Special City Council, Regular City Council and City Council Closed Session October 1, 2013

0:00:30good evening everyone uh thank you for coming this evening I'm going to call to order the uh let's see regular meeting of the city council of El Cerrito for Tuesday October 1st um let the records show that all five council members are present and that we will now take on item one

0:00:52the pledge of allegiance to the flag or observation of a moment of silence please join me thank you I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all

0:01:21we'll move on to item two which is uh Council and staff Communications have a number certainly do you need assistance yes please well while you're doing that I'm gonna I'm gonna start with one um when I was at the Contra Costa West County Contra Costa mayor's conference

0:01:43uh the city of San Pablo economic uh Development Corporation uh gave a presentation on removing barriers and one of the things that they're helping uh residents of San Pablo as well as any Resident in the East Bay or actually any Resident of California do is remove

0:02:02tattoos that might be a barrier to employment and they're also starting to um this week actually it was today they started a job Readiness training program so there is um cards like this out in the lobby of the city hall that advertise this subsidized treatment program to remove

0:02:27barriers including tattoos as well as job Readiness training now mayor Pro Town yes well I have a very special award to bring back from the league of California cities um and so I'd like to present it to the mayor on the for the city where's the camera here we go

0:02:47I don't know if we have a camera so what what this is is the beacon award you may remember we are a beacon City we have a little sticker out side somewhere that uh says so and this is a spotlight award and that is for having achieved one of the points that you have to do to

0:03:09be a full Beacon uh City and we got ours for Energy savings and um Melanie who I can't quite see right now there she is in that uh said because she was there too that we actually she thought had achieved all of them but we didn't turn anything in so um next year we'll have to turn

0:03:30everything in and then we will get the bigger award but this is actually pretty significant too there were not that many cities in the whole state of California that got one of these and so I would like to present it to the mayor on for our city and just so you can know for

0:03:48those of you who can't see it the board that it's presented on is actually a recycled board looks like a computer motherboard is what I know it as so it's kind of a special thing and um it was it was very nice and I want to especially thank Melanie for coming up

0:04:09um to the league of California cities for that uh ceremony and I also attended the um event that happened Sunday at the alberito street uh play fair and I was particularly uh pleased to see that we had what looked like Off the Grid trucks there so that we're incorporating them into our normal

0:04:35activities and that's a nice thing to see and it hopefully provided food and drink for people who might want them in that environment but what I mostly noticed about that was the large number of Little Feet doing various active physical activities so it was a really healthy activity the

0:04:57kids were riding bikes they were they had a um like a they had a rope thing and the kids were walking down the Rope long distances I was pretty impressed and um there were a lot a lot of ball playing all kinds of different sports activities so it was a very healthy

0:05:18event and we had um families from both El Cerrito and Albany so we ignored that border and just both crossed over and so that was really great and um let's see if there's anything else I wanted to mention I think um I think the rest of what I wanted to talk about is for later thank you great

0:05:41thank you councilmember Bridges councilmember benicini you've been any staff announcements all right with that we'll move on to item three which is oral Communications from the public this is reserved for the public to speak about items that are not on the agenda or are on the consent

0:06:00portion of the agenda um so new topics we allocate three minutes per speaker we do have a light system to help you stay within your three minutes green is go yellow is one minute remaining and red I will help you wrap things up um do we have any speakers tonight yes

0:06:22mayor we have four speaker slips the first is Al Miller foreign good evening mayor Lyman council members and staff you remember some weeks ago now off the grid came to El Cerrito in a very well-sought location I thought I missed the first one I was there for the second

0:06:46and the third one the second one I was there at I noticed an elderly gentleman trip on the curb in the median between uh I guess that's the Fairmont that goes down there or Carl said I don't know where they turn anyway if he hadn't had a cane he'd have gone down if you

0:07:07recollect the median it's like a curb and unfortunately the way it used to be the curb had nothing on you step on a curb and there's usually a sidewalk there well this was just a pit on the other side of the curb also there were old sprinklers sticking up and the third week they were there

0:07:30when I was there I saw a young girl trip and go down fortunately she didn't hit any of the other stuff she just kind of rolled in the sand and the dirt that was there I'm sure I wasn't the first and or the only one that came to the city and pointed out a hazard uh not knowing

0:07:48which of the Departments would be involved in that I talked to Susan yarler and asked her if she could call to the correct staff's attention uh that situation so someone can go out and evaluate it a couple of days ago I was down there on other business and I noticed that

0:08:07it had all been fixed and I just wanted to come and say thank you it probably been fixed for quite some time I just haven't noticed it until now I take it as another example of how fortunate we are here in El Cerrito to have a staff that actually listens to people when they ask him a question or

0:08:26when they make a suggestion and if it merits attention goes out and accomplishes it so I want to thank Susan and everyone else that she talked to that ended up getting it fixed thank you thank you next speaker please Liz block hi I don't know where the light's going to

