Special and Regular City Council Meeting October 17, 2023

0:00:06Okay, mia, we are ready to begin whenever you are. Thank you. City clerk.

0:00:11The October seventeenth, 2023 regular city council meeting is called to order at 6. So 5 PM. Will the city clerk please call roll

0:00:21council member for Delhi. We have a quorum.

0:00:32The first item on the agenda is consideration under, and we do not have any requests because we are all here.

0:00:41Okay. The next item is the pledge of allegiance. Please join me in the pledge of allegiance or a moment of silence.

0:00:49I, you know.

0:00:53and to the Republicans

0:01:09the next item is teleconference and public comment instructions.

0:01:15Thank you, Mayor. This hybrid meeting provides an option to participate in person, or via Zoom with closed captions. Available meetings of the City Council are subject to the Brown Act, and are held for the purpose of conducting city business. The Brown Act also ensures the public's right to be heard, and while city council is not able to respond to your comments directly your comments will be heard prior to council taking action

0:01:37for members of the public who wish to provide oral testimony, the mayor will announce the time for public comment on each applicable item. Public comments will only be taken in person, and a request to speak can be submitted to the city clerk by completing a speaker card.

0:01:51The Council's adopted rules of order and procedures specify that public speakers address the city Council in an orderly and respectful manner, proceed their comments with their name and city of residence, and be respectful of time limits. Thank you, Mayor, that concludes my instructions. Thank you. City clerk.

0:02:07The next item on the agenda is Council staff communications, and I would like to take a moment to comment on current events that affect so many of us.

0:02:17This week our hearts are broken by the unprecedented massacre of Israeli citizens by Hamas. As this conflict unfolds, we know that there will be more casualties, including innocent civilians in Gaza and Israel. We are here to support the many members of our community who have family and friends in the region. Please know our thoughts are with you during this tragic time.

0:02:38Now I would like to give Mayor Protem Rudnick an opportunity to address this as well.

0:02:44Thank you, Mayor, and I wrote a few little notes, because I will have to hold it together, since this is

0:02:52not easy. as your Jewish council member, and the only Jewish municipal elected in West County. I must express my profound sorrow and heartbreak over the recent tragic and horrific events in Israel and Gaza.

0:03:06These are personal for me. Children who I saw playing in Carazo only a few months ago, are now among the horrific images seen around the world

0:03:15as we mourn the loss of innocent lives, and actively work towards peace for all in better ways. Let us remember that El Cerrito is a safe and inclusive community. We celebrate our diversity, we respect one another and have compassion for those who are suffering.

0:03:35We must not let racism, anti-semitism, and Islamophobia enter the conversation.

0:03:42We must not let algorithms determines one's empathy for compassion, for peace and humanity.

0:03:49To quote Rabbi Daniel Ruttenberg. We will not get anywhere by vemming entire nations of people.

0:03:57We can remember that Hamas is not the Palestinian people, and that Netanyahu are not all Israelis.

0:04:05The only way home is a doggy refusal to let anyone be dehumanized.

0:04:11I am sending with deepest support to the Israeli, Palestinian, Muslim, and Jewish communities. Here in El Cerrito and around the world, and here we pray for peace. Thank you.

0:04:25Thank you, Mayor Prartan Rudnick.

0:04:28Now I'll go to City Manager. Do you have any staff communications?

0:04:33Karen Pinkos (City Manager): Thank you, your honor and thank you both. Mayor Mayor. Pretend for those profound words.

0:04:42Anyway. I'm Karen Pincus. I'm your city manager.

0:04:46I'm attending from Michigan this evening. And here caring for my mother, who had surgery yesterday. She's doing fine. She's home now, resting, but I do wanna thank the city Council and our city staff team for your support.

0:04:58so that I can be here to take care of my mom.

0:05:02I'd also like to start off by addressing something that happened at the last City Council meeting.

0:05:06where I was attending remotely with the assistant City manager, and unfortunately I am muted. The Zoom, during a conversation between us and some comments were able to be heard.

0:05:15I did apologize at that meeting, but I would like to apologize again. It was a snippet of a conversation that was caught on a hot mic at a very unfortunate moment. although I do wanna provide some context that the comments were not directed at any staff council member or member of the public.

0:05:31However, it was a mistake, and I regret it, and I do apologize to staff counsel, and any one that heard it.

0:05:37I take full responsibility for the mistake I've taken actions to ensure. This won't happen again, and once again. I'm sorry that it did happen

0:05:46next. I would like to highlight that the city has been working hard on our strategic plan

0:05:50for the future. The update process over the last several months. We've held many focus groups. We've collected data from surveys as well as got a lot of great feedback, and we will now be bringing everything to the City Council at a workshop on Saturday, October 20, eighth, beginning at 90'clock.

0:06:07At that meeting the Council will review all the work done to date. We'll review their mission, vision and values. And I know a lot of things that we'd be talking about even tonight will be will come up at that meeting.

0:06:19And we'll begin to formulate the goals and strategies for the updated plan. So I'm excited about this update. I'm excited about the future, and I do look forward to seeing everyone on October 20, eighth.

0:06:30And with that, your honor, thank you again. And that concludes my remarks.

0:06:34Thank you. City manager. Are there any announcements from the council members? Okay.

0:06:41yeah, yeah. Thank you. Mayor Motoyama.

0:06:45I wanted to also speak about what has transpired in the Middle East as someone who has visited the Holy Land.

0:06:54twice as a member of the Board of Directors of a wider bridge that supports the US. Position when it comes to the 2 state solution there in Israel and Palestine. I'm just heartbroken about what's going on there. There are

0:07:11people held hostage there from different countries, even in Thailand, India, Philippines, and other countries around the world. So this is something that we're watching very, very closely.

0:07:26I have growing up here in El Cerrito. I've always had friends from the Jewish community, and later on in life, friends from

0:07:38Palestine, and I have met with elected officials in Palestine and in Israel. So we truly believe in this two-state solution. We want peace, and as a board member for wider bridge that truly believes in the two-state solution. We need peace in the Holy Land, and I pray for that. So just wanted to let residents know of our close ties with Israel and with Palestine. Thank you.

0:08:09Councilman, thank you so much. I wanted to first mentioned that the El Sr. Branch of the Naacp is having a luncheon on Sunday. They may be sold out. I do not know, but I know we have members of our Inwacp in the audience. I know they would love to join. He could join them if they do have tickets available from 2 to 5 at the Berkeley Country Club. But I also wanted to address, because, unfortunately, we had some transportation issues here in the Bay Area last

0:08:35last Council meeting, and I was unfortunately very late. I'm so sorry about that. But I just wanted to. Publicly on the record was my dismay that we have gone ahead and dismantled and taken out people's ability to to virtually participate in my council meetings, and I wanted to illustrate the reason why. It's something that happened to me today. I was walking down the street.

0:08:57and a gentleman who was clearly going through some sort of mental issue, or maybe some sort of drug induced issue calling inward and the B word, and then attempted to punch me. As we were walking down the street, and lady that was walking with, he said, oh, no, you're right talking about me being calling City Council member across the bridge, and I was called that on. The Council dies just last month.

0:09:20so I'll be fine. You know the the harm is not in in the name calling, because the name calling is something. Accordingly, as a black field women in America, I've been called the N. Word. I've been called Epiphany.

0:09:31I've been called a bulldog, or I've been calling, which I've been caught off the times and names my entire life. But as a person who's again a black woman in States of America. I don't get to take that off.

0:09:42You know the fact that we have decided that we're gonna placate to people who don't feel that they should have to go through the whole of listening to those words that didn't stop me from getting part of that same way today.

0:09:53So if you're not doing the deep empathetic work that it takes to just cancel the system to answer the hey? We should not do anything that sheltering people who don't wanna have to deal with it, and we've generally changed the face of this city need to make sure that we are taking this with us to a convention, to a community such as other cities around, and figure out how to cancel the system

0:10:18that causes that to happen to our council members. That's what we're supposedly doing. As we're changing the face of the city. So I just wanted to make sure that people and that hopefully, we're going into our strategic planning. We are figuring out who the blow to actually stop the harm. There is actually a good episode of the Netflix show where I can already had a woman who didn't want her didn't want her daughter to see harm.

0:10:43I think she implanted a chip into her head. So she saw Blip, because hiding from her. So let's make sure that we are people virtually.

0:11:07Let's make sure, though, that we are dismissing the systems so that people are not coming in here through people with those words. That's how you dismantle hate. That's why you do that work and that I see my time

0:11:22councilmember fidelity. Yeah, thank you. I joined the mayor and Councilmember Weissinger at Layday, St. Peter's Methods church

0:11:31this last Sunday, and they're celebrating their seventieth birthday coming up so lots to celebrate on that front.

0:11:38Also, the East Bay had a public zoom on the wall cap pipeline last week that I attended. It's about to begin. It's gonna take about 2 years. And I it was so good and concise, I think all of us need to hear about it. So I asked that they maybe come back to the Council and give us that short power point. So we all know it's ahead, and we can deal with all the complaints that we might hear about that. Okay, thank you.

0:12:04So I have a few announcements. The ribbon cutting for plank and power. The new Pilates studio will be on October 20, first at 10 A. M.

