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LongBeachCC_06132017_17-0460 | Speaker 1: Christian Curtis.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Number 14.
Speaker 1: Item 14 is a report from Public Works recommendation to amend for agreement for as needed landscape architectures services to increase the aggregated amount by 4 million city.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Brief staff report, please.
Speaker 0: Craig back. As vice mayor, members of the council. What you have before you this evening is similar to some of the other requests that we brought previously. This is for as needed service contracts. This particular item focuses on landscape needs with the passage of measure. What we're seeing is a need to do a number of different smaller projects. Some of those are in parks. We'll use landscape firms to do that. We were redesigning certain medians. A good example of that is the work currently going on on Second Street and Belmont Shore. So these are, again, as needed contracts for projects that come up. That concludes that report.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: So moved.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Any public comment on this item saying no members, please cast your vote. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to amend agreements with AHBE Landscape Architects, of Culver City, CA; Hirsch & Associates, Inc., of Anaheim, CA; Mia Lehrer & Associates, of Los Angeles, CA; and RJM Design Group, of San Juan Capistrano, CA, for as-needed landscape architecture services, to increase the aggregate amount by $4,000,000, for a revised total aggregate amount not to exceed $7,000,000, and to extend for one additional one-year term for a revised total of four optional one-year extensions. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_06132017_17-0471 | Speaker 1: Wishing Karis.
Speaker 5: Thank you. We already handle 16. That makes it number 17.
Speaker 1: Item 17 is communication from Councilman Austin, Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilman Andrews and Councilmember Durango. Recommendation directed this recommendation to direct the city manager to support state legislation that would add a permanent seat to the Metro Board of Directors for the City of Long Beach.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: Thank you very much. And I want to thank my colleagues for signing on on this very, very important item, which is very consistent with our state led agenda that was adopted by this council in 2015. There is and specifically, we stated that our led our agenda was would be to monitor or sponsor state legislation that proposes to change the structure of the state and regional boards on which Long Beach is represented and maximize the city's representation. There is currently legislation making its way through the legislature. Specifically, the House of Origin was in the State Senate SB 268 by Tony Mendoza. Senator Tony Mendoza and was approved in committee as well as the Senate floor. Now it's in the Assembly. Currently, that bill has quite seeks to to restructure the MTA board, but it does not have a permanent seat for Long Beach. And as you all know, Metro serves as the largest metropolitan transportation planning organization in the nation and is comprised of 13 voting members and one ex-officio member. Metro does not include a permanent seat for the city of Long Beach currently, and as the second largest city in L.A. County, inclusive of the port of Long Beach, Long Beach shares representation with 25 cities, mostly from the Gateway Council of Governments, but also from surrounding areas. As part of the southeast Long Beach sector, current law prescribes membership on the Metro Board directors to be five members of the Board of Supervisors, the mayor of the City of Los Angeles, two public members and one members of the City of Los Angeles, appointed by the Mayor of the City of Los Angeles, and four members, each of whom shall be a mayor or a member of the city council appointed by the L.A. County Selection Committee. And these are from four sectors the North County, San Fernando Valley, San Gabriel Valley sector, the southwest corridor sector in the southeast Long Beach sector, which we are a part of. And again, we compete with 25 cities for that seat. I'm really happy to say that currently today, our mayor serves on the MTA board. He was recently selected and he's doing a fantastic job. Almost we saw almost immediate results once he was appointed to that board. But the years that preceding that, eight years, we weren't at the table. And we have to ask ourselves what actually happened during those eight years. Measure R was passed and major decisions in terms millions of millions of dollars were planned for transportation throughout the region . And most recently Measure M was was passed by the voters in L.A. County. Long Beach was not necessarily at the table in terms of setting the priorities for the expenditure plan. I think it's very, very important that that we again and I've said this long before I ever got on the city council that Long Beach have a strong regional presence on boards, particularly like the MTA. And I'd like to just move this, this agenda forward to, to, to, to support legislation in any legislation coming out of the Sacramento. And hopefully it's this session that would include a permanent seat for the city of Long Beach. Lastly, I would state that a permanent seat through legislation would improve our city's influence regionally and assure long term benefits to local taxpayers who depend on and are impacted by the decisions at the MTA. So I'd like to make a motion to move that the city council direct the city manager to support state legislation that would add a permanent seat to the L.A. County MTA Board of Directors for the City of Long Beach without disproportionately affecting representation from the L.A. County Board of Supervisors or adding more than four new voting members to the board, bringing the board membership to no more than 17 voting members again. And I appreciate the second by Councilmember Gonzalez. This this is very, very important to the city of Long Beach. It is consistent with our state led agenda. And I would like to also get a. Have input on this as well. We have Diana Tang, who has also been working very, very hard with our state led agenda. Mr. Mayor, if I might, my.
Speaker 3: Mayor, members.
Speaker 7: Of the city council, I believe that Councilmember Austin provided a fairly robust description of the bill and what it chooses to do. Currently, the City of Orange does not have a position on this. The bill is in the California Assembly that's been referred to local government and transportation and does not currently include a proposal to add a seat for a Long Beach.
Speaker 3: And so the bill must pass.
Speaker 7: Both policy committees by July 14th. We do have an opportunity to ask for amendments that do do what the recommended action tonight here at state. And so we stand ready to implement your direction.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Is there public comment on this? Okay. Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 7: Thank you. I just wanted to thank Councilman Austin for bringing this forward. I think it's absolutely needed, especially in addition, as we have millions of dollars of investment along the the metro. And we should certainly, you know, have a seat at the table, an additional seat at the table to be able to talk about so many things happening in our city, but also just have a regional seat at the table. But, Diana, I wanted to ask. So July 14th is the the deadline basically. What happens next after that? What is the process? July 14th is the deadline to get out of policy committee. The bill is key to fiscal and so it would need to go to the Assembly Appropriations Committee as well. And the deadline to get out of that committee is September 1st. So assuming that it passes both policy committees on the appropriation committee, then it would go to the assembly floor for a vote by the full assembly. And because we have heard from Senator Mendoza staff that there will likely be amendments, the bill would need to go back to the Senate for concurrence before it would be eligible for the governor's consideration. So end of the year, we're thinking sometime around then I believe end of October, around that time frame. Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I do want to come to an answer.
Speaker 8: So I'd also just like to add that I didn't mention that this bill got out of of the state Senate, got out of policy committee. It was also voted on on the Senate floor and passed. There have been several iterations of this type of bill moving through the legislature over the last few years. And this is the furthest such a bill has gotten. This one has me concerned because it doesn't not prescribe a seat for Long Beach, a permanent seat for Long Beach. And I will just state that, you know, our state senator, Ricardo Lora, did support this bill as well moving forward. So there is there's, I guess, support for some sort of change on the MTA board. We just want to make sure that we're not left behind.
Speaker 0: We're going to have public comment in just a minute, I think. But I just want to reiterate, I think what Councilman Nelson's point is that it's been the position of the city, I think both from as mayor and certainly as members of the council, that this body would support changes if, if and when Long Beach was explicitly added as a voting member of the Metro Board at Long Beach were to gain a seat. And so I think while this has been discussed, certainly Diana Taylor, government affairs manager, is a thing can be there in the past at former iterations. We discussed this last year as well. I think this explicitly puts the city council on record once again and just making very clear that that we would support a bill that would include Long Beach as having an explicit membership permanently on the seat. With that, let me invite any public comment.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Members of the council. My name is. Sadly, I'm here on behalf of State Senator Tony Mendoza. On his behalf, I wanted to thank you for your courtesy of letting me speak. Sentiment also has been supportive of the idea of having Long Beach.
Speaker 0: On an expanded.
Speaker 5: And reorganized MTA board. Last year he offered Senate Bill 1472 and Long Beach was listed as one of the seats. There's a historical reason for that. Some of you may remember that before the current MTA was organized, Long Beach had a seat on the previous commission. However, last year, Senator decided to hold his bill 1472, which had the provision for Long Beach because there were three concerns that. A lot of organizations raised. They'd had two legislative appointments made by the speaker and the pro tem. The people were not happy about that and the size of the board was 25 members and people felt it was too big and secondly, that there needed to be a local process. So the Senate went back to the drawing board. He has met at least six or seven times with a working group consisting of the League of Cities, L.A. Division, the Independent Cities, Contract Cities, the County City Selection Committee, the mayor of L.A. and the chair of the MTA board. And the current.
Speaker 0: Bill emerged out.
Speaker 5: Of that discussions. And now it's a very simple bill. It essentially expands the board to make sure that the 87 cities other than the city of L.A., the city of L.A. and the Board of Supervisors between them are represented on the board. That is proportionate to the share of the population that govern the 87 cities. That includes you represent 52% of the county's population, the city of L.A., around 38%.
Speaker 0: Both of them.
Speaker 5: Have 31%, each of the board seats. So by expanding the board once again, we hope that we can accommodate various groups. What the bill does not do right now, unlike last year, is specify which cities should serve on the MTA board, and that is at the insistence of the three city associations and the city and the county city selection committee. So the Senator wanted me to come here to make sure that I explain that to you. And he would very strongly encourage and he would work with you. Mr. Mayor, the council members, if you wish to work with him, to stress his recommendation that language should be accommodated on the MTA board. But it is a decision that this time is developed through this consensus process, and I've named the groups to you. The second issue that Senator wanted me to bring up to you is the part of the motion that restricts the size to 17 members. If we do that, then the current imbalance which runs against the interests of the smaller cities, 87 cities, will continue. And I'll be happy to get into the details with that. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Thank you. And thank you to the senator. Any other public comment? See? None. Well, there is a motion and a second on the floor to support on as part of our legislative agenda, to support a bill that would have Long Beach as a permanent seat. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 5: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next item. I think that was the last item was public comment. Second public comment period at this time.
Speaker 5: My name is Steven Cardio. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to direct City Manager to support State legislation that would add a permanent seat to the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Agency Board of Directors for the City of Long Beach without disproportionately affecting representation from the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors or adding more than four new voting members to the Board, bringing Board membership up to no more than 17 voting members. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_06062017_17-0439 | Speaker 3: Okay? We're going to go ahead. And first, we do have a hearing, but we're going to take item 16/1 to the top of the agenda so we can have an official city clerk here as we move forward tonight. So I'm going to please have the clerk read item 16.
Speaker 4: Communication from Mayor Garcia. A recommendation to adopt a resolution approving the appointment and terms of compensation for the city clerk.
Speaker 7: Move it and get it.
Speaker 3: Thank you. And I'm going to turn this actually over to the city attorney for an update on this.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Mayor. This item comes tonight before you for the recommendation for the appointment of the city clerk and pursuant to government code 54 953, it requires an oral presentation at the direction of the city council. The city has reached an agreement regarding the compensation of the city clerk. The proposed compensation must be approved tonight in open session. The proposed compensation is $69 and 0.473 per hour, or 145,000 on an annualized basis, plus a monthly car allowance of $450,000. Thank you for 5400 $50. 1000. Okay.
Speaker 3: Thank you. She's getting a new she's got a new car to look.
Speaker 0: You like.
Speaker 3: That? Thank you. Thank you, Mr. City Attorney. And we have we have we have a motion in a second. I'm going to just make a couple brief comments and turn this over to Councilwoman Price. I want to think and think. Think, really just with a lot of of support and love and welcome our new city clerk, which we're about to vote on tonight, someone with an incredible amount of experience here at the city of Long Beach and in the clerk's office. And we just know you're going to be a great addition as you in this role, but you are obviously already part of the team and we all know you very well. So thank you for for stepping up. And we appreciate your service to the city of Long Beach. Councilman Price.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Congratulations, Monique. For those who don't know, our new city clerk has dedicated much of her career, most of her career to the residents of the city of Long Beach. And she has been a vital part of making the office what it is today in terms of its efficiency, its technology, and her consistency with the department , credibility with her colleagues, and commitment to the city. In times of uncertainty and the fact that she has stayed committed to the city is is going to prove to be very successful for her and the office in general. I think that your arrival in this new position is going to be of great benefit to the city and of course, make the department stronger and and restore the integrity and the credibility that the department has always had and worked hard to have. So thank you and congratulations.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 4: Yes, Madam Clerk, congratulations. Very happy for you. And I know that you've worked very hard for our city. And I just want to thank you for all the years ahead that you'll be working for us. And your team is incredible as well. I sit next to them every council meeting and I see them just kind of clicking clacking away. But they're working very, very hard on the back and on so many different services that many other cities don't even offer. So thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I got to sit next to him every day. So how long you've been with how long have you been with the city? Monique 16 years. I think it's I think I want to just say congratulations. But I also want to say this is a great message and a great example to send to our staff and the department and the people, you know, that work for our city, that if you work hard, you put your head down to do good work. People recognize that and you can be very successful in this city. So congratulations to you. Look forward to many years of working together. Thank you.
Speaker 3: But Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: I yes, I want to congratulate you, but first, I want to make sure we think Poonam Davis, for her tremendous work as our interim city clerk, she stepped in at a critical time. But I think it was the right amount of time for us to highlight and recognize all of your work that you've done in your leadership over your 16 years in the city. And, you know, Long Beach is one of those cities that also runs our own local elections. And city clerk in our city is not necessarily an easy job. So I know that it's in the right hands with you. And so congratulations. We're proud.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 7: Yes, Monique. Patience is a virtue. And I see why you stick around. Because $450 and what that's like. We appear in the diocese and our car. Who? Who could ask for more than that? Congratulations, young lady councilmember.
Speaker 3: Super. Now.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I'll apologize again for losing my voice. But first, I'd like to state that I enthusiastically support this item. City Council doesn't get many opportunities for a do over, but we did get a second chance to select a city clerk. I believe we've made an excellent choice. It's important to note, however, that this would not have happened had our candidate not stepped up to the plate. So I'd like to commend Monique for having the confidence in her own abilities and the strength of character to reapply for the position. For that reason, while I thought she was a perfect fit two years ago, I'm even more impressed with her today. Finally, this outcome is not an endorsement of our process. Over the past two years. I believe City Council will need to examine some of the systemic challenges in the very near future. However, the final outcome has restored my faith in a concept judged, learned hand referred to as the eventual supremacy of reason. Thank you and congratulations. Money.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilmember Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: Well said, councilman. Or soup or not, it's. It's your time. And congratulations. I know you're going to do a great job because you've been doing a great job for for many years behind the scenes as of the deputy city clerk. It is your time to shine. And I know that you have the full support of this council and your staff. So congratulations again.
Speaker 3: Is Israeli public comment on this item. Okay. Seeing no public comment, members. Members, please go to cast your votes.
Speaker 4: Motion carries.
Speaker 3: Great. And let's give Monique a big round of applause. Our new city class. And I'm going to I'm going to ask and give her an opportunity to say a few words in official capacity as the city clerk of Long Beach. Madam Clerk.
Speaker 4: Thank you. I'd like to thank the mayor and the city council. As someone who was born and raised in Long Beach, it truly is an honor to be serving this community and also like to thank Larry Herrera and Poonam Davis for their unending support and friendship and my city clerk family both past and present. You guys are fantastic. I'm honored to contribute to the legacy of excellence in the City Clerk Department and to commit my experience and enthusiasm to this city clerk and the City of Long Beach team. I look forward to working with all of you, all the departments, and most importantly, all the residents of Long Beach. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Congratulations and excellent. We're going to go back to the regular agenda now and we have a hearing. So, Madam Court, if we can please read not hearing item number one. | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolution approving the appointment and terms of compensation for the City Clerk. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_06062017_17-0424 | Speaker 3: Congratulations and excellent. We're going to go back to the regular agenda now and we have a hearing. So, Madam Court, if we can please read not hearing item number one.
Speaker 4: Report from Public Works recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record. Conclude the public hearing. Adopt a resolution making findings for energy services, contracting and authorizing city manager to execute a solar energy power purchase agreement and easement agreement with FMG Solar Long Beach for the purchase of energy produced from solar.
Speaker 2: Photo of electric.
Speaker 4: Installations at 11 potential municipal sites for a period of 25 years.
Speaker 2: Citywide.
Speaker 3: Okay, we have a presentation by staff. Want to turn this over to our assistant city manager.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The staff report on this will be given by Craig Beck, our director of Public Works.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Mayor. Members of the city council. I'm pleased to be for you to be before you here this evening to talk about sustainability and the city's efforts to continue moving forward with its Climate Action Plan and sustainability goals decided before you is something that will have a positive impact reducing the city's carbon footprint and focusing on city parking lots and city parking garages, which will also result in a reduction in the heat island effect that we see in these large surfaced areas. What we have before you here this evening is an item that essentially moves forward a an agreement that the city tried to do in 2014 and 2014. This council took action to enter into an agreement with a company named SunEdison to identify sites and bring solar to the city of Long Beach. Unfortunately, SunEdison was not able to finalize any of those agreements and ultimately declared bankruptcy. We are confident that we are here this evening on the forefront of working with a new company, FMG Solar, and they have the wherewithal and financial backing to be successful in this endeavor. PFG has successfully implemented a roughly 236 sites for 29 different Southern California public agencies in a similar solar PPA agreement. What you have before you here is something that's a little unique and staff is here to provide a little bit of clarity to how this process will move forward. And we're also asking council to consider a slight modification to the recommendation that's before you this evening. So, for example, you have an attachment in the council item that that lists 11 potential sites. We believe these are good sites and sites that provide opportunity to add solar. However, we think that there may be additional sites to consider as well. And I wanted to clarify this evening that we are looking at not just the 11 sites listed, but other potential locations. For example, the Broadway parking garage that many visitors in this chamber here this evening parked in and that city staff park in. We believe that that provides an opportunity to consider for solar, as well as the public safety building. That may be another site to consider. So one change that we would like to make to the recommended action is to provide is to have council, provide staff with the flexibility to negotiate different sites and actually negotiate potentially different terms . I know the recommended action lists a 25 year term, but depending on the site and the site conditions, it may warrant different term a period of time, and that time may be 20 years as an example. We're just worried that we don't want to be locked in to a specific number of years and a specific number of sites this evening. So we're we are asking that this be changed to say up to 25 years and for more than 11 sites. That concludes a staff report. And we're here to answer any questions you may have.
Speaker 5: Thank you. So at this point, that concludes staff comments. Is there any public comment? Please come forward and state your name.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Vice Mayor and fellow Council members and city staff. My name is Tommy five. I represent IBEW Electrical Workers, Local 11, and I'm here to fully support solar infrastructure on city owned facilities. It's definitely in line with the city's Sustainable City Action Plan. We feel that the city staff has done a great job of moving this item, this solar agenda item forward. And we look to we look forward to more public and private facilities getting on board to help.
Speaker 5: Reduce the cost of electricity, greenhouse gas emissions.
Speaker 3: We urge the city council.
Speaker 5: To move forward with the recommendation. Thank you. Thank you. And further public comment. I see one.
Speaker 6: Very good. You look as the address, I'd suggest, as I've often done before, considering using also the roof of the Pete Archer Rowing Center. It's certainly not as large as a parking lot, but I think we get there's certainly the twice the square footage of a normal house and we see houses that have it. I think we could get to 120 feet by 120 feet and put the numbers to it and see if the foundation is is all brick. So I think that the excellent stability there, in fact, it could even come out even further across the eastern side. Thanks. As well as as well as the waterfront site. Thank you.
Speaker 5: Thank you. See no further from the comment. Public comment is closed before we take it back behind the real Mr. City attorney, you have a comment. Yes. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Just as a clarification for the additional flexibility requested by staff, the motion would include that you could have a pension potentially up to or not to exceed 15 additional sites instead of the 11 listed. If there are more additional sites to come to through the process, we could certainly come back with a contract amendment and that the terms would be given the flexibility to city staff to up to 25 years. Yes, as staff indicated, if it was less than that, we could certainly negotiate that. We wouldn't go beyond 25 years unless we came back to council. Thanks for the clarification. Taking it back behind the rail, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 4: Thank you. You must have read my mind. City Attorney I was just going to ask that question, so I appreciate the clarification on that. I'm completely good with that, and I think this is wonderful that we're doing this. So I want to thank PFM as well as IBEW Local 11 for being here. I think any time we can add additional solar and sustainability measures is a great thing in the city and it's definitely what we've been heading in the right direction and what we've been about. So thank you both for being here. And I look forward to working with public works and hearing more about the additional sites. Thank you.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: Yes. I also want to thank staff for all their hard work on this and definitely support expanding the number of sites and looking at, you know, any parks and rec sites that we have, senior center sites, animal shelter, any opportunities like that. I did want to ask I know that there's some fluttering of conversation around community choice aggregation with these solar panels. Be able to be a part of that portfolio should the city eventually decide to go that route.