0:08:47be that I need to look right in front there's a green one on right now that's a green light all right my name is Liz block I live at [address removed] and I've been in El Cerrito resident for over 30 years I've raised two kids here and I've been so happy about all the

0:09:04changes we've had in El Cerrito the pla past five years a wonderful Redevelopment along San Pablo our award-winning School Camps summer camps our recycling center and Off the Grid really really proud of Off the Grid in fact my kids live in Manhattan and I said well we've got off the grid here in

0:09:26El Cerrito so we're pretty cool here too I am here today to represent the voices of 250 parents who've signed these letters in support of a charter school here in El Cerrito these parents at 60 from El Cerrito but as you can see it's a big group of parents who were devastated to hear that the

0:09:55West Contra Costa Unified School District denied the request for Charter School here in El Cerrito and even had the audacity to say that this was because parents didn't want a charter school here in El Cerrito so these parents represent the parents who strongly want to have a middle and

0:10:19high school option Charter School here in El Cerrito at 1800 Elm and parents have been patient they've given the school district many opportunities to reform but as you can see from recent statistics our schools continue to fail here in West Contra Costa parents here don't care if there's go to

0:10:46district schools or Charter Schools they just want their children to attend good schools that are safe and where their children can learn I've been an educator for over 30 years I've been in elementary school principal at a transformation school been a special education administrator and a school

0:11:06psychologist and I really feel that I can with confidence support Summit charter schools for El Cerrito thank you great thank you where should I put these uh with the city clerk please Robin Mitchell um I wanted to let you all know that on um Sunday October 13th between 10 and 4 pm

0:11:40there's going to be a family field day and Community Forum at the guild tract in Albany at the bottom of Marin and um I don't know if you recall that that's the um where the occupy the farm movement happened last year and so as a result of that the University of California has

0:12:00given the UC Berkeley College of Natural Resources 10 acres there for 10 years to do Urban Agriculture and agroecology research projects on and so um one of the first projects that I'm participating in is 40 community members have been given plots there to grow this

0:12:21fall under the supervision of a professor at the University we're in teams of four there's ten plots 40 community members we're growing as much food as we can we're gonna see if we can even come close to what Cuba grows I don't think we're going to get there but

0:12:36that's our goal um so and much of the produce that we're growing there is being donated to people in need of fresh vegetables food banks and that sort of thing because there is so much coming off that land and so this is not this event on Sunday the 13th is an opportunity for the

0:12:54public to come and see what we've been doing and to think about what other projects could happen there and the organizers are really interested in having elected officials from the local cities come and see the project just to get a sense of what can what the possibilities are for urban agriculture

0:13:10in in the city environment and so I would um encourage all of you to come to that event and I have Flyers that I'll pass out and the thing that I've really realized from growing food on that land is it is very special lands I have grown you know tried to have food garden

0:13:29vegetable gardens in lots of different places in the East Bay and nothing has ever grown the way it does there and I think it's the natural fertility of that soil because it's an alluvial plane and it's also been well tended by the researchers that had been working it and

0:13:44stuff just grows like three times bigger than it will in any of our Gardens and it shows to to me that it's it's classified as class one agricultural soil which is about the best soil you can get and you that that kind of soil should be used to grow food so thank you what time uh 10 o'clock it

0:14:04starts it's um there's a schedule on this flyer so 10 to noon is open field day then noon to one they're going to serve lunch with food grown off the tract and then two to four they're going to have a community Forum to sort of Envision what could happen on the land

0:14:19in the future great thank you very much our next speaker is Virginia duplessis Virginia if you would pronounce your name for us that'd be great my name is Virginia duplessis I live here in [address removed] which is Northwest tip of El Cerrito and I'm actually here tonight

0:14:47to also lend my words of support for the summit Charter School at the old one dress campus I can't remember what the address is so I could go on and on I only have three minutes to talk about why I'm so excited about the potential to have Summit here and I'll just focus on two small points one

0:15:06is as a resident as a homeowner in El Cerrito uh my husband and I bought our house 13 years ago we didn't even know what where El Cerrito was until our realtor started showing us and now we love this little city and we are committed to living here and really improving it and as you know especially

0:15:26in our end of El Cerrito we've had some issues with empty buildings so we are excited to have a viable vibrant option in the old Windrush site I know there has been some concern about traffic but as someone who drives through that intersection a lot and remembers when it was a school before it

0:15:46was never a problem so traffic for our neighborhood it's not a concern there and then the other piece um is really just as a parent you know I have an 11 year old she's going to be in seventh grade next year so having the opportunity to send her to this new Innovative public school is just a great

0:16:08opportunity I think it's a great um example that El Cerrito could set by welcoming new and exciting Public School options to our community so thank you thank you no other speakers with that will conclude that item and move on to item four uh we do have three presentations uh today uh one is the

