Concurrent City Council, Redevelopment Agency and Municipal Services Corporation Meeting March 7, 2011

0:00:50when we'll call this meeting to order at 7 35 so if we can please have the pledge of the allegiance by councilmember Lyman oh we're not going to recall roll first what are you doing sorry roll call First yes councilmember Abelson here councilmember benicini here

0:01:16councilmember Lyman here mayor Pro Tim Jones here mayor Chang and also Municipal Services Corporation board members Hannan and Pincus okay now roll call thank you I pledge allegiance of the United States of America to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with

0:01:45liberty justice for all um any Council or Council Communications I have some um first of all um the Environmental Quality committee has been extremely busy working on programming which you are all invited to enjoy and this coming Saturday March the 12th at 10 A.M in the morning at the Rialto

0:02:17Cinema Cerrito you're invited to come and um to a free movie called Tango 73 a bus Rider's diary which is about um three women who are bus riders I happen to be one of them it turns out and the filmmaker who made this movie actually won a number of awards for doing so and she will be there

0:02:43so there'll be um it's about a half hour movie and then there will be some other shorts and then there will be just a discussion of Transit and in the period of time during which this movie was made which was in the 90s there was a lot where a lot of service Cuts being

0:03:00proposed on Transit and just as things are now so it's it's pretty parallel and I think you'll find it interesting and the price is right no charge but if you're interested you do need to reserve your spot which you can do at HTTP colon forward slash forward slash

0:03:25Tango t-a-n-g-o 73 Dot eventbri te.com and if you didn't catch all of that it's on our City website um then um the other thing I wanted to mention is um let's see I attended a um Elks Lodge 1251 uh dinner honoring police officers of the year and honoring our own Robert talk Jr

0:04:03who was selected as our police officer of the year and those are my announcements I just have one announcement here uh mayor Chang and I met a wonderful woman over the weekend at an event called March for peace which was to call for anti-violence campaigns during the month

0:04:25of March in reaction to in part in reaction to the loss of an El Cerrito High School Community member Jean Grisby Bell and we met a woman who's working to help families in Richmond and she uh asked that I helped participate in this what she's doing is a diaper giveaway

0:04:42it's sort of a way to get families in the door into her non-profit to connect them with other types of services and I wanted to just enter her flyer into our meeting notes it's on March 26th so she's accepting package diaper donations or you can also make a tax deductible

0:04:58donation at her organization's website it's called mended families Inc and if you just Google that you'll find it right there thank you are you announcement and I'll just add that um the three of us actually including council member Jones um and uh benicini and myself were at

0:05:19this rally and in support of this high school student um of our community and it was a really moving event to you know experience the the neighborhoods that many of our kids who attend elsewhere to high school um what they face and hear those stories um at the lunch table with the parents

0:05:41of of very you know just lots of challenges in in those community in that Community which is part of our community and I just ask all El Cerrito families to look within themselves to become allies with these really troubled youth there's also um uh councilmember benassini brought up a

0:05:59while ago the the writer coach connection is another great resource they're actively looking for volunteers in our community to to you know be a mentor to these youth to provide them with really critical skills for their future so um another announcement I wanted to

0:06:16invite everyone to the the human relations committee is co-sponsoring an event um also a film on March 19th Saturday at 10 A.M as well um it's the Iron Jawed Angels um movie it's a all about the women's suffragist movement and also free and there'll be a reception next door um at

0:06:38the shutter Cafe so yes the following Saturday so lots of great Community Theater events that are free of charge and should stimulate some great discussion so so with that um any staff Communications and then at this time and on to item three any oral Communications from the

0:07:00public no General comments uh no comments so with that I do um want to pull one item from um or consent calendar to move into our presentation portion of our meeting tonight and that is to um it's a sorry it's it would be item 5G um a proclamation honoring and recognizing Kimmy Honda on her selection

0:07:36as Contra Costa College woman of the year and so with that I'm going to read the proclamation and request that this the council move to adopt the the proclamation and then we'll we'll do a presentation down on the floor okay I'd also like to pull image after you're

0:07:54finished Okay so okay so with that um let me flip to the and so with that um so the city of El Cerrito Proclamation is congratulating Kimmy Honda 2011 woman of the year for Contra Costa College women's History Month whereas Kimi Honda is a 35-year resident of El Cerrito mother of three and

0:08:29graduate of Stanford University with a graduate degree in educational psychology a teaching credential administrative credential and real estate license and whereas Miss Honda retired as a school nurse from the Oakland School District after 25 years she continues

0:08:46her profession in coordinating an annual health fair for particip participants of Sakura Kai a japanese-speaking senior a japanese-speaking senior center and by serving on El Cerritos committing on aging and whereas Miss Honda has dedicated her time and service in

0:09:04numerous capacities such as by serving as a Bart Community advisor be involved with cosis communities organized to support Adult School serving as a coordinator of sakurakai coordinating many reunions as a Stanford University alumni member being a life member of Contra Costa jacl

0:09:26and serving on the board of J say SEI formerly j-a-s-e-b which is the Japanese Services of the East Bay and whereas Miss Honda also as a coordinating instructor with West County West Contra Costa adult education offering participants of sukkura Kai a twice a month day long older adult education

0:09:50program of Fellowship cultural and educational opportunities activities and services members of sakurikai have raised over 78 000 for Sakura Kai room to be used when the city is able to build a new Senior Center quen quite a great feat um whereas Miss Honda was co-recipient

0:10:11of the Excellence in teaching award from the California Council of adult education in 2007.

0:10:17and whereas Miss Honda is recognized as a dedicated volunteer and energetic senior Advocate a positive role model for many including myself and who is always led by example and is instinctively engaged and aware of her everyday activities now therefore the city of El Cerrito

0:10:37that the city council of the city of El Cerrito does hereby recognize the significant contributions of Kimi Honda to the El Cerrito community and congratulates her upon her selection as El Cerrito's 2011 women of the Year particularly her recognition at the March 24th women's History Month

0:10:56celebration at Contra Costa College [Applause] do I hear res emotion to adopt this Proclamation I move that we adopt item g proclamate a proclamation honoring and recognizing Kimmy Honda on her selection is Contra Costa College Woman of the Year second all those in favor please

0:11:24say aye um motion carries unanimously and I'll come down and present the word [Laughter] [Applause] thank you I'm not used to all this uh mayor Ann Chang and distinguished members of the city council I want to thank you very much I'm speechless so this is really an

0:12:40honor thank you again foreign [Applause] I'd like to address item H which is a proclamation honoring Willa suddath on her selection is the California Assembly District 14 woman of the year and we're really blessed and honored in El Cerrito on our committee on Aging in that this

0:13:08year we have not one but two Award winners for Woman of the Year both Kimmy and Willa serve on that committee and um so I very I you know I'm very proud to be the liaison to that committee Willow was unable to be here tonight but she has a outstanding history both locally and

0:13:33Nationals nationally where she helped work on behalf of women in the union movement um at a national level and um and she's also worked locally as a prior chair of our committee on aging and a number of other capacities and is still doing so so anyway I just wanted to mention that

0:13:54and with that I move um that we pass item number H which is the proclamation honoring Willa and I congratulate Kimmy Honda also thank you so I'll second that all those in favor please say aye aye aye motion is unanimous and so for the rest of our consent calendar do I hear motion too we all

0:14:19move that we adopt the consent calendar consisting of items 5A 5B 5c 5D 5 e and five f second all those in favor please say aye aye aye aye consent calendar items carry unanimously so we now go to um item number seven city council item policy matters on the San Pablo Avenue

0:14:50specific plan specific area Plan update thank you mayor members of the council I'll actually start and give it just a brief introduction uh before turning it over to Mitch as as I'm sure you all would have hoped and certainly than the staff side also um that you would actually be adopting

0:15:12the plan rather than giving additional Direction tonight um but when we were doing sort of our final quality check and reviewing the comments received over time from members of the council the public and actually a lot of the senior staff doing a final review there were a number of things that came

0:15:33up that were of enough concern that I thought we needed to take take a little break and really reevaluate some of some of the issues in the plan before bringing it for adoption as you're all aware we've spent a lot of time and money and staff resources on it and over the four years or so we've been

0:15:55working on it a lot has changed um particularly the economy uh the makeup of the council and many other things over four years so we really wanted to make sure that on the day the plan was adopted it was implementable it was usable it was understandable and it really met the

0:16:17policy objectives of the city and the city council uh so to that end we thought it was appropriate um sort of to Circle back and do a check-in before we spent the time um taking the final draft of the plan where we thought it needed to go um but before I turned it over to Mitch

0:16:34I just wanted to acknowledge that a number of the staff have spent a lot of time and hours on this not just over the last four years but in the last four or five months particularly Jennifer Carmen our planning manager and her staff as well as the economic development staff

0:16:52Lori Trevino and Dwayne delman and uh Midge and of course Karen our assistant city manager we have all sort of been banging our heads on the wall about trying to find the best way to get this right so with that I'll turn it over to Mitch for the presentation but all of

0:17:07these folks are here including myself if you have any questions or detailed questions we're all happy to take them so Mitch thank you Scott Madame mayor members of council I'm Mitch oshinski I'm the city's economic development director and I'm here to talk to you

0:17:22tonight about the San Pablo Avenue specific plan update and direction thank you so for the study session agenda tonight we're really taking the balcony level approach with a broad discussion and in the future we'll return with more specific information based on your

0:17:39direction tonight so with that we'll start with a review of the San Pablo Avenue specific plan background we'll talk about the current status of the draft specific plan we'll talk about specific plan options for completion and then we'll seek direction from city

0:17:56council and discussion of possible next steps regarding the specific plan background a city's General plan provides an overarching land use vision and policies for the physical development of the entire city whereas a specific plan provides more detailed development and design policies

0:18:17regulations and implementation measures for a defined area of the city such as San Pablo Avenue now the San Pablo Avenue specific plan attempts to create a clear framework for future development that will unify both sides of San Pablo Avenue through seamless shared standards between the

0:18:37two cities of El Cerrito and Richmond and the goal is to see both sides of the Avenue improve with consistent Transit oriented development standards land uses and design standards were appropriate now the plan has really been a collaborative effort the cities of El

0:18:54Cerrito and Richmond have worked together on the plan along with involvement from citizens Bart the West Contra Costa Transportation advisory committee or whiptack and AC Transit funding for this specific plan has also been a collaborative effort with funds provided by the city of El Cerrito City

0:19:12of Richmond and whiptack Mig was contracted to provide consulting services in the development and preparation of the specific plan and related activities including public Outreach technical studies and environmental reports in 2007.

0:19:29there's really been a lot of public input on the specific plan the San Pablo Avenue advisory committee or SPAC was comprised of 23 members appointed by the city councils of both cities and that included officials residents and business owners from both cities as well

0:19:45as representatives from Bart AC Transit and WIC Tac and the SPAC held eight meetings between 2007 and 2009.

0:19:54in addition there were three public workshops and those were attended by over 150 people the first Workshop in August of 2007 had attendees participating in a visual preference survey and rating photographs of buildings and streetscapes the second Workshop in July of 2008 gave

0:20:13attendees the opportunity to have input on land use and design as well as character and development standards and then the last Workshop in August of 2009 gathered Community feedback on the July 2009 draft of the specific plan which the attendees were able to view

0:20:30there were also study sessions conducted with the design review boards and planning commissions of both cities in addition to all of that we had two city council study sessions so far not counting tonight the first one a study session was on housing height and density and that was

0:20:49held in April 2008. and at that time Council was able to view various residential densities Heights and designs from projects throughout the Bay Area the city council in viewing these examples was generally comfortable with higher density development if it was well designed situated in appropriate

0:21:08locations and included features that mitigated the bulk and massing of buildings features such as step backs facade articulation landscaping and interesting building materials were identified as means to achieve high quality design in new higher density projects

0:21:25the second study session was on the update of the draft specific plan and that was held in November 2009.