Speaker 6: Councilmember Pearce. I guess my response to that question is it depends on how the city moves forward with a key agreement under what's contemplated before you this evening, the city would essentially be purchasing power from PFG. PFG would own the assets, the solar assets, but we would be purchasing the power. So in a sense, the city would be using green power for its facilities. I think that falls in line with the discussion that at least come forward to date regarding community aggregation program for Long Beach.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. Great work, guys.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: Thank you. And before we vote, if I could just get staff to give us an indication on what how many jobs and what type of jobs will be created through this action.
Speaker 6: Councilmember Austin apologize. I don't have those numbers before me this evening, but we'll reach out and put that together and get back to you.
Speaker 8: Okay. Well, will they be good jobs?
Speaker 6: I think, by the fact that the IBEW is here this evening. Yes, they will be good jobs.
Speaker 5: Thank you. So seeing no further public comment now, I would say if all that needs to happen is IBEW, show up to make it a good job. Tommy, you should come to every one of our council meetings. Thanks a lot, everybody. Please go ahead and cast your vote.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 5: Thank you. So at this point, we're going to move to public comment and non agenda items.
Speaker 3: And public comments on their.
Speaker 0: Way.
Speaker 5: Okay. We're going to move forward with public comment on non-urgent items. Will the speakers please come forward? Each speaker has up to 3 minutes on the list. Thank you. So we have rich gardener, Larry Goodhue, Morgan Caswell, Kirsten Burge and William J. | Resolution | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, adopt resolution making findings for energy services contracting and authorizing City Manager, or designee, to execute a Solar Energy Power Purchase Agreement and Easement Agreement, and any necessary documents and amendments, with PFMG Solar Long Beach, LLC, for the purchase of energy produced from solar photovoltaic installations at 11 potential municipal sites within the City of Long Beach, for a period of 25 years, with the option to renew for three additional five-year periods. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_06062017_17-0440 | Speaker 4: Motion carries.
Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you, madam.
Speaker 4: Item 17 Communication from Councilman Andrews. A recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund and the Economic and Property Development Department by 45,000, offset by the Six Council District one time infrastructure funds to support the establishment of a bid for the Pacific Avenue Business Corridor.
Speaker 5: Thank you.
Speaker 7: First of all, I want to start by thanking my fellow council members for putting this business improvement effort in prior years. I've seen incredible improvement along the A9 with the Midtown bid. And I would like to see the same along the Pacific Avenue. My staff is my staff has prepared a brief presentation regarding this item. Will you be.
Speaker 2: Honorable mayor and members of the City Council? The item before you is a request on behalf of Councilmember Andrews to transfer funds from the Capital Projects Fund and the Public Works Department to the General Fund and the Economic and Property Development Department. The purpose for this allocation is to aid in establishing a property business improvement district for the Pacific Avenue Business Corridor. A brief account of the six districts efforts to establish improvement districts goes back several years. Funds were initially set aside to assist in the formation of Business Improvement District along council districts six major corridors. Beginning on Anaheim Street, the Midtown bid was widely favored by business owners and unanimously passed by city council in 2015. The midtown bid has been active for a year now and is a great success. Our goal is to replicate this approach and accomplish the same along the Pacific Avenue corridor. Pacific Avenue is an integral hub in the Six Council district that houses many small businesses and connects South Wrigley to the rest of Long Beach. Pacific Avenue has great potential to thrive and be a bustling source of small business activity. But the area is plagued with challenges of crime, blight and deteriorated infrastructure. Among the communities, stakeholders and patients have shared dialog regarding the formation of a property business improvement district and an effort to improve the conditions of the area. Upon recognizing the need for such an initiative along Pacific Avenue. We want to make this permit a priority. Establishing a business improvement district. Some low income communities are, in fact, recommended by the city's economic development blueprint. Moreover, the results of a 2009 assessment of Los Angeles bids indicate that the implementation of business improvement districts can reduce the occurrence of violent crime in its surrounding neighborhoods. Tonight, Council District six is requesting Council support and increasing appropriations in the General Fund in the Economic and Property Development Department to aid in the establishment of a bid along the Pacific Avenue corridor. That concludes my staff report. We will be happy to answer any of your questions. Thank you.
Speaker 7: And I am asking my colleagues to please not move aside.
Speaker 0: No questions.
Speaker 5: Okay. Councilwoman Gonzalez?
Speaker 4: Oh, yeah. I just want to say congrats to Councilmember Andrews. I think this is wonderful that you're revitalizing the corridors and you're doing such great work here. So keep it up and any support we can offer. Absolutely.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 5: And I'll just chime in and say, you know, good luck with this. They really make a big difference when redevelopment ended. You know, we formed one in North Long Beach, still figuring it all out, but we're leaps and bounds ahead of where we were. So good luck with that. You have my support. So is there any public comment on this item saying please cast your vote?
Speaker 2: Motion passes. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund (GF) in the Economic and Property Development Department (EP) by $45,000, offset by the Sixth Council District one-time infrastructure funds transferred from the Capital Projects Fund (CP) in the Public Works Department (PW) to support economic development efforts by supporting the establishment of a Property Business Improvement District for the Pacific Avenue business corridor. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_06062017_17-0445 | Speaker 2: Motion passes.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Item number 18, please.
Speaker 4: Communication from Vice Mayor Richardson, Councilmember Pierce, Councilwoman Mongo. Councilmember Your UNGA recommendation to receive and file a report on the status of inter-departmental efforts around the education, prevention and enforcement of.
Speaker 2: Illegal fireworks in Long Beach.
Speaker 5: Thank you. So we know every summer, increasingly our offices are bombarded with phone calls and the police department does a tremendous job in the time leading up to the 4th of July, in the months, months after, for the 4th of July, and dealing with the issue of illegal fireworks. And I wanted to make sure that we do have an opportunity out here in public session to hear from our our fire department about our efforts. I want to highlight one thing. And, you know, this is a really cool lawn sign that's going up in front of my house. I know that it's really sensitive for people who have pets. I know it's sensitive to people who have newborns like myself. I have a pet and a newborn, but it's also a very serious issue to people who value quality of life and, you know, veterans with PTSD and folks who are who are actually harmed by these activities . So I want to hear from our city staff on some of those efforts. And I just have a few questions after that. So let's go ahead and turn it over. Steph, thanks. Chief Mike Duffy Mr. Vice Mayor. Council Members. Good evening. And I'm joined here at the podium with my partner and public safety and city chief Robert Luna. And as was just mentioned, the 4th of July holiday is just under a month away. And as usual, the holiday will be commemorated with block parties, legal and organized fireworks shows and unfortunately, illegal fireworks. As I've reported in the past, the NFPA reports an annual average of about 18,500 fires caused by fireworks from 2009 to 2013. And in 2014, the U.S. hospital emergency rooms treated over 10,500 people for fireworks related injuries. 51% of those injuries were to extremities and 38% were to the head. The risk of fireworks injury is highest for young people ages 5 to 9, followed by children aged 10 to 19. Your police and fire departments have been working together for several months to address fireworks, education and enforcement in a proactive manner and to encourage the Long Beach community to have a safe 4th of July holiday. The staff report will provide a brief summary of these activities. Our primary focus is public outreach and education to communicate that message that all fireworks, even those labeled safe and sane, are dangerous and illegal in the city of Long Beach. As in previous years, the fire department will continue to coordinate public service announcements and press releases, distribute educational materials in English, Spanish, Carmi and Tagalog to communicate our message throughout the city. We are using a variety of media to accomplish this, including social media sites, electronic signage and posting fliers in highly visible locations such as parks, libraries and city busses. An example of what's in city busses is right here, and I'll be able to share that with with you after excuse me. We're also utilizing our CERT program, volunteers and lifeguards, to distribute educational fliers to residents. And additionally, fireworks are illegal. Magnets are now displayed on all fire department apparatus throughout the city. Representatives from the fire department will speak at block parties and other community events about the illegality and dangers of all fireworks. And requests for block party permits will continue to be coordinated through the Special Events Office, but the block party organizer this year must sign a permit stating that they're aware of all regulations, one of which is an acknowledgment that all fireworks are illegal. Our other focus is on enforcement. As you can imagine, our communication center receives hundreds of fireworks related calls on the 4th of July. In the days immediately preceding and following. In many cases, the caller is not able to identify a specific address, making it difficult to locate and report a reported incident. It is also common for a suspect to flee the scene prior to the arrival of fire or police staff. Last year, our enhanced police and fire patrols handled over 80 fireworks related incidents, issued citations and multiple warnings, and seized over £600 of illegal fireworks. Additionally, the fire department responded to five fires and one serious medical emergency, an injury that were all directly related to fireworks. It is important to remember that this increased call load for both fire and police over this holiday period is in addition to what we would normally expect to see in our normal call volumes. This time of year is already typically busy for us in the 4th of July holiday period just compounds that every year we ensure that we have all available personnel on duty to handle what we know will be a very busy period for public safety in Long Beach this year. To respond to reports of illegal fireworks on the nights of July 1st to July 5th, the fire department will deploy two additional patrol vehicles, each staffed with two arson investigators to work in conjunction with our police department's proactive patrols. Patrols will continue to target those areas of the city known for historic use of fireworks and respond to reports of illegal fireworks activity citywide. Anyone cited or arrested for fireworks violations may face a fine of up to $1,000 and be sentenced to jail for up to six months or both. The fines and penalties may increase depending on the fireworks classification. Fireworks may be voluntarily disposed of at collection bins, which are located at all fire and police stations as well as lifeguard headquarters. The above. Measures are these measures are being implemented to encourage community to have a safe 4th of July holiday. And for those who want to view a fireworks show, I would mention that there are two professional firework shows already scheduled one on July 3rd in Alamitos Bay and one on July 4th at the Queen Mary. Mr. Vice Mayor. Mr. Mayor and Council Members, this concludes my report. Chief Luna and I are available to answer any questions you may have. Mr. Chief Looney, you have something that I thank you. Thank you. So. So you see our you know, we are working together, our fire department, our police department, they work hard every year. And we know that if you want to see fireworks, you can go to Alamitos Bay or you can go to the Queen Mary. But we all know those of us who live in our neighborhoods understand that this is going to require a little bit more. We're going to need to work with our neighborhood associations and our neighborhood leaders to make sure that we are doing our part to sort of hold each other accountable. I think we need to send a clear message. I think these these lawn signs will help to send a very clear message. And so I want to I want to, you know, first just ask the chief, how would you envision we could sort of work with our neighborhood groups to disseminate these signs and the other materials that we have? Like, you know, I have this one that's printed in Spanish and we have all you know, we have, you know , English, Spanish, combined, Tagalog, all of all over four languages. What outreach efforts are we doing to make sure that our neighborhood associations and our neighborhood leaders have access these heading into the 4th of July weekend? Mr. Vice Mayor, as of today, I'll give you a rundown of all the activities that we've been doing through our fire prevention and community. And how about, you know, we don't even need all of them. I just think very specifically, if you're a neighborhood association working to get this stuff right, we can get those. You can reach out to Long Beach fire headquarters. We can provide you access to those things. We will be making the rounds out to all the neighborhood associations, community groups, faith based organizations. Also be able to plug people in through our social media sites, our city website next door. A lot of the other social media sites that are active in our communities, we're targeting those as well to get the word out to people and we will be able to provide these these materials to them. Great. And I want to make sure I know funds are limited. So we want to allocate some resources to make sure we have, you know, enough of these lawn signs at our field office and at Fire Station 12, so we can partner to make sure those are available there, right? Yes, sir. Absolutely. And then in terms of we you know, we get a lot of chatter on social media that people don't know how to collect the right information to report, say an adult who's contributing to the delinquency of a minor and engaging here. So I know that the police department does go around to every single one of our neighborhood association meetings every month. So is it possible, Chief Luna, to make sure that over the course of this next month we're equipped with specific message on here's the information that's helpful to actually make sure we can, you know, we can levy a fine or a ticket to someone who's engaging in fireworks. Can we make sure we have a message like that or a training available? Vice Mayor Richardson and members of the City Council, thank you for asking that question. Yes, we have been doing that and will continue to do that and step it up. Honestly, I wish we can get through the 4th of July with issuing zero citations, but I don't believe that's a reality, unfortunately. We are going to stress or encourage community members to make sure that when they do see somebody lighting fireworks that they call our communications center and any time the officers are going out there, we are encouraging the officers when they do see the illegal activity occurring to make sure they do.
Speaker 6: Issue the citations.
Speaker 5: And if the parents are involved, there will be consequences for them as well. But I can't tell you how important it is for people when they see this activity to report it. I think somebody will be less likely to do it if they know everybody's watching them and will call the police when they're doing so. Fantastic. So that concludes my my questions. And I just want to say, you know, we're we're one team here as a city. I see the chatter on social media on next door. I get it. I live in the neighborhoods. I understand the only way we can abate this is we really hold our neighbors accountable. So I have this lawn sign up. We'll have them available to our field office. We'll have them available at Fire Station 12. And feel free to continue engaging our police department and engaging your neighbors. Thank you so much and happy 4th of July.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: Yes. I want to thank Vice Mayor Rex Richardson for bringing this item forward. And I think you asked a lot of the same questions that I was going to ask. I did want to. Find out. Just so I know, every year around 4th of July, everybody says there's not enough officers out. Chief Luna, how many officers do we have out on 4th of July?
Speaker 5: Lots of them.
Speaker 2: I understand. It's all of them. I know what I've been told.
Speaker 5: Yeah, what we do. The 4th of July is the busiest day of the year for the Long Beach Police Department, as well as my partner here from the for the fire department as well. Unless you have a scheduled vacation or there's some unusual circumstances, you are working one of the shifts on the 4th of July. So our staffing is significantly increased for that day. And I'm happy to report, although we're sitting here talking about a very annoying issue with fireworks, that really the men and women that work for the city entire, whether it's public works, the fire department or police department, if you take the last several 4th of July and how many people are in the city celebrating. Yes. And drinking, too. And some other things. We keep this city, at least we have in the past, thank God, very safe with the influx of people we have here. So we've done an amazing job. And I think it's because of our planning. Our strategies have been very effective in dealing with with the fourth.
Speaker 2: Great. Thank you so much. Again, I just want to commend the work and I know I'll have a sign in my front yard and hopefully my neighborhood associations will also be able to get many signs as well. Thank you, guys.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 7: Yes, I like to I just one question I can ask both. First of all, I want to commend our police chief and Chief DeVries for this. But because the question I'd like to ask is that can we put these signs up in our parks and recreation areas? Can these signs go up there?
Speaker 5: Councilmember? Absolutely. We're happy to provide the access to these materials and where you place them. I would leave that up to up to you, certainly. And I would encourage I would encourage, you know, any council member who is interested in getting these signs. We can definitely point you in the right direction. Thank you. Where you place them is up to you.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Is there a public comment on this item? Please come forward. Sir. Mr. Goodhew.
Speaker 6: Very good. I would suggest we do two things. One. Anybody caught doing fireworks? The fine is 1500 dollars. Period. That's an emergency order. Number two, the individual. Will. Spend. 50 hours per month in the animal shelter. And in addition to that. We will pay any off any police officer or fire department member or any other security people. The city wants $1,000 if they find somebody and have for that, find somebody shooting out fireworks. Half of that will go to that officer, be it a policeman, fireman, somebody they hire, a city staff person, whoever. And we all benefit financially by that because quite frankly, posting those signs is useless, period. Half of them after kids will take those and use those. Like they're like the firecrackers from the fire that they set those that they use those to build. So let's get pragmatic about it. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Seeing no other public comment members, please go ahead and cast your votes. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to receive and file a report from City Manager on the status of interdepartmental efforts around the education, prevention and enforcement of illegal fireworks in Long Beach, as well as an update on statistics from last year's efforts; and
Recommendation to request City Manager and Long Beach Fire Department to partner with neighborhood associations and community groups to disseminate educational materials in advance of July 4th. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_06062017_17-0441 | Speaker 4: Motion carries.
Speaker 3: Item 19 Please.
Speaker 4: Report from Economic and Property Development Recommendation to execute a Supplemental Agreement to Management Agreement with SMG for the completion of certain capital improvement projects at the Long Beach Convention and Entertainment Center in the amount of 2,150,000 District two.
Speaker 5: Thank you. City staff, please. Our esteemed assistant city manager, Tom Modica, will handle this. Thank you, Mr. West. Mr. Mayor and members of the Council. These are tidelands dollars that we're investing back into our convention center. It will be a mix of projects to upgrade some of the infrastructure and also to help the convention center book more business, especially out in that plaza area, which is very rapidly becoming a quite marketable area for them to bring in convention something like nobody else has around in the area. So we're available to answer questions if you have specific questions about the project. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Dr. Pierce.
Speaker 2: Yes. I want to thank staff for their hard work on point rather the funds to make sure that our convention center, as I was talking earlier, has the bones working. And when do we expect some of these projects to break ground?
Speaker 5: So we expect the the fountain repairs to begin very, very quickly and we will sign an agreement with SMG and they will be conducting that project. We expect it hopefully in the next couple of weeks and to be completed by the end of the year.
Speaker 2: And with the fountain repairs because it's 1.5 million, does that trigger a project labor agreement?
Speaker 5: And this it would. I'd have to check the actual agreement, I believe, because it's not done by the city, but by and done by an outside party, that it is not part of the project labor agreement project. The Labor Agreement covers city projects that are done with by city staff, but we can certainly take a look to see if they were included in that.
Speaker 2: So let me ask, are the entitled costs of the found repairs 1.5 hours, some or someone else putting additional funds into.
Speaker 5: The cost of the found is is 1.5.
Speaker 2: So it's all city funds being used.
Speaker 5: That is city funds for that particular project. Yes, there are funds in the seaside way, general improvements. There are SMG funds that are that they are putting their own money into that and CVB money into that. Okay. I do want to point out, though, prevailing wage does trigger. And so it is a prevailing wage project that is required when there is any dollar going into a project like that.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Tom. Yes. Just thank you for this. I know that we're making sure that, as we mentioned earlier, that not only is the convention center a beautiful place that people remember, but that we're maintaining our competitiveness by investing in it and making sure that that's an investment that's going to last a long time. So thank you very much.
Speaker 3: Vice Mayor Richardson, any public comment on this? Kate members, please cast your vote.
Speaker 4: Motion carries. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute any and all documents necessary for a Supplemental Agreement to Management Agreement No. 21667 with SMG, a Pennsylvania joint venture, for the completion of certain capital improvement projects at the Long Beach Convention and Entertainment Center located at 300 East Ocean Boulevard, in the amount of $2,150,000. (District 2) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0397 | Speaker 1: Okay. Okay. Thank you. So we're going to hear item 19. Madam Clerk, item 19, please get in reverse. Yes.
Speaker 2: Item 19 is communication Councilman Andrew's recommendation to increase appropriation in the general fund in the Parks Recreation Submarine Department by 10,000, offset by the six Council District one time infrastructure funds to help fund playground equipment at the Jenni Rivera Memorial Park. And request the city attorney to draft a resolution in support of the efforts of the Jenni Rivera Foundation as they apply for Playground Equipment Grant with the nonprofit organization Kaboom.
Speaker 1: Okay. Great. There is a motion to second Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 5: Yes. Thank you, Mayor. This is a really a fantastic event, what we had in sixth District, because the fact that you guys are predicting Garfield and then we have the universe, you know, kaboom that we're going to put over there. Because the fact that a lot of individuals have lived in this district who don't know a lot about cheering, feel, that's a big hole of a walnut. So if you had a chance to go through there, it looks like a might now because we've done so much work and put so much time into it. I want to thank first, I think, in the Department of Parks and Recreation, Marines for the incredible work at the Geneva Bears Memorial Park. To date, this park is one of the most walk through every day in my district, and it has served an area to remember a wonderful woman who contributed to Long Beach in many ways . The General Bears Love Foundation has really stepped up and worked with the city to keep Jenny's legacy alive, and I am excited to see the playground come to this park. So if you guys haven't had a chance, please go down walnut walker from Walnut over to California Street and you will be able to see one of the most beautiful parks and the mirror of my whole life. And her family is here today. So I'd like to have them come up and I'd like to get a motion, but please help me pass this motion.
Speaker 3: Good afternoon, everyone. I don't have a cute kitty, but I have a very cute niece. And if you want to take her home, I'll let you. I asked her for permission. Thank you so much. You're you've always been a great support to everyone in your district. And in this case, my sister Jenni Rivera. And we are so pleased with this park. Like you said, many children I've seen from middle school and adults walk through this park. And what Jenni Rivera Foundation has seen is that single mothers, which are our mission, is to help single mothers raise again with their children. So we provide shelter. We were providing child care, and now we want to provide a park where a single mother can.
Speaker 9: Take her child and it's free and it's spending.
Speaker 3: Quality time with the family and it will be out in the open, just, you know, get the kids off their cell phone and on onto a playground. And this isn't our only project. We have many other projects, but just so you get an idea, it's it's $5,000 to test the soil before we can even begin anything.
Speaker 9: So these $10,000 will help us so much. And Jackie, the board of directors can that you know, other projects the park has.