0:16:32first one will be a presentation by Maisha Harris executive director for Girls Inc of West Contra Costa County good evening mayor city council members and audience thank you for allowing Girls Inc of West Contra Costa County to present its services and programs to you

0:16:58I am Aisha Harris the executive director for this agency and am committed as our board of directors staff and volunteers are to inspiring all girls to be strong smart and bold part of a National Organization whose roots are a century and a half strong growth Inc of West Contra Costa County

0:17:19has served over 6 000 youth in the county county in nearly 40 years through life-changing programs and experiences we help girls navigate gender economic and social barriers research-based curriculum delivered by train mentoring Professionals in a positive all-girl environment equip

0:17:42girls to achieve academically lead healthy and Physically Active lives manage money navigate media messages and discover an interest in science technology engineering and math we are coming to El Cerrito to bring our effective after-school programs and stem economic literacy leadership and

0:18:04Community Action and college preparedness to girls ages 6 to 18.

0:18:10we appreciate your support and the opportunity to share about our services with this community I now would like to present to you a couple of our young ladies who will speak about their experience with Girls Inc Mr Mayor and City Council Members my name is Bree Allen and I am 16 years old

0:18:37I live in Richmond and I'm in the 12th grade at Cal prep in Berkeley I have been involved in Girls Inc for the past three years I am currently a college-bound girl and hope to attend either Stanford or University of Pennsylvania my participation With Girls Inc has helped me to learn about

0:18:55scholarships why college is important what the difference is between a career and a job and lastly be more assertive with my educational Journey I believe that being a part of Girls Inc and college-bound girls has given me more confidence determination self-motivation patience and made me

0:19:16more people oriented when I say people oriented I mean to think more about how I can help others in my career and less about the money in conclusion Girls Inc of West County has helped me gain confidence to be successful in my future career as an FBI agent thank you thank

0:19:37you thank you good evening my name is Mia Harris I attend nclc which is Nia Community Learning Center which is a charter school at Al in Alameda I am currently in the 11th grade and I've been in Girls Inc for three years now I've been a college round girl and through college

0:19:57Bongo I've learned to start dressing for Success I've been doing public speaking such as this example as itself I've been granted lots of college opportunities by getting scholarships or applying for scholarships which I'm applying for one right now and going to colleges and

0:20:12seeing everything that I'm going to be uh excuse me everything that I'm going to be getting used to when I go into my college year I have also been into other extracurricular activities such as the yeah Business program at Cal Berkeley and I believe it I believe that Cal I believe that girls

0:20:32zinc and the college fund girls program has helped me win my actual first case through the business study by teaching me how to do public speaking speaking which I'm still learning how to do as you can see now and I'm very excited to be in the College of on girls program

0:20:46thank you thank you so next we just want to show a very brief PowerPoint presentation of some of the activities that we have done with our young ladies and we also offer programming in the elementary middle school and high school and okay take your time oh can everybody hear me now okay the

0:21:24program manager and I'm just show you some events that we've done just from the summer until now we participated in the Ace baseball game the breast cancer awareness day and we had about almost 20 girls come and help serve the breast cancer survivors at the A's game they we

0:21:43were able to register them provide them with meals just greet them and just make them feel really special on that day and it was a wonderful community service opportunity for our girls we were able to we also passed out the balloons and made sure they felt fired

0:22:01up as they went out on the field even one of our own board members was a breast cancer survivor and she was surprised there to be a part participant and she's actually here tonight miss Vicki Winston and the ladies were just wonderful they had nothing but nice words to say about us and hopefully

0:22:21we'll be invited back next year and the girls had a really great time doing it and afterwards they were able to go and sit and wine watch the game and that's Vicki right there with strength and that's them all on the field and they release the balloons it's a very

0:22:39wonderful day this is our Kinders fundraiser given by a female motorcycle club called Night Riders and this happened in Concord and they raised money for our organization you were able anytime you bought something from Kinder's for I think it was about three days they donated about 10 percent to

0:22:59our organization and they had a bike night at this particular Kinders where we were able to go and it was like a huge party we got to see stunts being done and dancing and hanging out with the DJ and Mia was able to get on the mic and DJ a little bit so it was a

0:23:17great time and we are also able to get on their bikes we couldn't ride them but we were able to pose and get on their bikes it was a good thing that's our president of the board and um the girls again about four or five girls came out and helped support this event

0:23:36yeah Maisha and that's this wonderful woman she saw what we were doing there and she donated 500 on the spot so it was just a great event um this is our that was our um Nevin Center we were also at Booker T Washington delivering program and also at the Richmond recreational center this

0:23:59past summer and again the night writers came and allowed the girls to get on the bike and test it out and take pictures but we delivered like our stem programming our media literacy and and everything this is the Alameda Girls Inc grand opening they opened a new building