0:12:12And as councilmember Weissenier mentioned the L. Sudo and N. Double acp. Freedom. Luncheon will be on October 20 s, and our own chief, Keith, will be an Honoree there, so, please. Yes, the best of Elsrido celebration will be held at the Honda of Elsrido on October 20 sixth, at 5 30 PM. Our Special City Council Strategic Plan workshop will be held sorry. Held here on Saturday, October 20 eighth

0:12:40and the ribbon cutting for Dolly's Italian restaurant will also be on October 20 eighth. as well as the Senior Resource Fair. On November the third from 10 to one PM. At the community center.

0:12:53The next item is oral communications from the public. Now is the time for members of the public who wish to provide public comments regarding matters not on the agenda. Consent items and presentation items requests to speak can be submitted to the city clerk by completing a speaker card.

0:13:12Public comments will be taken in person. Only please remember to identify yourself and your city of residence at the beginning of your comments, Cindy, clerk, how many speakers do we have this evening?

0:13:24At this time we have 5 speakers, Mayor. Great.

0:13:30Okay. I'll go ahead and begin with our first speaker, Max Mankita, followed by Stewart Sunitina.

0:13:37care to the podium.

0:13:42Good evening, members of city council and residents of El Cerrito. My name is Max Mankita. I'm a resident of El Cerrito, and I'm currently a senior at El Cerrito High. I'm here to talk about an issue that I'm very passionate about. I've brought it up in strategic planning focus groups that were done at the school. And I'll hopefully bring it up with you guys on the meeting on October 20 eighth.

0:14:04That is, that Ashbury Avenue, particularly from Stockton on towards Albany, is incredibly dangerous for people biking or walking all the way through during rush hour for school commutes.

0:14:17and it is incredibly clear that a wider redesign of that avenue is necessary in the future. If we want to make sure, people are able to safely get to and from school. But in the meantime there are some small steps that I believe we, as a city can take, so we can make sure everyone gets to school a lot safer

0:14:35at Harding elementary. There is a bike lane which goes. There's a bike lane which is sandwiched in between the lane that parents use to park their car and drop off their kids. If you are to use that bike lane, then cars will be cutting you off, attempting to get into the parking spots and drop off their kids. That creates an inherent danger for any person biking to school, which I, as a Harding student, did for 3 years.

0:14:58I had many, many close calls right there in that bike lane, and it's incredibly easy for us as a city to fix it

0:15:06and help start the process of making El Cerrito a much safer place for everyone to get around. If we move the parking lane and flip it with the bike lane. So the bike lane is in between the parking lane and the sidewalk. Then bikers will be able to safely go through, and parents will much easier be able to park their cars, drop their kids off and then leave without ever having to interact with the bikers.

0:15:30This will make a process much safer for bikers. It will make it much safer for people dropping off their kids and will facilitate. It will make it a lot easier for everyone to bike to school or get to school in a much quicker and safer way. That means you're gonna have a lot less congestion out there, a lot more kids getting to school at time, and a lot of kids being able to experience the joy and fun of biking to school as someone who's done it constantly.

0:15:52It is really a great way to start your morning, and we need to make sure, as a city that we're doing it in the safe way possible. So while again, this is not the final step that we need to take to make Ashbury the safest place for people to bike. It is a great first step that is a city we can take to make sure everyone stays safe on their way to school. Thank you.

0:16:12Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker, Stewart, Sonatina, followed by John Stashik.

0:16:22Okay. I'm not on the debate team, so I won't be that smooth Stuart Sanatina.

0:16:31Stewart. Can you try and speak into the microphone for those on the second way, please. Thank you, Rito. Resident as well.

0:16:41I'm here to also talk about bike infrastructure

0:16:46coming from the line. Knit side of things. As I mentioned before, the climate action plan for us rule. You know, specific calls out, transportation is 50% of our emissions. And it's the, I would say, easiest and most satisfying thing to address as well,

0:17:06anytime people get out on bikes, they enjoy it. It's yeah, really high leverage here.

0:17:12So

0:17:14yeah, going around talking people. I have found that

0:17:19many parents of parting and other I mean schools around here are,

0:17:25you know, buying e-bikes and getting on their bicycle kids and going to school. And I started a bike bus and a lot of other people, or you know, people are joining that and join it as well. So I'm seeing a lot of pent-up demand for bike infrastructure.

0:17:42However, the current

0:17:44action towards that is long term planning. And so I'm I'd like to encourage city Council to get some quick build solutions in place. Max's location is one. All of Ashbury is a

0:18:02excellent candidate because of the location of the Community Center sort of vista Ecpc, the parting else through the high lots of stuff all in that corridor. And it's flat. It is ideal for a two-way, two-way protected bike lane.

0:18:18So

0:18:20going down that term

0:18:21in pursuit of that, I just hosted a small audit with about a dozen people today to go and look at Ashbury and come up with some

0:18:32observations and possible recommendations for how we can go about that which I will soon kind of put together into a report and a possible proposal for City Council to review. I'll email it to you. I emailed, you guys all before no one's responded to me yet, though. So

0:18:51and yeah. So I'm just gonna get that on radar and let's make it happen.

0:18:58Thank you. Thank you.

0:19:01Thank you. Our next speaker, Sean Snatchik, followed by Susan Duncan.

0:19:07the

0:19:11Jon Stasher Kelseyov. Be really brief. When I looked at the agenda packet and saw the request for an emergency backup generator for Station 52.

0:19:22This is, I saw. This is a no-brainer, but I further read that the existing generator experienced a catastrophic failure, or leaving the fire, so with no available backup

0:19:33power source. that's that could have been a tragedy.

0:19:38So

0:19:39I know we get into all this discussion about we're gonna get a generator power by batteries, or wind or rainfall, or who knows what? Let's be? Just keep it simple. We need a Diesel powered backup generator, and we need it now.

0:19:55and when the professionals that me all buy, operate, maintain, and use this thing, tell me we'll need one. I listen to them, and this should be the no-brainer for the Council. We're just approve it, and we're done with it. Thank you.

0:20:10Thank you. And next, Speaker Susan. One thing followed by Kimberly.

0:20:27Good evening. I'm Sue Duncan, a resident of El Cerrito. I strongly encourage the Council to approve the request to purchase a new emergency backup generator for fire station 52.

0:20:38To reiterate the information in the agenda packet as to why the purchase is essential. Station 52 sits on the Hayward fault, and if it lets loose. I assume that the station will lose power.

0:20:50Obviously a fire station needs power plus station 52 is El Cerrito's Backup Emergency Operations Center, which currently has no backup power source. With climate change and the likelihood of an El Nino. This winter our power outage is more likely to occur this winter. El Cerrito needs to be prepared for this possibility.

0:21:11The proposed unit meets the California air resource boards and the Bay Area Air Quality management district's current requirements, and is compatible with the city's transitions to renewable Diesel.

0:21:24It is imperative to have this new generator to ensure public safety. I know that solar power battery storage systems have been strongly urged.

0:21:34How much electricity, though, is stored during consecutive cloudy days, or when we have 24 h rainstorms with heavy cloud cover. This is not a recycling truck. This is power to keep a fire station and a possibly the emergency operations center going public safety first. Thank you.

0:21:54Thank you. Thank you. I have asked. Request to speak is Kimberly white.

0:22:08Good evening, Mayor. See city manager and everyone here today. My name is Kimberly White, and I'm a resident of El Cerrito. We don't

0:22:18what I'm here today, because it's great to see the year and financials as part of the part of the packet items 7 J. And K. Just discuss the check cash investment reports

0:22:33and the I'm sorry the check report and the investment report, but there's nothing on the agenda for the financials. There are a number of reasons to add a discussion item to the to the agenda when financial information is included, and get

0:22:48number one is transparency. Public discussions promote transparency in government operations due to accountability, and when the cities hold public discussions on financial matters, they are held accountable for fiscal management decisions.

0:23:043. It's informed decision making making public input can provide valuable insights and perspectives that officials may not have considered

0:23:14this can lead to better informed decision making.

0:23:17and it can also lead to prioritization over expenditures also leads to equity and fairness, financial discussions, highlight disparities, resource, allocation, and allowing for various discussions that need to take place.

0:23:33It also facilitates. Excuse me, facilitates long-term planning. Public input can also aid in long-term financial planning and allows the city to anticipate future challenges.

0:23:45public engagement on financial discussions, discussions, foster a sense of civic participation and involvement, and encourage residents to take active interest and support of government

0:23:58in summary public discussions on municipal financials are essential, essential for promotion.

0:24:03I can see

0:24:05as well this

0:24:08I respectfully request that the city allow for agend the items on any faculty.

0:24:13Thank you for your time.

0:24:16Thank you. Thank you. I can put the request to speak me.

0:24:20Thank you. City clerk.

0:24:23Our next item is presentations, the annual Sundars Garden Club awards, and when we take this item out of order, as the presenter was expected expected to participate and provide her presentation remotely, and she is currently on the call. So I will keep the advice if she does join the meeting, and we can take the item at a later time out of order. Thank you. City clerk.

0:24:46The next item is adoption of the consent calendar, which includes the following items.

0:24:54shelter in place, education day, proclamation.

0:24:57regimen, lodge, number 35, proclamation

0:25:01oops

0:25:06following prevention, month and Unity Day proclamation, seventieth anniversary of St. Peter, Christian Methodist Episcopal Church

0:25:15Committee on Aging Appointment Resolution to authorize the purchase of an emergency replacement generator for Station 52, and an amount not to exceed $75,000. Authorization of agreement for the infill infrastructure. Grant catalytic qualifying infill area program of 2019 for the Elsrido.

0:25:39Where'd it go? Where's the rest of my sentence?