0:21:33and that update looked at the July 2009 draft of the specific plan that was presented to council including the consolidation of Concepts visions and principles design guidelines parking and signage comments from the SPAC and the public were included and provided for

0:21:50the city council review as far as the specific plan Direction based on all of the study sessions the public input meetings with Council other boards and commissions staff and Consultants have developed land use transportation and design recommendations to include in a specific

0:22:08plan the focus is on Tod Transit oriented development higher densities and Heights established as Baseline standards Allowed by right at BART stations there are decreased parking requirements and new parking strategies in the specific plan and the direction is to evolve from an

0:22:28Antiquated long auto-oriented commercial strip between the BART stations and to go to Transit oriented nodes linked by a mixed use Corridor with increased residential development commercial activity and Transit connections as far as the status of the draft plan

0:22:48there's an administrative draft environmental mitigated negative declaration or mnd that has been reviewed by staff that m d was prepared in October 2009. then the project application for Safeway came in so at Del Norte so that necessitated that the draft specific plan traffic study and

0:23:09the m d be revised to include the new Safeway traffic generation standards the consultant has also submitted a revised administrative draft of the specific plan for staff review in September 2010.

0:23:24and that includes the analysis in response to over 400 comments that came in now the city of Richmond is still in the development of their General Plan update which was begun before the specific plan and so approval of the general plan and specific plan enrichment are not likely

0:23:41until late summer or fall at the earliest with specific plan coming after Richmond adopts their General plan and the timing could be plus or minus what we've stated the project budget is six hundred thousand dollars and again we have a collaborative array of sources with

0:23:59almost 300 000 coming from the El Cerrito Redevelopment agency 125 000 from the city of Richmond and a hundred and eighty thousand dollars from with tech and the balance of funds is that we have about seventeen thousand dollars for Meg which is for tasks that they have not yet completed and we have

0:24:17a project contingency of about eighteen thousand dollars so as Scott mentioned as we reviewed this latest administrative draft of the plan the staff saw some issues that we identified that impacted the plan over time and the length of time that's passed since the project was scoped in 2006 has

0:24:40resulted in dated assumptions because of the dramatic economic changes that have occurred including the collapse of the housing market and the lap lack of development capital or financing also the majority of the city council has changed since the specific plan

0:24:55process started and parking and Transit policies have progressed other impacts on the specific plan is that the draft specific plan in its current state may not provide sufficient density height and parking detail regarding land use standards to immediately influence development in the

0:25:16current economic environment particularly at the BART stations the draft specific plan may not fully reflect the current state of the art practices state law or Metropolitan Transportation Commission MTC standards of development in the cities of Richmond's General Plan

0:25:32update again is not complete also the city council approved phase one of a TOD strategy for Del Norte in February 2010.

0:25:41so as time has passed an El Cerrito General Plan update is also more timely since we are now about four more years down the road in the life of our general plan [Applause] now staff has had some ideas for dealing with the impacts we've identified with the draft specific plan as far as

0:26:00parking the specific plan could more clearly identify and Define overall parking strategy and policies in a parking section of the plan which would include but not be limited to short-term and long-term mechanisms such as a park one strategy unbundling parking requirements from

0:26:21development projects shared parking across parcels flexible demand based pricing for parking in Luffy's versus reduced parking requirements and implementation of parking benefit districts as far as economics the feasibility analysis should be updated to reflect

0:26:39the dramatic economic changes by using current assumptions including rental and Retail components and further analyzing specific sites and parking which is directly related to project economics and Transit use other ideas are that we would distinguish between the character of the

0:26:59two BART station development nodes by adding sub areas within the specific plan areas at the plaza and Del Norte stations to provide a more specific level of appropriate parking density and height regulations some adjustment of spa boundaries could also more closely match the block and

0:27:18development patterns as they exist we would also look at adjusting development priorities for Parcels that are adjacent to the BART sub areas to allow for market-driven flexibility to allow more housing or more commercial or more mixed use so that we facilitate

0:27:35rather than hinder development and we would also update components of the draft specific plan that are out of date and to reflect current city council priorities now the specific plan as it relates to the general plan the specific plan is a tool for systematic implementation of

0:27:53the general plan and general plan and specific plan must be consistent with each other General plans should be reviewed every 10 years to ensure that they're not out of date and when a specific plan is adopted amendments to the general plan may be necessary to achieve Conformity between

0:28:10the two amendments to a general plan could lead to inconsistencies in the plan or defects and So to avoid this the state recommends a general Plan update if you're to address these issues if they arise due to too many amendments to the general plan also related to the general plan and the

0:28:33specific plan staff is currently beginning to prepare for a general Plan update for El Cerrito our general plan was adopted in 1999. the scope of work for that must be identified and funding as well must be identified so adoption of the draft specific plan will necessitate a general plan

0:28:50Amendment and we've always known that but the changes to the general plan will depend on the final scope of the specific plan in other words how far we go in terms of the amount of density and height changes the planning areas identified changes to Maps so if we

0:29:06change the specific plan too much it might cause a major general Plan update at this time and then that could slow us down by about another two to three years to do the general plan as well as ADD considerable expense so if possible we'd like to try and avoid that

0:29:24so again the general plan specific plan must conform and the goal is to minimize duplicating efforts for a future General Plan update so we've identified three options for Council to consider the first option is a specific plan cleanup and this would involve revising the draft specific plan

0:29:44to deal with the open issues and the comments that have been received as well as what we've talked about tonight we would expand the parking study we would expand and update the economic analysis and we would add sub areas for location appropriate density parking height and

0:30:01land use in El Cerrito to reflect the priorities of the city council and consistency with current Urban Transit land use standards now we've identified pros and cons for all three of the options so with option one the pros are that we would have consistent land use and design standards

0:30:20with Richmond which was really one of the basic original goals we'd be ready within about six months depending on the consultant's availability this update to the specific plan would update land use design guidelines density and height with greater focus on the sub areas around the BART stations

0:30:40it would require less parking in the sub areas as well as the overall specific plan area it would reflect the substantial public comment that we've had the council input the Planning Commission drb and SPAC input to date we'd have more up-to-date parking policies and economic analysis

0:30:59than we already have we would minimize the need for a general plan for a for a broad or a big General Plan update at this time we would improve flexibility for developers and we'd have little to no additional analysis needed for environmental review as far as the Cons with option one we

0:31:17may not go as far with land use density height and neighborhood character as the current Council desires outside of the BART nodes primarily so we may need to revise or update the specific plan in a few years when we do the general Plan update the cost impacts of option one are

0:31:37approximately fifty thousand dollars plus or minus and funds are available from Redevelopment agency program budget funds the second option is to separate out and adopt the design guidelines portion of the specific plan so by separating out the design guidelines we'd have it's

0:31:57it's there'd be its own document that could be adopted by both cities we would not change density height or land use at this time in order to be addressed instead in the future General Plan update and we could consider parking strategy and the economic analysis updates

0:32:13separately or as part of the general Plan update down the road now the pros and cons and costs for option two the pros are we would end up with consistent design standards for both cities Richmond and El Cerrito we would enable design guidelines to steer the design and Aesthetics of future

0:32:33development immediately and this would allow for concurrent development of the general plan and the specific plan in El Cerrito as far as the cons we'd have a substantial delay for higher density height and revised parking requirements about two to three years or more for the

0:32:52general Plan update to be prepared new development in the meantime would then miss out on the policies that are in the specific plan regarding land use parking density height standards and development would be processed on a case-by-case incremental basis which

0:33:09could require multiple General plan or zoning ordinance amendments and those are time consuming expensive and of concern to Developers and the cost impact for that we're estimating for a general Plan update approximately 500 to 700 000 and that's currently unfunded

0:33:28and the third option we've identified is to stop the specific plan process we would not adopt any of the specific plan Provisions we would roll all of the issues into the future General Plan update and so the pros and cons for option three the pros are that no additional

0:33:45time or cost would be expended on the specific plan the general plan would use all of the information contained in the draft specific plan as a Baseline new standards would be developed with the most up-to-date information data and public input and the cons are that we would have no

0:34:03consistent standards with Richmond we would have no shared design guidelines to guide development no updated land use parking design density or height for two to three years while we wait for the general plan and again new development in the meantime would miss out on the

0:34:19policies for density height and parking that are in the specific plan now and again development would be processed on a case-by-case incremental basis with General plan and zoning ordinance amendments time consuming expensive and provide uncertainty for developers and

0:34:35again the impact for cost of that is approximately 500 to 700 thousand dollars for a general Plan update that's not funded so at this point staff is looking for a specific plan discussion and direction from the city council we're looking for the council to discuss the options talk

0:34:54about your priorities content timing costs questions comments Alternatives that you would have the staff preference is option one as we believe it takes a very good first step at moving forward in terms of higher density less parking and more Transit oriented development with improved

0:35:18design and aesthetic standards and unified policies with the city of Richmond so we would ask Council to discuss this provide Direction with staff and then potential next steps again tonight is the balcony level view with more discussion and we would return with more specifics in the future as we

0:35:37move forward and so with that I would turn discussion back over to the city council and staff is here tonight to answer your questions thank you all right should we start with clarifying questions please and then we'll and then when we're clear with that we'll come back

0:35:52and do comments on options so who would like to go first I'm happy to start just a couple questions thanks for your presentation Mitch there are a couple bullets you went over that I wanted to give you a chance to expand on a little bit because I think they're they're really important one of them on

0:36:07our page 10 you noted is draft specific plan in its current state may not provide sufficient detail regarding land use standards to immediately influence development in the current economic environment particularly at the BART stations could you kind of just talk

0:36:23talk about that a little bit more may I add to your question yes um because that was certainly one of the ones I picked up on in your clarifying remarks can you please let us know if the option one would begin to address this issue yeah so the idea is that by updating and

0:36:46expanding the economic analysis that we would be looking at the current economy what kinds of densities are appropriate specifically around the BART station areas and looking at the standards that are in the plan now which deal with different heights and different

0:37:04densities and different locations and trying to also address flexibility of land use so that we would at one time maximize the densities and the parking would be decreased because that affects the economics so we're looking for the study to look at what was already

0:37:24analyzed but now that we know the economic conditions have changed this would provide us a new basis of information to go into the specific plan areas at the BART stations and come up with more specific nodes perhaps on a block by block sub-area basis that would

0:37:42get into more detail about the appropriate densities the appropriate land uses Heights and parking so is the idea then I know that we want to be really limited with the amount of additional scoping we give the consultants and we want to maintain the eir documentation as much as it is at

0:38:00this point so would the idea be that perhaps we would move some density from some portions of the plan and move them to BART station nodes to allow for the types of development that are more marketable during these economic conditions and still preserve all of the

0:38:16eir impacts that have already been calculated that's a possibility possibility okay consultants get into that that's something that they may find absolutely okay there's an sorry you're okay no there okay alrighty uh the the next one that I kind of picked up on uh that during your remarks

0:38:37was making sure that the draft specific plan didn't get to the point where we needed so many General plan amendments that um we're getting ourselves into more work than maybe we anticipated do you have any examples of sort of what would be what would be too much that would

0:38:52trigger the point where we're changing it so much that we need to you know potentially roll it into a bigger planning process well I think if we decided that we don't like the specific plan as it is today at all and we basically want to start over on a specific plan and

0:39:11um so look at you know much broader density and general plan issues so that might then go beyond what our existing General plan contemplates okay so the direction that under option one that we would give to Consultants would be to make sure that we're not going to that

0:39:28point of triggering the need for just going into a new general plan that would be one of the goals and certainly we'd be checking in with the consultants and making sure that if we do get to the point where we're going to trigger something we would then come back to

0:39:42council provide information determine if that makes more sense based on the specifics at the time but we would be trying to avoid that and stay within the boundaries of the general plan and the environmental review there might be some revision needed to the environmental but