0:24:19in Downtown Oakland area a five-story building state of the art equipped with a gym and um kitchen and it's it's just phenomenal and these are their city council people we also participated in the juneteen festival which is at nickel Park every year our girls also did another

0:24:39community service they helped with the hamster balls and the game shows so that's just some of the events that we did just from the summer till now great thank you very much that will conclude our presentation unless you have questions for us questions yeah can you talk about how many girls

0:25:00are currently in the program I see that you have 6 000 that you've served in West County over the decades how many do you have involved now we currently are in I believe seven schools and one Recreation Center we have about 20 girls at each site so about one 60 160 right now our goal is to serve

0:25:19365 youth for this school year right so I the question I had has to do with um how at what age do the girls enter the program do they stay with the program if they're interested through high school graduation or how does that all work most of the girls do we try to be in as many schools as we

0:25:42can following the girls from age six as they go through middle school and transition into high school we have a college-bound growth program that's specifically Geared for 9th through 12th and once they graduate high school we also offer them a ceremony for graduating our program

0:25:58great thank you very much thank you and have a good evening thank you we'll move on to item 4B which is an arts and culture commission update on the San Pablo Avenue art project uh presentation will be by Suzanne ireola [Music] good evening mayor and council members

0:26:48my name is Suzanne erla I'm the community outreach specialist and I also am the arts and culture commission staff liaison I'm here tonight to celebrate the completion of the San Pablo Avenue public art project not very good with the remote apparently I think the white one's been proven to

0:27:14not work I'm just gonna I'll sit down here oh no there's a black one coming part of the city's San Pablo Avenue streetscape program the city issued a call to artists for public art that would support the goals of the streetscape improvements and provide color and continuity along the length of

0:27:43the Avenue the city received 17 proposals from across the nation and in 2009 after a competitive selection process the husband wife team of sayori ede and Jonathan Russell were selected and the artists spent the next two years working with the arts and culture commission first on their original

0:28:03design for two-dimensional metal sculptures and later at the request of the commission an alternate design that was for more abstract three-dimensional sculptures all that work culminated in March of 2012 when the arts and culture commission approved the proposal

0:28:25entitled 12 wind sculptures the artist then went to work fabricating these sculptures and I'm happy to report that all of the sculptures have been installed along the length of the Avenue specifically there are two at the south end of town there are two near City Hall

0:28:45there are three near the Potrero Avenue intersection I'm sorry there are two near the Potrero Avenue intersection three near Safeway in the Del Norte BART station and two at the north end of town I would like to invite arts and culture commission chair Nancy Donovan to come

0:29:03up and speak to you for a moment and then the artists are here to give a presentation and they have a brief movie as well Nancy hi my name is Nancy Donovan I'm the chair of the arts and culture commission and have been on the commission since about 2008 and I'm just really excited

0:29:23that the sculptures are up and want to thank the city council and the city for their support and um ask if you have any questions about the project or maybe we should wait until after so thank you for being supportive of Art in El Cerrito it's uh it's made it's

0:29:40been a long process and we look forward to having more and more art in the city of El Cerrito thank you thank you well we've got like an hour and a half presentation and then we're gonna um as long as we as long as we can see how each one was fabricated I'm I can

0:30:01sit through an hour and a half it's a feature film is what you're saying yeah it's a feature film um and it does show you a little bit we were hesitant to do it but we did put a little bit about how some of them were fabricated you'll see a few fabrication pictures fantastic

0:30:16um but I think really what we want to say is uh how great this experience has been with the city of El Cerrito we've worked and do work with a lot of cities doing public art um and if you're artists commiserating together you're always talking about what a nightmare it is

0:30:34but this actually has been really great I have to say Karen and Suzanne have been unbelievable in facilitating and keeping the communication up and that really is where it's you always have the breakdown is where the communication between the artists the art commission the city council that

0:30:55whole thing and it's gone very well it wasn't easy there were some some uh there was a long process but the art commission was great we finally came together we hammered it out and I think the end solution was fabulous it was fun for us so I think she agrees um but it was great so and I have to say

0:31:23one thing was really good was that we we practically live in El Cerrito I mean our kids go to school here we they go to Japanese school they we play on the soccer teams here we go shopping here I mean everything we do is in El Cerrito so um we sort of feel it's it's like our

0:31:40town as well thank you next door neighbors we didn't know which side of the uh the tug of war for the Albany El Cerrito tug of war we didn't know which side to get on it was a tough decision and luckily it broke the string broke um so we'll show you this movie and if

0:31:59you guys have any questions we'd love to answer them thank you [Music] thank you we thought art monk would be a nice addition yes foreign [Music] football player yeah never mind I'm watching too much football have you been able to get them all balanced so they'll perform the way you

0:33:01expected them to uh that's a great question and the answer is yes but there's a few that need tweaking and we'll talk about that afterwards [Music] a bigger next thing you know when you do public art when you do it it looks huge and you bring it outside it disappears