0:25:44Sorry.

0:25:50By Jane.

0:25:52Thank you so. or

0:25:58Alserrato Plaza, Bart. Transit Oriented development resolution authorizing execution of a grant pass through agreement between the city and Bart to receive funding from Bart for transportation, infrastructure, planning design and construction around the Alcerator Plaza, Bart. Station

0:26:14and Consulting services. Agreement with Gerard associates for the El Srido del Norte Transit Oriented Development Complete Streets, Improvement project City Project number C, 4, 0, 1, 4, Federal project number C Ml. 5, 2, 3, 9, 0 2, 9

0:26:32monthly disbursement and check register report for September 2023,

0:26:37and fiscal year 2324, first quarter cash and investment reports.

0:26:44Okay?

0:26:49Okay?

0:26:52While I will vote on the Consent calendar. Out of an abundance of caution I will ask the city clerk to indicate my recusal for consent items. Gnh, my employer. Community Economics, Inc. Is a nonprofit that advises regarding affordable housing, finance and development. One of our clients is satellite, affordable housing associates, or Sawa is a member of the development team selected by Bart for the Plaza to D project

0:27:18community economics is not advising Saha about the plaza to D project and has no financial relationship to the project. Nevertheless, to avoid any concerns, I will not be voting on those items.

0:27:31Items B and D have a representative here to speak and receive the proclamation which will occur after adoption of the Consent calendar. Are there any brief questions or requests by the Council to pull items off the consent. Calendar.

0:27:47Okay, I do have one brief question. and it is

0:27:54on the monthly, on the first quarter cash investment report.

0:28:08A good thing.

0:28:10Thank you. So my question is, we have 3.7 million dollars held at Mechanics Bank, and I was wondering if that is if we hold that there, because that's like one month of payroll and expenses. So if you can elaborate on that recently Hi, crystal reams finance director, we're actually in the process of evaluating cash, flow.

0:28:31projection, the mic up a little. There we go. I'm actually in the process of evaluating cash flow projections. So we can maximize what we have to have in the bank versus what we can keep it safe. So we're still working on that. It's it's work in progress, but we hope to have that soon right now. It's about

0:28:462 and a half months of expenditures that we have in there.

0:28:49Great, thank you very much.

0:28:53hey? So

0:28:55do I have a motion to approve the consent, calendar motion to approve motion by Councilmember Quinto, and second by Mayor pro tem Brunnick. I have a motion a second. All those in favor

0:29:12machine carries with with me and Matyama, recusing herself from items. Gn, H. Okay. And so now we will go to

0:29:22our representatives received a proclamation.

0:29:25Start with Legima Lodge.

0:29:29number 35.

0:29:42Good evening, City council my name is Royal Roberts, and I'm the wishful master for Ugima lodge Number 35, and I will say that my in-laws are actually residents of El Cerrito. So I'm here quite often.

0:29:57I just wanna thank you all for recognizing our lodge. This is our 100 and second year of roots in masonry which cross both Contra Costa County as well as Alameda county. Tonight. I have brothers here from my lodge I have our senior warden, who's basically the vice President. Manny Padilla.

0:30:21I have our 3 illustrious past masters with me, Brian Ames, William Higgs, and Alfred Tolles, and again, on behalf of our lodge. We just want to extend our thanks. We currently meet on Stockton Avenue in the Veterans Hall, and have met in El Cerrito for over 2 decades. Now, I believe

0:30:42we do. Numerous housing programs help feed the the hungry and various community activities. For with that we just want to give you our humblest. Thank thank you.

0:30:54Thank you so much, and thank you for being part of the El Cerrito community, especially in it's so wonderful to see you in your full regalia at the Mlk. I did want to recognize Sister Pat Durham, she host the parade which we also participate in every year. So with that I just again thank you so much

0:31:21of this guy can be a fixture duty

0:31:28like

0:31:52Hello.

0:31:59the comment. Yep.

0:32:39isn't it?

0:32:40Thank you.

0:32:42Yeah.

0:32:54that's

0:33:00and next we have our seventieth anniversary of the Saint Peter's Cme. Church of El Cerrito. Is there anyone to speak?

0:33:18He said. Everybody comes staying with her.

0:33:23My name is Michelle Jackson, and I'm a member of Saint Peter, Christian, Methodist, Episcopal Church, and to our mayor, Lisa.

0:33:36Motama, Yama.

0:33:38and Holly, who

0:33:41actually did the work for us to be here today, and to Tessa. We were very touched by your words, and we feel the same way for you, your friends and your family.

0:33:53and to all the council members here today, especially Gabe.

0:33:59Quinto and Paul Fideli and Carolyn Weissanger, for we look at you as honorary members of Saint Peter, Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. We accept this proclamation on behalf of our pastor, Reverend Willie Mcdaniel, who could not join us this evening, but we also warmly accept this proclamation on behalf of our

0:34:23charter members who made it possible for for us to be here to day. We accept, on behalf of our city leaders of our church.

0:34:34that partners so well with the city of El Cerrito, and that is Patricia Durham.

0:34:40Mira Wilson, Barbara Grace Davis.

0:34:44and Buddy Athletics.

0:34:47And we're all here to receive this along with our leaders of our Church, and we accept it on behalf of the late WA. Williams

0:34:59and Mrs. Dorothy Williams, and the late Judge Charles and Lucy Wilson, who work diligently with the city and with the council members.

0:35:12We accept it as the only African American church in the city of El Cerrito, and on behalf of all of our officers who are here with us to day, and members of Saint Peter, send me church. We can't thank you enough, because every time the bell is rang and we call upon you.

0:35:35you're there for us. So we want to be here to say Thank you for all that you have done for Saint Peter's Semi Church all the partnerships down through the years 70 years in the city of El Cerrito, we say, thank you.

0:35:58Thank you so much. I would also. But we would like a photo with any other councilmembers I should have offered. Yes, we would like a full comments.

0:36:08I I'll make a comment. I just wanna thank God.

0:38:12I didn't, because I'm like.

0:38:22And then we also respond.

0:38:32Hey, okay.

0:38:35hey?

0:38:38The next item is fiscal year 2022, 23, general fund budget Quarterly. Update through June 2023, and we please have the staff report

0:38:55and no.

0:38:57there we go. Thank you. Mayor. Council members. I'm crystal reams. Finance director.

0:39:05Oh, yeah, okay.

0:39:09Oh, no, no. It's okay.

0:39:15There.

0:39:17perfect. Thank you.

0:39:20Okay. So tonight I have for you. The fourth quarter of fiscal year 23 general fund budget quarterly update. So background for this city of El Cerrito Council adopted an annual budget for fiscal year 2223. On June 20, first 2022. The Council has closely monitored the city's budget and financial position, and directed city staff to submit Quarterly General Fund financial update reports.

0:39:46The attached fiscal year 2223, fourth quarter general fund, financial Update and income statement reflects the unaudited year end projections and includes estimated final expense accruals.

0:39:59The overall analysis. The report reflects unaudited general fund revenues at 49.2 million or 2.2 million above budget

0:40:10and expenditures, including estimated your individuals at a total of 43.5 million or 3.9 million above, below budget. The projected unaudited year-end fund balance is estimated to be 5.6 million dollars.

0:40:25Staff has calculated these numbers based on the most current information as of the date of this report, but it is important to note that these numbers are unaudited. During the annual independent audit which is underway and estimated to be completed in December.

0:40:39there will be adjustments to both revenues and expenditures, with verified year-end totals to be included in the annual comprehensive financial report, or the Akfa. Once it's completed.

0:40:49the numbers were kind of small. So that's why I wanted to pull this up for you guys. When I talk about this one we'll get into the actual update. So again, this is the fourth quarter for 2023, and keep in mind that it does take a little bit longer to prepare this one, because we have to wait for our availability periods to pass, so we can

0:41:08most of the way close the books. That's why this one isn't as timely as other quarters.

0:41:13And reminding these are unaudited. I stress that a lot in this.

0:41:19So the city's audit is underway which will result in the fiscal year 2220, 2223 comprehensive financial report. This process will audit the year-end totals which will verify all balances and may be subject to adjustments, so the audited actuals may be slightly different than what is presented in this update.

0:41:35However, these unaudited actuals are based on current information at your end as of now.

0:41:42So the summary, the city of El Cerrito's unaudited actuals show the city has met its budget targets for fiscal year 2223, and, indeed has generated a significant surplus of approximately 5.6 million

0:41:55revenues continue to trend slightly higher year to date primarily due to property tax receipts, property transfer tax sales, tax and business license and permits. In addition, program services are trending slightly higher than budgeted

0:42:08expenses associated with salaries and benefits trended below budget largely due to vacancies, year to date. Expenditures for services and supplies are within budget

0:42:18overall. The departments have maintained fiscal prudence and have operated within Budget

0:42:24general Fund revenues. On March seventh 2023 Council approved the fiscal year 2223, general fund amended budget increasing revenues by about just over 1.3 million for an amended total of just over 47 million table one shows the unaudited year-end revenues total by category.

0:42:44That's big enough for you guys to see.

0:42:46So, as you can see, property taxes were trending just under budget sales. Tax was over. Budget over what we budgeted mainly due to the city's portion of the county pool for online sales.

0:43:01As some of these are trending a little bit under some trending a little bit over for a total within of just over 105%.

0:43:11And we go down to the other taxes. As I said before, earlier permits increased this year. So we were over 131% of budget finds, and for features were a little bit lower. Use of money and property was 183 over.