0:39:57at this point we're not envisioning major changes to that okay and another part of your presentation had to do with the general plan process and there was a note that it may take two to three years the specific plan is taking longer than that it is two to three years so a

0:40:14figure that were that could be expanded significantly just depending on how the process goes you know again the the Richmond General plan started before the specific plan um I our goal will be two to three years and we will work uh diligently and as hard as possible to fulfill that when

0:40:31you get into these kind of projects as you know sometimes things happen uh public input may be more considerable than you would have anticipated there could be shifts and directions there can be economic changes all kinds of things that can sort of divert you in a way

0:40:47that you could not anticipate so okay the last the last thought I had was um just to make sure that we understand correctly that if we were to go forward with substantial with some changes to the specific plan when we begin the general plan process well is the idea

0:41:05that to the extent we're willing to fund those types of studies we could get back into the specific plan area and event and the new general plan would address areas of the specific plan that maybe we weren't that as completely satisfied with yes absolutely that is that is

0:41:20quite true okay thank you those are all my questions um did you get your it I don't care I had okay um on on shot slides nine and ten the title was impacts on the draft specific plan and that's associated with I assume comments that were collected um so this is a related question to the

0:41:43councilmember been seen these questions is the scope the fifty thousand dollar scope that's that's proposed for option one does it address all these bullets or most of these bullets what what's the yeah the scope of work the cost fact figure is related to updating the economic analysis which

0:42:03is one of the basic building blocks and updating the parking analysis so those are the two uh building blocks of outside consultant work that we will need to pay cost for of course there will be staff time involved and working through this with the consultants and

0:42:18putting this together as we've been doing all along um and if there you know is additional environmental review uh possibly we could do that in-house if it's more significant then we might need some additional funding for that but we'll we'll get there as we proceed and if we

0:42:33have to we would come back for further directions so the fifty thousand dollars is identif that you've identified in option one is associated with addressing a specific scope of work by Mig to update the specific plan to address the impacts listed on slides nine and ten is

0:42:50that it's Mig as well as the subconsultants for the economic analysis and then a parking subconsultant as well and the 500 to 700 000 number that's out there that's the cost of a general Plan update yes that's correct um does the does in option two and option three we complete different

0:43:13levels of work to a published form um do does doing you know doing this design document reduce the cost of the general plan Plan update the design guidelines typically you're not a part of a general plan they would be a separate document it's an optional document for a city to do it really

0:43:34helps developers it gives them the understanding and knowledge of what's expected of them before they go through the process so um you know we we should it does belong in a specific plan and if for some reason the council would decide not to do a specific plan it would be a good

0:43:52thing to have the design guidelines anyway but I guess what I'm saying is that you know options two and three your cost projection of options two and three are effectively the same because regardless of what we do the general Plan update is roughly the same cost that's right isn't

0:44:11that true for option one as well the that whenever we do the general Plan update it'll cost between five hundred and seven hundred thousand it very likely could but as if we adopt the specific plan then that might also provide Base information that the Consultants can work off of so they

0:44:28don't have to sort of go back to square one so so option one the implementation the general Plan update may actually cost us less than 500 to 700 000 depending obviously when we start it and all of those things so is possible yes I think we would say it's on the lower end

0:44:45right and if I may council member one of the things that staff has struggled with with these impacts to the Gen to the specific plan is that we're we don't want to fast reach that Tipping Point where it's not cost effective to go forward with the Plano Plan update so

0:45:00yes we anticipate anticipate a general Plan update anyway it's just a matter of where the specific plan fits into that and how we can be most cost effective so that we don't reach said Tipping Point so agreed um the fifty thousand dollars that we might need to depending on our decision

0:45:18tonight that we might need to move forward with option one to amend mig's contract for them and their subconsultants to perform the analysis that you've so well articulated um we would take that all from El Cerrito even though the current funding agreement the property split with

0:45:37Richmond is 80 20 and the current funding split if you take with attack out is is 70 30 we would be the ones that would be obligated to carry the entire load of this uh of this revision this final revision you know at this point we feel that's appropriate because we're the

0:45:54ones coming forward and talking about making changes and the changes we're talking about making are primarily in the El Cerrito portion of the plan great thank you okay um one of the topics that I didn't hear discussed that that I think has primarily been um uh in the picture during this period of

0:46:16time that this has been going on is climate protection and in particular What's called the sustainable communities strategy or the SCS that's being worked on a lot right now um and uh it's a planning process going on at the regional level and I um not sure I know how to describe

0:46:40specifically the details of the interaction between that and this but I would think that there is one can you address that issue well I know that the general Plan update will be dealing with climate protection and sustainability issues as it goes forward so what we

0:46:56will do is look into that with the specific plan as well and see if there are things in that that we should be including in the specific plan and not wait for the general plan to come forward on that so we'll take a look at that but you would in fact now look at

0:47:09these issues yes and determine whether it's appropriate to deal with it now okay because those I mean the SES is rolling along um from what from where I sit I did want to say that introduced you can hear me name oh I'm sorry excuse me Lori Trevino Redevelopment manager

0:47:33as you may recall we received a um technical assistance program um Grant from MTC uh several weeks ago and part of that work that we're doing there is for parking and economic feasibility of development in the Del Norte area and that um that effort actually ties the specific plan directly

0:47:57to our prior priority Development Area designation by a bag which is a criteria for being um part of that sustainable Community strategy that MTC a bag are working on together so a lot of the um the planning that they're doing will relate directly to this as we go forward with the

0:48:18parking and economic study that help yes thank you um and the I guess the other question I had is we're talking about in option one um I believe having um what I would call limited higher densities which would be in specific areas correct we're looking primarily at

0:48:42the BART station right so what are we thinking of well the plan now goes up to 70 units per acre at the at those areas so we're going to look to the economic analysis that's going to be done to tell us what makes sense in terms of penciling out um and making projects that can actually

0:49:04be built and financed so I think that will help guide us okay and so it might what I remember from the other documents is that it was specific parcels were designated so that might get expanded a little bit or moved a little bit is that what yeah I was thinking

0:49:22what we did in the Del Norte area for instance was that there had been a project proposed up there on the Mayfair block a number of years ago and there was an economic analysis done for that that's obviously out of date now so we would pick a an appropriate location in

0:49:38the Del Norte area and do a new economic analysis of that okay how how fast do you think this whole thing would get done um we're looking at about six months for option one okay because the other question that comes to mind has to do with Redevelopment and the process

0:49:55that's going on right now with the state um attempting to end Redevelopment and selling off properties and I'm just wondering if there's some place that um this process it would seem to me that it would make us want to complete this process more quickly um and and I suppose that's more of a

0:50:18justification for option one even um or one of the justifications yes um so that we don't then have some later difficulty because we've decided we want to do an option uh but meanwhile somebody's already somehow magically bought the land and applied put in an application for a project which means

0:50:38they don't have to follow it um am I thinking correctly there well we would want to get option one or any of the options done as soon as possible option one really provides the best timing uh factor to try and get things done before the Redevelopment changes again as you know we don't

0:50:57really know what's going to happen with the Redevelopment we feel we must move forward with a specific plan one way or the other regardless of Redevelopment Redevelopment certainly is a factor but there are a lot more properties in the specific plan area that are not owned by

0:51:13the Redevelopment agency so we want the tools in place regardless of what happens thank you yes thanks uh Mitch going back to option one um what is set on apps what part of what is set in a specific plan under option one what is set what is something that you what are some of the things that you

0:51:39don't need to study or review at this time well most of the um uh design guidelines are pretty well established we do have lower parking standards we also have a number of strategies for parking in the plan but we want to go into more detail and analyze those and look at more

0:51:59state-of-the-art parking so we do have a base to start with we've already looked at going up to 70 units per acre at the BART station areas and maybe we'll be going beyond that so we've gotten to the point of 70 being okay and now that's a basis to then look Beyond so those are

0:52:17things things like that are pretty well said I would also add the largely the area in between the BART station nodes is set I mean I don't think we will be looking at unless it's direction of the council um sort of Reinventing the areas because I think practically where the transit

0:52:37oriented development or the higher density development is likely to occur in the short to mid term is is essentially around the BART property BART stations okay so on a percentage basis just and I know you don't have the calculator out but roughly how much of the specific plan is set and

0:52:55how much are you looking at that you need six months more to kind of solidify you know Scott just or the city manager just indicated that you know there's actually a lot of area that is pretty well set right so I would just off the top of my head say we're probably 70 75

0:53:15percent of the way there okay so we're we're almost there we're 75 70. we'll go we'll go conservatives 70 percent there 70 so we're talking about the last 30 percent to kind of tie up loose ends and go forward correct that's all I have thank you thank you again for the the recap of

0:53:41where we've been it's definitely been a very lots lots learned over the the years then lots of changes um so to follow up um with the the just where are we at with the general plan cap I guess I'm curious if we do find that where we can support over 70 units an acre

0:54:00um what is our current General plan kept us out at or I guess what would require you're saying we want to avoid introducing you know too much new density that would require us to do a general Plan update and and want to hear what that was hi I'm Jennifer Carman

0:54:17development services manager our current General plan limits us to 45 units per acre with incentives um up to 70 if it's a senior or other project with special needs housing um so we'd be looking at doing right now the plan has 70 by right and the transit oriented notes and then we'd be looking

0:54:37at possibly changing that and going higher in particular areas and and so that so our general plan you say support 70 buy right um no under the incentives program as well under the incentives okay or the affordable housing program either way so the general plan amendment that would be

0:55:00required under the current or under option one would just be a change to that table okay whereas other if we went farther you'd have to change more of the general plan okay just that okay thank you very helpful and um with the the you know the great award we got or the I guess the technical

0:55:17assistance mtc's um extra I think it was 60 000 or so as I'm seeing Laurie say yes and and I was just curious if that um part of being awarded that assistance was reliant on the kind of a local match at all or if it was completely and I'm wondering if this what we've

0:55:41identified as like a additional 50 yeah there was no local match required but there was um I think it was definitely a positive that in our application that we said that we wanted to use this both for the specifics of Tod at Del Norte as well as to kind of help validate some of the assumptions

0:56:00and Analysis that we had done in the specific plan okay great thank you and um and I just said just curious um you mentioned on page eight there was 400 comments um received was that throughout the whole process of developing the plan or is it just on the the draft specific

0:56:20plan that was through the process the entire process of the draft specifically so every sticky note and everything that was or I'm just or or they by individuals or comment cards or all of those yes okay and then um and then you mentioned on page nine as well um the the

0:56:42the last bullet um parking and Transit policies have progressed and I was just curious what um if you had any in particular you were thinking about and including that well we've seen more uh Progressive uh parking policies coming forward from a firms such as Nelson Nygaard and they

0:57:00had done that study session with you about a year ago so even though the plan has a number of strategies ones that I mentioned in the presentation I think there's new things coming out there's more information on those too because more cities have been doing them so

0:57:13we're finding out what works what doesn't what may need to be changed to fit into an area like El Cerrito okay thank you and um and then I guess the same for mtc's standards of development I know we talked touched on the economic piece but on page 10 sorry second bullet on page 10.