0:33:34these don't disappear I can tell you that I I can see them whenever I'm driving in the Avenue so great well I'll tell you we are not very intimate with the winds and they are really different down the street different really some places are more windy than others

0:34:20have you named each one ha that's not a fair question we will we'll tell you what we decided at the end I haven't seen that one yet where's that one posted this by the Home Depot it's right there yeah it's right there look at that we'll find that one tomorrow here's the wind

0:35:46[Music] thank you [Music] foreign no and you see this one here that we actually installed this one again today this morning it is uh it's quite copper because we quite we at first wanted them to weather because we thought that would be really nice but we've fallen in love

0:36:41with the copper look we really quite like it so we've now have sealed um to answer your question about the titles what happens was that when people see them they come up with their own interpretation like I was when he was just asking about uh we were installing it with st Alex I think was

0:37:07one of the guys helping us and he goes hey man it's a kidney a heart and a lung right and that's what I saw right so we loved that part of being able to come up with your own interpretation I mean we don't dare say this but the LA the the one that we polished you know our kids

0:37:24call it the lollipops and so in other words we what we wanted to do is leave them basically Untitled so everybody can come up with their own interpretation oh that's the one and they have whatever they think it is and not sort of guide them to a an imagery that we don't

0:37:41you know we don't want them to know about it and then you do we're shacking an analysis after they come exactly right the way right right um but the other question that you asked was about the the Turning mechanism we if they're balanced the balance they are and we but we do want to take down I

0:38:03think what's that I guess we'll be taking down five of them so over a period of the next whenever whenever we work it out we will pull down probably two at a time we're going to do some adjustments on them and put them back up just a congratulations it's been a great

0:38:24result I think after after what as you spoke of a long and winding road but I think a long and winding road to the to the right destination it's just a question for staff there's been all these rumors around town that they're getting stolen as you all are taking

0:38:36them down and repairing them just to confirm there have been no attempts to steal the art no vandalism or anything like that great thank you and I'll Echo uh it's a fantastic beautiful art installation and I want to thank the Art Council Nancy on as chair if you could take that message back and

0:38:57Suzanne and Karen for your efforts um protracted efforts over the from the beginning just and this is actually as beautiful as anyone could ask for a public art project so thank you thank you thank you thank you and I think it does a lot to symbolize what um the arts and culture

0:39:17commission and the one percent for art was all about when we created it in that these are all individual unique pieces and they're on our Avenue and I think they are to me what they represent is a statement about El Cerrito and that statement is that we can be our

0:39:40own entity and it's a good entity and I and I really like what you've done in this work thank you that's great you know I I have to say with the Arts commission Nancy she stuck to her guns and she in other words we went back and forth about exactly that issue what was this project

0:39:58about and how would it address you know exactly what the city was looking for and it was good I mean it was a it was a real dialogue that went back and forth and really the commission really did push us in that direction so you know hats off it was great thank you well I'd

0:40:18like you to say a few more things which is really great that it's October 1st um Arts month in the city of El Cerrito the sculptures will be up all month long as far as I understand they will um and as the arts and culture commission goes forward through the city

0:40:31in the city of El Cerrito um really wanting to continue a dialogue about what the community wants as far as funding um what kind of programming I'm we'll be talking about possibly doing some kind of a survey I like the idea of Arts uh Artisan residence in the schools as a

0:40:49possibility but um this is just like a really great celebratory thing arts and culture congrats to everyone cool thank you guys [Applause] and with that uh I I don't know who's giving this is it is Nancy are you going to come up and say some words about item 4C which is Arts and Humanities month

0:41:18Proclamation you look like you didn't even know it was on the agenda because Andrew said it was about getting a picture taken so oh yes it is it is just about giving it let me go ahead and uh introduce this item it's item 4C uh it is a recognition and support for the

0:41:36October 2013 uh supporting the month of October as National Arts and Humanities month in El Cerrito um so some of the key ones in here whereas the month of October has been recognized as National Arts and Humanities month where Arts and Humanities contribute towards cross-cultural understanding and

0:41:56enhance the quality of life the arts and culture commission Works to encourage and promote Arts programs and events and has created a poster and web page of Arts related events happening in El Cerrito this month now therefore the city of count the city council of El Cerrito uh hereby declares

0:42:16October the Arts and Humanities month in El Cerrito and encourages all members of the community to celebrate and promote the arts and culture in our nation and to encourage community members to participate patronize and support the Arts and Humanities in El Cerrito so

0:42:34with that can I get a motion to pass this spell move second we've had emotions been made seconded all those in favor say hi hi opposed or abstentions let the records show that this Proclamation will pass unanimously and I am signing it and now it's photo time that brings us to our uh that concludes