0:43:28but again, overall similar to the 104% over. So within our ranges

0:43:36turn up on expenditures, fiscal year 2223 general fund amended budget increased expenditures by 2 point just over 2.6 million at Midyear for a total amended expenditure budget of 47.5 million table 2 shows. The unaudited expenditures by classification. Personnel costs are the largest component of the general fund expenditures at approximately, and I apologize. This is the typo. It should be 72,

0:44:02just a little bit different. Departments with multiple vacancies have maintained services through increased professional services. And or overtime budgets. With these costs offset by salaries, with these costs being offset by salary savings, expenditures, main remained well within approved budgets.

0:44:21See that budget presents along with the

0:44:25prior, your actuals for comparison for all the columns

0:44:29at 92% of the total.

0:44:34the general Fund departments, the Department's expenditures have remained within budget throughout the fiscal year with expenditures as a percent of budget ranging from.

0:44:42And I so apologize, this should say 78% to 97% for the period ending June thirtieth. As previously noted, vacancies throughout the departments contributed to these expenditure results.

0:44:54Table 3 reflects actual expenditures by department through the fourth quarter, and provides a baseline expenditures from the fourth quarter

0:45:02of the previous fiscal year.

0:45:07In conclusion, the city of El Cerrito has ended fiscal year 2223, well within budget, with an estimated surplus of approximately 5.6 million. It will be important for the city council to note going forward, as the city fills vacancies that the expenditures in future years will increase accordingly, and city staff will continue to monitor these expenditures in relation to revenues in the current fiscal year

0:45:30study staff will also closely monitor the economy and will continue to update the general fund projections. Further city staff will work with the City Council to determine any future uses of surplus funds and general fund reserved in order to meet the City Council's financial sustainability goals

0:45:46bye.

0:45:48and that concludes my presentation. Any questions?

0:45:51Thank you for the presentation. Are there any questions from Council?

0:45:55Yeah. I just wanna say I'm very pleased to see the progress we've made and revenues, higher expenditures lower. Let's just keep that theme going right. Revenue, higher expenditures lower.

0:46:10And we've worked hard, I think, to provide a framework

0:46:13in this city with the Council and the staff. and I feel good about the framework and moving forward 2 quick questions. I'm seeing lots of for sales. Sign. Still.

0:46:23any. Is there any summary on the property tax transfer? We're doing fine in that category, right? So the property transfer tax was just under

0:46:35pull that back up. So not a dramatic drop in that. So yeah. So it was. We budgeted at 4 million, and we came in at 4 million. I will.

0:46:47yeah, yeah. 4.1 million. Karen, did you have any comments on that?

0:46:52Karen Pinkos (City Manager): Sure, thank you. Yeah, I agree. We are seeing several for sales signs throughout the city. We know that the market is slow. That's happening all over the country. Frankly. So we're gonna continue to monitor, that is, you know, we kept

0:47:05that flat for this year. So at Midyear we'll we'll see where we were. We actually had a couple of good months in, I believe, August and September. So we will track that, and if we need to make adjustment at midyear. We will. But we're keeping our fingers crossed, and you know again the volume may be lower, but the prices are higher. So that's been what we've seen over the past couple of years. We're just gonna keep a very close eye on that.

0:47:29Thank you. And you mentioned vacancies.

0:47:32How many vacancies do we have that need to be filled with staff

0:47:36mean, is it going to be a dramatic? You're saying, let's look forward to this vacancies when we fill them.

0:47:42Karen Pinkos (City Manager): Yeah, I can address that. We're actually doing a very good job, as you've heard from the police department public works is finally filling up some of our vacancies. So some of our vacancies are starting. They're they're just in the past

0:47:543 to 4 months, are starting to fill back up. And so, while we may not have a high vacancy rate as we did last at the same time last year. What we're wanting to show is that because we're starting to fill the vacancies reflectful last year. Now that we're starting to fill them, we know that that's gonna shift some of the expenditures coming into the next fiscal year. So again, we're gonna be keeping an eye on that as well. The classification and compensation study, we know, will be completed

0:48:21by the end of the calendar year that's going to make some effect on on what our market value is, and and we'll be watching that closely as well, and bringing all of that information back to council once that's completed.

0:48:32Thank you very much.

0:48:33Councilmember Mayor. Pretend like.

0:48:37Thank you. It's really exciting to have you here at the Dyess, and to give us a really positive, strong update. I also want to welcome our new budget manager, Claire Coleman. We're so lucky to have you, and and to have a really strong finance team is something that in this past 3 years, since I've been sitting here waiting for this time, when we have expertise. And so I'm so excited about the work that is to come from this team

0:49:04question around where we are now, it's the end of fourth quarter. To then, once we get those Ak for numbers, those audited numbers, what should the public anticipate as far as variance? How close are

0:49:19for numbers usually to these fourth quarter unaudited numbers, and I know that there's we don't know those numbers yet, but just to anticipate. So folks have a sense of how closely aligned will be to these numbers. It shouldn't be too terribly far off. You know, cash is cash, and so what cash has already gone out. So that's kind of our our

0:49:41biggest determination of where we're at. So at this point, it's just making sure everything's classified correctly in within the different within the different funds, making sure that we're implementing the new gasbies correctly.

0:49:55The in the general fund. We don't have any n, none of the long term stuff. So the stuff that we're still working on all of our, you know, fixed assets and things like that aren't within the general fund. So really shouldn't. It shouldn't have a dramatic swing either way. There might be minor adjustments, but

0:50:12I've only been here 3 months, so Hello! I'm doing my very, very best. Excellent. Thank you so much. Councillor, we're looking to. Yeah, thank you, Mayor. I also echo what my native portal just said. And and I think it's just fantastic to have our staff up to 100. And it's been.

0:50:32you know, quite a ride that, yeah, at least, Paul Fideli and I have gone through difficult, difficult times. You know, the last 4 years. And now this 3 years, and to bring it back, I just wanna say thank you for all your work the last 3 months, because, our credit rating is at a respectable rate now and very, very proud of that, and it's good to

0:50:56work with this pragmatic staff that is keeping an eye on the budget and also being fiscally responsible and and glad we're staying out of ideology because we are paying our bills by night. So again, thank you.

0:51:14I do have a couple a question about the sales tax, which is much higher, which is very exciting to see. And I was wondering what portion of that sales tax is. Online sales as opposed to to sales that occur within the city, and you know, I think, that

0:51:35it's it's something that I think might be a little bit esoteric for the public. But

0:51:41when we do purchases online, even if the stores are somewhere else, El Cerrito gets the taxes through the county pool correct. Yes, and I apologize, don't have the exact percentage of what is the what is else Rita's portion? But in our last quarterly update we did receive very very positive news that we had. I think it was the highest within the county highest increase in the online of the county pool for online portions. So I can definitely get that percentage for you.

0:52:12cause I know that that is something that was a change for us through the pandemic where that was not the case before, but through the pandemic. This shift to online sales has actually benefited El Cerrito significantly. Fair was good. Yeah. So seeing Amazon trucks, I guess around town is a positive thing for us.

0:52:33Okay? And I was wondering if within these cost savings on the expenditure side, if there were any sort of efficiencies that will be on. You know. We know vacancies are going to be filled in. So that kind of takes that, you know. That's not a savings that we wanna count on for the long term. But are there any efficiencies or other things that we can hope that we can continue that will keep our expenditures lower and looking at.

0:53:00and our budget, I think departments have done an excellent job of being fiscally prudent and just really kind of watching what what they're spending. So I would expect that trend to continue. But I will. I will to defer to City manager pinkos for some additional comments on that.

0:53:18Karen Pinkos (City Manager): Yeah, I would agree with that. I think it's it's been a you know. II it's not an overstatement to say that it's been a big culture shift within our organization, but also within our community. As again, we're monitoring our budget so much more closely, we're dividing it by department, as you saw, like in the even that was that had come up with the State Auditor, and we've moved to that and made that a permanent

0:53:39change within our policies. And so I think that again, as we have talked about, and when we come back from mid year we'll be able to to. You know, as we have done in the past, show the model for our balance to show where we're at and kind of do the stress test Mayor, that you've talked about

0:53:57looking at the next couple of years while we're before the redevelopment agency bonds are paid off and we shift our property tax even further. So II just really think that, you know again, the economy is still volatile. We're still being very conservative with our revenues and expenditures on our budget. So we're just continuing to monitor that. But again, I have to. I have to commend all of the departments. I have to commend the council for your leadership

0:54:22and making sure that we're we're focusing on this. And it's it's just

0:54:28Yeah. I agree with Crystal. I think the trend will continue, and even further with crystal. Now that we're fully staffed in finance, making sure all the policies that we put into place are absolutely. You know, they're they're maintained in a very good and and expert way. So I just wanna I wanna thank everybody. I wanna thank all the department has I? Wanna thank all staff. I wanna thank the Council. This is

0:54:49This is this. This report was a delight to read, and I hope it was for you, too.

0:54:55Thank you. So do we have any comments from the public on this item

0:55:02going once, going twice. We do not have any public comments on the site.

0:55:08Okay? And so in any closing council comments

0:55:13as someone who lives on the north side, I want to point out that you know the real estate in our neighborhood. It's it's still the same, and we've had homes that were purchased within 10 days. So but El Cerrito real estate is still going strong, and people are lower bidding, and we're getting mostly people from Oakland and San Francisco that have had enough of the crime.

