency has placed no financing or inspection contingency on the purchase the interest rate on the note is 6.75% this interest rate is well below

3:03:23what is available to the agency through other financing means in this Current financial Market given that the acquisition is um not going to result in any physical changes to the property environmental analysis isn't required at this time so I'd be happy to take any questions that

3:03:40you have and Karen tan our agency council is also here here to answer any legal questions that you might have I have some if nobody else does no questions for me okay uh on page five of the sales and purchase and sales agreement talks about uh hazardous material that would be

3:04:07under Section 9B it says there's a phase one environmental report prepared MH however I don't know that it well it says except the owner disclose the existence of asbest on the property has that been cleaned the asbest is actually um is on the mckillop property it's a

3:04:31there's a small area of tile on in the mckillop property that um uh we know of all right and this was done several years ago I I take it though the the uh test is still valid there hasn't been any changes in the environmental law or testing uh standards the tests were completed by

3:04:53the Olsen company in 2007 and there's been no significant changes that we're aware of um that would require a an additional review so do you know if any of the legal standards have changed there haven't been any changes in the legal standards okay so phase one I'm

3:05:11taking that would cover toxic and we we did not find any toxic on the on the site or the 2007 report has not right and and generally a phase one report will indicate whether you need to go on and do a phase two and it did not so um there wouldn't be any additional

3:05:28information at this point that would change that okay um the agreement in several places uh also I'm on page six um section 9e um talks about about uh the current use isn't uh somebody's operating a parking lot yes um however there wasn't any the report that I saw didn't reflect

3:05:55that there wasn't a copy of this uh is this one that we have to uh go is there a contract that goes out an extended period of time can we close the uh contract with a certain day's notice what are the particulars we would be assuming lease um and um we well Karen

3:06:17would you like to address this um actually the the contract with the parking lot operator is um very cleverly drafted by Mr Valente and it terminates when he sells the property um however because this is a public agency acquisition you may have some obligation to that parking lot operator with

3:06:40regards to relocation um Lori is meeting with them this week we have talked about ways to negotiate an extension of their agreement potentially in return for relocation as effectively relocation benefits but they don't really have a lease so they're in a very nebulous

3:06:57situation it's it's an interesting contract in other words they can go any just about any time no I think it was drafted for Mr valente's benefit my suspicion is they wanted a lease and he wanted something that would give him the maximum flexibility okay do you know uh how much

3:07:16revenue that's generating right now I don't um they they pay I want to say something like 3,000 a month in rent okay there may be some advantage to us to maybe keep that going to offset the interest we've got to pay yeah I mean we we'll be looking at that and we may be coming back to you if

3:07:39we need to do something with that operator and when you're looking at it I I would assume that you're going to do this but I'd be interested in if there what risk does the agency have that's by conducting this business on our property that's the trade-off of letting them

3:07:56continue okay thank you the last I've got one more question here can I have a say something on that issue before you go move on okay okay um I I don't know if I was on the council at the time or the Planning Commission of the time but I think I remember that when they came in

3:08:18to apply to operate that site as a parking lot the concern was that it would uh it would be re would be developed in some other use and they didn't want that um parking lot use to have any ability to continue and I think that may they may have been even have been part of the agreement to allow them

3:08:42to use it as is a parking site oh so that may have been part of their use permit yeah okay we should look into that thank you um okay I it's been okay that's it thank you is there a public hearing or we have two speakers thank you we have two speakers go ahead please

3:09:19Peter loo today uh Redevelopment pass spent 40 million doll at Del not and a lot of it went to waste Target store the failed Mega theater failed Ule housing at the mayair side failed oen project and I don't think the other projects are big success so let's say 20

3:09:46$20 million wasted uh that's in line with actually if I got today's report about how much waste went on in the P past administration's attempts to reconstruct Iraq I think they mentioned 20 billion maybe it was 200 billion 20 billion so elero essentially wasted Del

3:10:07not there was 15 times what was wasted on reconstruction in Iraq I'm not talking about other waste in Iraq and uh I have heard of no other plans by devopment than to have a mixed use site it was L sort of kept it open but um all I know is that the thought was to have mixed use so to spend $4

3:10:31million on this side proves and if the plan is to have mixed use then it proves that staff doesn't have a clue about what goes where and why cuz anybody with an IQ who stands on that corner of cutting in San Pablo for a couple of minutes will realize that the buses

3:10:51already are blocked and any transportation planner will tell you that Del not B has to double its patronage to fill its function we have to have so many more buses going in by the area that is not a good site for mixed use now if the plan is to somehow eventually swap it with B for uh for a

3:11:09sight further east okay but that that is have to before you go into this what you should resolve is what do we do about access to and from they not bought by public transit and uh otherwise land banking like this is silly I'm sure that there's other other ways of spending the

3:11:30money that you if you want to hide it from the state thank you thank you next speaker please Dan fabulich hi my name my name is Dan fabulich I've been living in elero since 2006 and this is my first time speaking before the council I wanted to ask you to oppose the $2.7 million Redevelopment

3:11:51project um I fear that I face a council already hardened against arguments such as the ones you may have already heard and has a Pen in Hand ready to sign this proposal um but I want to ask that if the general fund is not in a place where it can maintain our streets without a

3:12:08special proposition if we've just completed a magnificent but very expensive city hall and if we're talking about closing relocating and rebuilding our schools I don't think we can afford a new Redevelopment project at this time I feel like we're cutting into Necessities to gamble on a Redevelopment

3:12:26project and I would ask the council to focus on the city's core Services focus on streets focus on the library focus on our schools thank you thank you I have a comment sure no more no more speakers that's it right any more uh before we go on is there any other uh