0:43:24item four and brings us to item five adoption of the consent calendar move adoption of the consent calendars item uh 5A minutes for approval 5B classification plan Amendment which is about revising the class specification of permit technician and C which is the

0:43:43annual Natty act local appointment list um which has a listing of all current and board and commission members whose terms will expire on January 1st of next year 2014 and also various vacancy information for each board commission and committee a second um before we move this forward I just

0:44:11want to anybody who is at home or even in the audience here who is interested in becoming a volunteer for our community there are opportunities on almost every boarding commission so hopefully it is something you will consider with that we have a motion and a second

0:44:28all those in favor please say aye aye aye opposed abstentions let the records show that passed unanimously um that does bring us to item eight we have no public hearing or policy matters this evening so we will move down to item eight which is Council assignments

0:44:45liaison reports I see council member Bridges looks like she's prepared to I am um entertain us okay [Music] the Parker Rock commission met on Wednesday September 25th um items on the agenda included a discussion of the remainder of the um is your WWE funds and what they may

0:45:12choose to do with that money [Applause] um at the meeting it was decided to wait for the completion of the urban Greening plan and considers 20 projects or priority projects that'll probably end up coming out of that um there was also um the umbrella joint use agreement between

0:45:30West Contra Costa district and the city of El Cerrito was reviewed uh Chris Jones gave a pretty complete presentation on that this will be coming to city council and um I there was a little bit of discussion they did approve it and we'll move it on to us I did hand out to you

0:45:53two handouts that um regarding some of the fees that were are now being incurred this um invoice that was presented to you is from the soccer uh sucker group and this was I just wanted to point out that they're spending almost six thousand dollars for 11 reservations

0:46:23under this use agreement um we the way this agreement is structured is that we probably won't be paying so much for the field use this is the turf field this is the one at the high school it's it's not the sodded field what we're really paying for is the custodium

0:46:42correct and um one of the things I want to point out to you is that there's a fee structure that's the second sheet of paper and because this is 10 and a half hours and because this is on a weekend I think there it's incurring over time for their staff which is why these fees are so high

0:47:02so I just you know it was a little surprising to me and I wanted to make sure that Council will is aware of this I think staff when you bring this forward to us and I think that there's probably also going to be a mem is there going to be a memorandum an mou that's going to come out of this for

0:47:19a long for long term use maybe not um not not necessarily but anyway whenever whenever this gets it brings to council um is it going to be the next meeting I didn't know when it was agendized yet it's just something that I think we need to make very clear that we we know what

0:47:38this this uh agreement involves um I also wanted to point out that for all you trick-or-treaters out there Halloween's coming up in the community center is again having their um I guess it's the Halloween haunted house there's a scary version and a non-scary version the non-scary version starts for

0:47:58the younger children around 2 30 on Halloween and at 4 30 the haunted house for older children will take place they also have a costume dog parade that's going to be at Cerrito Vista Park and I think check-in is at 4 30 and the parade starts at five we're little animals we're a little Halloween

0:48:16costumes and they will also do their trunk and treat which they've done in the past but haven't done for a couple years um also the joint Powers agreement GPA met and that was on the 18th of September you as you know that the turf field down at the Bates field needs replacement

0:48:46there will be a user's meeting on October 15th for all the users of those fields there is a proposal to have a fee increase of about 36 percent to those users starting the fiscal year of 2014 through 2017 it'll be across the board increases for Youth and adults

0:49:13and we'll continue putting in our agreed fifteen thousand dollars for the cities um not really clear how this is going to go over with the user groups um but it's a proposal that the jpa has put forth to the user so we'll we'll have to see how it's received on the

0:49:3318th that's all I had to report great thank you councilmember Abelson yes I have um several things I recently last week attended the East Bay division meeting and what we did at that meeting as we do once a year is to invite members of the Chamber of Commerce from each of our

0:49:53local Chambers to come and attend and so I um ask our chamber president who was unable to attend because she was away on vacation but we did have three people from the our local chamber come one was the executive director of the chamber Mark Scott our prior Fire

0:50:18Chief and also our immediate past president John Stasek and Marilyn um Hanson I think is the last name and um so they all came and we had a it was really interesting we had some really good discussions the table that I was at uh which turned out to be a West County

0:50:39table of three different cities and representative so it was kind of a nice opportunity for us to um just talk to each other get to know each other and find out a little bit more about what we had in common and and I think it helps to be able to work with our um sister cities in our region when

0:50:58we have activities like that so it was a really helpful event this year and I did attend the league of California cities but I'm not really sure I need to do an AV 1234 report because I had no expenses to report can you answer that question this guy if you received no

0:51:19compensation from the city for attendance then you do not need to make an ab12 okay I will not be but I will just note that I did attend I arrived at midnight and there was no room in the Inn for me um so I stayed in someone else's room on a cot and um the next night was comp because the