0:55:38and they know that we never defunded police here. And yeah, so we're doing the right thing. So I just want to say congratulations to this council and and to staff, because this city is doing the right thing, and that's why people are moving here, and that's why our businesses are flourishing here while the other cities are losing their

0:56:02businesses. So you know, it's great to see so many new restaurants opening in San Pablo Avenue, and I know our chamber staff here. John Stashik is in the audience and is always telling me about the the great restaurants opening. And and these are restaurant owners that used to own and and run restaurants in other cities like San Francisco, Oakland, and Tiburon. So I just want to say, you know.

0:56:31this is a place to do business and to open a small business, and it's great to see El Cerrito residents opening their small businesses in our hometown. It's great to see.

0:56:42And just in closing, thank you to staff. Thank you. I would really like to reiterate what city manager said. Thank you to the departments for really taking our budget seriously.

0:56:54having even close to a 5.6 million dollars. Budget surplus is stupendous and will help us to get back on track, particularly with our

0:57:05pension liability. Now that we have our policy in place and our 1 15 trust, and I think that we are on the right track, and I hope that

0:57:15it will prove out when we get the act for Council member for the yeah, I just wanted to concur and just say that I hope that 5 million dollars surplus figure gets in the city managers. Monthly report gets out to all the residents in El Cerrito.

0:57:31because, as we move toward getting a library, a new library in the city, the new ratings that we have from bonding, and the surpluses that we have and the reserves that we have

0:57:41make our city solid and beneficial toward that goal. So thank you very much for that. And so there's no action on this one, because this is receive and file. So we'll go on to the next item, I may interject our presenter from the earlier presentation, for Sundarshadi has joined the call. So if it is okay with you, we can return to that presentation item. Now, okay, we'll move on to presentations. The annual Sundari Garden Club awards. May we? Please have the presentation?

0:58:13Oh, Pamela, you're still muted.

0:58:20Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): Thank you. Good evening, Mayor and council members.

0:58:24I am here this evening again this year to present information about the Sunders Shadi award.

0:58:33My name is Pam Austin. and so I'm sure most of this audience is aware of the Sunders Shadi award and that Sundar shoddy was a San Francisco resident.

0:58:46He created the Christmas display that consoled on Motion Lane at holiday time, and he was also an avid gardener.

0:58:54Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): The El Cerrito Garden Club honors his contributions to the city

0:58:59with the Sundar shouty awards.

0:59:05The Sundar Shadi Award recognizes the hard work of residents to create beautiful gardens that benefit our community.

0:59:12The gardens express the homeowners creativity using natural materials and plants. They also reflect environmental concerns, such as water, conservation and support for native species only. If I may. Did you have a presentation that you wanted to share with us tonight?

0:59:32Yes, you can't see it.

0:59:34No, you'll need to. You'll need to select screen share.

0:59:40Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): Oh, I'm so sorry! I forgot that I had to do that here. Oh, got it!

0:59:45I'll give it just a second. There.

0:59:54we can see it. Thank you. Thank you

1:00:02Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): annually. The El Cerrito Garden Club sets out to identify outstanding front yard gardens. El Cerrito residents, including City Council members, are invited to nominate gardens any time throughout the year, and a committee of club members selects the winners. A presentation ceremony for each winner is held on the sidewalk in front of their garden.

1:00:31In 2,02326 gardens were nominated by Garden club members, and the public 3 winners were chosen, and I'd like to introduce you to the 2023 Sundarshadi winners.

1:00:48So this garden is at 2616, Yuba and the homeowner's name is Marianne Bell.

1:00:56The home was built 1926.

1:00:59The garden was started in 2021. It was designed, designed, installed, and is maintained by Marianne and her sons. The front lawn was converted to a dry garden with a rock retaining wall.

1:01:15adding bermms and hills to break the flatness

1:01:19it offers outstanding curb appeal with its rock border wall and meandering path through a colorful variety of plants, including cacti, succulent seasonal flowers, and natives.

1:01:33along with attractively trimmed mature trees, a maple and a diodas, cedar.

1:01:41an elegant rock garden garlanding the kill that blends well with the architecture of the house is also a feature.

1:01:50and the drought tolerant plants are interspersed with rocks and stones.

1:02:00The second garden is at 1520 Elm Street.

1:02:04and it's the home of Carol Fender and Mark Frabier. This home was built in 1912, and the garden started in 1999.

1:02:15The owners are retired landscapers and avid hikers who designed the garden to reflect their passion for the natural world.

1:02:25It's a unique garden in a small space with a lot to enjoy, the eye is immediately drawn to the stone. Feature might create it. To replicate the ovens of indigenous peoples.

1:02:39It's surrounded by succulents, cacti, kangaroo paws, and other New Zealand and Australian plants that offer harmonious colors.

1:02:51nicely tickled by yellow accents.

1:02:54A large yok yucca, and a tall ginkgo anchored the corner.

1:03:00and the garden displays a nice variety of textures and levels which include native grasses and small plants, such as Euroboana.

1:03:15and the third garden is at 73, 44, pebble beach drive. and this this garden was created by Bridget Leary.

1:03:25This garden is a redesign of the Zen garden

1:03:30that was originally planted by her parents.

1:03:34Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): And they now live in in the home that

1:03:41the Bridget.

1:03:43Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): you're welcome.

1:03:44Additional plantings were added with the goal of having it feel evergreen and inviting. The garden is a beautiful use of rock features, a stone stream, wood planks

1:03:57and bonsai trees. It's also a wonderful mix of color, depth, and height of plants and focal points. The garden blends, rhododendrons, Japanese maples, azaleas, conifers, succulents, diamondia, and other flowering plants.

1:04:17The garden accents the house, and has pleasing cream stone steps leading to the front door.

1:04:24It has outstanding curb appeal.

1:04:27Bridget and her current gardener, Sean O'sullivan, worked together on the redesign and planting.

1:04:38So those are our Sundarshari weather weather winners for 2,023 each of the winners receives a sign for their gardens, for for the coming year, a certificate and a check for $100.

1:04:54So please keep an eye out for the signs around town and and if the winners are are present, please congratulate them on their gardens.

1:05:07So thank you.

1:05:09Thank you very much for the presentation.

1:05:12Are there any comments from council members?

1:05:17Yeah.

1:05:19thank you for the presentation, Miss Austen. It was we love our gardens in El Cerrito. And it's really nice when we're going on walks, that there's community members who take that extra step. And so for those 26 nominees

1:05:33you know, especially at the plaque plaque that cool. It should go on all 26. But it's just nice to know that there's people who care enough about the built environment and making sure that our community is a really welcoming and beautiful place.

1:05:46Thank you, Marie. Thank you.

1:05:49Thank you. Mayor. I also want to congratulate you. Pam again. What a great job to have 26 homes that

1:05:59signed up for this! And and it's wonderful to see the new generation of homeowners that have chosen El Cerrito, and and to see these these homes with with new energy and new gardens, and and just makes you really happy to see the areas where I grew up

1:06:21in here in my hometown, and and to see a next generation of folks putting their roots down literally. So again. Pam, thank you for all your work.

1:06:32Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): You're welcome. You're welcome, and that of the club. It's a joy.

1:06:36Yes, Hi, Pamela! Great! Great job! Beautiful

1:06:41and what a pleasant little recess for us here on the Council instead of other issues! And I was glad to see. I don't think I saw any s junipers.

1:06:54That's a good thing we just need to focus on not seeing Jennifer is out and around our houses. So for the fire season. Thank you very much.

1:07:04Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): Thank you

1:07:06again. Thank you so much for your presentation, and I really appreciate the work of all your volunteers in the Garden Club to really bring us this awards.

1:07:14events! And you know, really

1:07:17taking the time to choose the winners. It must have been very hard, so thank you so much, and thank you for for honoring the beauty that is in El Cerrito.

1:07:27Pamela Austin (EC Garden Club): Thank you.

1:07:29Alright. Good evening.

1:07:31Denise. Good evening. Thank you. Thank you.

1:07:37The next item is wildfire, safety and preparedness. Can we? Please have these staff reports?

1:08:05Good evening, Mayor Council members. I'm Eric Saylors, and I am your fire chief.

1:08:10Tonight. We're gonna talk a little bit about wild. So wildfire safety and preparedness and an Update of where we came from, where we're at now and where we're going

1:08:21so a little bit about the changing environment, and what is our major threat in El Cerrito. In the last 10 years one out of every 8 acres has burned due to wildfires. We've lost 173 lives.

1:08:3343,000 homes have been burned, and as the climate changes it's creating longer droughts. The when the atmospheric rivers do come in and it does rain, it creates a lot of ground coverage that creates additional fuel fuels which causes the fires to become more violent. And we're also facing mass tree death in the areas where we do have a lot of trees.

1:08:55That local threat to El Cerrito primarily comes from our Diablo winds as that

1:09:00air moves across the desert, it gets drier and hotter, and it comes through the central valley, and it picks up speed across our coastal ranges, and it has the potential to come through our homes that sit on the ridge and then down into the flats.

1:09:15The spread of wildfires, wildfires mostly spread by embers. 90% of our wildfires are spread by ambers. So the homes don't actually catch on fire as from direct flame contact. It's usually from embers that are carried in from wildfires into the neighborhoods.

1:09:31They come from nearby wildfires, and then they'll potentially go from house to house.

1:09:37Our job is to reduce the vulnerabilities of this threat that comes in a three-part package from a prepared fire department, fuel, reduction, and partnerships with our neighboring agencies to make sure that we can help them when they need our help, and vice versa.