0:57:35um in which standards were you were you thinking about there so the MTC standards have a number of different land use designations for development in different parts of a city and they have different density ranges and different heights and different land uses so we've

0:57:53already been looking at those and trying to determine which ones best fit our city and the situation and right now we're looking at things like the urban centers as well as I believe the transit neighborhoods seem to be the two closest line so you're talking like the place

0:58:08type designations and then the the smart growth parking toolbox yes resources specifically okay I'm familiar with those great okay um so that was I think those were my main questions for now so can I ask one more follow-up um if we were to go forward with something like option number one can we

0:58:37talk a little bit more about the process so the last draft that we saw was July 2009 we've the staff has since received in August 2010 draft um when would we when would there be a new draft that would be released to the public given the idea that two subconsultants would have to work on

0:58:55their various plans yeah we would look at uh nailing down the contracts with the subconsultants to go forward and anticipating uh their work would take at least a couple of months to do and then feed into the plan document which we've already reviewed and and so adding in the updated

0:59:16economic analysis as well as the updated parking analysis then we would most likely look at possibly other public participation opportunities and then coming back to the council with an update of where we are with the findings from the studies and seeing if that is

0:59:33pointing us in a specific Direction so is the idea that there would be opportunities for input on sort of preliminary findings but the next document that's released is going to be the final specific plan the final draft the final draft with additional opportunities for public input or no yes

0:59:53yes additional opportunities yeah I would just add to that I think there's going to be interim or iterative steps before that I think we need to we will sort of sit down and map out the process but I think you we're going to look to the council to sort of set the framework

1:00:11first that whether it's if it's the land use around the BART stations we would come to you before we give the um consultant Direction and say this is where we are where do you want to go on the parking you need to come back and presumably hear there may be other public meetings

1:00:33but before I think we could give the count uh any the Consultants really specific Direction I think we're going to be back to council and multiple times to get direction on parameters and really sort of roll up your sleeves and get into the sort of the nitty-gritty a

1:00:49little bit more then give the council Direction and then ultimately fold it back in as Mitch said to hopefully the final final okay thank you any other questions from Council can move into comments how about oh a public comment that's right is there are there any public comment cards on this

1:01:11item Tom panna's good evening mayor Chan members of the Council on City staff my name is Tom panis and I live at [address removed] in El Cerrito I think staff's recommendation uh for option one is a good recommendation uh staff's recommendation the plan needs some cleanup and I have some ideas about

1:01:46things that need to be cleaned up the purpose of this documents to help guide development on the Sam Pablo Avenue Corridor San Pablo Avenue is amongst the if not the oldest historic Legacy of non-native American origin that we have in East Bay city has already found ways to honor

1:02:03this Legacy for example by installing the historic U.S 40 signage along the Avenue plus we're about to install interpretive pavers along the entire length of the Avenue the draft plan notes that for nearly uh that San Pablo administered as Transportation Corridor

1:02:18and focus development from Oakland to Martinez for nearly 200 years accordingly another goal of the plan should be that the final outcome reflects the historic nature of San Pablo Avenue itself um I believe the traffic analysis and the plan is an area that really needs

1:02:32some attention um it appears to be completely ignore the fact the proposed parking garage west of San Pablo Avenue in the Del Norte area doesn't take that into account at all notice analysis appear to include the impact of moving traffic from Peerless onto San Pablo Avenue at the parking lot

1:02:47exit in front of Walgreens um it's hard for anyone who drives around El Cerrito to believe that there's just a single level of service erf condition at cutting in San Pablo and none at Central and San Pablo it's difficult to comprehend now the I-80 freeway and off-ramps could not be

1:03:05contributing to congestion of San Pablo and cutting the traffic analysis appears exclusively for traffic on San Pablo Avenue I think analysis is also needed for cross streets which can be quite congested and certainly will be impacted by the specific plan at the south end of

1:03:18town there should be a traffic analysis at Fairmont in San Pablo and where you go into and out of the plaza at San Pablo uh you know I think we all know it's very common for track of traffic to back up two or three Cycles at those places at times I'm not going to believe It'll

1:03:34point any further uh but I was important to get the traffic analysis correct in this document I'd certainly like to see this document move forward as fast as possible but otherwise we're getting left with a stamp Pablo Avenue development being Guided by a plan that's based on some erroneous

1:03:47assumptions thanks very much for your time the staff's worked hard on this I certainly appreciate it thank you um with that I'll open up for comments amongst Council and discussion I support option one I'm going to try and be as brief as possible I think it's at some

1:04:03point we do need to start making the changes in El Cerrito that reflect the goals and desires of the of the council and the and the community and there's no better time than now to start and that option one what you're looking at is essentially fifty thousand dollars to

1:04:19salvage a six hundred thousand dollar investment so it's economically uh sustainable um and it and it would give us some flexibility uh to determining when the general Plan update would start which we've noted is between a half million and a million dollar investment so uh

1:04:37economically it option one is by far the best choice and with regards to moving forward and starting on the process of of making a change in El Cerrito option one is the fastest way to do that I agree with what councilmember Lyman just said um not only is it I think the best choice

1:05:02of the three options it's also the cheapest choice and that's a great combination to have um especially right now um and um I like the fact that it gets us started into the future that we need to be headed towards and I think it um you know it looks like it is a promising

1:05:23start it's what I think I would call it and um we really do need to start moving in that direction the world is changing especially you know when you see a lot of stuff about climate protection and so forth and and all of the changes that are going to have to occur around that this is the

1:05:44one that does the most for us um so I'm quite happy to support this proposal option number one I'd like to agree with what's been said already what's most important from my perspective in getting this done is to have our zoning and land use rules clear I think it's so important to have that

1:06:05done before as our economy is slowly picking up um the development Community starts early especially in the Bay Area because they know how long it takes to get things built and we need to have the rules out there so that they know what to expect even if they're gonna if they

1:06:19may be updated in the general plan process we've been working on this for some several years now and you know people know that it's about to be in place at some point or another so it's great to get it in place I'll also make the comment I'm happy that councilmember

1:06:31Abelson brought up the SCS and I know that this is related to this project as well as others but I think it's going to be so important that El Cerritos nodes get recognized in the SCS strategy because the idea is eventually those SCS areas will get transportation funding

1:06:48priority down the road so I just want to make sure we're all being reminded that that's something that we want to stay keyed into as the as a bag moves forward with those plans so I'm happy to support option one as well thanks yeah um I agree with all the opinions of on

1:07:07option one uh although option two would be okay too but the cost and the time involved really doesn't really meet what I was looking at for the plan it's been going on a while and uh I think it's time to implement to begin to implement the plan we do have actually natural built-in times of which

1:07:32we can make adjustments down the road one is when City of Richmond finishes their General plan and then takes up the specific plan and the other is when El Cerrito starts to look at their update so there's two natural things that we can even as we go forward those are two times

1:07:55that we can take a look and make adjustments as as things happen I I do say I um it's kind of interesting you indicated that it doesn't fully kept on let me back up here slide 10. bullet two may not fully reflect current state of art practices state law Metro I think we

1:08:17can say that at any point in time I I appreciate you pointing it out but I I it really didn't sway me because that that argument can be said almost any time but you're absolutely correct and it's just a reminder of why we need to update certain things whether it's this

1:08:35the general plan whatever so I appreciate that the key thing to me here though is flexibility um I know we were on the balcony but at some point we're going to get down into some things and that our time the last couple years economic marketing even uh philosophies have has changed a

1:09:03little bit so I think our the key to the whole plan in my opinion is flexibility so whether it's now or what you know a couple years from now I think we need a plan that is flexible to react and react fairly quickly to advantages and development possibilities that that come

1:09:24up so I appreciate that and uh let me see here one thing one other thing I should say I guess it's all said anyway I look oh the one thing though is and I want to say this is in a positive vein not a negative vein but we've been at this for four or five years and I

1:09:47think you've laid out six six months and I think our consultant um should be reminded that we're I think the council is looking at six months I didn't hear seven months I didn't hear six months to a year I heard six months and I think that's the time that we need

1:10:07to have a plan in place and that they need to we got 70 percent of it done uh wrap up the other 30 percent and let's get going with it so thank you I'd expected council member bensoni to make this comment so I'll I'll say it um I'm hoping that we'll get an opportunity

1:10:27to weigh in on the traffic scope similar to the public comments that were made sometime soon so we can stay on the six-month schedule that uh councilmember Jones just identified so I'm I'm hoping that we'll have an opportunity to weigh in on the on the scope of the economic

1:10:45analysis and the traffic um actually two weeks away is probably not realistic but maybe a month from now thanks for all the comments and I won't belabor too much of the point but I feel um definitely option one is the wisest Choice given that we've got all these

1:11:04timelines that we need to get in sync with and to to have some sense of closure given all the dialogue that's happened to date I think um this the proposed steps to completion really you know are are honed in enough they're focused on the BART station areas which we have the greatest

1:11:22potential and want to make sure we're we're doing the the most thoughtful um best informed um planning for those areas and so um you know with that I think you know we're just at this really interesting cusp of change between two general plans and it's it's a constant evolving

1:11:41process um that's just the nature of planning and I think you know we can definitely make significant progress that will benefit the general Plan update discussion as well and it just continually feeds each other so so I think delaying that obviously would lose

1:11:58our opportunity to use this great matching technical assistance and you know not seize this um you know I think we're definitely at the the bottom bottoming out and there's definitely activity starting to rumble again um so to take advantage of this this window

1:12:16would be really important um so with that I guess can I entertain yeah yeah can I just add one one thing I also want to state that uh through the four years I think our staff has performed admirably on this project we do have a lot of expertise that they bring to the table actually

1:12:39part of the reason why they were hired I understand I wasn't here when they were hired that was because of this expertise and I think it shows here um it's it's a difficult task in that it involves two cities and two cities that had this irregular boundary for 70 80

1:13:00years and it's the first time that I know of that is that the attempt has been made to kind of Bring It Forward and I think the original one of the original reasons or the was to get a common look and and common Direction on the Avenue and I think that's uh going forward so I'd like to

1:13:20thank you for that thank you and so with that I guess I wanted one final comment is um is is just that we you know looking at the scope in the the future look at the transportation um you know seizing the the new Innovations coming out um in my day job I run this green trip

1:13:39certification program for new development and essentially what it does is incentivize developers who want to reduce parking um within Transit rich neighborhoods and instead of building 20 000 to 40 000 worth of parking space they are putting that towards free or ninety percent

1:13:59discounted Transit passes when developer in San Jose they basically agreed to because the cost of the password solo offered two free uh VTA Eco passes per household for 40 years and so I think with that you know there's just definitely a change from the economy to

1:14:16the the growing up of the Gen xers there's there's New Attitudes in what is expected of Transportation amenities for new development particularly in areas that are really well served with regional transit opportunities and those people are making themselves known and I

1:14:33think you know also in light of um lead becoming kind of the business as usual there's there's interest in um using Transportation as the next Frontier in green development thinking so with that I'm very excited for us moving on and I heard emotion yes I'd be happy to make a motion

1:14:54um to proceed excuse me I'm not certain we can make a motion we were actually just providing guidance tonight and I think we were very unanimous in our guidance okay there's there's no resolution in our package listen but we're so excited we want to make a motion but okay well

1:15:11then I move that we provide direction to staff uh to proceed as we just discussed with option number one um is that all the direction you need yes okay thank you thank you from all the staff okay thank you I think we all support that so um with that we don't have a motion at

1:15:33all nope we're done we can move to 7B giving improve okay so let's move to item 7B the 2010 2011 mid-year budget review good evening Madam mayor remember to the council I'm Mary Dodge administrative Services director and I'm here tonight to talk about the mid-year budget review

1:15:56this is something that we do every year and the purpose of it is to take a little look at halfway through the year and see if our projections and our forecasts are still holding water and for this year it's always really nice to say we have a pretty boring report it's always something you like to

1:16:14get from your Finance people when we look at the revenues what we found is um well we we do this at a 12 January 31 time frame because if we did it just through December 31st we don't get enough detail and the timing kind of gets messed up it's hard to see when we

1:16:32don't get Revenue sometimes two or three months later than we were supposed to get it like sales tax in uut so for this period we had um sales tax actually showed up higher than we had anticipated and we're still not starting our new measure our money until April 1st

1:16:50so we anticipate the sales tax numbers to come through for utility user tax we had one um fluctuation in our payments and it showed that amount to be a little bit less than we anticipated but overall revenue is coming fine and we have no proposed adjustment adjustments there

1:17:09were a few minor variances but they were either of an immaterial amount going up or an immaterial amount going down so we basically determined that there would be no changes for expenditures what we found is generally an overall conservative approach to spending and I think this is