0:51:39hotel realized the error of their ways and I would use this opportunity to tell people to be really careful when you go somewhere and arrive late at night that in fact there is a place for you to stay that was first time I had ever had such a bad experience but anyway the league

0:51:59event itself I think was really successful and I was especially pleased that we were able to receive a beacon award although next year I'm planning on receiving the beacon award and I think we will we deserve it um so um I also wanted to mention about WIC Tac and CCTA what's happening

0:52:20because actually a lot is happening with WIC Tac is going through a period of becoming its own agency we've previously um done everything through the city of San Pablo and becoming our own agency means um moving our Calpers into our own agency and so we're going through the

0:52:41process so at our last meeting we took some action to make that happen um and it's basically what I would call technical stuff that we have to get everything into place we have to specify who we are organizationally and so we're going through that process right now but

0:52:59what we would like to do besides conforming to those requirements is to be able to hire a new executive director and we don't feel that we're able to do so without having that issue resolved but it's well on its way to being resolved right now and we do have actually a an announcement out

0:53:19for an opening for our new executive director to be and that closes I think um somewhere around the 10th of October I'm not quite sure of the exact date but so if you know of anybody who you think would be appropriate for running a small agency in Western Contra Costa County

0:53:36that deals with Transportation then please contact WIC attack and let me give you a phone number here um let's see I don't know if it is here um so perhaps the best thing to do would be to contact somebody at the city of El Cerrito who would that be Scott Cheryl

0:54:05okay Cheryl Morris at um 215-4305 thank you and we'll get you the information about it or if you know of somebody who would be good at doing that moving on to CCTA I'd like to tell you about some of the things that have been going on recently and are about to happen because it's a pretty exciting

0:54:28time and if you remember Contra Costa Transportation Authority or CCTA is all about a sales tax major it's called major J currently and CCTA is also the congestion management Agency for the county so we um oversee the congestion management function I this year am the chair of

0:54:52CCTA so I've been going to all of the events that happen or at least as many of them as I can because some of them are at the same time so um one of the local ones here was the Intermodal Transit Center located up in Hercules and it actually had a groundbreaking for its first phase and

0:55:14that's a project that Hercules envisions as really making its Community come alive and doing so using um rail fairies a bicycle path and a bus bus access so all of those things would come together and if if you've ever been on the Capitol Corridor and you go through

0:55:38and you see where Hercules is there's a bunch of interesting looking houses kind of overlooking the bay that's where that will be it's called the I they call it the ITC for short now Intermodal Transit Center so we had a um a groundbreaking for the bike path I think I may have

0:55:57mentioned that before here so that was something that had a lot of significance because it represents um dirt actually moving as opposed to this planning process is going on in eastern Contra Costa County they have a different dream and their dream is that they want to reduce the congestion on

0:56:17the roadway so I I kind of think of going to Brentwood as you go to the end of the two-lane road and then you turn left and if care I don't know if Karen's still around but she remembers doing that with me I think and um that's been very much the way it's been out there

0:56:33which is just unbelievably congested so what they have done is uh develop or developing interchanges on Highway 4 and um The Interchange enables the traffic to flow once it's completed in a more orderly fashion so that there isn't all of that delay and do remember that delay

0:56:54causes air pollution because the longer the car is sitting out there on the road the more pollution there is so anyway that we opened um or we you know we opened the one that's what's called Sand Creek out in Brentwood recently um let's see in another West County

0:57:13project that you may be seeing signs of these days is the um the um it's a it's a intelligent um and tell it it's a project that uses um intelligent excuse me intelligent means for accomplishing what is usually accomplished with uh moving dirt and building roads what we'll be doing with

0:57:44the um this project is the um is putting in um signs that tell passengers in a car when it's getting too crowded on I-80 and it will direct them off the freeway and then the second part is to direct them back on the freeway when whatever the problem was is behind you so to speak in

0:58:11addition to that there will be um some ramp metering but it won't be the old style ramp metering where everybody just kind of Waits this will be a an intelligent kind of ramp metering that will detect who is waiting on the ramp is it a bunch of cars is it one car is it no

0:58:32cars is it a bus buses will get special treatment priority treatment and the the concept of the whole thing is to move the vehicles on the roadway in a more intelligent way without actually building any extra lanes and at a relatively low cost for such projects so

0:58:55it's very state of the art um and um we you know you probably are starting to see signs of construction and if you see something at different interchanges or whatever that may be what you're seeing so just to explain that and then the last thing I want to mention is the

0:59:16fourth Board of the Caldecott Tunnel as you probably know there's a tunnel going between Oakland and Orinda called the Caldecott Tunnel and it has three three roadways sets and each one or one of those roadway sets can be changed in terms of which direction it moves and it is and that's done so

0:59:43pretty much every day what we'll have with a fourth board is the ability to just have two each way which is the way a normal roadway is and this is one of the largest uh projects of its type that is to say a tunnel in the United States so it's actually a really big deal