1:09:53So in 2022 we achieved a lot of goals. We hit the ground running hard, and we started by attending the Eoc drill, which is called the Golden Eagle. This is a large scale county wide drill that did a scenario of a wildfire that came across our ridgeline into Richmond, and then into El Cerrito. It helped our members that participated learn how large fires are managed and how we can participate.

1:10:15If we do have a fire come through and how we can operate with the county Eoc to gain resources and and manage those fires appropriately.

1:10:25We've also been focusing on increasing our incident command training. We've had 2 major classes in the last few months. We did a division and group supervisor class and a safety officer class. Both of these classes expose our firefighters to large scale events. They're not typically see. So they see a lot of house fires. They go out very quickly, and they're very good tactically at that. But you don't get a lot of fires in your career. The only way to

1:10:50to up your skill level on that is to go through these drills and these classes over and over again. So we sponsored 2 of them. The fantastic thing is is that neighboring agencies participated. So we had agencies from Albany.

1:11:01Berkeley, Richmond. We had a group from Texas fly in and do some classes with us, so our officers and our company officers and our chief officers. They volunteer to take these classes. Their commitment is very high, and every time they learn and get better

1:11:16we have also focused on reigniting our cert team and then upgrading it. So we have been actively recruiting cert members. We continue to have successful water storage sales and fire extinguisher sales. We've partnered with our neighboring agency, La Miranda. Cert. They have an excellent program, and they are providing training for our cert members that are interested so that we can build a stronger team.

1:11:41Now, cert in El Cerrito has typically been focused on self resilience. And we're trying to get self resilience back and then also upgrade into an actual response model. So that if we do have a large event that cert team can engage with the fire department and they can meet operational objectives, and that is when a very effective cert model.

1:12:01they become a force multiplier for the 9 firefighters that you have on duty every day. So that is where we're moving with spurt

1:12:10now. We've also continued to accommodate oes staffing, which shows to the level of commitment to your firefighters. Not only do they go out on the oes rig that is housed here in El Cerrito to wildfires, but they also continue to volunteer for additional local up staffing. So oes is learned from some of its larger weather events and fires that if it sees an event coming it'll up staff its rigs, and it'll fund that.

1:12:34But in order to have that that up staffing come to your local agency. Your firefighters have to volunteer to do it, and every time they've offered that up our firefighters have volunteered to staff those rigs. And you see a photo here of

1:12:47Engine 3, 72 which isn't typically staffed. But it was staffed on those major weather events by oes, they were staffed by our firefighters. So that means they get to get housed in our stations and respond to our community, and they're also driven by one of our battalion chiefs, who also volunteers to do that job as well. So we continue to accommodate the Oes staffing across the State. And locally.

1:13:08we've had some fantastic targeted fuel reductions in the hillside. Natural area. We applied for Measure X Measure X funds. We got funding for that, and with partnerships with our local community specifically make El Cerrito firesafe. We had some good work days out there, got a lot of fuel removed, built a very good fuel, break off our property lines, and we did that before fire seasons, that if we did have something happen we'd be able to have a defensible space across those fence lines.

1:13:39We continue to collaborate with our neighbors. We continue to do drills almost on a monthly basis with Albany, Berkeley, Richmond. Every opportunity we have we get together, either in the same room, and we do tabletop exercises, or we do drills like you're seeing here where we did Wildfire live, burn drills out in the field or trench operations.

1:14:01these collaborative trainings they're key, because when our firefighters come together and work together, they now have they now know each other? They've seen each other in drills before they know how they operate, and they they are much more effective on seeing

1:14:15we continue to collaborate with our community groups as well like I mentioned, make El Cerrito firesafe has been a fantastic

1:14:23partner with the fire department. We meet with them about monthly. And we've worked on multiple projects with them. We continue to support Carol echo towards working to building a standard operating guideline for all the radio operators out there. And what we're looking for is a process of when they do make contact with each other. How do they reach up to the fire department and work with them if Comms go down. So we continue to work with all of our radio operators and our other local community members.

1:14:51and we continue to do our community outreach. We had a fantastic tri-city safety day. We did a very good auto extrication demonstration, but Smokey, the bear, and Sparky showed up for this event, talked to kids about wildfire preparedness. We also did a large community hillside hazard, walk with

1:15:10community members that live along the hillside, talking about fuel, reduction, evacuation routes, how you can harden your homes.

1:15:19So our future goals moving forward. we include immediately a refresher training with cws, so that we can get our evacuation procedures down pat with law enforcement. We do operate with multiple law enforcement agencies and

1:15:37evacuations shelter in place. That is not a function of the fire department that legally falls into law enforcement. But we always work with them in unified command. So we're putting on a refresher training focused on the community warning system so that we can be very effective when it comes to evacuations or shelters in place or warnings.

1:15:57We are planning an evacuation drill. After that we are in the planning stages right now the working date is November sixteenth we are in armed with Sp or else, Rita, Pd. To do an evacuation drill.

1:16:11I don't want to give you any details right now without the police chief here, but we've had one meeting. We've got a general framework worked out, and the working date is November sixteenth, and I look forward to an effective evacuation drill.

1:16:24We will study the evacuation closely, because we have some further projects we're working on, and we want to see how well the carrying capacity to the roads are when we do do an evacuation drill.

1:16:38We'll time it to see how far, how fast we can get into our meeting space, and we'll also issue a survey afterwards to do a simple gap analysis to see how we can do better. Now for these evacuation drills for our citizens. I put some links in this Powerpoint slide. They can click on to see the evacuation procedures that El Cerrito has published in their evacuation pamphlet. Also, I suggest that everybody register for C. Ws. That is where the evacuation notifications will come from.

1:17:06If we get everybody in our community registered, then we will have a successful real life evacuation, and also a successful drill also suggests everyone know their zone, your primary route, and have an alternative route out of your area if you can find one.

1:17:22So we have also been working hard on the Mou collaboration of the East Bay Wild Prevention Group, and we will continue to work on that.

1:17:32This is this is a good idea, and it works for the neighboring communities. But it is the first time I've ever seen anybody do this. There's a lot of questions when you bring in so many agencies into a room at once.

1:17:45And we have worked through most of them. Our last group, our last meeting with the fire chiefs was pretty much thumbs up across the board that we like the structure we see. We don't see any real operational barriers to us right now, and that was after multiple meetings and working through and updating this document. We are now looking towards the legal teams to give their advice and their viewpoint on it to see if they see they have any questions on how this is gonna work in the future.

1:18:13We continue to work with this document and

1:18:17the chiefs, the fire chiefs that are nearest to us on each side. They both support the document, and we'll bring it to you when it's ready.

1:18:27Oh, you know what, Karen, I'm sorry. I was. Gonna give you an opportunity to comment on this if you wanted to.

1:18:34Karen Pinkos (City Manager): Sure, Chief, thank you. I just want I just wanted to acknowledge that this is something that the that the City Council City staff have been looking at and working on, I believe, since at least

1:18:462019 2020, 2021. There was a community group that came together, worked with a lot of elected officials and created kind of a a big sort of organizing committee. And while a Council member for Deli was mayor, the Council passed a resolution expressing its support for such a group.

1:19:05At that time it was maybe floated. It could be a different type of a system or an agency, or a joint power as authority. It's sort of came to this over the over time and over a lot of meetings. It's come to this member, this concept of a memorandum of understanding that would involve elected officials creating this wild prior prevention coordinating group.

1:19:27and again, this the councilmember for Deli has been representing the City Council at these meetings. I've been representing the city and staff and Chief Pagoni prior to chief sailors right now, has been in highly engaged in all of this work. So just wanted to give this as kind of an update. I know that, as as the chief just said, there are agencies that are looking at this right now. And we're we're kind of coming onto the finer points to be able to bring this back

1:19:56for Council consideration hopefully, very soon, within the next month or 2, depending upon you know, getting through all of the logistics of the Mo. But this has been a long time coming, and a lot of work done by a lot of people. And again Council Member Fidel is represented, the Council on this one. And so, as the chief said, one when we're ready to bring that back for the Council consideration we will do so.

1:20:18Karen Pinkos (City Manager): Thank you.

1:20:20Thank you.

1:20:23We also continuing our Fema training. And we're looking at Eoc training for all of our internal sworn staff members and all of our non sworn staff members, so that when we do have a large event we can stand up the eoc in the City Hall and support the team that is actually running the event. We have a lot of new members that have been brought on on the city. We would make sure that they are ready to go

1:20:47this week. We are currently bringing our firefighters up to speed on this type of training. We will do a large earthquake scenario Thursday with the vendor that did a very similar scenario for San Francisco last month. He was the incident commander for the North Ridge earthquake, and we have in the room with us. We have once again.

1:21:06Berkeley. We have Richmond. We have 6 members from El Cerrito, and we have law enforcement representatives in that, so that we will be very good at unified command. If the earthquake does happen, and we'll continue this training.

1:21:21We've also looked at Red Flag parking as a pilot, and we've done a lot of work on this, so that we make sure we don't miss anything there really only 3 cities in State of California that have been successful with this, and one of the curious questions was, Why do so many cities fail at it? So we did a lot of homework, and we worked with. Make El Cerrito fire safe to look at one particular street. We surveyed all the members on that street to see what type of

1:21:50would be in favor of this. What problems or barriers that were there? We got some good feedback back. So we know that we are moving in the right direction. But we want to identify choke points in the evacuation plan, and

1:22:07for those choke points you have problems of not only vehicles coming down, but also suppression vehicles potentially going up.