1:17:29indicative of the overall economy we also found there was somewhat of a slowing in capital project activity and so there was just a slowing of somewhat that type of activity in the city overall with the completion of the street Improvement program and the coming to the near of the um

1:17:47threescape program there is not enough money as much money going out on those capital projects so for the overall the city is is basically an operational mode and functioning within the budget so we do not have anti-projections any adjustments proposed for that

1:18:04so the only other item we have tonight is uh the other part of the major review is to make sure that we take in the items that have to be looked at by the council and put them all together to keep the agenda uncluttered and so we have one item and that is the state

1:18:19decided to increase their portion of the parking fees by three dollars and asked us to make sure that we collect that to reimburse ourselves and as such we are requesting a three dollar increase in parking citations to amend the master fee schedule and that is just to give us the money back

1:18:41it has no budget impact and but without it we will lose money that will go to the state and that's really the only item that we have for the council to review and I'd be glad to take any questions I just had one on the increase in the parking uh fee are fine excuse me a couple years ago we

1:19:02had testimony from the police um police chief that basically it's a wash when we when we write a ticket the amount of money that the state takes the amount of money that we get of uh is offset really by the administrative costs involved in in writing the the parking fine or the ticket is that

1:19:26still the case that you know of are you talking about a cost recovery analysis on the parking fine amount correct I have not done a study on that on that that cost recovery and I'm not sure if our new chief um knows whether or not this is the case and I don't even think that when we did

1:19:47our cost uh our fee study whether or not parking citations were part of that I believe that some of that is State mandated is that correct Chief Moyer and and I so I don't know that we really have too much of a determination other than what we're directed by the state and what we can do

1:20:04with that where I'm going is this they write they raise their part of the deal which isn't surprising um there's really aside from enforcing the law which we should um public perception is we make a lot of money on this deal and so uh we had testimony two years ago that said wasn't

1:20:27so so I'm I'm just uh I was just curious if we it doesn't sound like we've analyzed it since that time so that's okay if we were gonna if we were really gonna do that what we would do would be take the revenue that we get from these citations and then we would look at the

1:20:43direct costs of having our parking enforcement people and then we would apply an indirect rate to that and I can my my off the cuff concept is that we are not even recovering the costs of having people out there do the enforcement and I think that the intention is is never to make any money

1:21:01off of this but is is to provide the public with safer plate ways to park and enforcement of our laws oh yes I I agree with that but the state is actually making money on it is where I'm going with this well I think the state's saying that their administrative charges

1:21:19have gone up and therefore they are required to be reimbursed and requesting that money I see but I don't I don't see them writing the tickets in El Cerrito so I yeah I know thank you very much I appreciate it are there any other questions any other questions on the

1:21:34variances no other questions is there any public hearing on this or public uh comment on this item no comments mayor I move a resolution on the city council the city of El Cerrito authorizing a three dollar parking fine increased to offset the state of California mandatory

1:21:50increase and amend resolution number 2010 hyphen 26 second I I carries unanimously okay so with that we move on to um policy item 7c Redevelopment agency item I'll pass to Redevelopment chair Abelson through staff report yes good evening agency chair Abelson and members of the agency board I'm

1:22:24Hildy mile your housing project manager and I'm here on item 77c this evening one of many um and this is uh the action before you tonight is to consider adopting a resolution finding and authorizing the executive director to execute a pre-development loan agreement in the

1:22:43amount of 350 000 with the eating housing for the development of a mixed-use affordable housing project next door the tradeway site and to approve the appropriation of funds for the purpose of that loan um I'm going to make it brief since we have many items to get through but this this

1:23:05relates I'm bringing this action tonight because it relates to um State legislation that was the draft of which was released on February 23rd and the language of that draft legislation if enacted would dissolve Redevelopment agencies Statewide and create successor agencies that would be

1:23:26responsible for settling the agency's Affairs this legislation is contained in your packet in item 7D and I won't discuss it fully because it'll be addressed more fully there but I want you to know that it has an impact on the housing fund as well um the non-housing fund and the housing

1:23:46fund are treated somewhat differently under the draft legislation but there are a number of Provisions that in the legislation that are unclear and that contradict each other so we're bringing this action tonight to help ensure that the tradeway project has funds committed

1:24:02to it from the housing fund and it's able to move forward regardless of what action the state may take um it is staff's opinion um that the developers request for 350 000 in financial assistance is reasonable noting that um a large amount of local subsidy will likely be needed for the project and at

1:24:25this point the plan is that that will be requested from the county um and uh that that you know the agency's investment if we can get this project done for the land right down and 350 000 in pre-development assistance would be a very reasonable proposition from the

1:24:41agency's perspective um to provide you a brief summary of the terms that are contained in the pre-development loan for those of you that were here back then this is basically the same terms as the pre-development loan we provided to rcd for the Ohlone Gardens project back in

1:24:592008. the security for the for the loan is a promissory note and the assignment of plans and specifications that are paid for with the pro season loan if Eden acquires the property through DDA then at that time there would be a deed of trust and a regular regulatory

1:25:18agreement recorded against the property uh the term of this loan it's two years very simple three percent annual interest um until the parties enter into the GDA at which time we would essentially roll the loan in to the DDA but that would be um the terms of that are part of the

1:25:38negotiation of the DDA itself the funding conditions um prior to disbursing any funds Eden must demonstrate that it is providing fifty thousand dollars of its own money towards the funds that we disperse the agency is will not be obligated to disperse more than one hundred thousand

1:25:58dollars of the loan until such time as we enter into the DDA so we are not obligated to spend all of that money before we sort of get further down the road in terms of feasibility and workable project uh funds for the funds that are dispersed at this point will be

1:26:15for costs and items that are consistent with exhibit B um those are largely for Environmental Studies and entitlement work exhibit B is representative and if other Environmental Studies or design work needs to be completed this loan can be used for those as well

1:26:33um and in terms of financial considerations this would appropriate 350 000 from the housing fund um and appropriate that for the developer in this fiscal year so that concludes my staff report I'm happy to answer any questions any agency questions Greg yeah I have three questions

1:26:55essentially um and I believe I know the answer but I want to ask them get them on the record as it fully States in recital H this agreement does not authorize the granting of land use approvals acquisition of property or the construction of the development correct

1:27:12therefore the paragraphs that do address the um uh Provisions that survive land transfer are in here and potentially would be restated as part of a DDA is that correct I'm thinking of like the HUD paragraph and some of the deed restriction paragraphs under the terms uh because we are

1:27:36providing financial assistance to a project should that project exist and we convey the land pursuant to a DDA we are obligated to make sure that that that is it those that project meets the terms of the affordable housing restrictions pursuant to Redevelopment law so in other words

1:27:54we are obligated to make sure that the 55-year deed restriction and that there are affordability covenants in place um so those would carry over through the through the DDA and whatever subsequent loan as well as the HUD Rider is in there because Eden Housing anticipates

1:28:09applying uh to HUD for HUD 202 financing and they don't give you that doesn't give you a lot of choice in terms of what they typically require but um they wanted to have that provision in there specifically to to know that the agency would work uh with Hyde should

1:28:27should they receive that financing great thank you and on exhibit B I did notice that there were a number of SQL oriented reports that are highlighted here um and I did a quick little math up here to to see that they don't add up to a hundred and fifty thousand since that

1:28:47would be all that they would be able to spend prior to uh to the agreement yes they're 50 plus their the first hundred um I did not see a historic resources or cultural resources report in here and I'm assuming that um they do not need any additional funds in in addition to the 350 000 to

1:29:13complete the um historic resources report that we are anticipating to respond to public comment that is correct they the uh whatever work is needed as far as as adding any addenda to the current historical evaluation will be covered under the budget and it's something that is being

1:29:34discussed as part of the environmental scoping process and this fund These funds that were we are considering tonight would could be used for for that purpose yes these ones could be used for that thank you bill yeah I just had one question um I know you've looked at the finance

1:29:50picture two three times here on on Eden and I imagine you well you indicated you looked at it before this proposal but Eden does have uh two existing programs ready to go one in Lafayette and one in Orinda and I'm assuming that that was those projects were taken into

1:30:10consideration when we were uh reviewing the financial liability of being or updating the financial liabilities uh liability and sense in the sense of that they will have the resources and they'll actually be in business uh to pull this off yes we did review their so it's part of the

1:30:32rfpq process we asked for developers financial statements some were provided confidentially others were provided publicly Eden provides those publicly so they're they're available for public review as part of the their application um and we did look at those uh and felt

1:30:53comfortable that they have the resources to do this project um what is uh sort of a current situation that I um a lot of non-profit developers are facing right now is um because sources of financing have tightened up such as that the nine percent tax credit program it's taking

1:31:13longer and longer to assemble your financing because whether whereas you may have just needed you know 350 000 from your local city and then boom you can go apply to your tax credit board uh tcac allocation committee um you now need to go through several rounds of funding applications at the

1:31:32county level to amass the amount of local subsidy you need so development time frames are getting longer um uh so I think we are sensitive to and I know the developers we work with are very sensitive to how long those projects are taking in their pipeline but at this point we feel

1:31:51comfortable that that they have the resources to to carry this out that is something that we'll keep checking in on because that that picture changes yeah because the way I understand it we could actually they could actually draw a hundred thousand off this 350 000 and

1:32:09then if the project uh goes away that's what we're out right that's that's correct so I just want to make sure that as we start this process we are confident we're looking at it I I'm not worried about you not staying on top of it but we're confident that they can go forward here

1:32:28we are at I I think we are at a place where we need to try to get the project entitled and moved forward um I originally had contemplated bringing this loan agreement to you when we were further along closer to the DDA or at the time of the day and we would have

1:32:49more definitive uh information as far as feasibility um I don't think we quite have that luxury at this time but based on what they submitted initially I feel confident that they have what they need to pull it off it may take several rounds of financing which they have been

1:33:08very upfront about but I think it will happen okay thank you Ann so thank you Hildy um so I guess in in light of Redevelopment just to be extra sure that you know I I assume what you're saying is that despite all of Eden's other projects and other potential likely Redevelopment areas

1:33:30that given all those pieces floating in the air that we still feel 100 confident that we should move forward I I'm not gonna there are uncertainties in the financing environment right now and the state legislation is definitely adding a whole new curveball to that

1:33:49situation so uh you know there are all kinds of rumors floating around right now as far as how state agencies May shift um you know so it's it is hard to forecast what the funding environment is going to be I think we've selected a developer that if anybody can weather

1:34:07that they can I cannot say there is no risk which is why I only put I'm only recommending a hundred thousand dollars to be put at risk rather than more than that but I think we're at a spot where um we want to make sure that we can move both our projects forward our CD and the

1:34:26Ohlone Gardens project you know we've taken it as far as we can take it in terms of giving it assistance and getting it through the entitlement process now we're doing that you know hopefully on the tradeway project um and moving that getting that to a point where okay they've gotten

1:34:41everything they need from us they can now go off and assemble the rest of their financing so and and I guess the it the the assuming the entitlements move forward at least the project will be entitled I miss I believe Eden would weather it as well but assuming that if they weren't

1:34:59able to stick with the project at least the entitlement would remain and that would essentially create an opportunity for someone other some other entity to pick up and it wouldn't be a wasted effort in worst case scenario yes yes that's correct thank you Rebecca thank you holding not to totally

1:35:18belabor this point um but I understand the 350 000 subsidy is based on the proformas that they've provided up until this point reviewed by you as well as the consultant and just to give us a better sense of whether or not this is I always want to know is this a lot or is this a little is this

1:35:35something which is standard practice in the industry or are they asking for something extraordinary um could you just kind of give give us a sense of other of the other respondents to the rfqrfp process is is 350 000 a requested subsidy that was a lot or a little compared to the other