3:12:50person like to speak that hasn't okay thank you well I just wanted to point out that the Redevelopment agency functions as a separate agency from the city of Els Sero we're sitting here assembled as the chair and the board members of the Redevelopment agency with

3:13:06control over that budget and we're not operating with general fund budget we have secured a stable Vue source for the repair of our streets through the measure recently approved by 81% of our voters in addition I wanted to point out that the problems with the structural

3:13:22deficit of the school are entirely within the jurisdiction of the school board and I think it would be appropriate perhaps for you to attend their meeting this week when they make their decisions on school closures to um voice those important opinions that you've shared with us but tonight as a

3:13:36Redevelopment agency we're here to make a commitment of funds to purchase a property to further our 10year Redevelopment plan and to promote affordable housing which is our charge under state law and so if there are no other comments from the council I'm ready to make a motion as we've extended

3:13:54this meeting only till 11:30 so I'd like to move that we adopt a Redevelopment agency resolution making certain findings approving agency acquisition of real property located at 11600 s Pablo Avenue amending the fiscal year 20 2008 and 2009 budget for the Redevelopment agency of elero and

3:14:17appropriating $670,000 for the acis AC and authorizing execution of a purchase and sale agreement for the property and a promisory note to the seller for $2,667 th000 secured by the D Tres on the property and direct direct staff to continue to work um with the tenants on

3:14:44the parking structure um for any appropriate relocation costs is there a second second it's been moved in second in discussion yes I reluctantly will support this motion but I I want to uh point out that uh it's because we already own three4 of the four Parcels that make up the M verb lot

3:15:07and the only way to really move a project forward is to have full control and so um therefore you know we we need to unify the block and and get that moving forward any other comments um I would just like to voice support for this effort because the the site and all of

3:15:31the land surrounding the BART station area has been stagnant for many years and we've the the Redevelopment agency could have you know because were it not for these difficult um land ownership you know kind of trying to Cobble them all together has been a long effort and it's coming to

3:15:50fruition and that there's a huge potential for for tax increment funding which means essentially once the land is developed that any assessed value on those new developments is essentially Revenue coming back into our city and I think not only does it create Revenue

3:16:09but um there has been a specific plan process um along s paba Avenue that I would encourage all of you to attend it's includes both BART stations as well as the Civic Center node and it's really time for us to re-envision what our city can do for us um that corner of the I

3:16:28grew up in the north end of town and the only thing that I could do growing up was you know go to the parks which is great but I would go to Atlas Liquors wouldn't it be great if there was also some a Town Square or just you know just something other than you know it's it's

3:16:42kind of a war zone right now and I think we can really do a lot to civilize it and um and my work in transit oriented development and um I have lots of access to you know good information that I would love to you know share with the city and I just strongly believe this is

3:16:58the right direction to go and invite you guys to uh both the public and you know members here today to to get involved and you know think big for our city thanks do we want to extend I have some comments I guess you want to extend yes I would make a motion extend to uh

3:17:241140 second moved in second and all those in favor iose I reluctantly support that I'm going to vote no and good okay get comfortable I've got a few qu now um I I actually do but here here's the thing I understand the advantages um it completes the block uh it will give us the agency full

3:17:49control we don't have to use eminent domain or even contemplated or or needed or anything and if we are going to improve uh the northern part around the bar station um we would have to take take advantage of that uh of that piece of property uh there's nothing uglier right now than

3:18:11that taken lot in my opinion uh in that particular area however um I don't like the terms I'll be honest with you and and we had discussed this when we were negotiating and I still feel this way I I've really looked at it I thought maybe um I'd change my mind if I looked at

3:18:31it this person the the owner has been asking 3.5 million in good times and we've had developers people who know know the business say that that was way too high and they walked away from it um now we're in a time that we evaluate it uh according to Redevelopment law we uh

3:18:55valuate it at 3.1 but that was in the fall meaning that the estimate was based on Good Times now we're in a time where uh people have a hard time buying a car let alone a $3.1 million piece of property uh so I I I think it's high uh 3.5 was was high even though the Olen

3:19:18group offered to buy it at that um they had to back out because times are tough so in my opinion it's not worth 3.5 anymore um also I so if we buy it we're going to buy it at a premium at the asking at the negotiated price the interest I don't know why the interest stays at

3:19:446.75% um the prime rate is almost zero and I know that the agency uh right now has a little bit of problem of of borrowing we heard 8% in the in the uh in the report but that's because we're an agency if we're a private person borrowing for a house uh we'd be paying

3:20:05between 4 and 5% and we're a better risk than a homeowner so um somewhere along the line uh I I think that the interest rate is too high I'm not a a legal expert uh but it just seems on common sense that we're paying high so if we do approve this uh we have to realize that we're paying a premium

3:20:28for the property um and one of the things inherent in this is we try to find a developer and and turn it over as soon as possible so I I can see where we're saying relative to the terms we may be only holding this uh a short period of time and and we not really paying a high

3:20:47interest in the long run but but I think we are I think we should understand that we're paying a premium for this and that um it's imperative that we that we do get a developer online as soon as possible uh there have been there have been people in the past that are

3:21:05interested in it um maybe since uh we own if if we do approve this that there'll be more people but I uh I think we're paying way too much for this piece of property uh and so uh anyway that's my thoughts on it anybody anything else I think it's time hey there's a motion on the

3:21:30floor uh it's been moved in second on the motion all those in favor I I oppose nay motion carries 41 turn it back over to uh the mayor given um the late hour and that we go into close session I propose that we continue item 8 to our um annual meeting on February 14th if that's acceptable

3:21:58it's fine M okay so with that I'll adjourn the special concurrent city council and Redevelopment agency meeting to our annual I'm sorry our annual meeting yes go goal setting okay