1:22:14And some of those streets are very narrow. So we wanna just identify those. And we know that we don't have many red flag parking days each year in elsewhere. We're usually looking at 5 to 6 days a year, so it shouldn't be too impactful on the community. But we did look at what type of responses we would have when we surveyed one street.

1:22:37We this is a screenshot of some of the surveys we got back, and for the most part it was favorable on the ability to move vehicles and the ability to accept the fact that it is in their interest for public safety, to have restrictive parking on these narrow streets that create choke points during red flag days.

1:22:56So our next step is we'll continue to work with the attorneys and staff to bring your recommendations for the Mo. Back to council. We're gonna watch what our neighboring agencies around us do. We'll look at the resolutions that they bring forward. We'll be ready for that, and we'll also seek direction from council to move forward with preparing for the pilot program so that we can explore the options of

1:23:19restricted parking on red flag dies.

1:23:24So I just want to say, Thank you for your support.

1:23:28It has been a pleasure working here. I am just past my one year anniversary, and this is like winning the Fire department lottery because I work with fantastic people, both at the management level.

1:23:39the fire service level and the elected officials. I enjoy working with all of you. So thank you very much. And now I'll open it to questions. Are there any questions? Council members? I see first, alright! Happy anniversary chief. Oh, thank you.

1:23:56Thank you for all the effort that you've done this year, and I'm glad to hear the progress about Red Flag Day and the drills that are going on. Those are significant things that our Council has talked about, and also the progress on the Mou regional effort. It's you know, when you blend a lot of cities and agencies. It's never easy.

1:24:16I think it's gotten better. The proposal as we've gone along over the last year and a half.

1:24:22So so thank you for that. And I just wanna say that I you know this is a voluntary optional thing, and if it's not good for El Cerrito, I don't want us to be involved. But right now I'm feeling very good about it.

1:24:36Think it can be good, and hope there will be supportive for this. So thank you for following through on that. My question is on the measure X funding that we've seen some good progress on the natural area.

1:24:50is there? What's the future of Measure X funding for? Is there a lot of money? Do you know about them?

1:24:57Potential grants for additional funding

1:24:59for the additional funding? No, there doesn't seem to be many options right now, but the creation of the portal that allowed citizens to put in requests for fuel reduction in their property or near their property, was a big breakthrough for us, because our citizens followed that up with requests for fuel, reduction, and crew. 12 crew. 12 was the

1:25:19was the crew that was promised to the county out of the measure X funds to help reduce fuels, and once that portal was open, all of our citizens engaged, and we got a lot of days out of crew 12 and a lot of fuel reduction.

1:25:34But that's done. Now you're saying. Next year it'll open up again, and we'll work on it again. Yes, yes. Annual process continue to follow through on that portal. Absolutely. We can take. Okay, yes, and we continue to pursue it.

1:25:47Holly great. Yes, thank you. Okay.

1:25:51Well, you said, you feel like you hit the lottery. And I think here in El Cerrito we hit the fire chief lottery. So thank you so much for the expertise, the wisdom the way you really clearly and succinctly articulate something that's incredibly complex. And you make it translatable and understandable for the community. So that to me, and also just your operational skills, all those things we are so lucky to have you.

1:26:19So you know some of the things highlighted. You know the Golden Eagle exercise that was fantastic for the whole entire region. I know in my day, Job, we participate in that one as well. Also with some of the water storage sales. I as Lameerinda, I believe, was doing that. Sponsoring their cert program. I went with a friend to pick up at the Elstria recycling center, and it was great to see so many volunteers and community members who care about this which brings me to my questions around, cert so

1:26:48so pleased that we're reigniting and really understanding the value and importance of cert. My question is, what kind of data are we tracking on our cert volunteers? So are are we keeping a database and a list of how many are for community members we've trained up insert and any special skills that they may have so that we can. It's almost like case management. Do we have a sense of who these folks are.

1:27:12and their ability to help support and really be in that broad network. Should there be a major event.

1:27:19our cert program manager is certainly competent with tracking data, and he has issued many surveys to track location and skills and training. And he's doing a fantastic job. And I'm looking forward to a very robust detailed database on our future cert members. When we build our cert team perfect because part of that is just making sure that we have

1:27:40in in our own wheelhouse in El Cerrito, that we're being really thoughtful about how we can involve the community which brings me to my next question which is around, you know, other jurisdictions we'll have. You know, city of Berkeley has the disaster Fire Safety Committee. You know we don't have, while there's incredible partners who are outside of the community groups. We highlighted El Cido, Firesafe and Caro echo.

1:28:05We still don't have a place for community members to be able to participate in this, which again, we unfortunately tabled a conversation a few meetings back. But I really do like in that list of things that are important, having a space where community safety can be really highlighted. And it can be collaborative, especially with what the cert class offerings are, because

1:28:28that that to me, I think, is a better way of measuring what kind of classes we can tailor to the community. It can be very community member driven, especially if it's either for older adults, specifically, or people with children. Because I know that's a huge demographic in El Cerrito just being able to really tailor our assert offerings to the community.

1:28:52Yeah. And and until we get there, I'm still open to all comments from the public I get. I get a lot of inquiries on how people can join cert, or how they can help, and the fire department is responsive as possible to get people in the right direction. 2 more things. So

1:29:11what are we doing around engagement for some of the more vulnerable communities in El Cerrito? So I'm thinking of our older adults. I'm thinking of disabled. I'm thinking of especially single parent households. What kind of

1:29:24engagement are we doing for those most vulnerable

1:29:27besides our normal? Besides normal practices of offering Cpr. Classes events like Tri-city Safety Day, our community engagement. We have just started a conversation about creating a disability registry

1:29:40that would allow us to know where our people that need the most help are. If we had to do evacuations or had a major event so that we can offer additional services. Communities. That plan for this. We'll have a pretty robust plan on transportation alternatives for people to get them out of their evacuation, or they assign guardian angels to them, as I'll say in quote marks, and as somebody to go check on them and make sure that they're doing okay.

1:30:05that's to me a part of the cert model and getting more spaces for community members to be involved in preparedness is that when people know their neighbors, especially those neighbors who are the most vulnerable that it really can help close that gap, as far as response goes, brings me to my final point, which is, I'm really glad that we're doing a citywide evacuation drill. I'm glad that Staff is being trained up, and how it is that we run eocs because

1:30:32If they believe it's been a quite a while since we had Staff engaged in an eoc exercise. But what I really want to highlight and hope we can have done in 2024 is a citywide exercise where the community

1:30:44can be really, really, actively engaged and involved. And we could think about a scenario that would involve community members in lots of different levels and involve potentially our partner agencies are are the ones who are around really thinking about what would be a robust exercise.

1:31:03I think it would be great.

1:31:05I entirely agree. Okay.

1:31:07good. And then

1:31:09Finally, if when it comes to that mou, just to assure the public. Well, we might not have that document. And then there's all all the pieces that you guys highlighted really? Well.

1:31:18it is important to know that these agencies are collaborative. So you didn't talk about it. But I just know this from from knowing it, that you have weekly calls with all the fire chiefs in the region. So should something happen. Still, in the absence of an mou, we are working collaboratively, and a lot of interoperation will just it will organically happen, because the communication's already there.

1:31:41Yeah, thank you. I just, I'd love to build off that, because not only do we have the Hillside Emergency Forum for staff. We also have constant collaboration with

1:31:49All the chiefs in this county, and then the chiefs that butt up against the other county, and we still continue our weekly Monday calls, and we still work together, and we train together. The Mou really gives an avenue for elected officials to collaborate right, but on the boots on the ground, the staff we are constantly working together, collaborating, drilling together, and preparing, and I proudly wore my I/O.

1:32:13Is so class one PIN tonight, and I hope we maintain that. Thank you so much. Thank you.

1:32:19Councilmember King, too. Thank you. Mayor. I also want to echo what my mayor pro tem. Has said, and just appreciate you working with all of our residents, especially the El Sri Firesafe group. I want to thank Council member for Deli for all his work, and attending all those meetings, and know how much our residents appreciate you. And

1:32:43yeah, and and I'm reminded by John Stasi today about the anniversary of the Loma Prieta earthquake

1:32:50and and I'm reminded by the the other earthquake. I live through the one in Los Angeles, and it was the fires that we had in Los Angeles is because a lot of our fire trucks could not move up these narrow hills where I lived in La. So we we did have some problems back then, I believe La is one of the cities that

1:33:14established the restricted parking on Red flag days definitely, you know. Appreciate you looking at that and know the importance. I know we have a few

1:33:25super narrow streets Berkeley has more, but we have a few here, and and the importance of making sure when we have these red flag days, that we have the space to do this. So and also, you know, looking at the future of electrification, it's the fires are caused by a gas explosion. So yeah, that the quicker we get to electrification

1:33:50the better. And I'm also reminded of the past, former elsewhere mayors. And it was this is Barki Mayor Barkley, who worked on house hardening. So, Mayor Barki, I know you're watching, and know how much of that work that you worked on back in the 19 eighties and nineties, and then you were able to change from those wooden roofs

1:34:19to non-combustible groups. And know how much. Yeah, we appreciate your work back then. So yeah, with the fire safe group and the future of this mou, yeah, I'm reminded also of of taking the the crash course.