1:35:53um the other developers sure um and I take your question to sort of have two points one is is this a typical practice of Redevelopment agencies to give pre-development loans is one question and sort of how does Eden Stack Up relative to the other proposes in terms

1:36:10of what they requested to answer your first question not all agencies provide pre-development loans the more leverage you have the larger agency you are you don't typically have to do that smaller agencies and some agencies do provide pre-development loans because

1:36:27you're you are the seed money for uh getting a project going it's not an unusual practice and I think we've been pretty prudent in terms of how we've structured our pre-development loans in terms of how Eden Stacks up um the level of assistance requested ranged

1:36:50from zero to over two million dollars from the the requests um but when when we sat down with the when I sat down with the economic consultant and really tried to control for other variables um such as the the tax credit tiebreaker score there is um sort of a very complicated uh formula

1:37:13that the tax credit allocation committee does and essentially gives um to be to be it make a competitive application a developer has to have a lot of local subsidy in the project so some development proposals showed uh a very low score for the tax credits which

1:37:31meant they showed very little local subsidy in the deal which looked great from the public agency perspective but in reality it would not be competitive for tax credits so we had to look at it proposals to sort of even that out and say you know you're asking for you know

1:37:46500 000 but in reality you'd need a million and we don't have that um so I think Eden's application was very um realistic in the sense that they they had a very competitive tiebreaker score given the information at that point in time so that what they were requesting

1:38:08from the city in my view was realistic they are expecting to request quite a bit from the county if they go for a nine percent tax credit allocation they will have to request funds from County home and cdbg program um in order to amass the amount of local subsidy needed that will take several

1:38:28years several funding rounds to um to to bank up um but I felt that they they were definitely um uh on the on the conservative and both in terms of how they formulated their performer the assumptions and how much they asked for is that that was good that was very

1:38:47detailed I appreciate that that was my question any further questions okay are there any speaker slips no speakers okay then back to the agency are there any comments or motion is there a motion I can go ahead and make a motion that we can discuss I move that we adopt a resolution

1:39:07uh a resolution of the El Cerrito Redevelopment agency board making findings and authorizing the executive director to execute a pre-development loan agreement with Eden Housing Inc in the amount of 350 000 from the low and moderate income housing fund for the development of a mixed-use affordable

1:39:25housing development at the Redevelopment agency property located at uh one ten thousand eight sixty and ten thousand eight forty eight San Pablo Avenue and approving the appropriation of funds for the purpose of the pre-development loan okay there's the motion in a second is

1:39:46there any discussion I think we had a discussion last uh session on this topic on this specific topic and I think that 350 000 is a is a reasonable amount and certainly it's my recollection from um the summer of 2008 that for the hapland center we did I think 100 or a

1:40:07hundred and ten thousand dollars um that was at risk for that project and so this is in scale with with uh our other projects that are in the going on in the in the area so I would I think this is an appropriate investment all in favor I I believe that was unanimous okay then

1:40:28I think I it's time to go back to the mayor origin item 70. incorrect item 70 Joint City Council Redevelopment agency and now Municipal Services Corporation item staff presentation on that please I have I have so much paper for this evening that I trying to keep it

1:40:56organized um good evening again I'm Lori Trevino the Redevelopment manager before you next is a consideration of an assignment by the city of El Cerrito to the El Cerrito Municipal Services Corporation of the non-housing portions of the public improvements and cooperation agreement between the city

1:41:18and um Redevelopment agency um she'll recall you approved an amendment to that agreement at the last meeting um as a city in the agency subsequent to that approval the states proposed budget language was released and in that language the Redevelopment agency would be eliminated

1:41:42but replaced by a successor agency which would most likely be the city but would not be permitted to under take any excuse me and all the activities that we would be permitted of the successor agency would be governed by a separate oversight board so the concern that

1:41:59um that came up is that in the end if the successor agency was to take over the agency's obligations the city could end up being contracted with itself and there would be a risk that the agreement could be challenged particularly by the oversight board and that it would perhaps not be an

1:42:15enforceable obligation so the purpose of this change the change that's proposed this evening is to protect the agency's future projects which is what the municipal Services Corporation board would be electing to do if it feels that it's in the community's interest to do that I think

1:42:32had we realized that the legislation was going to end up this way we would probably have recommended making the cooperation between the agency and the corporation from the start it isn't allowable Arrangement that many communities have used for redevelopment activities over

1:42:47the years the corporation here in El Cerrito was created in 1982 it's been used for various things over the over that time and the last purpose it was used for was um for the financing for Station 72 it does remit it is currently a valid active Corporation and it's in good

1:43:04standing with the secretary of state as you'll see from reading the um information about the the corporation its stated purpose is very broad particularly about communication but also about anything that's beneficial to the public so the the board can determine that it's

1:43:24a public benefit to assist the city and the agency with its public Improvement projects and its development projects um the purpose of this new agreement would be to remove the liability and responsibility to different entities between the city the agency and the

1:43:40corporation but in the end it would be to protect their overall shared interests um so um I think that's it and if you have any questions about it I'm happy to answer them and we have various legal counsel here can who can help us well um I I appreciate that you have uh given

1:44:04us very good reason for why we would should be entering into this agreement tonight because it does reduce the opportunities for challenges by the oversight committee to uh to disrupt the development that we're trying to make the improvements we're trying to make in

1:44:21the city um there is a statement that Emmett that the municipal Services Corporation is capable of doing this work can you speak to the fact that I the the same resources are available to the municipal Services Corporation as were available to the Redevelopment agencies well it's

1:44:41essentially different entities that are controlled by the city are going to be contracting with themselves so that the players are the same it um you know the agency's staff would be working for the municipal Services Corporation this is really more about moving around the liabilities and

1:44:57the responsibilities on paper than it is in practice um and then last one of my concerns is that the this is the first time at least I remember taking action as the municipal Services Corporation board um you have testified that we are in good standing is there any other

1:45:20additional actions that the Board needs to take to appoint members or we're automatically appointed as a result of the elections it was not clear from reading our bylaws that it was uh upon election or upon action our read of this was that um that the members are appointed

1:45:40automatically by virtue of their position and that you can hold this meeting pursuant to those bylaws I don't know if you have any further thoughts okay no I'd agree the reality is that um the city has a number of associated um authorities and other organizations

1:45:59that um exist that don't take regular actions um but that which the members of the city council become members of the board upon taking the oath of office as a member of the city council the MSC is one of those organizations and again our read of the bylaws was that simply upon

1:46:17Assumption of your office as a member of the city council that you would also become a member of the board of the MSC certainly we have for the last two years I've participated in setting the budget for the the corporation so I know we've we've even taken actions

1:46:33um it's just I don't ever recall Us in in conformance with the bylaws and Articles of Incorporation having our January annual meeting so I was just just wanted to make sure we really are in good standing other than other than the adoption of those budgets there has been

1:46:48no business for the MSC um in fact it's it's their their business so there had basically been no reason for for a meeting um but for going forward I'm assuming that the relationship that's being established um continues for it in time obviously the MSC board will be meeting

1:47:05more regularly and we'll be at least conducting its annual meeting in January although we certainly expect that it's going to be more com more frequent than that going forward great thank you very much any other questions I had sort of the same concerns as council member Lyman just thinking of

1:47:22transferring or having a contract between a public agency and a public agency compared with a public agency and would we call this a non-profit organization just wondering whether or not they're or if we've thought through if there are any constraints or more areas of flexibility that may come out

1:47:41of making this agreement compared with the previous agreement we made with the city um the MSC is a non-profit public benefit corporation which is a type of corporation that is defined in the business and professions code in state law I think that obviously it's not going to

1:47:58have the same um powers and um range of action that either the city or the Redevelopment agency would have on the other hand the reason that many public agencies form a related and Associated non-profit of some kind is that actually it has some leeway to do some things that the public agencies

1:48:15wouldn't I think that going forward we are going to need to explore somewhat frankly what the right range of appropriate actions for the MSC is but we felt comfortable with this Arrangement and felt like we would be able to work around any limitations that we found but that the more important

1:48:33component at this point was to ensure that there was as binding a set of contracts as we could make between the agency and the Redevelopment agency and or the city and the MSC so that we would have um as binding instead of contracts as we possibly could I I see so we may make

1:48:49this agreement at this point and perhaps in the future add to our bylaws or add to our rules of operating for the board in order to make sure that we are able to implement all the actions that are under the agreement the internal discussion among the staff has been that

1:49:07we will figure that stuff out as we go but we were comfortable with the general framework that we were setting up and that we'd fill in those details as necessary but again that the general framework was appropriate lawful and would accomplish the goals that we're

1:49:18trying to okay thank you Skye questions yeah just a one more question is the point of clarification to follow on uh what would be I think are we board member board member have been to sing these comments um we we are for example as a board unable to use condemnation rights because we're a

1:49:42non-profit organization but a benefit might be that we have a different investment policy for any funds that we have and so those are some of the the differences that that we would have is that I think you've got the gist of that I would agree with those characterizations generally and I think

1:49:59you've got the got a handle on where we see the differences being thank you any questions councilmember Jones any questions no more questions okay I just have a quick question um in light of you know this is all pioneering new territory with the onslaught of State

1:50:17Redevelopment threat and I'm just curious to if if you're aware of other what other cities are doing just to have some context for what we're doing and from what I've heard other cities are creating um you know non-profit entities in which to do these types of arrangements with

1:50:34where we're lucky that we actually have one um I think already in existence that we can work with and if you can speak to that at all that would be great I'm trying to think if I know any that are are creating one now a non-profit many many cities or agencies are doing agreements between

1:50:53themselves as you've done already um cities that are there are cities that have had them for years the one that's jumping to mind is San Diego that actually has several um hold on just a second I think San Pablo I thought created something new I'm trying to say that was

1:51:15trying to yeah a lot of cities are contemplating creating non-profit corporations for just this purpose um the unfortunate reality of creating a non-profit Corporation it used to be very simple and it used to be very quick but as part of the state budget crisis

1:51:34you have to get the Secretary of State to accept your Articles of Incorporation and they have a four to six week backlog right now so there's a lot of cities that are looking at that option but in terms of timing because we don't know when the budget is going to get approved

1:51:50um they're looking for existing entities that they can use because we just may not have time to wait out the Secretary of State so I think San Pablo is looking at creating a corporation Pittsburgh created one about a year ago and they've transferred most of their Redevelopment

1:52:07functions to a non-profit Corporation at Long Beach many years ago transferred a lot of their Redevelopment functions to a non-profit Corporation thank you very much can we get San Pablo's money this is not a free-for-all to grab money can contract with us so discussion at this point or public

1:52:34any public comments on this item no comments yeah I just I had some comments and it's it can carry over to the other agenda items I just want to say that if there's people wondering these projects these are projects that are either in the planning stages or have been

1:52:54identified as as projects in the future they've been in the plans for a while this isn't something that were just all of a sudden coming up with and therefore it is proper to protect them it's proper to protect our Pro our project so that they stay in El Cerrito and we have

1:53:16funding in which to complete them um the state's proposal is really unclear on a number of issues and um there's some of us that have the opinion that it's a a lousy piece of legislation but it is the legislation that's going through and we have to play accordingly so I I

1:53:40personally think that if they do go through with their proposal to dissolve Redevelopment projects there's going to be a number of lawsuits there this could be tied up legally for a long time so again it's proper to protect our projects and so um it is I would concur that to protect

1:54:05the agency's resources we should take the action like this at this time any other comments discussion I hear a motion I'll take the first I'll be a city representative at this time a resolution of the city council of the city of El Cerrito approving a partial assignment

1:54:27of the city's rights and obligations under that certain public improvements and cooperation agreement second all those in favor please say aye aye the motion is unanimous move to item 7e no we have we have two more emotions there is also a there is also a municipal Services Corporation