Speaker 3: As you guys know we already have the memorial that my brother did in honor of my mom. And we want to do the playground first off. And our next plans would be exercise equipment and maybe a doggie center for people to walk their dogs. Maybe also organized family days are my thing is really important to her family. Her family spend quality time together, not just in front of the TV and mom's busy, but just we want to provide a place where families can spend quality time, like.
Speaker 7: My mom said. And we want to we're planning on having a family day.
Speaker 3: So this grab would really help to start us up and really moving forward with the park. Thank you.
Speaker 9: Guys.
Speaker 1: Thank you guys very much. Thanks again. Yes. Okay. Did any public comment on this motion saying none then of course, the Jenni Rivera family, we're very grateful to be in partnership with you and look forward to all the great things at the park and beyond. And so thank you very much. There's a motion in the second. Councilman Gonzales, any comment?
Speaker 9: Just congratulations to the family and also to De Andrews. You do a spectacular job for your community. And congratulations, Councilmember. Appreciate all your work there.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Membership is good and cash vote.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you very much. Congratulations. Okay. We have we have two hearings, and so I need to make an announcement about the first one. So we have about we have two large groups for two items today. The first one is the two. The first hearing hearings are up first. And that is in particular, people are here for the appeal on the mental health facility. And so that's up first. The second large item that we have here is on the healing issue. And I know that the folks here from the don't waste the Don't Waste campaign, we need to get everyone in for the mental health issue first. That is going to at least take an hour of time for that hearing. It's a long hearing. And so if anyone is willing to give their seat up for numerous seniors and others that are outside, that want to be able to speak on the other item that would be appreciated, this this item will not come up at least for an hour. Okay. It's not the first the first hearing is up first. And so this item is won't be up for an hour. And so that's up to you guys. I just want to everybody know that I think from what I am about, from what I'm hearing from staff, there's about 40 people outside. Is that so correct?
Speaker 5: Mr. MODICA At last count was almost 80. Okay.
Speaker 7: Now.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to just take one minute and I'm going to see if I can get all of the folks that are here for the mental health hearing. And first.
Speaker 0: You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think a lot of the time.
Speaker 0: Yeah. Look. You're.
Speaker 1: Okay. If I can have someone from staff, the fire department, whoever, please go out. I know we're about 80 people outside and just bring in the folks from the mental health appeal and then we'll bring everyone else in after that. Okay. Who on staff is doing that. Tom, is someone doing all this?
Speaker 5: Yes, we do have staff outside that are moving in. I think the hearings and asking those to come from.
Speaker 0: Service. You don't.
Speaker 1: Reschedule the next one.
Speaker 0: Three weeks. Hmm. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund (GF) in the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department (PR) by $10,000, offset by the Sixth Council District one-time infrastructure funds transferred from the Capital Projects Fund (CP) in the Public Works Department (PW) to help fund playground equipment at the Jenni Rivera Memorial Park with the Jenni Rivera Love Foundation; and
Request City Attorney to draft a resolution including, but not limited, to the suggested draft language provided in support of the efforts of the Jenni Rivera Love Foundation as they apply for a playground equipment grant with the non-profit organization KaBOOM! to benefit the Jenni Rivera Memorial Park located at the 20th Street and Walnut Avenue right-of-way. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0380 | Speaker 2: Because Ben Andrews. Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 1: Okay. We're going to now go back to hearing item number one. Is there Mr. Motorcars or anyone else out for the hearing that's still outside?
Speaker 5: We believe we may have some that are finally just coming through the door and or in the lobby, but we can go ahead and get started and they can hear it in the lobby.
Speaker 1: Okay. And there is there is there are empty seats here. So folks who can as long as staff is letting people know that they're still out there still are empty seats. Okay. All right. So if I can just get we're going to go ahead and begin with our first hearing on the agenda, which is hearing item number one. If I can please ask the court to open the item.
Speaker 10: And an oath is required.
Speaker 2: Hearing item one is a report from Development Services recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record conclude the public hearing except categorical exemption and consider appeals. Uphold the Planning Commission's decisions to deny it request for continuance by a third party at the Planning Commission hearing of March 30th, 2017, and uphold the Planning Commission's decisions to approve a copy for a Behavioral Health Urgent Care Center located at 3200 through 30 220 Long Beach Boulevard District seven and offers to require.
Speaker 1: Okay. We're going to go and do the both.
Speaker 2: Anyone wishing to speak on this item, please stand and raise your right hand.
Speaker 0: My.
Speaker 2: You and each of you do solemnly state that the testimony you begin in the court now and pending before this body shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Speaker 3: So help you God.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you very much. With that, we're going to go ahead and I'm going to start off with Mr. West, who will then staff to staff report.
Speaker 10: The staff report is going to be given by our planning bureau manager Linda Tatum, assisted with planner Scott Kinsey. And we also have our city prosecutor up, Doug Halbert.
Speaker 1: Linda.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Mayor and city council. We're here this evening to consider a public hearing.
Speaker 9: For a an appeal of an action that was of.
Speaker 3: For approval of a star's behavioral health urgent care center at 3200 Long Beach Boulevard. Just a brief history on the project. The Planning Commission on March 30th approved the operation of this facility at the address, and at the time of the public hearing, we had a request to the Planning Commission to continue the item. However, Planning Commission determined to not continue the item. And there was an appeal filed not only on several of the other substance of the approval, but.
Speaker 9: Also on the.
Speaker 3: The the Planning Commission's decision to not continue the item. So there were a total of four appeals filed on this case. I'd like to just briefly go over the location of the project here in point of the location. This is just north of the 45 Freeway on Long Beach Boulevard. The street to the south is 32nd Street and access to the site is from 32nd Street. Next is the zoning map that gives you a better idea of the location there. The arrow is pointing to the red Kia and that is the community commercial, auto oriented zoning of the property, which in the Midtown specific plan, which in which the property is located, requires a conditional use permit in order to operate.
Speaker 9: An urgent.
Speaker 3: Care facility such as the one that's being proposed. The Behavioral Health Urgent Center is proposed to be operated by the star's behavioral health group, and they are under contract to the Los Angeles County Health Department of Mental Health. They proposed that we use an existing 14,400, approximately 14,400 square foot medical office building that is currently vacant. And their operation consists of two secure units. One unit is for adults and there would be space for 12 adults and there is a second unit for six adolescents maximum. And it is proposed to be a 24 hour operation seven days a week. It is an outpatient only facility and the maximum stay for any potential client is 23 hours and 59 minutes. So we call it a 24 hour facility or a 24 hour, a limited duration of 24 hours for any patient. But the average patient, according to the history of the operation of this facility, is approximately 4 to 6 hours. The way the project operation has been described to staff, the patients arrived on their own by transportation, by ambulance or by police. But they can also walk into the facility. The patient does not, except what they call code three, which is lights and sirens by the police department. Those are not the type of patients that are accepted at this facility. It is not a homeless service facility and it is not a shelter. It is a mental health crisis center. And it currently it fills a current gap in the existing mental health care system by providing an alternative to a hospital or an emergency room or jail for a person who is experiencing acute mental health crisis. And these other facilities are not appropriately designed to accommodate the kind of crisis that this facility proposes to provide for its clients. I'd like to share a brief rendering of the project with you. This is the this photo shows some of the improvements that are proposed for the facility. They will be enhancing the facade of the building with nice wood siding and new entry features on the building. And the next slide shows you a site plan of the property. It does meet all of the city's codes for parking and access. And as I mentioned earlier, the access to the site is not from Long Beach. The building sits up adjacent to Long Beach Boulevard and access to the parking lot is from 32nd Street. I talked earlier briefly about the project staff has worked really closely. Scott Kinsey was the project planner and he worked really closely with the applicant to establish appropriate conditions of approval for the project. We've added some very strict operations and security features to the plan in addition to those that were already proposed or initially proposed by the operator. Those includes security guards at the site at all time during this facility operation, which is 24 hours. Patients will not be discharged to the street, meaning that they will have rides to to take them away from the facility. There we also included conditions of approval that will document and memorialize some of those security and operations plan. Rather than going into detail on these operations. The applicant will be speaking after the staff presentation and they can elaborate more fully describe some of the operations of the facility. Again, just on the site, I'd like to just briefly talk about some of the improvements that will be made to the site to upgrade the building before this this particular client goes into the that address. There are going to be doing parking lot repaving and re striping. They're also proposing additional security lighting they'd be providing on site security cameras. They would construct a new block wall.
Speaker 9: Along Elm Avenue and.
Speaker 3: 36/2 Street on the site. And they're also proposing to upgrade the landscaping that's already on the site, and that would include new street trees in the parkway. They're also proposing right away improvements to the site, including new sidewalk, curb and gutter as appropriate. And they would be upgrading the ADA or the accessibility improvements around the site perimeter. With that, I would just like to to close the staff presentation. And staff recommends and finds that with the inclusion of the recommended conditions of approval that I just discussed earlier, in summary that this facility will not generate negative impacts upon the neighborhood or the surrounding community. This facility will also fill a critical, a crucial care gap in the local health care system for mental health services. Staff recommends that the City Council uphold the Planning Commission's decision to accept a categorical exemption for this project in compliance with sequel. It also recommends that the City Council approve the conditional use permit for this behavioral health care center and deny the four appeals that were submitted for the project. I'd like to also, before closing and before hearing from the applicant, I'd like to introduce the city's the city prosecutor, Doug Harper, to make Hulbert to make a few comments on this project. And that concludes the Planning Department's presentation.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Honorable Mayor and members of the City Council. The Seventh District Council Office asked me to expand on some comments in the record with the letter from my office on some of the potential benefits of a UCC to public safety. And I know they'll be represented. Representatives of the police department here to answer other questions if you have them. In July, July eight, 2014, Los Angeles District Attorney Jackie Lacey held a mental health summit to discuss the intersection between mental health and the criminal justice system. A number of representatives from various stakeholder groups were present. Also present were members of law enforcement, including LAPD, L.A. County Sheriff's Department, Los Angeles, L.A. County Probation Department. The Superior Court was represented other legal entities such as the Public Defender's Office, other first responders, L.A. City Fire Department, L.A. County Health Department, L.A. County Department of Mental Health , also Long Beach City Prosecutor's Office, as I mentioned, Long Beach PD, Long Beach Health Department were there. We talked about a number of things, including best practices that have been deployed in other cities such as Miami-Dade and San Antonio, to see what works in other jurisdictions and what might be introduced here in L.A. County to help the intersection, again, between mental illness and the criminal justice system. The result of that meeting was several other smaller workshops that which culminated in an August 4th report, 2015, from the District Attorney, Jackie Lacey. It was published by the Criminal Justice Mental Health Advisory Board. It's called A Blueprint for Change, and it's a very large document that has a number of recommendations. One of those recommendations was to use mental health, urgent care centers to assist law enforcement, but also to make connections between law enforcement and community services that might assist people who are suffering from mental illnesses. The report specifically talks about the difficulty that a police officer in the discharge of their duties has when they come across someone who may have a mental condition that makes it difficult for them. They can take the person to jail if they are in violation of the law and be returned back to the streets. Or they could try to transport the person to a hospital where they may wait five, six, seven, 8 hours to get services are more likely. Police officers will move someone along if they can at least reduce the problem and and move on with their shift. What we lacked here in L.A. County and what we've seen work in other jurisdictions is an urgent care crisis center, which is kind of an intermediate step. It's part of a larger strategy that's been deployed throughout the county. Police departments are doing training for their officers. CIT training, crisis intervention training is being introduced to many departments. In fact, I think just about everyone in Long Beach will have that training within the next year or two. The expansion of met teams, mental evaluation teams will help police officers better deal with problems associated with mental illness. There's long term and short term supportive housing pre-booking pre filing diversion programs and a number of other things. We were excited when about a year ago we heard that there was funding for urgent care centers. And when we heard that a center would be located in Long Beach, it gave us in law enforcement, police and prosecutors at least the hope that we will have additional tools to help our law enforcement officers deal with what appears to be an expanding problem. My final comments are that this is also consistent the locating of a UCC in Long Beach. It is consistent with what the city has been doing for quite some time now, which is looking to transform the role of public safety. The expectations on our public safety officers is greater now than it ever has been before. They're not just expected to be versed in the law and know how to arrest and perform their law enforcement duties. But they're also being expected to identify the root source of problems. They are now expected to become problem solvers in a wide range of areas, including mental health, by giving them the tools they need. I believe that they can do their job better, more effectively. This is not just for the goal of assisting persons with mental illness. This is also for the goal of improving public safety in our neighborhoods. And I think if done properly, a UCC such as this with the conditions that I've heard and read in the in the record with an applicant who has the resources to do it right, I think it will also leave our city better prepared to deal with the mental health problems that our law enforcement and first responders encounter on a daily basis. That concludes a city.
Speaker 10: Prosecutor's office report.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Halbert. We're going to go ahead and like all hearings, first hear from the applicants. I'm sorry. We heard from the we're going to hear a plea from the appellants first. Right. Mr.. Mr.. City attorney. Yes, that's correct. Okay. So not we're not going we're actually not going to hear from the applicant's case.
Speaker 10: The applicant can make a brief statement or if the applicant is here to speak, does the applicant and the. Appellant Yeah.
Speaker 1: If the applicant wants to make just a few a statement, you're more than welcome to and then we'll go to the appellants who get a certain amount of time. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And city council members. I'm Kent Dunlap. I'm president, CEO of Stars Behavioral Health Group. We are the agency that is going to be contracted to open this program. You know, this is something that is not just here in L.A. County, but it is actually sweeping the nation, this movement, to develop crisis services as a alternative to incarceration, to use of hospitals. We have talked throughout the community here, see broad support from city leaders, from the business community and especially from law enforcement, where we were told that on average there's about 6000 of these met team responses per year and the city is to be commended. The city was the first in L.A. County to develop the the Met program. That's about 500 per month. 50 of those are hospitalizations. And when that occurs, as the city prosecutor said, it takes about a half a shift for a police officer. It converts into a hospitalization at a psychiatric hospital. It's a loss of entire ship when that officer brings that individual to the behavioral health urgent care center, we're calling it the buck for short. They would wait for an assessment to be done, and that would take about 15 minutes and then they'd be on their way. So a big improvement in freeing up police time throughout the community. I want to address the issues and concerns that we heard from the neighbors that are the source of the appellant. The pills. Would you like me to do that now or wait till you hear from them? Well, you have you have the opportunity to have a time to speak. After they speak, there's a rebuttal opportunity. So it's up to you if you want to bring up some of those issues now you're welcome to. If you want to do it after the appellants speak, you're welcome to do that. I do have some slides that would give you some more information. I'll try not to be redundant to what you've already heard. You've already heard that it is a 24 hour service crisis. Stabilization is the name of the actual medical service that's provided. The average stay is 4 to 6 hours. Even though they can stay 24 hours. The average client we will have is somebody who's living with a mental health condition, a chronic health condition. And just like anybody else with a physical health condition, a heart disease, a neuromuscular disease, they have times when their symptoms flare up and they need emergent treatment. That's what this is for, for individuals with the mental health program. They often come in, they know what's going wrong, they've received some trauma. Additionally, that's exacerbated their problem. Their medications are no longer working. So that's why the length of stay can be short. Again, you've heard that it's about 12 to 6 adolescents. The volume is about 30 clients per day, most of whom will come in during the daytime hours. So you're talking about two or three admissions or people coming and going per hour. It's both voluntary and most of the clients will be voluntary. The involuntary clients will be in the minority. It is a medical program, doctors, therapists. They also use peer counselors, individuals with lived experience. They're very effective in working with. Our clients will employ about 50 people. And if it wasn't clear there's no city funding involved with this program. It's all county funding as well as the initial grant funds from the state to start the program. We really like the site. We looked at 17 locations across the county, I mean, across the city. This location is central between the Orange County border and harbor, UCLA, where there's another one of these urgent care centers being developed. It's also very proximate to college and memorial hospitals. Freeway close to the other hospitals. Convenient. And that way you've seen the location with the other map we we like the location has ample parking for police vehicles to come in and drop off clients. It is now kind of an eyesore of a building. It has been sparsely occupied graffiti at times. And we'll convert that, as you saw, into a beautiful new facility that will operate 24 seven. We're the right agency to do this for this city. We have we're one of the largest organizations providing county contracted mental health programs throughout the state. We operate these programs in San Bernardino County. We actually operate higher levels of care, psychiatric hospitals, including one in Torrance. And we're a Long Beach company. Our headquarters are right next to the Long Beach School District. We've been in the community for over 20 years. We are on 46 school campuses providing school based services. We provide a variety of other services throughout the community. We operate other urgent care centers. And you can see this that it is a inviting home like non stigmatizing environment for the clients to come into. On this floor plan, you can see that the buck is actually just two thirds of the building. We're actually going. To be releasing the bottom third of the building on the corner there for a regular community services office. Those green things around the building are cameras. This is something that we did and proposed. And now as part of the conditions of the the permit to provide security in the community. We don't need these cameras to protect our patients or our staff. We don't have these that our other programs that we operate. They don't have them at the other L.A. County urgent care centers. But we did this expressly to show our commitment to community safety. These cameras will be available to police enforcement, to the police via the Internet. We also are going to have a security service I'll talk about in a second. There's the the three units of the top unit, the adult unit. Yellow is the adolescent center. Green is the crisis walk in center. So most of the clients will come there again. Most will be voluntary, but we'll only operate that 8 to 8 is the current time period that we're looking at. After that time, anybody can still come in voluntarily, but they'll go to the rear entrances off the parking lot, to the secured areas. So you've heard about the impact on law enforcement. It's an equal impact on emergency rooms. That's where individuals now go. If you talk to the hospitals in the area, it means it takes the emergency room staff many hours to work with these individuals. The police are asked to stay there because the hospitals don't have the resources and so it'll be a big savings for them as well. We have all these other benefits. It's not as it was, had a program specifically to deal with homeless issue individuals. In our experience in San Diego County and the experience in L.A. County, about 90% of the individuals coming to these programs have a home and we'll return to them. It's only about 10% that are homeless for them. I'm part of the the program will be to link them to services will work with the homeless coalition here in Long Beach to do that to give priority to these individuals. It's a better looking building. In addition to the cameras, we're going from a building that's closed and vacant and dark to a building with a light, a parking lot operating 24 seven. We are having security staff on all shifts. And another condition that the city asked of us that we've agreed to is that one of the security staff will be outside the building in the parking lot at all times, will have two on the inside, one on the outside. We'll also want to make ourselves available to the community. They'll always have an ability to call our manager who again will be there. We'll have somebody there on a 24 hour basis as well as we will take any invite to come and meet with the community groups down the road and talk to them about any issues and concerns. The important thing about the program is that individuals don't stabilize and then walk out the door. Part of the goal of the program is lasting stabilization, and the way we do that is to transition them into services so they have supports as they return to the community. We do that through what's called a warm handoff. It's not just giving a phone number, but we make that linkage, maybe have that agency that's going to work with them, come and pick them up, for example. The other thing is that that 24 hour clock is ticking for everybody who gets admitted. But if that is ending in the evening time, they don't have to leave. They can stay there until the next morning. We prefer that they do that and then they can leave during hours. So the concerns we heard from the community are really three fold. One is that there are homeless individuals in the area and that this is going to exacerbate the problem. We heard from local neighbors and we talked to 200 going door to door. We went to 200 neighborhood homes to their door, talked about 60 people there, about another 80 people in neighborhood meetings and heard this is one concern . A, they expressed that there was an increase in homeless individuals that they attributed to the food bank that's done by the Salvation Army down at spring. So first and foremost, again, you can't get access to the program just because you're homeless. You have to have a mental health diagnosis symptoms at a level determined to be in a crisis situation. And our experience is that individuals don't repeat through the program we're failing at that happens so you're talking about a high utilize or may come three or four times per year. Again, our approach is to stabilize them so they don't need to come back to the service. Those individuals again that are homeless, about 10%. We will work to transition them into into housing as they leave. The effect of the deterrence of their facility with the 24 hour operation, with the cameras, with the security guards outside, with occasional police patrol cars dropping off individuals we think will be a major deterrents to homeless people being in the community addressing that concern that we heard. The second concern is that individuals after receiving treatment can just leave and walk out into the community. That's not our experience or said. It's a planned transition where transportation is provided typically that through. Friend or family member. If there's no other resource, we will provide the transition in transportation back home. If an individual does not complete treatment, if they want to leave before our clinicians determine that they've completed treatment, including have that transition plan in place, then we do an assessment, we do a risk assessment, and our staff will have the ability to invoke an involuntary status at 5150, if there's any risk, determine for that individual leaving, and then they will have to remain in the facility on an involuntary status. The last concern that we heard from the community is that this is a great program. It's absolutely needed. But why here? Why in this community? Because there's other programs. Again, they equated it with a homeless program, which it's not. They also communicated that there are sober living or other group homes in the community. Again, this is not a residential program. Our clients will come to the building, go into the building, remain in the facility, and then go back into a car or other vehicle and leave the facility. They won't be in the community. So there's that as well. A lot more to say, but I know you're sensitive to time, so I'm happy to answer any questions now or after the appellants. Thank you very much. You'll have a chance, if you'd like, after the appellants for a couple minutes. For three or 5 minutes. Okay. Thank you very much. Now we have. We have the appellants, and I want to make sure that the different appellants are here. I don't think one of the appellants is here, but I'm going to read their names. If you're an appellant, please come forward. I believe it's Rick Ivey. Nefariously. Choi Carmen Allan Stevens. Did I miss anyone? Official. Doug, are you here for Doug? Otto. Okay. Please come forward. Let me just first get all the appellants here for a second. Okay. Okay. I just want to make sure I have. Who's your first set of appellants?