1:34:37The cert and I know there are folks in my neighborhood that were involved with Cert, and they're quite elderly now, but you know we need to get, you know, encourage our new homeowners to participate in cert training in the future. You know, with earthquakes, you know, cerritos and a fire

1:34:59danger area. And we're right up the earthquake fault. So, chief, your your work is so important. I'm glad. Congratulations on your one year anniversary. I'm reminded about my time when I was in Washington, DC. And I met with one of the fire chiefs that was meeting with our Congressional

1:35:22staff, and I told him, you know, from Sacramento area, and he thought very highly of you so, but know that you're well known up and down the State, and glad you chose El Cerritos again. Thank you for all your work. Thank you.

1:35:39So I do have a couple questions. So first, congratulations on your one year anniversary. And I wanted to say, Thank you for kind of getting us to speed with the Nims and the Ics training. So I think I really did learn a lot. And I think that's going to be really helpful for me to know where you know how this all works together, and it gives me a lot of confidence that things will will go very smoothly when when and when something terrible happens, because we know it's coming for us eventually.

1:36:09So I do have a question about the

1:36:12the fuel reduction, and we talked about maintenance. So maintenance.

1:36:18as I understand from your discussion here, is that we will be reliant on going to measure X every year. We don't have some. I thought that was part of the hillside. Natural area vegetation management plan that we would have something more formal than kind of

1:36:35applying every year for grants, and and being able to maintain kind of these fire breaks and and reducing fuel in our hillside natural area. Well, I just want to clarify. There's there's 3 things happening. So the hillside natural area that gives us our fuel breaks.

1:36:54So that happens regardless. And we do that on basis. The access to the portal feature X, which will allow us to do additional fee. So some of the larger choice that we couldn't our budget

1:37:08and get us some some clearance off the fence lines. Now, if you refer to the plan, we just got a grant for that would allow us to apply for additional grants in the future, because that would actually give us a few reduction plan work we've had in the past, and then we can apply for larger Federal grants for hillside natural area. So those 3 things are happening continuously and we're driving them forward.

1:37:37That's that's a relief. There was a small fire in the in the Pg. And E. Right of way, and I know that some other Fire safe members were concerned about that, that there was no explanation of why it happened. Were you able to find out from Pgin why that fire occurred so fast and we didn't find any source

1:38:01so undetermined. Start. Okay, but that is, it is a concern that that we did have

1:38:06an actual fire. So we were very fortunate. That was not a a windy day. And then I know you flashed it for a second, but I was wondering if you could bring back up the Zone Haven map

1:38:19and just briefly explain what that is, so that people will understand what that map is showing us.

1:38:26Yes, yes, I can. So I am.

1:38:36Here we go. Thank you.

1:38:40testing my, it skills on the fly. I like it. Okay, sort of the zone. Haven't map right here. And this is a screenshot of our hillside community and

1:38:52the intent of Zone Haven is a pre planned evacuation tool. Right? That's really what it's there for. And it's designed to manage your carrying capacity of your roadways right? So if you needed to evacuate everybody in this green area that is on the screenshot, you would start with the lower zones in an ordered format right, and then you would work your way up the hill.

1:39:18And so the goal of the citizens are to know what zone that you're in and be registered for C. Ws. So that they can notify that zone of your either evacuating. You have evacuation orders, a voluntary evacuation orders you, or you have a shelter in place or simply a warning. Now.

1:39:36C. Ws is our community warning system, you know. It's ran by our sheriff. They use Zone Haven as well, and we can call on a request to zone, or we can call in a request specific streets, and they can draw an area over it. But Zone haven allows us to do this in an ordered format that is pre-planned.

1:39:57So if that was a fair explanation.

1:40:00yes, so if we know what our zone is, will you be, you know, will you? Will that information also be part of what you tell us like? It's like Zone 4 will be going next. So we should know that we're in Zone 4. Or do you use C. Ws, and you just tell people you right now will now move out. No, that's a great question. So logistically how this works is. If we're gonna do evacuations, I will go into unified command of law enforcement because it is technically a law enforcement

1:40:28procedure. And I will say, we want to evacuate zone. Ec, K, 0, 0. One law enforcement officer will call cws and say, we're gonna evacuate. We're giving evacuation orders for Ec. K. 0 one. Then you'll get a message out through cws that says we're evacuating you.

1:40:48It can tell you your zone. But really, the key is that you're getting a message from Cws for an evacuation order

1:40:56that make sense. Yes, great. We can Update information to the community using Nixel

1:41:01right? That can be that can be pushed out via Pd, we can also update information via Everbridge. Reverse 9 1 one. But the evacuation order will come through C. Ws. And we use Zone Haven to to determine what areas we evacuate first, and C. Ws stands for community warning system great.

1:41:24Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you for the leader. I do have one more question, Chief, and we met last week, and you made a very good point that II said I might want to bring up. So you can talk to our residents here. Post Laina. A lot of

1:41:42citizens. Residents have come to me and say, we got our. I hope we're okay. And you made a very clear point that we're not Lahina.

1:41:51Can you talk a little bit about why we're not Lahail, and we may be better prepared than that. California is your best prepared state in the nation, probably because of the amount of

1:42:01wildfires that it's faced. But each time it's gotten better and better. Starting from 1,976, when it created fire scope and a process to actually manage these events. But we now watch the weather very closely, and we take mitigating actions to reduce events like Loina, for example, if we do see high winds coming on a hot, dry day, we will close the parks. East Bay regional parks will close the parks.

1:42:25What that does is that removes your primary, your biggest

1:42:29cause of starts for wildfires, which is humans. If you simply remove the human factor out of it, then that removes your biggest cause of starts. The second biggest cause of starts, we know is from our power lines, and those will get shut down as well. So now we've removed our 2 largest causes of wildfire.

1:42:48and and we will also start to issue warnings and voluntary evacuations if we get really nervous. If the wind gets high, so we will take actions and mitigating actions to prevent something like Wahina. We also have cameras on the hillside, monitoring all of the parks, so that if a fire does start out there will see it coming, and we'll have warnings. We also have an incredible response system in California compared to Hawaii.

1:43:12where we can order up aircraft, and they can be here in 30 min and start dropping lines to block the fire before it gets to our rich line.

1:43:21So.

1:43:22Councilman Fideli, I hope that was a clear and concise explanation. Okay, so thank you very much.

1:43:29Great. Thank you. That that was really helpful. That was very comforting to know. Do we have any comments from the public this evening? We do have one request on this item, Su. Susan, if you wanna come up?

1:43:52Good evening. I'm Sue Duncan City, resident of El Cerrito. I urge the city council to join the East Bay mou wildfires, you know, knows no boundaries. It is not a one city or a one county threat. Wildfire is a regional threat, and must be dealt with as such. The East Bay Hills from Panol and Richmond to at least through Oakland, are threatened.

1:44:15El Cerrito should participate. Remember it does. If it doesn't work out an entity can withdraw with this with a 60 day notice, but this needs to be tried. Please join and try it out.

1:44:29I also encourage the Council to approve the private

1:44:32pilot project when it is presented to the Council for restricted parking on red flag days, residents must be able to safely evacuate as emergency vehicles enter. Can you imagine being in your car, unable to move with flames surrounding you?

1:44:49I worked in a burn unit, and you do not want to get burned, or you don't want to die that way.

1:44:57I also want to inform you of a fire earlier today in H. And A, which Mayor

1:45:04Motoyama

1:45:05mentioned a member of our group was walking in H. And A, when she came upon a patch that was still smouldering a little bit, and it was still warm. She did call the ECFD. And they came. They came right away.

1:45:19Luckily there wasn't any offshore wind today. This emphasizes like you've been talking about

1:45:26the need for significant increase in vegetation management funding for H. And A. Now, not when the we can't wait till 2024. We have to start now after the new plan is, we already have 3 plans in place that have been ignored 1987,

1:45:451997 and 90 17. They're already sitting on a shelf. Use them now.

1:45:55we also need it for not just removal, but for maintenance of these areas. Thank you. And thank you, chief sailors, for your presentation.

1:46:03Thank you. That concludes our request to speak. Mayor. Okay.

1:46:10great. Thank you very much. It was really informative. Presentation. Thank you.

1:46:16Okay. Our next item is city council, local and regional liaison assignments. Are there any council reports.

1:46:27Mayor pro temp? If we're still using this period to talk about items, places that we did attend and things we did do. I attended the citywide garage sale over the weekend. It was fantastic.

1:46:40No comment. I don't know. Thank you. Okay.

1:46:47May. Councilmember Fidel. Yes, I attended with you the Mayor's conference in Pleasant Hill, where they talked about Bart changes. Bart. Director talked about the changes to address the transit cliff.

1:47:00and also coming up in the next 2 days I'll be attending the Contra Costa. Transit authority retreat on on their plans to change the role of

1:47:10Ccto, and how we deal with future transportation issues in the county

1:47:15perfect.

1:47:18On October fifth I attended the Contra Costa Mayor's conference in Pleasant Hill, along with Councilman Fidel. On October the sixth I made the Mayor's choice selection for the Elsrido Art Association, art show, which was very exciting for me. October fifteenth. I attended the Albany Film fest, which was held at this year in the Cereo Theatre. The gala event which was really really nice, and I hope that we will be able to host them again next year.

1:47:48Hey? With that it is now

1:47:527, 53 PM. We are adjourned the next regularly scheduled city Council meeting is Tuesday, November seventh, 2023 at 6 PM. Thank you very much. Everyone. Thank you.