1:54:53resolution and an RDA yeah yeah I was just doing the city somebody else has to be a board member and somebody else has to be a agency member so with that what we'll do go ahead I'm I'd like to make a resolution as a board member I move that we adopt the resolution of

1:55:11the board of directors of the El Cerrito Municipal Services Corporation approving a partial assignment of the city's rights and obligations under that certain public improvements and cooperation agreement second all of those in favor please say aye aye aye motion is unanimous as the municipal

1:55:32Services Corporation your board actually consists not just of the five of you but of the city manager in the assistant city manager so they also need to vote on this resolution okay thank you thank you for that call again I heard the city manager say aye as well as assistant

1:55:48city manager okay that past seven seven oh correct we had them out voted anyway but now we're on to the Redevelopment yes and and I think since your chair I will not make the motion yes uh I as as a as an agency member I will uh move a resolution of the El Cerrito Redevelopment agency con

1:56:11consenting to a partial assignment of the city's rights and obligations under that certain public improvements and cooperation agreement for a second second all in favor please say aye aye motion cares unanimously okay we can now move to item 7e okay following right on

1:56:38um for implementing the um the public improvements and cooperation agreement in order to implement the agreement the municipal Services Corporation needs to adopt an operating budget for the current fiscal year and the agency needs to amend its budget for the remainder of the fiscal

1:56:56year um under the state budget legislation the agency is required to would be required to pay all of its existing contractual obligations and we um the um budget changes that are proposed here reflect that all of those pass-through agreements Debt Service payments loan

1:57:20obligations are all will remain with the agency and only the operating the remaining operating budgets in cash will flow to the municipal Services Corporation for the purposes of funding the activities which are part of the cooperation agreement so that's just some background

1:57:38um so essentially what will happen is the msc's revenue will be a transfer from the agency of the funds that are necessary to fulfill its obligations under the agreement and then the MSC will fund the same expenditures that the agency was doing previously and then the agencies the agency's

1:57:59budget actually is not changing because it's just simply taking direct charges and taking them to and making them into a transfer to the municipal Services Corporation we also have about four hundred thousand dollars in bond proceeds that are sitting in a separate

1:58:13fund they have not been appropriated for any particular use but they are Redevelopment funds that can be used for public improvements by through the cooperation agreement and so those funds are being transferred to the municipal Services Corporation for use on future projects they're not going to

1:58:29be expended in the current fiscal year so um the bottom line is that the um the agency the MSC will have a revenue an increase in revenue of about 1.3 million dollars and they'll have expenses of 950 000 and the agency's budget will be amended to transfer the four hundred thousand dollars from the

1:58:53agency to the MSC if you have any questions about that the intricacies of that I hope I can answer them I do um through your testimony it it is um I I might be suggesting some points of clarification so I'm trying to figure out the does the non-profit organization

1:59:16adopt a revenue or accept Revenue the the corporation has to adopt a revenue budget okay the revenue is expecting to receive so we actually have to we don't we don't just say we accept it we we actually have to adopt a budget okay and then um on the authorization of the

1:59:40expenditure you didn't use the term Appropriations we're authorizing an expenditure budget is is how it's written I'm just trying to figure out it's not an appropriation at that point we're just authorizing an expenditure I think that's the same thing um it's an appropriation

1:59:59okay sure the only reason why I'm parsing these words out is that I don't want I want we haven't appropriation process and and it's my concern is that we are appropriating the four hundred thousand dollars in one organization and therefore it's technically going to

2:00:21be appropriated and all we're doing is setting a budget of 950 000 in the other organization so I want to make sure that it's that the 400 000 is not available for expenditure in this fiscal year and and the wording is changing between the two resolutions and and potential leaves

2:00:40a door open and I just want to make sure that I understand the difference the the municipal Services Corporation fund is still a regular special Revenue fund of the city so it follows the same budget process as the city including adoption of Revenue budgets and

2:00:58Appropriations in this case we're going to end up with a four hundred thousand dollar fund balance and next year when we go to do our budget one of the things that you'll see is a beginning fund balance of around four hundred thousand dollars and current activity just like

2:01:12everything else so I guess I guess in the be it there be it further resolved Clause the first be it further resolved Clause of the municipal Services Corporation resolution should it say appropriates an expenditure budget I'm just trying to figure out what if this I

2:01:32want to make sure that the language that's in here is is accurate adopting an expenditure but we're adopting an appropriation it's uh that you're on the municipal Services yes attachment one and it's the first be it further result I just want to make sure the the verbs

2:01:51and the nouns in that sentence are appropriate given the they are appropriate adopting an expenditure budget is also accepting an appropriation I don't know that there is any real difference that would make it that there would be any legal issue in regards to this if I understand these

2:02:07things correctly and please tell me if I don't the budget contains the Appropriations so to adopt an expenditure budget is to accept it in essence approve a document that has in it a description of Appropriations that the agency is that the board is approving I

2:02:25believe that this wording is is is correct okay so so even though we are appropriating it under item attachment two which is the agency resolution we've used the word appropriation there it's actually not appropriated under the corporation therefore it's not eligible for

2:02:44expenditure in this fiscal year it is going to I think the ACT it's Revenue so we what you're going to tell us is appropriating those expenditures great thank you just want to make sure that we're not making a shell game here that's all thank you foreign that's not a game

2:03:20for figures any speakers nope okay um with that any other discussion on this item comments they're a motion by the board members of the MSC to um come on Karen your opportunity all right I move that the municipal Services Corporation adopts a resolution of the municipal Services Corporation adopting

2:03:50its fiscal year 2010-11 annual budget and of the else reader Redevelopment agency amending its fiscal year 2010-11 annual budget but I don't think I can do that should withdraw the motion I move we adopt a resolution of the Alfredo Municipal Services Corporation

2:04:08adopting its fiscal year 2010-11 annual budget a second that motion all those in favor please say i l seven I I thought you have to say bye not as easy as it looks is it Karen okay um I move a resolution of the El Cerrito Redevelopment agency authorizing the amendment of the fiscal year 2010-2011

2:04:34annual operating budget second all in favor aye aye aye sorry for that being late this motion cares unanimously and now we're on to the next agenda item F 7 f which is the Redevelopment item this is going to keep us awake all evening isn't it again it'll be miles still your housing

2:04:57project manager so item 7f is to adopt an agency board resolution approving an assignment of the agency's rights and obligations under that certain agency resolution number 581 dated March 16 2009 and the California state Housing and Community Development award letter

2:05:16and secondly adopt a city council resolution accepting assignment of said agencies rights and obligations under resolution number 581 and the hcd award letter the reason we are recommending this is again the draft legislation um has a provision that specifically

2:05:37would prohibit agencies from accepting advances loans and advances from state and federal governments and we're not quite sure how that was would be interpreted but the grant may be seen as an advance so we would like to protect the two approximately 2.9 Million

2:05:57Dollars of prop 1C infill Grant funds awarded to the Ohlone Gardens project and assign the agency's rights and obligations to the city so that the city may act in a timely manner to accept those funds on behalf of the project the concept has always been that the state

2:06:14would Grant the funds to the agents see in the agency would then turn around and Loan those funds to rcd for the project we would follow that same Arrangement but the city would then be turning around and loaning those funds to the project instead of the agency

2:06:30or any questions but that that concludes my staff report a point of clarification we're not involving the municipal Services Corporation at this time because the agreement is with an external party and not between the city two reasons the the draft legislation contemplates that

2:06:52that the housing fund and housing functions of the Redevelopment agency can be treated somewhat differently than the non-housing funds for example the city can retain all the rights and obligations can continue to enter into contracts etc etc even after the non-housing part of the agency goes to

2:07:08whatever that successor agency is so um we did not think that it was necessary to to assign that to the municipal Services Corporation and I we didn't really even Explore it to be honest because I Works quite well if the city is going to be the entity retaining housing

2:07:30functions going forward it makes sense that it would be assigned to the city and that they would carry that out going forward and similarly we assigned the NRA uh Eden's Andra to the city as well as conveying the tradeway property to the city and not the municipal Services

2:07:47Corporation for the same reason that the city appears to be able to continue to act and retain the housing functions and then I want to thank you for your testimony but I want to make sure that I understood it uh definitively there's a statement in both resolutions about it

2:08:05being the best interest of the organizations whether it's the city or the agency to take this action at this time and it is to as you stated very clearly protect our interest in in the grant funds correct thank you I had one question um in in light of the 1C infill grant

2:08:27funding I I had heard at some point that the the the potential Safeway closure at Moser would impact um that site in some way because of the scoring for infill included giving weight to grocery stores and just you know being able to meet essential needs within walking distance and I'm

2:08:47wondering if you think uh there we haven't raised something apart from that yeah with hcd um there is some gray area in terms of if you're so the site amenities is one of the scoring criteria under under the infill Grant application if there's a significant change in any of those

2:09:06conditions that could be grounds for hcd reevaluating the allocation um for reasons that are probably understandable all parties have not sought to raise that issue with hcd at this time um we rcd has sort of been the lead in terms of communications with hcd they are what their take at this point

2:09:32is is what's most important is that they continue with performance I.E moving along in terms of their their timeline in terms of funding applications and so on so until hcd raises that issue we're probably not going to raise it and and don't really know what the issue

2:09:48don't really know what their answer would be I mean at this point um uh our fear is that they are looking to deallocate the award funds so that they don't have to issue bonds for those funding commitments um so we don't want to give them any excuse to to take back that award

2:10:09thank you a little confused here because the agenda item starts out looking like it's Redevelopment but then in the resolutions the first one is the city resolution so which way should we do it does it matter does it matter I guess you're right it is we can do it we can do it in either

2:10:29order if you would like I'll start with the read-along agency but okay do we have any public speakers no speakers okay I'll be the Redevelopment agency board member Redevelopment agency member moving a resolution of the Redevelopment agency of the city of El Cerrito

2:10:44approving an assignment of the agency's rights and obligations under that certain Redevelopment agency resolution number five eight one there a second yes I'll second okay any further discussion all in favor please say aye unanimous motion carries unanimously I'll turn it over to the mayor

2:11:05um can I entertain another motion yes I'll move that we adopt a resolution of the city council of the city of El Cerrito consenting to an assignment of the agency's rights and obligations under that certain Redevelopment agency resolution number 581 second all this in flavor please say aye aye

2:11:25aye and motion carries unanimously as well hold on we're done with that one okay item 7g staff report on that please okay fifth round Okay Lori Trevino still your Redevelopment manager I like that um for you this evening is um resolutions that would authorize execution of property conveyance

2:12:03agreement between the agency and the city for Real Property that's located within the Redevelopment project area so as part of the state budget legislation that's proposed um the the Redevelopment agencies in California would be dissolved and the legislation would prevent Redevelopment

2:12:25agencies from taking any action after the adoption of the legislation which could theoretically happen this week um part of that legislation would prevent agency would require the successor agencies to the Redevelopment agencies to dispose of Redevelopment agency properties

2:12:43um and I think they said expeditiously um with and there's really no regard for what their intended purposes were only to maximize the property value um the sales price so that it's a benefit of the taxing entities who are believed to be the future recipients of

2:13:01those funds um under the current law the agency is authorized to transfer ownership of the properties if we're about to lose that um that Authority then the agency should at least consider whether it wants to do that now the transfers that are allowable today are for public purposes

2:13:20um and so that is the purposes for which these properties are proposed to be transferred to the city um all those transfers would be contention upon any existing restrictions to the properties and there's various ones detailed in the staff report which I can go over and if you would like

2:13:38um let me see well I guess so the bottom line is that the the issue here is really that we're trying to protect the agency's properties in the same way that we were trying to protect the agencies um monetary Resources by transferring them to the municipal Services Corporation

2:14:01the agency could can also transfer its properties to the corporation but it's a it's a different process it would require a public hearing and a 14-day notice so we did not have time to get that accomplished for this meeting the meeting on the 21st is noticed for this