Speaker 3: I'm Topher Isley. I'm here for Troy. Carmen.
Speaker 1: Okay, so why don't we begin? We're going to give each appellant 10 minutes. If you need to go past 10 minutes that we'll give you a few more minutes after that. A reasonable amount of time. Okay. And so why don't we go ahead and start with the Nephi Eisley? We'll go first.
Speaker 0: Okay.
Speaker 1: And the rest of the passage. As long as you just take a seat somewhere closer to the front, if there are any. Thank you.
Speaker 3: I don't know. I've got 10 minutes, Robert.
Speaker 1: You can. You don't have to take 10 minutes. That's.
Speaker 3: That's more. I would have taken longer.
Speaker 1: No, it's up to you. However you. However you know, anything shorter than that is appreciated.
Speaker 3: Okay. Good evening. My name is before I leave. My husband and I are homeowners at 375 East 36th Street and also 2500 Cedar Avenue in the sixth and the seventh District of Long Beach. I want to say that I agree that mental health services should be available to all that need them. However, I disagree with the location of the proposed mental health urgent care facility. According to the Long Beach Health and Human Services website, we currently have 14 mental health facilities in Long Beach offering services. The proposed site of the new facility is located in District seven, which already has three facilities to treat mental illness. District six to the immediate south has one facility and District eight to the immediate north has two facilities. In addition, in District nine, there is Telecare La Casa Mental Health Urgent Care Facility, which is located at 66 Paramount Boulevard. They already provide outpatient services for those in crisis and provide crisis stabilization. During the Planning Commission meeting on March 30th. The Staff Behavioral Health Group stated these types of services were non-existent in Long Beach, which is not true. They are. They exist and have for some time now with the Telecare locus, a mental health urgent care facility. I'm not sure why Long Beach needs yet another mental health care facility, especially a facility, according to the CEO of the Stars company that was service all of South Bay in Orange County. Long Beach has enough facilities for people in crisis that we don't need to burden the residents in this one neighborhood with yet another facility. I don't know if you guys have been to the Albertson's supermarket shopping center on the corner of Long Beach Boulevard and Willow lately. I don't think it's a coincidence that the College Medical Center, which offers inpatient and outpatient mental health care services, is located just behind the shopping center and has an increase in the numerous mentally ill people loitering in the parking lot while people are trying to patronize the businesses. In addition, the Salvation Army load located across the street from the proposed site also offers social services. Why are we impacting one residential neighborhood? It can't be for the greater good of the community. We have close to 500 signatures that say otherwise, and I'm almost positive less than a quarter of the people that will be speaking today that say we need this facility live anywhere close to the proposed site. We are allowing others to come and tell us what our neighborhood needs instead of the residents speaking up for what we want. And this is not at this location. We'd be better off putting a pediatric urgent care facility to help the growing number of families in the area with small children needing care instead of going to emergency rooms in our critical care hospitals. And one last point. Of the 14 mental health facilities in Long Beach, none of them are located in districts three or five. Maybe we should look into a facility in those districts where today's services do not exist but are probably needed as well. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next up, we're going to have Rick Ivey. Mayor and city council. We are a compassionate, caring and concerned community as residents involved in the welfare of the community. We have a vested interest in all issues affecting Long Beach citizens. We care and we want to help. We recognize the need for such an air mental health facility within the county. I would like to bring your attention to the L.A. County Department of Mental Health response to a motion made by Don Carnaby and Ridley-Thomas. And it talks about. Urgent health care facilities to be used as a pre-booking diversion as appropriate. The exploration of psychiatric, urgent care facility, urgent care centers. So they may serve as a site for pre-booking diversion of individuals with mental illness and substance abuse disorders. This is a document from 2013 to be to Pre-Booking jail diversion programs, initially as pilot projects serving the Long Beach and Antelope Valley areas are proposed. The proposed projects would be housed in new CCS urgent care centers to be located in the Antelope Valley and Long Beach areas. The use CCS would serve as an entry point for the Long Beach Police Department to link individuals to mental health services in lieu of them being charged with low level offenses. Now I fully understand and I'm concerned. But we're talking about a facility for the county. We're also talking about bringing people from Orange County. In the Mental Health Advisory Board, A Blueprint for Change. The document by Jackie Lacey from the District Attorney's Office, dated August 4th, 2015, describes diversion in the criminal justice system. Is the term often used as a legal term of art to describe alternative programs which prevent someone suffering from suffering a criminal conviction? This report uses the term diversion more broadly, as used in this report. Diversion includes all circumstances ranging from pre-arrest to post-conviction in which mentally ill persons can be prevented from entering jail at all, can be redirected from jail into treatment, or can receive linkage to services to help prevent them from returning to custody. What concerns me is that we're dealing with a residential neighborhood and we're talking about some. Individuals that are we're dealing with as a criminal element. This is a little bit different from the walk in facility. 80% of mentally ill of offenders also suffer from cold occurring substance abuse disorders. As a practical matter, someone who is actively high on drugs alcohol may be violent or competitive and will not immediately be amenable to mental health treatment, may not be able to be received by an urgent care facility. The report goes on to talk about the need for sober living centers and residential detoxification centers. The parking lot for this emergency urgent care facility is in the front yards of people's houses. Even a bar has hours of operation. 24 hours a day is a little bit much for a residential area. The Los Angeles City Council centralized its homeless services in the 1970s as a destination for homeless resources for over and over the decades. The area now marks a huge area where homeless people are choosing to reside. Store is a privately owned for profit business that is currently taking funding from the county under the guise that they are the solution. Unfortunately, Starr is oversimplifying complex issues, making overly optimistic policy promises of instant medical health care solutions and resolutions to grave social problem. Problems in which the majority of care will be provided for patients in the community are just a Band-Aid to bigger issues. Los Angeles County, as cited in the report, does not fund the next level of mental care health hospitals that treat 5150 patients or seriously addicted individuals with habits costing hundreds of dollars a day are already full to capacity and overflowing. Obtaining treatment consists of a prolonged process of calling every hour for days until a bed becomes available. I believe there's 36 beds and they every day they have 60 to 90 more patients than they have occupancy for. The major concern here is that patients will have no facility to be referred to, will be under no obligation to stay at this facility, will not be bound by state law and are free to leave the facility dreadfully in need of more extensive treatment and further care. No one will be waiting to take them back to their location of origin, though Starr claims they will arrange transportation, deserving people will be unwillingly relocated to our community with no money and no place to go. We are compassionate Long Beach. Other cities are not as kindhearted and benevolent. The Irvine Police Department and others have been cited for dumping homeless individuals on Skid Row in downtown L.A.. This is a privately funded county facility. They said they're going to accept drop offs from Orange County when it's funded by L.A. County. Outside jurisdictions are going to be able to legally go back to their carefree, unfeeling practice of extracting and transporting and banishing their responsibility to us in the form of disoriented, confused, traumatized and now displaced individuals. Even though our acts of kindness will result in the escalation of an issue that is not a promised resolution. It was not long ago when there were 96 vacancies on Long Beach and Atlantic Avenues. Currently, retail is getting hit hard by the Internet. Our business district contains stores that are forced to lock their doors now, a practice that a few years ago was unheard of. Jewelry stores lock their doors as customers, employees and merchants. Begin to feel unsafe. They will first lock their doors. It will be a major change for our industrial or retail area. In Bixby Knolls, industrial businesses are fortified with fences and obstructive security measures additions, additions that a retail district's fragile atmospheric sensing experience can rarely accommodate. This property is surrounded by four residential neighborhoods due to proximity of so many residents. I would ask first of all that you would find a more industrial and better location for this facility, but that you would limit the hours of operation like a normal business or any, I think steel craft and the other bars. From 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.. We would ask that a licensed psychiatrist be present at all hours of operation that they chose to be open. It's not fair to bring people from outside the area to a facility that does not have somebody to treat them. Likewise, that all staff persons would be appropriately licensed individuals with the minimum licensing for their position. We'd ask that the Long Beach Police would double the patrols of the premises and the vicinity to include at least patrol 12. Patrols that day. That would be one every 2 hours. We would ask that when wait times exceed one and a half hours, or when wait times exceed two and a half hours, that the facility would stop accepting patients from outside of the area until the wait time went down. I thank you for your understanding. We want to make Long Beach a great place. We just think that we need to think this thing through a little bit better. They went out. They got 17 locations. If we're going to cooperate with the county, if we're going to cooperate with other counties, it seems like we could put a little bit more effort into doing a little bit better job for all parties involved. Thank you. We'll hear from the next. We're going to go ahead and hear from the next opponent, please. The next opponent up will be Troy Carman. I think someone's here on Troy's behalf. Yes.
Speaker 3: Mr. Carmen says. Dear Council members, I am an appellant regarding the proposed five year Behavioral Mental Health Crisis facility located at 3200 Long Beach Boulevard. Unfortunately, I had a previously planned trip out of town and will not be present at the May 23rd hearing. I am respectfully requesting to allow Desiree Keys to speak in my absence. Thank you. Carmen. I am a resident homeowner of 3201 Pine Avenue, and my immediate concern is the safety and security in the neighborhood, as well as the culture and the climate change that I am anticipate happening. Although this is an issue that is sensitive to others and we are not insensitive. We also agree that this location is not the best location for us in the neighborhood. I do have a statement that I'd like to read from to one homeowner and one resident that reside at 33, 64, 33, 66 Pine Avenue. And this is from Miss Linda Shelton. The duplex is adjacent to the star facility on Wardlow Avenue. The facility has an open patio with picnic benches, lights and a camera outside the entrance door. I rent the bottom duplex to my son and his family, so I frequently visit the property at times, all times of the day and night. I would like to share concerns about the facility after hours, for instance, on May 20th. At 9:15 p.m., I witnessed a man and lady leaving the picnic benches after having sex. There are many times when people are smoking pot blasting music for my renter to hear or just hanging out. The staff facility should surely recognize this loitering problem because they have cameras. The problem could easily be solved with a fence gate around the property. As Star Corporation grows, so does the number of employees, which means they take street parking during working hours. It is very inconvenient for the many duplex residents on pine. For the past years I've watched the area surrounding the star facility on Wardlow and proposed star urgent care grow in crime. I speak from firsthand experience. Long Beach needs to be needs to help the residents in this focused area and make every effort effort to make the neighborhood more resident friendly. The new businesses should be resident friendly and responsible 24 hours, seven days a week. The staff facility on Wardlow is not resident friendly to their immediate neighbors. I am deeply, deeply concerned about the proposed urgent care and their responsibility to the neighborhood. I am I am opposed to the proposed mental health urgent care at 3200 3230 Long Beach Boulevard. Linda Shelton. Scott Shelton lives at 33, 64, 33, 66 Pine Avenue. The duplex is adjacent to the star facility on Wardlow Avenue. I rent the bottom duplex with my wife and four year old son. We have lived here for just under five years. The staff facility on Wardlow is taking a lot of the parking on Pine. There are many duplexes on pine and parking is scarce. They have a good sized parking lot on Wardlow. But as their clients and employees grow, so does their need for parking after hours. The building, the building's patio welcomes homeless people and pot smokers. Homeless people have access to an exterior electrical socket. The property is not adequately lit at night and weekends. The building alarm goes off and there is no follow up. I will look out to see what triggered the alarm for my family's safety. But no one from the Star Corporation nor the police ever follow up. The Star Corporation does not take responsibility for what goes on outside the building and neighborhood. Within the past nine months, my family and I have experienced an increase in in crime to break ins at night with the family inside the house. One home invasion last week. Intruder in the house when I came home. Why? Wife robbed on Pacific World before cell phone. Car battery stolen. Car vandalized with graffiti. Mailbox theft repeatedly caught on camera. Car break in. Gas siphoned from car twice in April, three different neighbors, car windows bashed in, small things stolen.
Speaker 1: I just just want to interject. I know that the appellant is Mr. Karman, right?
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 1: Okay. So are these the testimony from other neighbors? Are they part of Mr. Carmen's testimony? Yes. Okay. I just want to confirm because I want to make sure it's Mr. Carmen's words.
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 3: Okay. I speak from firsthand experience. I oppose the proposed mental health, urgent care at 3200 3230 Long Beach Boulevard because their facility on Wardlow is not responsible for the local residents. The area proposes a high crime area, a growing homeless community, and already has numerous social service facilities. This Wrigley neighborhood needs more resident friendly businesses. The city of Long Beach needs to help the residents in this focused area and make every effort to make the neighborhood more resident friendly. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Although Stevens saw an Olive Stevens. Allen. Okay. Mayor Garcia, members of the City Council, thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak. I live at 3193 Long Beach Boulevard. That address is significant because it is directly across the street from the site where staff behavioral health group wants to open their behavioral health urgent care center. I am here this evening to ask that you uphold their conditional use permit but require staffers to select a location for it in a non non residential neighborhood, not at 3200 Long Beach Boulevard. Proponents of the location say those of us who oppose it don't understand what we're opposing. Since being first being notified in January. Star's intention to open the book across the street from my house. I have learned quite a bit about this proposed mental crisis center. I've attended neighborhood meetings, two hosted by staff representatives and many others organized by people like me who live in the area and are concerned about what the book will mean for our community. There's a false narrative being put out that we oppose mental health that could not be farther from the truth. Speaking for myself and several hundred of my neighbors whom I've talked with about the book, we are persuaded of the need for urgent care services for people experiencing mental health breakdowns. We support mental health. We support the book. My late mother would be upset with me for telling her story, but I think it's apropos here and she's not here to stop me. In February 2010, my mother experienced a mental breakdown aboard a cruise ship in the Gulf of Mexico. My brother and I had to fly her back to California because she was kicked off the cruise for assaulting the ship's doctor and nurse, as well as my sister in law. That whole experience, especially the flight from Cozumel, Mexico to LAX, was one of the most horrific experiences of her life or mind, made even worse by the fact that we didn't know what to do with her upon our return. My brother and I took our mother to an emergency room in Burbank. Once she was checked in, we went back to her house to catch some sleep. All night long, she kept calling us on the phone to ask whether we were playing tricks on her. She thought we were sneaking up behind her, then running to hide behind the wall so she wouldn't see us. The whole time she believed my brother was really himself. But I was an imposter. She was completely delusional. The hospital staff refused to take the phone away from her because they said patients are allowed to make phone calls. They didn't know how to treat her, and the next day they transferred her to a mental care facility where she remained for several days. If there had been a mental health crisis center like the duck for us to take her to, we would happily have done so. The staff there would have known what to do for my mother. It would have been wonderful for her and also for us. I tell the story because when I spoke at the Planning Commission meeting on March 20, sorry, March 30th, asking for the buck to be located somewhere other than across the street from my house. Supporters of the buck told me, I don't understand. They said if I knew what benefit this facility would provide the community, I would be in favor of it. The fact is, I do understand. I am persuaded of the need. I'm in favor of the facility, but I'm also realistic. My mother, one of the kindest, mildest, most well-mannered people I've ever known, was kicked off the ship because she violently attacked three people. People in the throes of a mental breakdown are not responsible for their actions. They're not bad people. They're not criminals. They're people who need help. And they need a place to get help. But to say that they represent no threat is disingenuous. Most mentally ill people don't attack people, but some do. Most mentally ill people aren't dangerous, but some are. Most mentally ill people won't cause harm to people or property, but some will. And my house is right across the street. Driving down Long Beach Boulevard gives the impression that Memorial Heights is a business district. But appearances are deceiving. An aerial view reveals houses and apartments lining the west side of Long Beach Boulevard from just below the four or five overpass down to 31st Street. Be tucked behind 3200 Long Beach Boulevard houses fill the entire span to Atlantic Avenue behind my house. They stretch all the way back to the L.A. River. There are literally hundreds of homes within a two mile radius of the building where stars wants to open the buck. Hundreds, maybe thousands of residents live there with their families. Yet when those of us who attended the neighborhood meetings went door to door and set up at first Friday to speak with our neighbors, we found that most of them had no idea that stars wanted to move in. They, like us, are concerned. And nearly 500 of us have signed a petition to express our concern. We are concerned because a mental health crisis center will have a detrimental effect on our property values. We are concerned that the city of Long Beach, the seventh largest city in California, seems to be concentrating the full spectrum of social services in our small neighborhood in rather than distributing them equitably throughout the city. We are concerned because our neighborhood is already experiencing an influx of homeless and transient people, a significant proportion of whom are mentally ill, drawn by services like the Salvation Army Food Bank just down the street, according to an article in the Long Beach Press Telegram dated November 21st, 2013. Long Beach already has the fourth highest rate of unsheltered homeless people in the United States. We're seeing them camping under the freeway overpasses, panhandling in the medians at intersections, and wandering around the parking lot, shopping centers and blue line stations. And now stars proposals to bring more mentally ill people into our neighborhood from all over Long Beach, as well as from Orange County. We don't object to people in need seeking services. We object to the likelihood that unharmed people with mental illnesses will remain or returned to the area once they receive those services. Mentally ill people are not criminals, but they sometimes do cause damage to property and persons. Even as we sympathize, we recognize them as potential threats to our families and our homes. We are concerned because the best staff will have neither the ability nor the authority to prevent mentally ill people from walking out of the facility and staying in our neighborhood, Star says. This is not their preference. It's not ours either. Star's representatives promised 24 hour security, but that security is for their facility, not for our homes. They address the members of the City Council. Please uphold the conditional use permit, but please require stores Behavioral Health Group to move their urgent care center to a nonresidential part of Long Beach. Let the buck stops here. Okay. Thank you. Next up, I have on behalf of Delgado. Right. And was there someone else?
Speaker 3: I just couldn't find a place to sit. I'm just. I do want to speak, but I'm not.
Speaker 1: Okay, then just grab a crab. Go ahead and just grab another seat. Ma'am, I don't want to have you. There's. There's a few seats right over here. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3: Every time I find you.