1:00:04and it's coming in under budget which is also a very nice deal unfortunately the one bad thing about it is that the state having given us the money because the price appeared to them to be under took away the money and it was needed for another segment so we do have a shortfall in money even

1:00:27though we're under budget and so we're working on finding ways to um cover that so those are kind of some of the highlights of some of the things that are going on right now in our County and what they all will result in when we're done is actually bringing the um

1:00:49what the voters voted for with major J to completion in probably about four to five years of a 25-year measure so we're getting all of the the big projects done and I didn't even by the way mention ebart out in eastern Contra Costa County which which will bring an extension to

1:01:10the Barts using different Technologies that'll be next year so um anyway so there's a lot happening it's pretty exciting and um there's a lot of people who have done a lot of really good work thank you all right thank you um what Suzanne did not mention in her presentation is in honor of Arts and

1:01:36Humanities month the commission has produced a really nice flyer which I think copies are available here but it details a lot of the Arts events that are happening this month and just gives you a sense of how culturally culturally Rich our community is not just every

1:01:53October during Arts month but every month is that available on our website yes it is go to the website great thank you councilmember benassini great I'll report on Fab and planning Fab met uh last week and had a discussion session on liquidity of the city and that was something of great

1:02:14interest to the members as we're starting to now use um the the temporary financing that we've been using this year and last year so they wanted to discuss liquidity and what other cities are doing no action was taken just sort of a discussion a a preliminary discussion they're going to

1:02:31have another discussion later on as more examples are brought in they also discussed uh that also led into the reserve policy as another point of discussion of to what extent are other cities using Reserve cash or not using Reserve cash so it was just sort of a

1:02:46broad far-reaching uh discussion that resulted in we need to have more discussion and this is a thing we're going to wrestle with the whole year so it was very interesting and all the members were extremely engaged so I think they're looking forward to having a complete board but the four members

1:03:02who are there are extremely strong um I the Planning Commission met and I want to pass around Eden housing's latest proposal as well as their draft eir it's nothing nothing like a visual um so the Planning Commission had a study session on the project and the draft eir uh no dis decisions were

1:03:22reached but there was they heard from the public and the Commissioners also gave some pretty detailed comments and questions with regard to the whole range of the project as you might imagine I I counted eight speakers from the public who came and nearly all of them spoke

1:03:39about the mabuchi house there were a couple of speakers who also spoke about uh views and making sure the annex was included in the in the um in the notifications of these sorts of meetings so there were a couple speakers who wanted to point that out but most folks

1:03:55talked about the mabuchi building and specifically the use that's proposed by Eden you might not be able to tell by the drawings but the use um and Eden discussed how in terms of their financing they have restrictions on what they can use the money for it has to be related to affordable housing

1:04:11so the use they're proposing is to rehabilitate the building and do a number of items to commemorate the history of the building and the site but ultimately it will be a building for the residents that would be a fitness room and also a storage area for for bicycles

1:04:28so there was a lot of discussion about that and what's an appropriate use and many of the Commissioners gave some alternate ideas for for what the building might be used for you can also discuss their pretty aggressive schedule they're looking to they would need two row two rounds of

1:04:45funding in order to meet what I recall I believe it was a three million dollar three or five million dollars I don't remember exactly it was but they have a deficit between the amount of money they believe they'll get from tenants and the amount of costs that they have in the

1:05:00building and they need to have a funding mechanism from the state that would bridge that Gap so they would have to go through two rounds of funding one at the end of this year the other in Spring of next year with the idea being that by fall of 2014 they would break ground

1:05:13they recognize this as extremely aggressive but it does it would coincide with those rounds of funding if they miss those two then they'd have to have to hit a third one and there it was a it was a great meeting and I think all the Commissioners really appreciated these

1:05:26sorts of study sessions before a big project comes for their approval so um they were they were glad that all of the developers and the public came and they got to hear all the concerns have a discussion about it before they had to have a vote so that was sort of the main

1:05:40Planning Commission item I wanted to report on great um since we last met uh or we I have to I'm going to alert you that um councilmember Friedman and I have met with regards to the commission and committee rules and subcommittee and we are working towards a presentation

1:06:02in October November a working session on some of the things that uh staff has pulled together and and some of the discussions we've had the West County Mayors and supervisors met and the main item I already reported on was the removing barriers project that Sam Pavel Economic Development has

1:06:21done and uh that really is all I have to report on um with that we will adjourn the regular regular scheduled city council meeting of October 1st until Tuesday October 15th and we will convene a special city council closed session this is the opportunity for oral Communications so

1:06:47I'm reek meaning us this is the opportunity for oral Communications from the public the topic that we will be taking up in closed session is public employee performance evaluation for the city manager do we have any public speakers I know I have no request to speak seeing

1:07:06none we will move to our Chambers we're out of these Chambers can we do it here