2:14:19purpose to transfer the properties to the municipal Services Corporation with the exception of the tradeway property in the event that we'll still have that Authority and be able to do that on the 21st but this is stop Gap measuring in the meantime so if you have any

2:14:34questions I'm happy to answer them there were some changes to the agreement which um you have um there were a few very minor changes which I'm not going to walk through bit by bit but the most important ones are in section five um set and section six um we are um proposing to change this so that the

2:15:01property is not being um the city is not six accepting the property as is the agencies instead indemnifying the city for um any sort of uh remediation or other obligations that might come with the property and the other section is um what's section nine it's now numbered

2:15:25section 10 and it is changing the conveyance date from the date of recordation to the date of approval so um so that will just um shorten things up a little bit and then there was also a correction of one of the addresses on the property description on exhibit a

2:15:46um so in section three the date of execution of the grant deed is referred to in this agreement as the conveyance date section three yep page three section three method of conveyance does that need to change again because we want it to be date of execution not necessarily granteed

2:16:12in just a moment whereas is is this consistent with the same change in 10 I guess is what I'm trying to ask yes the the language in three was changed because previously it had said the effective date for the conveyance would be upon Recreation um whereas under law all you have to do

2:16:30is deliver a grant deed so now the actual conveyance of the properties will be effective upon delivery of the granteed not recordation which is tonight or tomorrow morning or something yes okay yes um given given the indemnification which I like um should the Transformer property be

2:16:51put on this list as well um well there's a couple issues with that property I mean one part of the reason for doing uh the conveyances as Laurie said the legislation says that the successor agencies are supposed to sell the property expeditiously maximizing value the Transformer property is not a

2:17:14property that's really going to be subject to sale for maximum value because it's in a public use and we'll stay there so we didn't include it um and in particular because of the liabilities that we are very aware of we thought we would leave it with an agency that's not the city I think it's still

2:17:32better to leave it there even with the indemnification since the indemnification only covers those liabilities that occur before the conveyance so the city could conceivably be in the chain of title and still have some liability under that one great thank you that's my questions

2:17:53any further questions any comments from the public no comments any discussion or motion I I will I will take this opportunity to sort of um make an opinion I think it's absolutely ludicrous that we're going to be looking at sale selling a large amounts of the State of California as the Redevelopment

2:18:16agencies are disband around the state and that's only going to have a negative impact on property values and have a negative result in in uh the economic aspects of our state so this is I understand that we're taking Provisions tonight to protect our financial assets and protect our our

2:18:39land resources and I fully support those because I think that the disbanding of the Redevelopment agency and the corresponding actions that will happen such as the liquidation of of our of land throughout the state uh is is absurd do I hear Motion in your comment you

2:19:03didn't but I will gladly make a motion a resolution of the um Elsa reader Redevelopment agency authorizing the execution of a property conveyance agreement with the city of El Cerrito for the conveyance of certain real property located in the city of El Cerrito Redevelopment project area and a

2:19:20certain property is listed as an attachment second all in favor aye aye unanimous motion carries unanimously back to the Mirror any other comments or emotion I have a motion um I um move that the city of El Cerrito authorized the execution of her property conveyance agreement with the El Cerrito

2:19:47Redevelopment Agency for the conveyance of certain real properties located in the El Cerrito Redevelopment project area second all those in favor please say aye aye aye aye motion also carries unanimously that's we made it that we are now on to the final um final item on our agenda Council liaison

2:20:20assignments and reports would anybody like to take the first step just wanted to report that the joint powers agency that runs the Gilman Sports fields of which we're a member the softball field has been completed and is in operation at this point and it looks like that well it doesn't look

2:20:49like we are the The Joint Powers Authority is out of my development money to proceed so at this time all the development that can be developed is it's complete and there still is some things on the master plan that could be built but we will need funding for that and at this time

2:21:12there's no funding identified so basically the project is very good city city Berkeley should be commended and actually managing it and it's unfortunate that some of the things aren't built yet like the baseball field but on the other hand there's about 80 percent of that project is complete and

2:21:34there's hundreds and hundreds of people each week using that facility which was the main purpose and goal of the project I want to let you know that that we're complete for now I do have a quick question a few new um there's these huge mounds of dirt right just south of the

2:21:55Berkeley pedestrian bridge and I was wondering if that was if that's associated with that project or if you guys know anything about it no that's not part of it I believe it's part of the city of Berkeley's restoration project down there the Environmental Quality

2:22:18service activities I thought I would just mention a few more in my report in that regard there's going to be a meeting on the new recycling center where they will be discussing plans for reuse in exchange at the new recycling center including rules of conduct for

2:22:37these activities and I believe one of those might be the Book Exchange and that'll be on March the 26th from 9 to noon um and I believe it will be at the community center on April the 16th um from nine until about 1 30 we will be celebrating Earth Day from nine till

2:23:01noon with projects and um followed by a lunch so if you're interested in participating you can sign up at earthday at ci.el.cerido.ca.us or look at our website thank you I'd be happy to provide the next update I attended the economic development board meeting where we were so happy to

2:23:26welcome two new members Judy Pope and Jade Smith this was the first meeting of the year so we discussed what would be going on during 2011. the members expressed support for assisting with the San Pablo Avenue Spring Fling event that's currently being planned by

2:23:42um by City staff and we talked about ways to incorporate San Pablo Avenue businesses in that sort of event we also talked about getting together a new event which would be called restaurant week and this would follow other cities restaurant weeks where restaurants would

2:23:57be publicized in El Cerrito for a particular week and during that time period they would offer some sort of deal um or some some way to get new customers to come in and either try a new dish or just to come to the restaurant for the first time we also talked about

2:24:11potentially putting together a treasure hunt which is similar to what goes on in Amazing Race wonderful television program and the idea would be that these events have gone on in other cities and a city like El Cerrito it could actually be done very easily just sort of

2:24:29um we're kind of small enough but small enough to be manageable but large enough to be interesting for the event participants that was another idea that was brought up by several members and got a lot of support so we hope that in the next during our next meeting we'll

2:24:42solidify some of those events and I'll come back to you with with more details yeah I have a correction I think I wasn't reading this right the meeting of about the new recycling center will actually be at the recycling center at 7501 Schmidt Lane yeah I have two reports to make one was

2:25:04the park and rec commission met and uh Mr Savage from the Unified School District came to talk about the status of uh the improvements in the city of El Cerrito and most notably they have resolved their litigation around the port of the school so they are moving

2:25:27forward with the design at its new location and they I think I believe he said that there would be potentially starting work later this year at that location potentially as soon as later this year they are moving forward I think we've we've seen notification of this before

2:25:47but they are moving forward with phase one of the high school reformatting which is the baseball softball and five tennis courts configuration and they're moving forward with the design and feedback of the stadium which is a football field track and Stadium complex so they are they are

2:26:12moving forward with the high school um it's pretty clear to them that they will continue to need to use some of our resources at Harding or at Sarita Vista for their softball or and or baseball programs um that they don't know what their need is so that still needs to be worked out

2:26:35of particular note is that the demolition of the existing Middle School is supposed to start soon is what he said he gave no specific calendar dates on that but they he said that they are accelerating it forward and I the um the park and rec commission will take up

2:27:04at their next meeting a recommendation to potentially uh discourage the demolition of the gymnasium that has gone through some retrofit so that that's something that's forthcoming from park and rec um the design review board met to review the sign up and passed the sign policy for

2:27:29Safeway and also they reviewed and provided comments on the recycling center and approved the majority of the recycling center for them to move forward so they could begin ordering their long lead items like the prefabricated buildings so um that's moving forward through our

2:27:49design review board the human relations commission met and essentially welcomed the the new commissioner Linda jolivette and had a great discussion about looking into the future activities for the year and they will be also looking into appointing new board and board or commission chair and vice

2:28:18chair and um and taking a step back to look at what their work plan will be for the year there was no meeting of the arts and culture commission at since the last time we met and with um the I recently just wanted to report going to the mayor's conference out in

2:28:37Concord where there was a presentation a panel presentation by this city of Concord city manager as well as Brentwood city manager and County Administrator David and it was a very interesting discussion about you know kind of tips from their perspective of you know

2:28:55with their Collective something like 160 years of experience or 50 some something north of 100 um what they felt like were were key kind of restructural budgeting tools that they were looking at in in the result of these economic times and it was really um good to see that there was a number

2:29:16of things that we're already doing everything from the budget models that factor out you know and look out forecasting over 10 years and um to you know the great great Partnerships with local community groups um you know when communities when cities were asking for help they were

2:29:33hearing that local community members and organizations were willing to step up and help helping to augment and so I think we're definitely seeing that here in our community as well as the joint efforts with joint use agreements with schools becoming more and more

2:29:50common and so I look forward to hearing more about our high school and potential you know adult gym opportunities that maybe the the community can partner with um and then with that the other thing I just wanted to to highlight in flag I don't have the exact details but at the

2:30:07West County mayor's meeting had continued discussions about you know amongst the the the four Mayors um what you know Redevelopment challenges everybody had definitely much more devastating in other cities um as bad as it is here it's still it seems even worse than other communities

2:30:28it's just a definitely a difficult time for all and um but the one other thing that came out of that was a very interesting presentation by McKinley Williams who's the president of the Contra Costa College and they're planning to go out for a bond issuance um out to the voters to essentially do a

2:30:46seismic retrofit fundraising of just the West County College District area that would go all the way all of the West County cities up to um rodeo and I think Crockett so they think they've pulled it and there's a lot lots of support but essentially it would help to to bring up to

2:31:06seismic safety a number of the buildings and one thing I didn't know about was Middle College it's a high school that actually is embedded within the Community College where high school students are drawn from around the region they when they graduate with a high school diploma they also get an AAA

2:31:22degree which is that was amazing and on top of that there these high school students are winning college national awards in journalism and biosciences and a number of other things I thought that was a really great treasure that we got to hear about so one to share with you

2:31:41um and with that I just wanted to request um maybe speaking of the the whole SCS process um if council member Abelson as our CCTA and WIC Tech rep um I I've heard that there's a number of processes getting forward to starting to identify um what Transportation projects should

2:32:00be look you know starting to create project lists for the next round of the regional transportation plan at MTC and that for the first time MTC is looking at um you know they had prior previously just projects that were obligated um were were just kind of rolled in and

2:32:18continued on in um and and now that we have this new rubric of policy framework they're opening up a number of projects that maybe historically would have just been rolled in but now they're they're willing to take a step back and re-analyze uh priorities and so so that

2:32:36I thought that was really interesting and I'm curious well what I know about it and there are a number of committees being worked on around um the art the RTP uh read the regional transportation plan I actually am on a one of those committees not through either of those agencies but just

2:32:54directly and the committee that I'm on is um involved in setting up the parameters for selection of projects so that actually addresses pretty right on what you're talking about um it's uh we're having the committee is having three meetings we've had two of them already and we'll have one more

2:33:17and then it's it's on the whole process of the RTP seems to be on a really fast track the rtps uh in the SCS are aligning as I understand it and um so the RTP is normally done in in the past it's been done every three years this year it will be four but they're

2:33:38trying to really align those two things at our last meeting one of the things that we discussed um was the role of the pdas the project development priority development areas and um it's a little unclear how that will move forward um because there was some concern from

2:33:58areas that don't have pdas that they would be left out in particular in the Santa Clara area so I there's no resolution of that but that's one of the discussion points um so it's a real interesting time a real busy time and they are really trying to move it fast for for that

2:34:16process again and I guess for that I guess where would you recommend that we give input and at what point um and if you could maybe follow up with I think actually there are any number of points I'm not sure that I know what they all are right now but I could um

2:34:30ask the next time I go to a meeting which is I think next week okay thank you very much okay with that I think we are adjourned until our next meeting excuse me Madam I'm sorry one Sky uh remind me of this I wanted to report out from our closed session um essentially that we took no action

2:34:52and that's we can now adjourn thank you foreign