Speaker 1: Okay, great. Go ahead, sir. Thank you, honorable mayor, members of the City Council. My name is Ben Jasper. I'm speaking on behalf of the law offices of Douglas Otto, who represents third party appellant. Khalid Tansey. Dr. Tansey is an actual and equitable owner of this property since 2012. We're here as an appeal, of course, from the March 30 decision of the Planning Commission. You have each received honorable mayor or members of the city council, and the city attorney received a may 18 letter from the law offices of Delgado. I would ask that that be part of the record here today. There are. It's a lengthy letter with number of exhibits. I don't need to repeat the entire letter here. I would like to hit on a few highlights if I could. One is that there is currently litigation over who actually owns this property. This litigation is pending right now in the superior court in the city of Long Beach. You'll not find that anywhere in the application. Isn't that funny, that the litigation already existed at the time the application was filed? But it was not declared openly to you. One must wonder why. The next thing is that the application refers to the property as vacant. Dr. Swansea has continuously operated a medical practice at that facility. Why was that not openly declared? Well, some will say, oh, no, he's not there. But two H Properties 3060 LLC. The claimed title holder to the property at present actually entered into a stipulation in the Long Beach Superior Court in early 2017 that acknowledges that Dr. Tanzi has a medical practice, yet at that location has a lease for that facility that he's using and that he's welcome to stay there as long as he continually pays rent. Has that ever been disclosed to the city or the city council members? I don't think so. One must wonder why. We next need to look at what is the impact of this of the conditional use permit. Once it's granted, it forever changes the complexity or excuse me, the the actual uses of that piece of property. Well, you're being asked to change the declared use of that property by someone whose title is put at issue in a legal process. If Dr. Tansey is successful in the lawsuit. Dr. TANSEY if the cup is granted, tonight will be handed a piece of property different from the piece of property he owned in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016. All we're asking. We're not against medical mental health. We're not for mental health. We're not taking a position at all in that regard. All we're asking of this city council is that it delay this proceeding until after the court system has determined who is the true owner of the property to determine whether or not Star's has a valid lease to the property, which will permit their development of this facility. If they don't have a proper lease, they have no right to develop the property. I'll be happy to answer any questions anyone might have. Thank you very much, sir. Thank you. Okay. And just so I know that this was an issue that was brought up as well as the planning commission. And so I know our city attorney is going to comment on this in just a minute. But I do believe that the property owners attorney is also here. And so Mr. Parkin has asked that he be allowed to do a short comment on this or a rebuttal to this. And then we're going to turn this over to our city attorney, and that'll close the appellant's portion. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, and members of the Council. My name is Larry Cagney of the law firm of Kreeger and Kreeger. And we represent the property owner to Property 36. Earlier today, I submitted a letter, along with several exhibits to the city clerk. And I hope you've had an opportunity to review those. I'll draw your attention to two documents. They are really the key documents that should concern the Council with respect to this issue of ownership of the property. Exhibit one is the deed that Dr. Tansey executed in 2014 in which he transferred. All right. Title and interest to the property at 3200 Long Beach Boulevard to PUR and goes to an LLC. The second document that is critical to the Council's consideration is Exhibit two, which is a deed from J. K Perron Guster, LLC to to which property 3060, which was executed in October of 2016 last year when two H paid $2.65 million for the property and in an arm's length transaction. Now, Mr. Otto's appeal was voluminous and he raises countless points in it, and there are answers to all of those points and which contests all of it. And we could respond to each of those points, but we don't have that time here and we don't have the procedures here to examine all of these disputes and and all of the evidence. But the good news is that's happening somewhere else. That's happening at 275 Magnolia Avenue in the Superior Court. Those proceedings are underway. They are on track for orderly resolution. And there is no reason for this body to delve beneath and behind the record title to this property, to weigh in on what we believe to be farfetched claims by Dr. Tanzi that that he owns the property . Mr. Jasper commented that the fact of the stipulation that was entered between two agent and Dr. Tansey, by which he is remaining in possession of a portion of the building, was not disclosed to the city. And I have to take issue with that because I personally delivered that document to the Planning Commission on March 30th when we addressed this issue the last time around. And with respect to Dr. Torrance's claim of operating A and ongoing practice, I don't know how many of you have been by that property, but two inches there regularly and I go by there regularly. Dr. Tansey is not active there. No one has seen him there for six months. What we have here is an attempt to delay and frustrate a very much needed project in this city. And we would urge the city not to jump into this issue of of the claims of ownership and to instead defer those decisions to the superior court at to 75 Magnolia.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I'll take any.
Speaker 1: Questions you have. Thank you very much. So I'm going to I'm going to allow our city attorney to comment to me. I know that our attorney office addressed this at the planning commission level as well. So, Mr. Park.
Speaker 0: I'm sorry. I'm not real.
Speaker 1: Good, actually. I'm sorry. It's it's not it's not comment yet. It's okay. That was for the appellants Mr. City. Mr. Park in thanking.
Speaker 10: Them it was the city council matters. As you indicated, this matter that was brought up by Mr. Otto's office and the over the ownership issue is currently pending in the Superior Court. That's the only thing that I think everyone can agree on.
Speaker 5: The the issue of of the applicant and the owner.
Speaker 10: Of the property did submit an application under penalty of perjury that they're the owner. They did provide a valid title. The staff had done a title search and title insurance. And under the Streamlining Act, we don't believe it's appropriate that the Council will have to wait this matter, although it is scheduled for trial in September. And unlawful detainer, I believe. In the end of this month could be appealed, could be continued, and it could be two or three years before the legal issues are over. And so we felt that it was appropriate and within the Planning Commission's jurisdiction to deny the appeal, to continue this, to allow the resolution. And we do not have any basis to change that opinion.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So with that, we have concluded the appellant's portion. The applicant does get an opportunity to rebuttal any of the appellant's comments just for 2 minutes, if there's anything that you want to add. Thank you. Just for clarification on a couple of items that were mentioned by the other appellants, the couple mentioned that we are going to be serving individuals from Orange County. I don't know where that came from, except perhaps my statement about the location being equidistant from the Orange County border. It will not serve Orange County. This is a L.A. County program. Orange County actually already has one of these urgent care centers, and they're in the process of opening a second one. Secondly, that there was a discussion about the need. And well, let me first talk about the discussion about our office at 100 Wardlow. Just for clarification, that is not an urgent care center. It is a counseling office that operates during daytime hours. This is the first I've heard that individuals are smoking pot and having sex on our picnic bench. We will certainly address that. But actually we had positive feedback when we had our meeting with the Del Mar Association that's most proximate to that location. People didn't even know that that site was there. There was talk about drug dealing going on, on the street, in front. And as a result of that, we actually added cameras and lights to the front of our building in response. That was the first we heard that. We're happy to work with the community. We'll certainly address this issue that we've discovered this evening. I'll leave it at that. Thanks. Thank you. So. Before we go to the counsel conversation, deliberation will go to public comment to start off public comment. We do have a member of the school board that's here that's going to make comments on behalf of herself and the school board. And I know the county supervisor has a deputy that also makes some comments and everyone else please public comment, come forward.
Speaker 9: Good evening, Honorable Mayor, City Council members. My name is Megan Curr. I'm the vice president of the Board of Education for Long.
Speaker 3: Beach Unified School District.
Speaker 9: And a proud eighth District resident actually reside just a little over a mile from the proposed facility where I raised my three children. I want to thank the Planning Commission.
Speaker 3: For their very thorough work and their very fair decision to move this forward. As a member of the school board, we fully support this facility. Fully support. On record with STAR is a letter.
Speaker 9: From our assistant superintendent, Dr. Tiffany.
Speaker 3: Brown of Student.
Speaker 9: Support Services, talking about the great need that this will fill for our families and our students.
Speaker 3: As a native.
Speaker 9: And lifelong resident of the area.
Speaker 3: And having a personal stake in this as well as being a school board member. We need this facility.
Speaker 9: And we need this facility as soon as possible to serve our students and their families. There's a lot of other izing happening here about the others who will come and be served by this facility. This facility will serve us. This facility will serve my family. This city. This facility will serve my friends, family, my friends, children, our communities, families and children. So I stand before you today and strongly urge you to support the Planning Commission in supporting our families and our children in a very.
Speaker 3: Accessible.
Speaker 9: And close proximity center where they can get the help that they need in the moment that they need it. Thank you for your consideration tonight.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: I am her Linda Chico. I'm a representative from Supervisor Janice Hahn's office. The new county supervisor, the fourth supervisor supervisory district has a letter of support that I'd like to read into record. Dear Mayor Garcia and City Council. I am writing in support of the permit for a proposed Long Beach Outpatient Behavioral Urgent Care Center, which will be operated by the star's behavioral health group. Too often, individuals who suffer from mental health crisis are not given the adequate care and services they need to make a positive shift in their lives. Instead, they may end up cycling in and out of hospitals and jails. The Urgent Care center would provide a safe, effective alternative for these individuals. This will reduce the impact on hospital emergency rooms. The Long Beach Police Department and the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. I am committed to working in partnership with you, city council and the residents of Long Beach to ensure that the operator is able to provide care in a way that is acceptable to the community in which it operates. Thank you for your consideration in advance. Sincerely, Janice Hahn, Supervisor, Fourth District. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Thank you. I hate public speaking. I get really nervous. I'm Michelle Gray. I live at 3616 Pacific Avenue.
Speaker 9: My husband and I have been there for 30 years.
Speaker 3: We have seen a big change.
Speaker 9: In the neighborhood and in the area.
Speaker 3: We are tired of feeling like the city crams down our throats what they want to do. I do believe this is a necessary thing that we need, but it's not needed in this neighborhood. They need to find a different place to locate this. From what I.
Speaker 9: Heard, it sounds like it's not even.
Speaker 3: A legal matter that this guy doesn't even have the deeds, the rights to do this. I'm confused about why we were even considering it in the first place. And secondly, I just wanted to make a clarification. I believe.
Speaker 9: This is on the south.
Speaker 3: Side of the four or five, not the north side. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hi, I'm Lisa Jacob. I'm a Long Beach resident of the third district and I work at Community Hospital Long Beach. I think that's in the fourth district. I am in support of this mental health care. I'd actually suggest changing the name to mental health instead of behavioral health, but that's okay. I do also agree that the burden would be lessened. The local Long Beach emergency departments, mental health patients have very special needs and so often people seeking mental health services, they don't know where to go. So this this urgent care would be have staff to triage these patients appropriately, as opposed to the emergency department where we're dealing with gunshot wounds and medical crises and all kinds of things. Someone mentioned that the there might be dangerous people coming, that the police would be bringing dangerous people, I believe, by Long Beach police departments. They are police officers are very well trained and they know if they have someone who's 51, 50 violent, that they'll take them straight to community hospital where they will be properly handled and hospitalized. So I think we need to give credit to our Long Beach police officers who they know they can do a lot of triage in the in the field. So those types of patients wouldn't be brought to this urgent care center. I also want to verbalize that as we would be welcoming to partner with this urgent care. So we're just a phone call away if somebody does need to be hospitalized. There are several hospitals in the area that do take 5150. So thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Hi. Thank you very much. My name is Dr. Maria Chandler. I'm the chief medical officer of the children's clinic. Dr. Lisa Nicholas is our CEO and has submitted a letter of support. I've been the chief medical officer for 25 years.
Speaker 3: The children's clinic, despite its name, sees patients of all ages. We have 11 sites in a mobile unit, all located in Long Beach.
Speaker 9: We are a community health center where a patient center and medical home, and we have integrated behavioral health with primary care.
Speaker 3: We see 40,000 of the most vulnerable patients in Long Beach every year. We we do 125,000.
Speaker 9: Visits in a year. We have over 60 physicians and ten behavioral health therapists.
Speaker 3: Who see many with acute illness. We do about 400 internal behavioral health.
Speaker 9: Referrals per.
Speaker 3: Month in our clinic system. We have partnered with stars for many years. We don't believe that the ERs and the hospitals are the answer.
Speaker 9: To most of the mental health patients that we serve.
Speaker 3: We are helping.
Speaker 9: To train Long Beach and trauma informed care. Dr. Nicholas and I have gone around and trained thousands of staff to.
Speaker 3: Respond appropriately to.
Speaker 9: Those in crisis. We fully support the urgent care. It would.
Speaker 3: Do.
Speaker 7: An incredible service to both our.
Speaker 3: Providers by relieving them on having a place to send our patients and to our patients.
Speaker 7: In crisis. And this location.
Speaker 3: Happens to be very convenient to those that we serve, especially our largest site, which.
Speaker 9: Is located on Atlantic and 28th, just a few blocks away. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Hi. My name is Roman on it. I'm from the fifth District. This is a little bit difficult for me to to talk about this. I have a relative that has a mental illness, and I'm not going to get into that. But I've had some friends that I grew up in high school that are not all that they had schizophrenia. That's a very difficult thing to to work with and. One of the most difficult things for me is I understand the the issues that that the Wrigley area is talking about. And I don't know how to address some of the parking issues or anything of that nature. But I do support having some kind of a psychological facility. In in this the city, it's so valuable to have. I don't know all of the details and I don't want to try to guess it. Let's do this or let's do that. As it relates to parking or the location, I hope that the City Council will be able to use their best judgment with the information that they have to to do what's right. One of the things that I did notice is that there's a lot of security issues that that people are concerned about and ordering as a suggestion. One of the things that I think would be good and that's been suggested to me, I guess, from others as well, is perhaps having some busses that would take the people back to where they came from. This might help relieve some of the, you know, the congestion that we have. In addition, I was doing my best to listen to the. The other folks. I do agree that having a licensed psychiatrist on staff 24 seven is certainly more than recommended, is probably required. I would definitely say that. There's a lot of things that I've grown to understand as I've gotten older in seeing a lot of these people with the psychological problems that we have. And I've also seen my own councilperson struggle with this type of. You know, issues with her district. And this is a difficult problem. I know. And I just. I don't know what to say about the Wrigley District. There's a density issue. I know. And. It's just a tough one. I don't know how to say it, but other otherwise, I'm in agreement with the facility that you guys deal with the rest soon.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Is evening. Honorable Mayor, members of the council. My name is Rene Castro. I'm a proud resident of the third district. And here tonight, on behalf of century villages at Cabrillo, we are a permanent supportive housing community located in the seventh District. Thank you, Roberto, for your support. We're here tonight to support this facility and request that the council move forward with the application. This is obviously a huge need within our community. It serves a very vital gap. It's cost efficient, supports our police officers or fire, provides a safe place for residents to find a place where they can have a safe space to heal themselves. And speaking personally, being it at century villages to be exposed to. We have 1300 people that are all formally homeless. And at some point I'm sure we're in crisis like this. And now we have a vibrant community. Today we had a wonderful fair and to see those those residents who at one point were in crisis now thriving is a wonderful thing. So we hope that you do the right thing. I know you will. Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hi. Thank you very much. My name is Debbie Freeman. I'm the director of clinical services at Jewish Family and Children's Service of Long Beach in West Orange County. And I'm here to speak on behalf of our facility in support of the Behavioral Health Urgent Care Center. JFK provides much needed mental health counseling and other social services to over 1600 people every year. We assist people of all religions, ethnicities, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation who are struggling with issues like anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, grief, and a multitude of life's other challenges. We're here to support the individuals and families of Long Beach who need your help. I have prepared a long example for you. I'm not going to give it because you've had multiple examples of the need for this. So all I really want to say is that the people that we would refer to this type of a facility are not homeless. They are not a danger to others. They are community members who are in need of help. And we urge you to support this. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening, City Council. My name is Manolo Montoya and I may be 12, but I totally go for this project idea because one not only is it helpful, but two, it's just like convenient for everybody because Long Beach, we have all seen the herd that is on this place. And what if we can shift this around, be using this facility? And that would be great because that would be actually be a ticket to getting rid of homelessness. And I've been told that it takes a village to raise a child. And today, I want to talk to you about the child from the village that needs your support. Albie USD has been serving our special needs students for over 40 years and all students graduate annually on average about the age of 18. So our graduating, where I have those special needs students gone. They've stayed right here in Long Beach, L.A. County, eight. That's where when they need urgent behavioral assistance. Where do you want them to go? Harbor UCLA. Harbor UCLA is scarier than prison and filthier than anything you've ever seen. I'm sorry. It's. That's true.
Speaker 0: Yeah. Okay.
Speaker 7: Do we want our special needs students to be heard and helped?
Speaker 3: Of course we do. They're our.
Speaker 7: Children, and everybody deserves a chance to learn. Equally, special students, regular grades.
Speaker 3: Why would Long Beach benefit to have a.
Speaker 7: Behavioral urgent care clinic? If you visit Harbor UCLA, like I said, then you would truly know why our special needs children and adults need their care to be a lot more special. It's honestly a title giveaway because it's because we're not educating them to fit ourselves. We're educating them to fit them. And about some facts about the U.S. which really dedicates and why we need this building is that did you know that approximately over 5% of the US residents have a serious mental illness? We're talking savage nurse. World Health Organization reports that substance use and mental illness are the prime cause. A disability, mental health and suicide are connected. In their prayers. Suicide is the second leading cause of death for ages 10 to 24. More teenagers and young adults die from suicide than from cancer, heart disease, AIDS, birth defects, stroke, stroke, pneumonia, influenza and chronic lung disease combined. Each day in our nation there there's an average of over 5000 to 140 suicide attempts by young people, grades 7 to 12. Four out of five teens who attempt suicide have given clear warning to this. Ladies and gentlemen, see the need and be the village that helps read this, the child and approve this proposal to help our local citizens right here in Long Beach together. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: How do you follow that?
Speaker 9: So my name is Joanna.
Speaker 7: Archangel and I'm.
Speaker 9: Here to represent.
Speaker 7: Project Return Peer Support Network. And we'd like to show our support for a star of Youth Mental.
Speaker 9: Health, Urgent Care. And I want to speak to you too. As a peer myself, I represent the mentally ill as well. When you see that, when you hear those words, you don't see your face. But here I am before you. And I've experienced homelessness and hospitalization, and now I'm working as the program coordinator at Hacienda of Hope, the peer run respite care center. And we'd also like to offer our services in support of this behavioral health care urgent center.
Speaker 7: And we would be honored to do so at what we do here at Hacienda of Hope.
Speaker 9: We're actually located at Century Village. Is that Cabrillo as well? And we have ten bedrooms staffed with peers only, and we don't have any clinical or medical staff.
Speaker 7: And we service about, I'd say, 3 to 400 individuals.
Speaker 9: With mental illness within the past four years, less than four years that we've been open. And I can tell you that much that we've only had to call the police that maybe.
Speaker 7: Five times within those four years. And it wasn't a threat to them, our neighborhood, but more to themselves. And so the program we would provide also immediate access to treatment for people experiencing a mental health crisis. Having immediate access to treatment drastically reduces the spiraling effect of.
Speaker 9: Going untreated or mistreated in other environments where maybe the individuals there are not as trained in mental health. It will be a police hospital, emergency rooms.
Speaker 7: Family members, professionals, quick access to those in need due to lower wait times for the treatment. It also adds an unmet need in Long Beach by offering another treatment option in our service system, where those in need can be seen in a more timely manner, which actually increases the chance of follow up care. And again, I urge you to look at mentally ill is a different definition. I stand before you as the mother of a toddler child who is three without the services that were provided to me. I wouldn't be here in front of you today. And we would really love to support this urgent care. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Stephanie Dawson, CEO Council District two. In 2016, my best friend in the world, the man who was the best man at my wedding, was living downstairs from us at the time and had a bit of a relapse from a serious alcohol problem that he's been dealing with over the last couple of years
Speaker 5: . For the next three days, he walked himself inside of his room and was continuing to drink himself.
Speaker 1: Frankly, to death with no access to food or any other services.
Speaker 5: Myself, as an attorney who has been trained in legal service and.
Speaker 1: Helping people access legal services. My sister, who is a.
Speaker 5: Waste and social worker and works in a mental health facility in Riverside County, all in myself with experience.
Speaker 1: Working for the city of Long Beach and knowing all the services that we have available to them, we're unable to to.
Speaker 5: Assist them at that time. I called every single resource I could possibly think of and for getting a and this may be going to shorten the people were saying that we have enough services in the city for an acute alcoholic suffering from a acute mental health crisis at this point and a corresponding relapse. It would take him a month in the city of Long Beach to get a bed for detox, something that should be happening immediately and corresponding with.
Speaker 1: Mental health treatment. Frankly, we by the grace of God and by the really good support of the folks that they will be, PD were able.
Speaker 5: To get him a 5150 status and a bed inside of community hospital where he received.
Speaker 1: The treatment.
Speaker 5: That he had that he needed and is now working a great job in the state of New York.
Speaker 1: I'm telling the story, frankly, because this is I mean, I just can't believe the people who are coming up today.
Speaker 5: And saying that this is something that is redundant care or.
Speaker 1: Unnecessary.
Speaker 5: This is an extreme need, you know, regardless of the status of the income of the people who are going to be coming into it.
Speaker 1: This is a human right. Access to mental health facility to mental health is something that.
Speaker 5: God forbid, we as individuals don't need. But at the same time, it is something that we're all one loss of a job, one substance abuse problem, one traumatic event in your family from having.
Speaker 1: To access it. Any one of us, regardless of what background we're coming from, regardless of our educational levels, regardless of the amount of money in our pocket, we will need this. There's a good possibility that at some point in your life, so many in this room is going to need this facility.
Speaker 5: And if we don't have it, I don't even want to think about the consequences. So please vote in favor.
Speaker 1: Of this today. Thank you. Thank you. Where just because of the length of the public comment as well as the one other large item we have today, we're going to go down to 2 minutes without objection. And the council's there's no objection from the council to that. So most of you've been going actually 2 minutes already, which is which has been great. So 2 minutes.
Speaker 3: Hi. Good evening, Mayor and council people. My name is Colleen Trish. I grew up in the Wrigley area. I now live about a half a mile north of the facility. And I feel that if that facility had been there when my brother needed help, he would be here today. He was arrested over on Willow and Main Avenue many years ago. I don't think the police knew how to take care of it at the time. And he is not with us because of not having a facility, as we've been told, is so needed. So I would highly recommend that you vote in favor of this facility no matter where it is. I think we need it in Long Beach. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next Speaker Good evening, Mr. Mayor. When I was not just Ricardo Pulido, a long time mental health advocate here in the community for NAMI, Long Beach, which is National Alliance for Mental Illness. I have two children, adult children who live here in Long Beach, Ricardo and Graciela. Ricky's graduating, by the way, tomorrow from Long Beach State. He's driving. He's a he's on his meds. He's doing excellent. Is a I'm so proud of that young man. And thank you to NAMI and thank you to the stars and to all of our mental health community that we have working together. Like the young man said so clearly for for all of our loved ones, Gracie also is thriving and doing well. But now I like to say that on behalf of not only NAMI, but the Long Beach community in general, I believe that I support the CLP. And what the prosecutor prosecutors said tonight was right on target. I concur with what he said for law enforcement especially. You know, we need to help our city and our IMET teams to be able to have another facility here in Long Beach. You have almost a half a million residents and you could probably use a couple more in the northwest, east and south side of the city. So with that said, I would say that this is long overdue. It's the trend for the for the county you'll be seen as overall you get we are setting the trend setters here in Long Beach for the West Coast and for all of the United States, by the way, because UCS will be the way the wave of the future. This is the way to help our loved ones when they're in crisis. As you heard, I won't be redundant, but Stars has an excellent, impeccable record regarding this. And I would say as a father, grandfather, that if we do this now for residents here in Long Beach, we will see law enforcement a lot of time so they can be out in the streets doing their job, taking care of the safety and the public. And most importantly, for all of our community residents here. We want to be friends. You heard we're going to do all we can to make sure we serve those folks that live in the perimeter of the 1000 feet area. So God bless you. I know you pray and make the right decision tonight. And thank you for supporting the UCC here in Long Beach. Thank you. Thank you. Mike Speaker, please.
Speaker 11: Good evening, Kim. Thank you. If my name at the local manager of the L.A. County Department of Mental Health, I oversee mental health programs here in Long Beach and behalf of our provider thin clients we work with. I'm here to express our support for staff development of the urgent care center. While we may have some good mental health programs, but we do not have urgent care program needed in our city. And if proposed, program will provide much needed services allowing mental health clients to be stabilized when in crisis, especially in the evenings and weekends when the clinics are not open by offering immediate intervention support for them to be able to resume their ongoing services in the community. Regarding some of the concerns expressed earlier in regards to increase the homeless in the neighborhood once the urgent care center is up. I would like to share what was written in that Long Beach press release last month, dated April 25th. It pointed out for the past two years the number of the homeless counts was reduced significantly in Long Beach. Unlike other cities, I might add, it's due to some of the excellent work of the city's homeless services and housing programs that have done the good work. While citywide homelessness is down. However, the result also showed a spread of homelessness across the city since 2013. This population shift explains why some of the residents may be seeing more homeless in the neighborhood, and this may be continuing regardless of urgent care than their location. In my opinion, real solutions for preventing homelessness in residential areas is through expanding our collaborative partnership effort and person overseeing a homeless outreach team I oversee called SB 82. So I'm happy to be a partner in the city to join in the efforts of addressing homelessness, along with other existing programs such as Long Beach PD, Quality of Life Team. We also would like to work with the U.S. to take homeless referral, linked them to receive ongoing services and provide a housing support needed in regards to providing housing support while we'll be coming to our community soon. Additional Housing Resources from Measure H. So hopefully it's our department played a significant part in the town planning and implementation of more than a billion of the funding available through Major H. Hopefully that we are able to partner together with the city and provide Long Beach getting its fair share of allocation to prevent homelessness, create more transitional and permanent housing, support the city needed. So with that end, we encourage your support. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker. Hello. My name is Michael Anthony Harp. And I think that this world has become very hard and extremely hard and everybody walking around mad at each other. For what? I don't understand how homelessness is one thing mental. Disturbances and other thing. Okay. I had a roommate.
Speaker 5: That was mentally disturbed and I didn't understand.
Speaker 1: Where she was coming from, where she was going or where.
Speaker 6: She was flying to.
Speaker 5: But all I knew was that she was mentally disturbed and I know what to do with her. I cared about her. I had a heart.
Speaker 1: So therefore, I stayed there with her and I reached out to her. She finally got the help.
Speaker 5: That she needed. I'm in for the hospital.
Speaker 1: All of I'm for it.
Speaker 5: I'm all the way for it. I mean, I'm that understanding these people that are not for it. I understand where they come coming from to a certain extent, but I don't understand it at all. Half of these people here are mentally disturbed and not even know it and.
Speaker 1: Have no clue. They have no clue at all. They are.
Speaker 5: But they're still you know, they're still.
Speaker 1: But I think what happened to open up.
Speaker 5: Your heart and given people a chance?
Speaker 1: Giving people a chance to go do what they have to do.
Speaker 5: Like opening up the hospital, Long Beach Boulevard. I'm a resident right there on Long Beach Boulevard. What's the problem? I don't know. I have no clue. But anyway. Bye.
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: My name is Susan Redfield. I live at 2510 Maine Avenue, which is one mile from this facility. 11 blocks. I've lived there for 13 years with my husband. I'm an attorney and have a master's in social work and I am in support of this. Instead of going into the detail of my father's experience after World War Two as a hero with the China India Burma campaign, with the Flying Tigers, and his return from service with what they called shellshock. Instead of dealing with that, I just want to say, obviously I am in support of this. I think it's really important and I feel that the concerns that have been identified by the residents that live nearby the facility have been addressed with regard to reaching out and other other services in collaboration. I think that when the police and the other agencies that have come up and said that they would like to work with them with stars and this center, I think that that collaboration and as long as well as the cop can alleviate some of the concerns that they have, I live in this neighborhood. I feel it's important to have this facility. I strongly urge you to vote in favor and support this program. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please. My name is Ross Parsons. I live in the seventh District, also about a mile from the from the facility. And I have a member of my family who lives with with mental illness, as do many of my friends, many of our neighbors. I think there's you know, there's a tendency to look at this as the other. This happens. This is something that happens to to the other, not to us. But it's something that happens to all of our part of our our Long Beach family. There are people who suffer from a treatable illness. And it's a it's an illness that's best treated, not in jails, not in hospital emergency rooms, but in the appropriate facilities. As someone who lives in the neighborhood. I'm sympathetic to the concerns about how about some of the impacts of the neighborhood. But we, you know, eventually hopefully every district will have one of these facilities in it. But this is something that's needed right now. It's something that can be built now. It's something that is funded now. The building's been vacant on Long Beach Boulevard for years. The renovation of it will be a benefit to the community. It will help extend that long, though the rebuilding of Long Beach Boulevard. And I I'm confident that that the operator has addressed the security issues and the will that will make this a good neighbor. Thank you. Thanks, Russ. Thanks, Speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Hi. My name is Ted Kane. I live at Willow and Main, actually right by word. The previous speaker was mentioning the seventh District, and I'm strongly in favor of this facility. One of the things that someone that some of these we've heard from the neighbors are the concern about the people in the neighborhood who already are marginal and and may be in need of help. And I think that's exactly why we need the facility. It's not a reason to fear the facility. It's a reason to bring it in. One of the things that concerns me a lot of times is we have people in the neighborhood that they don't need the police, they don't need to go to jail, but they do need some help and they need the sort of help that the mental health urgent care said it would be providing. I know I would feel much better knowing that it's there rather than have to wrestle with it with the dilemma of, well, who I call when someone who I don't think needs to go to jail. But but is is cause me concern in my community knowing this facility is there and if they can get appropriate help would be great for the community and I'm strongly in favor of it. I again, I do live in the seventh District. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hi, my name is Tony Cadmus. I live in the seventh district approximately about a mile from the proposed facility. And I'm speaking in favor of it. I, I think it's it's certainly needed. A lot of comments have already been made. I'll try to be brief. I am sympathetic as the speaker before me, Rose said. I'm somewhat sympathetic to the residents in the surrounding community. I feel that the comprehensive conditional use permit is actually a strong safeguard for the surrounding community, and I think it's a very important component to this project as it goes forward. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Good evening. I'm John Long. I live in the seventh district within walking distance of the proposed site. I am also a board member. For Mental Health America, Los Angeles. And I'm a mental health clinician. I want to speak to the types of people that I know will be served at this facility. They are people of all ages, all ethnicities, and who live in all neighborhoods of our city. They are devoted parents, dedicated employees and youth with bright futures. In fact, they are probably people, you know, and they're us, since one in five adults will have a mental health condition in a given year. Since they are us, I'm going to start talking about us since we are the potential patients of this facility. We need educated and caring mental health providers to assess our conditions and help us manage a mental health crisis. A proper and thorough assessment like those that Star View will provide will enable us to be connected to supportive services so that we can live healthy and productive lives. I'd also like to point out that the potential benefits of staff you do not end with those of us who arrive as patients, but extend out to all of those who love us. Because when we are healthy, our families are healthy as a community. It is our responsibility to ensure that appropriate care is available. And I will be proud to have star view behavioral health urgent care center in my neighborhood.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening. My name.
Speaker 9: Is Karen Weinstein and.
Speaker 3: I live a little less than a mile, I think, from the proposed facility. And I also work close to the facility. And I kind of want to just say ditto what she said. She said it so well. I completely understand the apprehension that my neighbors have. Listening to some of them speak so eloquently, there's a a picture that's painted of a clientele that really is concerning, perhaps, and scary. But I think I go back to what the representative from the school district said, that we are talking about us, our community, and we need to shift the picture a bit when we're picturing who it is, who's going to be served by this facility. And it's us, our community. And if we shift that picture and think about it that way, I think we understand how important it is that we have this available to our family and friends and others who need this kind of help. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Hello. I'm Frank Mannix on the clinical supervisor with the Long Beach Mental Evaluation Team. And I live in seventh District. I live on Walnut near Ward. One is two points. I think they've already been made, so I'll be one. This will help decompress the problems in the emergency rooms with therapy usage for people who need to be on hold and they're being taken to the emergency rooms where there are there isn't psychiatric treatment. It will also help the teams be in the city more because right now, if we have to take somebody to a hospital, say , harbor and wait three or 6 hours to get in, we're not in the city. We're not patrolling. We're not doing our job well. We're doing our job. But we could be doing more if it was a 15 minute drop off, as has been said here. The other part about the neighborhood, yes, I've got my cards fixed at the garage next door to this facility. I sometimes drop my car off and have to walk home, go up, the bombardment down, ward down. And sometimes there are some characters there. But I'm thinking, you know, if you're going to have 30 people a day, that's three police cars driving by and then driving back out on patrol. So I'm favorable for those reasons. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Next speaker police.
Speaker 1: An evening of air and councilmembers. My name is Steven Burkhart, the community outreach manager for the downtown Long Beach Alliance and also for autistic residents. I represented the to express our support for the proposed Behavioral Health Urgent Care Center along Beach Boulevard. Several months ago, Ken Dunlop made an appointment with myself to discuss the plans for the park. He was very detailed about everything, including security, public and restricted access, the scope of services to be provided to the community. And I thought that the plans were very well thought out and that our show is extensive for a medical office . Our city is blessed with a diversity of people, unique neighborhoods and culture. We have incredible service organizations, great hospitals, great universities, garbage and our own health department. But one element that is missing is an outpatient care center for people who experience a mental health crisis. I think it is very appropriate that this discussion is happening in May, which is Mental Health Awareness Month. One of the pillars of Mental Health Awareness Month is reducing the stigma surrounding mental illness. It is completely acceptable in our society to talk openly about cancer or autoimmune diseases. But too often mental health issues are kept private. One in four persons or one in five, one in four persons in their lifetime will experience a mental health issue, and this much needed facility will allow people to quickly access services similar to a traditional urgent care facility. It is time we treat mental health as important and openly as physical health. This facility will benefit all of the residents of Long Beach, and I hope the Council will make a decision based on facts and not unfounded fears. I would also like to give to the Kirk, please, a signed letter by Craig Hodgson, President, CEO of the DVA, and have copies distributed to the Council. Mayor. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Honorable Mayor and City Council. My name is Patty Laplace, and I used to be your former mental health coordinator for the city of Long Beach. I worked as a mental health coordinator from 2008 to 2015. I can tell you that I used to field calls every day from people looking for help and with the loved one with a mental health crisis and not sure where to take individuals. Many times has been testimonial testimony. Here they talked about going to emergency room and other places where oftentimes waits for very long, oftentimes were not be seen or were referred out to agencies that couldn't handle the problem at the time because of too much of an impact of other individuals waiting to get help. I guess I need to also kind of sort of satisfy some myths that I've heard here earlier. Someone mentioned that Long Beach already has an urgent care facility, which is not true. The current Telecare facility that operates in North Long Beach does not operate as an urgent care center. The other thing I'd like to dispel a myth is I'm not sure where the 14 mental health agencies exist in the city of Long Beach, especially to handle this kind of emergency. Many of our emergency rooms has been testified before, have suffered from overcrowding and would love to be able to have a facility like this. And I want to and my presentation by saying that if this was a medical care, urgent care, I don't think that we would hear some of the protests that we're hearing now, because as anybody who's concerned with anybody with it, with a medical condition, we want our loved ones and significant others have the best care possible and the best availability of care. And I believe that the mental health urgent care facility would supply both for that for that in our community and our citizens in Long Beach. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank inexplicably.
Speaker 3: I thank you, Mayor and councilwoman and councilman. My name is Alison Crisp. I am a District seven resident mother and mother of two children that live over there and go to school. Small business in our downtown lobby. I support the buck. I'm supporting the buck because not only do I have friends and family that have expired stars and understandably love their experiences with them. But I think our director of the Met team had said that there's a decompress.
Speaker 7: I think that.
Speaker 3: This facility will help not only decompress for those that are struggling with a mental.
Speaker 9: Illness, but those organizations that are out there are organizations that include.
Speaker 3: MH A are quality of life. Our Heart Team.
Speaker 9: Many of the churches are nonprofits that are dealing with the homeless outreach on a regular basis.
Speaker 3: That will help take a lot of pressure off them, including our hospitals and ERs, obviously, and the guys in the room who think you'll know the other ones that help. Paramedic That's what I'm looking for. But most importantly, thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Price They did that to the mom. But most importantly, I wanted to address and a lot of people already talked about this, is that this facility is needed for not only the seat, I mean, for the safety of those that are diagnosed are not even diagnosed with a mental illness yet. Many of those we see.
Speaker 7: On the streets. I know this facility is not.
Speaker 3: Geared for those that are homeless. But we none of us want to see those that are not being able to get any help from this awesome clinic without having been be on the street, without having this urgent care facility available. Last night, real quickly, I also want to say that myself and my family.
Speaker 9: My kids especially, have been over to the.
Speaker 3: Village on many, many, many, many, many occasions. Down in downtown Long Beach. And I have never felt so safe or can in a facility in my entire life. I feel that their support and again, I support this. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next week, a police.
Speaker 1: All right. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, and members of the city council. My name's Tony Leggett. I'm a homeowner here in downtown Long Beach. And and I'm fully in support of this new, urgent care center. And I applaud your desire to move Long Beach into the 21st century. On this issue, as well as many others, I must say that, you know, 25 years ago, I was a homeless person. I didn't. I lived on the streets in Long Beach. And the with my. And I was, you know, full of mental health issues. And the way my situation got resolved is I ended up in men's central jail in downtown Los Angeles. And that's the most hideous and brutal place that anybody can go to receive mental health services. So I believe this new, urgent care center will be able to respond to people like, you know, with issues like I had 25 years ago. And but another thing I want to mention is it seems like most of the folks that are protesting this are they're afraid of what's going on. And the way to get through that fear is to stand up in, you know, volunteer in a place like this because 20% of 20% of you guys that are protesting are going to need this. And you're going to be much happier to have this resource than the kind of resource I found 25 years ago. So thank you very much and I look forward to your passing this agenda item. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, council members and vice mayor. I'm Robert Fox speaking on behalf of Kono as executive director. Frankly, we could not come up with a vote on this issue that's too complex and we need more review so we don't have any opinion to give to you. So I would like to speak to you privately as myself, Robert Fox, living in the second District. This facility is obviously very needed and I encourage the City of Livy's to continue to reach out for mental health facilities. I do have one concern and it's a historic perspective. I've lived in the city for a really long period of time and sometimes we need to have a historian tell us what we did and what we didn't do in the East Village. Many, many years ago, we had 26 service agencies for the homeless congregated in the very few blocks. And so we did something called a PD 30 moratorium on that particular neighborhood in order to bring a better quality of life to its residents. We were not refusing services for anybody, but by attrition we would make sure that the distribution of services will be more fairly and evenly distributed through the city of Long Beach. What I've heard this evening is there was a concern about density of these kinds of services in this particular district. If that is a concern for us, maybe we should take a look at in the future when we're looking at planning commission zoning to distribute facilities more even handedly throughout the districts so that one neighborhood is not impacted above the other. My other concern, of course, would be as wonderful as our desire is for this facility to to be a success is we do need to have an oversight in terms of assuring the neighborhood, which has a concern that they will not be negatively impacted by the great intentions that we have here.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much. Make up next, be good, please.
Speaker 3: Thank you so much. My name is Bishop Barney Redden. I pastor at 1115 North Market Street and have pastored in this city for 20 years. And I'm proud to say that particularly I'd like to address you from three points a parent, a pastor and a mental health professional.
Speaker 0: Because I am also a psychologist. First, as a parent, I was asked by the Health.
Speaker 3: Department a number of years ago around the work that I do in HIV to start a faith based support group with HIV, I met a young lady who was HIV at that time, who was about 12 years old, and I made a choice to adopt her. She was HIV positive because she had been severely sexually abused by her stepfather. Unfortunately, we dealt with many mental health issues, as one could only imagine. I can't even tell you how many times I ended up at Harbor-UCLa. On hours upon hours upon hours and turned into days. To get help.
Speaker 0: From my daughter.
Speaker 3: I remember in January of 2010, the last year of her life, I told the social worker at Long Beach Memorial Hospital, somebody help me.
Speaker 0: If there was a facility.
Speaker 3: Where I could take my.
Speaker 0: Daughter for three or 4 hours.
Speaker 3: Where she could diffuse herself. She might not have stepped in front of a car on the 110 freeway. January 31st, 2010. First thing. The second thing is, I've been passionate about mental health for many, many years. I was granted a $100,000 grant from L.A. County Department of Mental Health in 2015 and 2016 to do mental health work in the church. Many pastors don't know what to do. I had a crisis on Sunday where I.
Speaker 0: Helped some officers defuze a young.
Speaker 3: Lady, and if I would have had a facility where we could have gone and taken them like what stars is attempting to put up, it would have been fabulous. And then thirdly, the pastors. We need this in this community. Thank you so.
Speaker 6: Much. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hi. Good evening, Debbie. Ines Gomberg with the L.A. County Department of Mental Health. I'm a deputy deputy director and a psychologist as well. And I just want to let you know, the department is very supportive of mental health, urgent care centers. And one of the reasons for that is over the last seven years or so, we've implemented a number of them. And what we found is that they're a key continuum in our mental health system of care. Very, very important. And basically what they do is they they provide a mental health service when a client needs it. And our outpatient clinics obviously don't do that. They're open from eight, usually 8 a.m. to about five or 6 p.m.. So it's very important. The other thing I can tell you is that as we look at our mental health, urgent care centers and their performance, only 6 to 8% of the clients that come in for a visit, an urgent care center, are psychiatrically hospitalized within 30 days of that visit. And that's a key metric for us. The other thing I wanted to let you know about is that this is becoming a best practice across the state. And I think I think you've heard that tonight. Many counties have implemented urgent care centers as a as a viable alternative to psychiatric hospitalization. So thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Okay.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: I am Belinda Watson and I live in.
Speaker 3: Seventh District and I don't have my words together, but I am one to voice it. I am not for the center being on Long Beach Boulevard and I represent a number of the residents that are in that area where we had meetings where we had a meeting and was done at the Vaguely Association meeting. Which story is good? That is bringing a lot of people to say, you know, mental health is need, mental health is needed. And what we did in the community is say, yes, we are, we agree with that, but we just don't need another facility in our area. And so I just wanted you to hear that even though they are good at bringing people from outside the district and in the Long Beach area and people in mental health, but there are actual residents. And I want you to remember those 500 people who sign that thing saying that they do not want that on Long Beach Boulevard. There are a abundance of areas where a facility of that type can be placed and it would not be in a residential area. I went as to want the council to reconsider that particular location. What we need. There are more community oriented businesses that draw our community, the community that lives there to come to there. We don't have an abundance of that. We have it over in Bixby. No. We don't have it in Wrigley. We need more of those and not more behavior services. And even though, you know, I know that there is a big need for it, we need some other things in our community other than social services. So remember those other 500 people that may not be here? I'm representing them. They have. I was astounded when I went to the two of the meetings and most of the people who said that they were in the district were really not in the district when they left the meeting. I have never seen some of these people, so.
Speaker 6: Thank you for your testimony. We have said.
Speaker 3: I want you to think about that and those 500 people that are not.
Speaker 6: Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Oh, hello.
Speaker 0: I am Jonathan Dunn. I may be 17 years old, but please allow me to speak. I am against the mental care mental health hospital at Long Beach Boulevard because there are plenty of mental care facilities, plenty.
Speaker 5: Of hospitals here in Long Beach.
Speaker 0: But if you are in Casey, do the hospital in Casey do the hospital over there? Please consider this. If there's if the idea is about security and staff taking care of people. Um. I would say.
Speaker 3: Dual dual life license psychiatrist.
Speaker 5: More than one because once not doing enough for a lot of people. So if.
Speaker 1: You truly care.
Speaker 0: About the people.
Speaker 1: Because Long Beach.
Speaker 3: Is a city which has.
Speaker 1: A lot of care and.
Speaker 0: Passion for people. If that's the idea.
Speaker 5: Or Mitch needs to step up its game. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Next for you, please.
Speaker 1: Mr. Vice Mayor. City Council members and staff. I agree with everyone who has spoken before me. This urgent care facility is needed. However.
Speaker 5: If if there's a question of ownership to this facility, can you proceed with with putting it there right now?
Speaker 1: Can you vote on that? Is our city attorney saying that Doug Auto is representing a frivolous lawsuit on on this?
Speaker 5: What's been presented here? Does it make sense? We have two sides here positioning for ownership on this. And if if our if everybody knows Doug Doug's Doug Auto here and everybody knows his reputation in our community. And if Doug Otto's.
Speaker 1: Client wins, how is that going to affect that building? How is it going to affect.
Speaker 5: This facility, which we all need, which we all agree is needed? I don't think you can vote on it tonight without letting the superior court determine that. I say we need this facility. We need it.
Speaker 1: Somewhere in Long Beach.
Speaker 5: And I say do it quickly. But I don't see how you can do that. You're not being told.
Speaker 10: Everything about this legally. Thank you.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Next week, at least.
Speaker 12: Good evening. Recap of rich eighth district. You know, I came here tonight to support the need but oppose the location. But I listened to this young man come up here and speak, and he talked about our special education children. I have a special education, son. Most of you know my son. And he has had a couple of bouts. He's he's been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury and he's had a couple of needs for some serious behavior intervention. So this facility, as opposed to my having to find it, find the help up at UCLA, would have been incredible. But what I do want to remind you and this is something that you can actually fix the problem. I believe that the problem is if you look at that intersection, look at Wardlow and Long Beach Boulevard. It is panhandlers on every corner. They've taken over the equality storage center and they have a meeting area that they sit at every day with all their belongings. You have the overpass, the underpass that is now home to homeless. You have weeds that are that tall with trash on the sidewalk. It's not a good entryway into our city. And it certainly doesn't doesn't make the people that live there feel protected. So if you worked on not only increasing the police presence, which means we have to grow our police department, but you also worked on having more than one quality of life team in the city. We had to reduce it from 2 to 1 because of patrol needs. If this corridor had a more cared for appearance, if the residents were seeing that it was being better taken care of, they might not be so afraid of the homeless population that has imploded in our districts. And those districts are seven and eight. We are seriously impacted. I know we're going to talk about that later. So thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. My name is Larry Tricia. I live about a.
Speaker 5: Mile up the street from the proposed facility. I live up in Linden. And I just want you to know that I'm in favor of the facility. Just a little anecdote.
Speaker 1: A young man lives next door, had a had an episode, and his parents.
Speaker 5: Had to call the police. He went into a catatonic state. They had to drag him down the stairs, but eventually bumped, got him in an ambulance and he was at the emergency room for quite some time, as I understand it.
Speaker 1: It would have been so much nicer if he had just gone to a decent facility and then then taken to the treatment center. Long story short.
Speaker 5: He's fine.
Speaker 1: He's married, he's doing great. And that's good. I want you to know I support the facility. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: And while we're at it.
Speaker 6: I think the gentleman in black jacket is the last speaker. If anyone else is the final call, there's anyone that would like to speak on this issue. Please line up now, because as I see it, the gentleman in the black jacket is the final speaker.
Speaker 0: So.
Speaker 6: Okay. So we've got one additional person. Okay. So the speaker's list is now closed. Thank you. Proceed.
Speaker 12: Thank you. My name is Georgia Case, and I've been in the seventh and eighth districts for 32 years. And having served on the Public Health Re Accreditation Committee, we certainly have heard about the needs. I'm not sure if I can say anything new. Wonderful comments tonight on in support of this very needed program. But I think after 32 years, having really survived the riots and, you know, a robbery in my home dealing with the trials and tribulations over the past 30 years in the city, certainly wonderful experiences, but nothing prepared me for having to deal firsthand with our mental health care system in Long Beach. It is a it was a nightmare. And to put families through these crises of humiliation and truly horrific experiences, dealing with the police department, trying to do the job, the best job that they can, but also emergency rooms and dirty. Private hospitals. So I think this suffering, pain and suffering does need to be documented. It's it's atrocious. And it's really time that we step up and join the 21st century in mental health care for our citizens. Thank you.
Speaker 9: Hi. My name is Monica Lopez and.
Speaker 3: I lived for many years in the seventh District.
Speaker 9: My mom and sister and nephews live there now. I am in.
Speaker 3: Full support of the program, but I'm also an employee of Started Community Services. I have worked there for 15 years so I can kind of opera more like global with greater perspective as to the services and being also a member of the community.
Speaker 9: I now own.
Speaker 3: A home in the sixth district and I am full and support. I cannot offer any more than what's already been said other than I don't fear for my safety.
Speaker 9: I don't fear for the safety of my mom.
Speaker 3: Or my sisters or my nephews who will live down the street from the.
Speaker 0: Park.
Speaker 9: I can only offer.
Speaker 3: The perspective that as a mental health professional, I have seen the great work that Star View has provided because I am.
Speaker 9: One of the people that provide that care and there's nothing more rewarding than when.
Speaker 3: We meet with clients and we see the tremendous growth that can be done when we as clinicians are given the adequate tools to do our work. And the park will be another of those resources that will be available to us for our community, our community that is in need. And it couldn't have been.
Speaker 9: Said better than the young man who.
Speaker 3: Spoke today, especially about our special education program. You know, we are a big city, but we're a small town and we're all intertwined.
Speaker 7: And we know each other and we know.
Speaker 3: People who will be greatly benefit if we proceed with this by approving it. And also we will know people who would be faced the consequences if we go the way of not approving it. So as an employee, as a family member and as a homeowner at Long Beach, I fully support this program. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hi. My name is Cecilia McGill. I live in in the district I have here living here in Long Beach like 29 years. And I support this project because we need it. And now I remember the enemy and I give my time to to other people with mental, mental problems and they see how important it is, this program for our people who is living with severe depression. And we they're not looking to prevent suicides, too. Thank you.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Next speaker, please. Hi. My name is Jane Case and kind of baby. I'm bummed that Robert and Pat work aren't here, but I have. I've been involved in a long beach for a long time and through the bike station and met many people with social and different economic situations. To me, it's not mental illness. To me it's being confused, depressed, abused, lonely. And you really need people that can help you, give you perspective on your situations. You don't take it to the next level and make really stupid decisions. And I think that sort of thing where people in crisis. Can come and talk to somebody straight up, given their options, and they might even want to go home and think about it and show that to me. Forget the mental illness. It's talking straight up with somebody that needs some help. And talking on a third party. Thanks.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Hi. My name is Blake, and I'm a resident and homeowner in the seventh District live about ten blocks from the proposed facility site. And I wanted to come out here tonight and voice my support for the proposed facility. So I also want to say that the living room neighborhood now for about six years and has seen a lot of positive change, seeing a lot of good things happening in the neighborhood. I know if you read certain Facebook posts and so forth, you would think that things are, you know, going crazy. But I really feel that things are going really in the positive direction for the neighborhood. And like I said, I only have about ten blocks from it, so I'm in full support for it. I really feel that this would be a. A step in the right direction, still on the neighborhoods progressing and changing for the better. And I think this is just a a welcome benefit to and I'll be proud to have in my neighborhood. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Thank you so much, Mr. Mayor. My name is Jacqueline Glass and I am in the ninth District. It's unfortunate that we're going through this over and over again. Regardless of what your people's belief is, the Bible says the poor will never cease. So therefore, we must lean out our hand. We're talking about a critical care unit.
Speaker 1: For critical.
Speaker 3: Crucial problems. Mental illness is serious. I'm a mental illness survivor. My grandchildren, my oldest grandson, who's 18, attempted suicide, and my ten year old sweetie pie, Savannah Juana also had issues, whether it's from the home or wherever it's from, wherever it came from, we must address it. And in saying that the reason why we need this is because you can look around and see. I talked to so many care providers. I talked to so many people. As I'm commuting every day, people are hurting. Their families are hurting. They don't know where to go. They sit in hospitals all day. And you have to understand, if it was your family, if was you, if you needed help, as they stated, if this was a medical hospital, be no problem is in a community the zoning laws provides that to be there as the perfect place for a disruptive freeway is you can't we can't you guys can't blame us when I say us. The support of this for the homeless in your neighborhood we have get your community together. You go out and you.
Speaker 1: Engage staff.
Speaker 3: You we have we we engage with people. We have the ability to engage. And when we have that engagement, our relationship with people, then you bring hope, wellness and recovery. And that's what we're trying to do here and that's what we're going to do here. And I'm going to make it my business as a recruit and all San Antonio buyers come in. I didn't told the families, we have to deliver on this. I've already put the bullhorn out to say, We got help for you and we're here for you. We have the city with us. We have more people for us than against us. So I beseech you, I beg you, please, we will help you in your neighborhood. We need. This is mandated. Please, by the grace of God. Love you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please. And we're going to close the speakers list. So we've had a long speakers lists, so. All right. Speakers list is closed. Yes.
Speaker 5: Thank you, ma'am. My name is Kevin. I was in high school, and as a youth, despite the issues that come along with the multi facility at allocation location, I think as a community and citizens allowances, you have to accept that there there's nothing really much we could do besides help these people. It's not it's not the the criminal, the sickness. We have to understand the background and the issues. Me personally, I struggle with depression and I see a psychiatrist for three years and I understand how difficult it could be to reach out and actually speak with people. So I think that as with this mental health facility, it's going to be one step closer to minimizing the mental health crisis and that I'm in for support and allowing my peers, along with my peers, that it will be a great it'll be it'll be a great resource to, um, to the to city to have this facility . If, despite the issues, we as a community have to understand that we have to help these people and there's nothing much we can really do. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, nick. Speaker.
Speaker 9: Mayor garcia and city council.
Speaker 7: My name is sandy villano. I'm an employee of stars and I'm also the mother.
Speaker 3: Of two adult children with mental health disorders. My family has a very long history here in Long Beach. My mother ran the.
Speaker 7: Elevator at the Breakers during the war.
Speaker 3: Where she met. My father and my family would want me to say, this is not about a building. This is not about a neighborhood. It's about providing desperately needed mental health services to very sick people. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 0: Please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Council Mayor. I'm Cathy Parsons and I live in the seventh district again, just a mile or so away from the center. I am the face of mental illness. I've suffered from mental illness for 40 years through therapy, psychiatry, medication. Thank God for insurance. I'm blessed. Many people aren't. And those people often can become homeless if you don't have the support you need to move through this devastating illness. It's it's heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking. I've been very lucky because I have a family who supported me. I have a great job with the city for 17 years, and I loved every minute of it. I think if you ask any professional who I worked with, they would have no idea what I was going through internally during all those years. And I would suggest to you that with one out of five people suffering from mental illness, that some of you on the council have family members. And I will tell you, your employees do.
Speaker 5: I hope it.
Speaker 3: Changes the way you think about the people you work with every day. Mental disease. Mental disease is like cancer. It's blind. It affects the poor. It affects the wealthy. It affects people with PhDs. And it affects people who are illiterate. It knows no color, no race, no ethnicity. It doesn't care about your gender or your age. And it affects, as we've said, one out of five people, one out of four, depending on what statistics you have. I will tell you that this project has been the best thing ever for me because I have never spoken in public about my mental illness. It was my deep, dark, nasty little secret. So at that point, I want to tell you, I'm here and I'm kicking and I'm wanting to give congratulations to Councilmember De Andrews, who recently, through his hard work and his willingness to stand up for those in need, which other district members, I'm going to have to say, aren't so keen to do approved the center on Long Beach Avenue. Thank you very much. And I would like to. Not knowing the outcome tonight, it doesn't matter. The bravery it takes for a council member to get up and be here and hear people yelling and screaming and whining, both sides. I've been on this side a lot in my in my career. I know what you go through. And for those of you who are brave enough to take on a situation like this in your council district in a coming election year. Bravo for you. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Kathy. Next speaker, please. Very good. You do not live in that district. But I thought they had referenced earlier something about mobile services and I would have no problem as a taxpayer to fund every Tuesday night if one of the facilities wanted to send somebody down and set up their shop in the council chamber over coffee room in the back and offer any advice and guidance to those council members that.
Speaker 0: May need that. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, honorable mayor and council members. My name is Jill Shannon. I'm director of communications for Stratus Behavioral Health Group. And part of my job in the last month or two has been sending materials to Scott and Plant at the Planning Commission. And so I just wanted to address something real quickly. So a couple of people talked about a petition with 500 names opposing the buck. And I wanted to note that there is also a petition and it's in favor of the program and there's 618 signatures. And of those 339 live in Long Beach and others live in Bellflower, Carson, Lakewood, South Bay, other nearby cities, we are also I think these are in your materials that they've given you, but these are all the petitions with signatures here. Also in the materials I sent Scott with 31 support letters and most of those people were not here tonight. So there are a lot of people on the support side that aren't here as well. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Good evening. My name is Laura Diaz, Winterset, and I am a District seven resident just a few blocks from the proposed site. A lot of people have talked about the reactive strategies of this facility. But I also want to talk about the proactive.
Speaker 3: We have a lot of.
Speaker 9: Families that are in services now that where there is a shortage of psychiatrists that can actually prescribed medication, sometimes people are having to wait four and six weeks to get appointments and this facility will be able to provide those mental health services immediately and also after hours when the surrounding clinics are already closed. I've had the opportunity to live in a neighborhood where they.
Speaker 7: Had an urgent care center.
Speaker 9: And never did I imagine that my mom would actually need those services. And when we called around to get services, they weren't able to get her in for about two months to see a psychiatrist. We were able to take her just down the street and she was immediately tended, tended to, and she was able to come home . And there's been other times where they've had to send people to our home to just assessor, and then she was willing to go with them to go kind of take a time out and take a break from her everyday stress. So I just wanted to point that out and I definitely in support of the facility.
Speaker 0: I think inexplicably.
Speaker 3: Hi. My name's Heather Morrison. I'm an eighth district resident and I just wanted to come and speak in support of this facility. This is something. I'm sorry. It's really close to home for me. I have family members who are suffering from mental illness. And this would be it truly would be a godsend to have something like this on which there isn't anything like this. I know there's not. I know that when you have a family member who is suffering from some kind of mental breakdown and the police have to come and the police have to help you with your family member, it really, truly does take them four or 5 hours out of their shift to go and take that family member somewhere far away like Harbor-UCLa, like the young gentleman said, it is terrifying, it is traumatic. And we need so many more mental health resources in this city and everywhere. And I just, I. I plead with you to please support this program. We are the face of mental health and it is so stigmatized. If it were cancer or if it were heart disease, it would be a completely different thing. But it's it's a really hard thing to deal with. And we really need this. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please. My name is Paul Barry.
Speaker 5: I worked in mental health for about 30, 35 years. And Long Beach, honorable mayor, members of the city council. Finally, I think I'm it you know, I try to read the paper every day and and I often go straight to the obituaries. And the reason why is I just find the stories of people's lives interesting. But I also notice that if you read down those obituaries, you'll see that there's usually a request for a donation, usually to a place that provided desperately needed services to the family or to the lost loved one.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you honestly, I don't necessarily donate.
Speaker 5: Because I've read these.
Speaker 1: Obituaries, but I realize how familiar.
Speaker 5: I am with the organizations that talk about the American Heart Association, the Cancer Society, the Alzheimer's Association. I know the importance of these organizations because I recognize the possibility that anyone with any of them at any time might be providing, though desperately needed services to me, my family, my 15 year old daughter. The urgent care facility is just like these organizations in one key way. At any time, it might just be providing that desperately needed services to people we know and love. Our own deputy chief of police, Michael Beckman, has said from his own personal experience, no family is immune from mental illness.
Speaker 1: Now, I know staff has.
Speaker 5: Made it clear over and over again that this is not a homeless program. And I think we can only conclude that the primary objection then to having this facility in the neighborhood is because these people have mental illness and we don't necessarily want them in the neighborhood. This is a really good night to end that kind of discrimination.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Okay. We are going to go ahead and close the public comment portion of the hearing and let me go ahead and go into public deliberation. So I'm going to start with Councilmember Marengo and we'll go from there.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mayor. You know, this is one of those agenda items that really puts a face to an issue that's not discussed a lot and not discussed openly. And it's one of those agenda items, too, that puts us as our as your elected officials in a quandary. At the same time that we want to do the right thing, we also have the political thing to do and to look at. So before I go on any further, I would like to ask staff if they could put Slide eight up on the screen again. Yes. So that we could have a constant view of what it is we're talking about, because I'm going to be bringing up some people that I want to ask questions about the facility, including our our applicant. But right now, if we could have representatives from the police department and the health department to please come to the back . I have a couple of questions that I would like to ask. Let me know when you're ready. Okay. What about this for the police department first? When a police officer picks up an individual with a mental health crisis. What are the steps that a police officer goes through to to help that that individual?
Speaker 1: Meaning Honorable Member Members of the Council. Councilmember Yang, if you could just repeat the very first part of that. I missed it when I was sitting down. I apologize.
Speaker 8: When a police officer picks up a person obviously within in a mental crisis. What does a police officer go through to help the individual?
Speaker 1: Very good. Thank you for the question. When a police officer encounters somebody that's in a mental crisis, they have a number of well, a couple of different options. Number one.
Speaker 5: The one that some people might be familiar with is.
Speaker 1: What is called a hold. And that is when the.
Speaker 5: Person who is exhibiting signs of mental illness and meets one of three categories.
Speaker 1: Number one being they're a threat or a danger to themselves. Number two is a danger to others. And the third would be gravely disabled if they meet those criteria. The officer has the authority to place a hold on them and take them even against their wishes for psychiatric care. The second part would be if a person who is exhibiting mental illness but does not meet those criteria as an officer is able to try and coax the person into voluntarily seeking services and transporting them to an available place for for such care. And oftentimes.
Speaker 5: In Long Beach, the Met team or mental evaluation team is utilized to help facilitate.
Speaker 1: That. The another option would be if the person was exhibiting mental illness. And that was, you know, maybe a reason for our dispatch out there does not meet the criteria for a hold and does not wish to seek voluntary services. If that person has committed a crime, the officer can take that person to jail for that crime.
Speaker 5: And that may be a fix for the situation at hand. However.
Speaker 1: Depending on what the nature of the crime was, likely won't have a long term solution. Lastly, absent any crime being committed, meeting the criteria for a 5150 hold voluntary service or a voluntary are self admit. A lot of times the officers just have to walk away because there's nothing that they can legally do. Thank you. Okay.
Speaker 8: So on a call like that, what would be the typical amount of time that an officer spends with an individual like that? Or let me rephrase it another way, being that this facility is not here, where do officers take individuals with this kind of of a sickness in terms of being able to drop them off somewhere to get some get some help?
Speaker 1: Typically, we we can take them to a number of different places. Generally, we take them to Harbor Harbor-UCLa medical center.
Speaker 5: We can also take them to. As was referenced.
Speaker 1: Earlier tonight by one of the speakers, a community hospital. Places like that, oftentimes places like that have.
Speaker 5: They're busy and they have difficulty finding a bed and they take up air.
Speaker 1: Space. Having a place like Harbor-UCLa with the size of care that they have for psycho psychiatric services is good, although they're overwhelmed as well. For people that have insurance.
Speaker 5: On the voluntary stuff, we can we can seek out those different places a lot of times that are outside.
Speaker 1: Of the city and will actually drive quite, quite a ways to.
Speaker 5: Get them the help that they need, even if it's.
Speaker 1: Outside the city. So regardless, it takes up a considerable amount of time.
Speaker 8: So what officer is in this type of a call? Are they are they on serve the currently on duty serving as individuals even though they have to drive, say, 20 miles to go to a to another facility?
Speaker 1: Yeah. They're, uh, they're out of service for the duration of time that it takes to transport that person, to care for their belongings, to fill out the appropriate paperwork.
Speaker 5: And to turn them over to staff at the facility that they've taken them to when they're ready to receive them. And it could range from a minimum as a couple of hours from one October and could be as long as six.
Speaker 8: Okay. Now, in terms of training police, are police officers or do you have a special unit of police officers who are specially trained in this area? Or or do all and or do all officers receive training in recognizing a mental health issue?
Speaker 1: Our police officers get trained in dealing with individuals. Some police officers have a higher level of training. Recently, there was some legislation passed that required field training officers to undergo higher amount of training in dealing with the mentally ill.
Speaker 5: And in Long Beach, we had the mental evaluation.
Speaker 1: Team, as mentioned, where we have six officers that are paired up with clinicians.
Speaker 5: From L.A. County. And just that is that is all they do. They don't respond to they're not dispatched to calls for service, but they respond in the field to.
Speaker 1: Calls or assist other officers on calls where.
Speaker 5: Mental illness is an issue. And just by virtue of their assignment, they have a tremendous amount of experience and are also put through additional training as well.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Chief, for the health department. When there are people who are experiencing a mental breakdown or think that they are, what's where do they go normally? Is there a place for them to go? And if they do come to see the health department through regular hours, what's what's your process, whether you do.
Speaker 12: So in excuse me, in terms of the in terms of our facility, we don't provide direct mental health treatment and mental health services for the city of Long Beach, comes through L.A. County mental health. So if you are coming in and lower income and are looking for different services, otherwise people could go to their own private providers . But we as a city do not provide direct mental health service. The Department of Mental Health, the rate is approximately 2 to 3 weeks if you have not already participated in their service previously. So if you have a crisis, you're probably going to go to the emergency room because you don't know where else to go. And then you would work with the Department of Mental Health to get an appointment, an assessment and move through their process.
Speaker 8: Okay. There's been a little bit of discussion and some, I guess, discussion about the number of mental health facilities in Long Beach. Can you clarify that in regards to how many do exists or not exist in Long Beach?
Speaker 12: You know, we heard the number tonight is 14. We've been racking our brains as to where a number 14 comes from and we're not really sure. So we we will look. But I think what that may be, the Department of Mental Health hosts, they do have outpatient sites within the city of Long Beach, and there are some other nonprofit providers and for profit providers. But the number 14 seems high to us. But we will look and will further fact check.
Speaker 0: That.
Speaker 8: There has been some discussion about the connection between mental health issues and homelessness. Can you address that issue? That that that question?
Speaker 0: Yeah.
Speaker 12: So many, many of those who are homeless have mental health have mental health needs. So between substance use and mental health, there are concerns for those who are homeless. However, many of those who have mental health are not homeless. So it goes both directions. So I think that, you know, as we talk about those who are homeless and the service and the set of services that are available, the Department of Mental Health co-locate with us at at the Multi-Service Center. So they are directly there. And when someone comes into the front door of the multi-service center, we're absolutely sure ability we have the ability to connect them. As you know, the multi-service center is closed at 5:00 during that on weekdays and not available for on weekends. So as a when someone is in crisis, then this behavioral health center would be the the urgent crisis center. It would be the space that they could go to be sort of de-escalate the crisis and then be able to attach to Department of Mental Health Services from there.
Speaker 8: Okay. Thank you very much. If I could have the applicant, please come to the podium. They have a couple of questions I'd like to ask.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 8: There's a lot of discussion, as you know, a lot of concerns about individuals who are coming in to the facility and how they exit. The amount of time we spend there. Can you walk us through a typical, maybe even an atypical situation where a person walks into a facility and take it from A to Z, from entry to release for a patient?
Speaker 1: Certainly. So they walk in there voluntarily coming to the facility.
Speaker 8: Just so that we can be clear that the facility map is upstairs. I mean, upstairs on screen. Yes. Could you like say they're coming through the switchboard where they come in? Through our home. They come in through 30 seconds. What's what's the process?
Speaker 1: Okay. So the the walk in component of the facility is on Long Beach Boulevard. And if individuals come by their own accord, there's a bus line there. There's a place, obviously, to park. Typically, though, they're brought there. They're brought by a friend or relative. And they would come in, wait to have an appointment, to be assessed, to be assessed by our clinical staff. And again, we have a nurse, we have a mental health clinician and we have a psychiatrist. And there's an initial determination made of the level of acuity. So the severity of the symptoms that individual is experiencing first, the assessment is, are they in a crisis? Do they have a mental health condition? Assuming they do, then there's a look to see how severe it is, and that informs the clinical team as to how long it's going to take to resolve that issue. So the decision is made whether that can be done quickly. They remain in that voluntary section, the quiet crisis walk in section that's there. That's again, off of Long Beach Boulevard. So that front entrance there, if it's determined that they are higher acuity, that they're going to need more intensive treatment over a longer period than they would likely go on to the adolescent, the child unit or the adult unit. And they can do that on a voluntary basis as well. They receive the services and again, it is a service to reduce the crisis. So they're stabilized, but it's also to facilitate their transition back into the community, to alignment with resources when they go back home or back into the community so that that stabilization is lasting. It's not just at the point where they're able to leave, but it's lasting. So they don't come back the next day, the next week, the next month.
Speaker 8: And there was some discussion as well in terms of some individuals making regular visits or going on a regular basis to this to this facility. And the concern, obviously, is, is that whether people are looking at this as a as a drug rehab facility or a substance abuse facility. So can you describe pretty much what what you do provide in this facility when somebody comes in and you dispense meds or anything like that? So thank.
Speaker 1: You. It's a great question that was brought up by several individuals. So to be clear, this is not a substance abuse treatment program. That's part of that initial assessment. And we'll work with law enforcement who all the other agencies that will utilize the program to know that we don't do medical detox. So that's one of the initial looks with just somebody that's going to go into withdrawal or they're going to need that kind of medical treatment. The program is really not designed for that. As has been said, there's obviously a lot of prevalence of substance abuse disorders among people that also live with a mental health condition. So we do what's called co-occurring disorders. We make sure there's a referral into substance abuse treatment if that's needed. But we don't deal with somebody who's on a high level that they'd be going into withdrawals and needing detox. I don't know if that answers your question completely, but that's a good differentiation.
Speaker 8: The the police chief sister chief mentioned that when an officer is dealing with such a case, they're usually off line. If they have to go travel far distances to go into to take this individual to a treatment center at your facility, what's the regular time that a an officer or any other person would spend with this individual once he or she is taken into the facility?
Speaker 1: So what would occur if they're bringing an individual and it's typically on an involuntary basis and that's where off the parking lot we have a separate secured entrance to the shuttle that.
Speaker 8: Would be entering through Elm.
Speaker 1: Yes. And coming into the lot there. There is a separate security entrance into the adolescent unit and into the adult unit. Our clinicians would do a an immediate assessment, again, ruling out this is somebody that has a physical injury where they really need to go get medical treatment in an emergency room. Are they at a level of intoxication? That's an issue. We rule out whether they are inappropriate for the program. If they're accepted, that usually is decision made in ten or 15 minutes. We actually have a location within the facility that the officers can go and work out. So there's actually a station. They can come into the facility, wait for that determination and, you know, use a computer, use the phone. So we have that set up for them as well. Okay.
Speaker 8: So in that area off of Elm, is is it gated? Is it fenced off? Is there a automatic gate that would be opening and closing? What's the what's see what's the likelihood of of someone going in through that backdoor to that parking lot late at night or anything like that?
Speaker 1: Well, part of the conditions is a increase in the elevation of the walls around the perimeter of the the parking area. So that's to decrease the ability to view into the facility in respect for the neighbors. But it is open access to the parking lot. We don't have a plan to out a gate, but one of the conditions that is being asked of us is to have 24 hour security in the parking lot. So we will have a security staff position in the parking lot at all times. Okay.
Speaker 8: Now, we talked about also they walk ins so people take themselves in and then we have after hours accepting of of patients, what would you described to be your peaks, your your your highest point of getting patients in there? Now, you mentioned 30 per day. What times what day would be your peaks?
Speaker 1: Well, I can only speak to our experience in other programs in other areas, and there is some difference between them. So part of the process of opening this program will to be to learn what those peak times are. But it is typical that most come in during the day and it's infrequent that somebody comes in after hours. Those are usually individuals that are on a 51, 50 after hours. It's infrequent that a voluntary individual come in, but we'll see that as well. And the peak time, the peak days are usually more on the weekends than there are during the week, more in the afternoon and early evening than in the morning or earlier part of the day. So there's those kind of trends.
Speaker 8: Okay. Now, there was also mentioned I think you mentioned it earlier during your presentation, that the average stays 4 to 6 hours and then they're allowed to leave and get in voluntarily if they wish to leave. But if they want to stay more, they can. It's up to them or I was that determined.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So it's a clinical decision made as to when the individual has resolved their crisis, where they're safe to return to the community. And again, that's with supports and linkage to other services to the extent they need them so that that stabilization can be ongoing. You asked earlier about, you know, the the outliers and those are the individuals that stayed the full 24 hours. That's somebody who's having a tough time resolving. And out of those groups, those are the ones that may end up having to go to a psychiatric hospital. They're not able to stabilize at that point. In that situation, we would arrange for the bed. They would be transported by ambulance. As the representative from the Department Mental Health spoke earlier, that's only about 6 to 8% of the individuals that come through the program. These programs are highly effective at stabilizing, which is what they are, of course, they're designed to do to avoid individuals having to be hospitalized.
Speaker 8: And I guess there's a definition that that I need at this point in terms of stabilize stabilization of a of a patient. What point determines whether an individual is stabilized or not when I guess when someone comes in highly agitated or in crisis and you provide the service, at what point in that process do you determine a person has been stabilized? What are the indicators to you that a person's ready to be released?
Speaker 1: Well, it's basically the reduction in the symptoms that they were experiencing that put them into crisis or whether that's depression, anxiety, thought disorders. You know, mental health takes many different forms. And for an individual to come into treatment, they have to be experiencing a heightened level of those symptoms. So whether it's through medication, whether it's just time they're working with our counseling staff, whether it's talking to a peer counselor, somebody that had that lived experience that can identify and communicate effectively. With them. We bring all of those resources to support the individual. So that basically is it. It's a reduction in those symptoms where the individual is saying, I feel better, I feel safe to go home again.
Speaker 8: Now, when they're released, is there a plan for release? Is there a what they call it the soft and to soft? And I forget the term that was.
Speaker 1: Us, the warm handoff.
Speaker 8: Warm hand.
Speaker 1: There, but it's off to feel. Yeah, and I can't emphasize that enough. And that certainly is a part of addressing the concerns of the community, that getting them home, getting them back to a safe place is is part of what we do. It is not just just charging them out the front door. And that would start with transportation, getting them there. And again, typically, there's family members that will come and provide that. If there's no other resources, we will have a vehicle. We will take them where they need to go.
Speaker 8: Now, one of the conditions, as I read through it, is that the that the Planning Commission put in, there was an 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. open hours for walk ins, and then it's closed down until the following morning, except for those that are brought in by public safety personnel. I would guess.
Speaker 1: Actually it will accept voluntary clients all the time so they can still come. It's just that front entrance off of Long Beach Boulevard that would be closed outside those hours. And they didn't the planning commission didn't determine those hours we just defined. That's how we would expect to operate. We didn't know it was actually going to become part of the conditions. We're fine with it. As you asked earlier, we'll actually discover, well, what are the peak times that may be that we say, well, nobody's coming in, you know, from eight in the morning till nine. Let's start there walking cetera at nine. The advantage of the walking center is that it has a waiting room. And so when individuals come in there, if we're at capacity, they can wait to be seen. And so it gives us that flexibility to manage the capacity of the 18 that we have that we can't exceed at any point in time. So when you stop the the walking center, you lose that that waiting room and you're limited just to the 18 clients at that point.
Speaker 8: So the doors that are Long Beach will arc will always be open for somebody to walk in.
Speaker 1: You know, that's what will only be open during it. And so if there's that after eight.
Speaker 8: So they would have to come in through Elm if they wanted to. If somebody wants to walk in.
Speaker 1: That's correct. Okay.
Speaker 8: I have an issue with that, but we'll discuss that later. When it comes to releases as well, there's, I guess, a rule or a law that says a person can only be held in their facility for up to 24 hours or 23.5 night. If an individual comes in at, let's say, 9:00, right after we checked him or herself in after 4 hours, says, you know, I'm good to go or or the assessment is made that that person's in is free to go and it's past midnight with that person leave, walk out. What's what's a release process for that for that individual after midnight?
Speaker 1: Again, it's that same process of making sure they're safe and have a place to go. If that individual has their parent coming and picking them up and the parent wants to come and pick them up at two in the morning, we'll release them to their parent, to a family member.
Speaker 8: Would it be a warm handoff? It would be to say there's a door go.
Speaker 1: No, we will escort them to the car in the parking lot. They have to show up before they would leave and we would make.
Speaker 8: Sure you have security.
Speaker 1: There. Absolutely. But to also answer your question, we give them the I thought you were going to ask is if somebody came in at 9:00 and it's 9:00 the next night and we determine they're safe to go, but it's 9:00 at night, they can stay. So think of it as you've gone to the doctor, you've completed treatment. You go back and wait in the waiting room. You're no longer getting treatment, but you're waiting for somebody to pick you up. They can stay that night and wait for somebody to come in the morning.
Speaker 8: Let's go to the other scenario. A person comes in at midnight and the 24 hours is midnight.
Speaker 1: It's the same thing. They can wait till the next morning if they work.
Speaker 8: In the morning so that they can see an additional 8 hours. So they'll be there 8 hours?
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're technically not. They've completed treatment. So the 24 hours limits the amount, the duration of when they can complete treatment. But if at that point we've determined, hey, you're ready to go home, but why not you? You have the option of staying until the next morning, until transportation can be more convenient. They have that ability. The state allows that.
Speaker 8: Okay, stay there for just a bit, obviously. I want to thank everybody who came up and speak tonight because I know you took a lot of time from your from your home, from your families. You probably skipped dinner. You probably missed happy hour. I know I did. But yeah, that's that's that's something else to be told. But I really want to commend everybody who came out here to speak because it's very important that the city council gets all the information that we possibly can on both sides of the issue, because we need to know to to address what the concerns are. And we can then make a determination as to which way the city council wants to go. So I want to I want to thank everybody who showed up today to talk about this, including the the person from the village, the the child in the village. I want to thank you for for being here. And I know there was another young man who was here as well that shows commitment and it shows a passion for being here and and passion for the issue at hand that we're dealing with now. I also want to to say that I had many a meeting with our department, services department and staff, Amy Borek, and we hash things out. We knew she I brought many concerns up and she addressed that and she put some conditions on there with the with 30, 35, 35 special and standard conditions that I think you've agreed to, if you don't mind. Right now, I'm going to mention a few more because I really would like to see if you if they workable for you at the present time. Condition 11 says well under condition 11. I would also like to add the condition that this deal with security that there be two security guards, especially from dusk to two to the morning, only because if we are going to be accepting individuals during those hours, I would like to assure the community that there's that there's security out there to ensure that these individuals get help, that they come into the facility and and they get the help. But there's someone out there vigilant for these individuals who are requesting to come in.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So just so I'm clear, you know, the condition that was added was for security guard to be outside the facility on the grounds that was in addition to the two security guards we already have. So we will be having three security guards total, 24 seven.
Speaker 8: That that's a good that it's good to hear. I really like that. Also, I'm concerned about the openness of the parking lot and the ability for someone to or even kids, let's say, gives like open spaces like parking lot, rollerblading gate. Anybody rollerblade.
Speaker 1: Anymore?
Speaker 8: I haven't seen a rollerblading in a long time anyway. Or yoga board, skating or whatever, jumping up and down doing the tricks. So I'm concerned about the openness of that, especially into the neighborhood in Elm. Would you consider or adding a being a fenced off area or the wall you say you're going to raise it and perhaps a sliding gate that would provide more security to that facility to to have the neighbors feel safe, safer. It's more secure that the individuals are not going to be wandering off the grounds and into the neighborhood.
Speaker 1: Well, my first reaction to that is if that's the concern that there's people in the parking lot and coming in because there's not a fence, then I need to get a different security guard because they're not doing their job. Okay. It's not a big area and somebody should be able to to manage that. And I'm also I don't know how a gate would work for that all. I would answer that. Thank you. I don't know how you know, with the patrol cars coming with the gate, I don't know how that would work, but it doesn't seem like it would be convenient for people coming and going. Okay.
Speaker 8: Is there also an assurance that that parking lot is not going to. Be used for special events such as a buy me a fundraiser or say a taco truck, moon bounce, that type of thing. I mean, I'm not I'm not saying that you can't. But I would say that if if there's if you're going to have one, I would like for you to apply for an occasional event permit on a sweep through the city so that we can look at it and determine whether it's it's a permissible event that you can have.
Speaker 1: We'd be happy to do that. We only have one event planned, and that's when I hope you come to. That's our grand opening.
Speaker 8: We'll get an all AP for that.
Speaker 5: Also, it's.
Speaker 8: It's it's a new facility and it's going to be something that that is obviously an unknown event right now that we don't know until it opens. So I would also like to add a condition in there that we will review the the the the facility in one year that we look at it and evaluate it in terms of the conditions that are put in there, that the you are biting through the cup and that they're all there. And we will review this at the end. When you go into planning commission, they review it and then they they determine whether we can continue with the with the process or not. Is that good? Is that okay with you?
Speaker 1: Well, I would respond kind of asking why that's needed. I mean, the my understanding of is there's 35.
Speaker 8: Conditions and added a couple more so.
Speaker 1: Well, but we have to abide by those not a year from now all the time. And, you know, we are going to have to answer to the city and to the neighbors if there's a feeling like we've not adhere to any of them. Our commitment is to do that. We're certainly happy to come and meet and talk about it again. What I just want to be sure of is that this is not a one year cup and then we have to reapply for it, if it is my understanding. But we have to come back and talk about this in a year. We're more than happy to do that. We're happy to do that at any time.
Speaker 8: And you brought up the neighbors. Maybe one last point. Would you be willing to add a hotline for it, for the neighbors, for anybody who's out there, a direct line that goes into a a comment line, let's say, where they might a neighbor may a resident might say, I'm seeing something out here. It's coming from your facility. I want to lodge a a concern or a complaint. Would you be willing to add a line like that?
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Actually, we want them to call the facility. We will have a manager 24 seven and we will have the the that person take those calls so that hopefully we can address things right away.
Speaker 8: Okay. Now, the reason the reason I asked about the the review in one year is that if there's one thing I can't stand and it's already been proven is when I have a bad operator or a bad neighbor, I'm not afraid to go after that operator and kick them out. We did that a couple of weeks ago with a bad operator who needed to who needed to go away, where we revoke their cup and we revoke their license to operate. And hopefully this is not going to happen with you. But I, I just need to say that because it's important that the residents and constituents know that we got their back, that they're going to be their concerns are going to be addressed, and that we are very concerned for their self safety and their welfare. So I want to assure that when it comes to the to this facility, as I said, as I said from the outset, you know, there's the political thing to do and there's a right thing to do. And with these conditions with these conditions, I want to go ahead and make the motion to approve the facility. But under the conditions of the CLP, with additional conditions that I added there, and I would hope my colleagues will also join me in that.
Speaker 1: There's a motion to to deny the appeals and to move forward with the with the facility is. And there's a second on that motion. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: Before before we go, because I want to make sure that I did it right to the city attorney.
Speaker 5: Well, one more.
Speaker 8: Question and is to the city attorney. What's the possibility of us at this point approving the copy but not approving the location? Is that possible?
Speaker 10: No, that would not be possible tonight.
Speaker 0: Right.
Speaker 8: So can you clarify I know I said a lot of things here. In my words with Blair.
Speaker 10: I misspoke. Clarify the motion.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 3: Mr. Mayor, members of the City Council, Councilmember Ewing, I just wanted to confirm a couple of things. You had asked for a dedicated 24 hour telephone hotline. Yes. That would be responded to that the neighbors could call in. Is that is that correct?
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 3: You had asked for a within 12 months of the occupancy of the facility to have a hearing in front of the planning commission to review compliance with those conditions.
Speaker 0: Correct? Correct.
Speaker 3: And I just want to state we don't give one year copies, copies run with the land. So this would be a an opportunity for us to make. Sure that those conditions are compliant. And if we do need to modify the hours of operation because of high points or low points, that would be an opportunity for us to consider that. Is that accurate, sir?
Speaker 8: Councilmember, help me. Yes.
Speaker 3: So many serves. And then you had asked about a special events permit and whether a special event permit would be necessary. Is that a condition you would like us to craft? Yes. Where they would be required to have a special event permit if they were to hold an event over a certain size.
Speaker 8: Yes.
Speaker 3: We just had staff count and I think there's about 67 or 70 parking spaces already at the facility. So we would propose a condition that they would be required to to get a special event permit through the Office of Special Events. If they were doing a special event activity at the facility, that would involve more than 75 people. Is that acceptable?
Speaker 8: That works for me.
Speaker 3: My last question for you is that we have an existing condition, number 11, that requires the operator to maintain at least one outdoor security guard at all times when the facility is open to receive patients. I understand to the applicant, that means 24 hours a day. Is that correct?
Speaker 1: Correct.
Speaker 3: Council member Did you want one security guard on the exterior or two security guards on the exterior?
Speaker 8: Well, at this point, I think one would be sufficient. But again, if there's an uptick in complaints, that that would be revisited.
Speaker 3: Understood. So there is. Mr. Applicant. There are two inside, is that correct?
Speaker 1: There are two inside. They're not restricted from going outside. If there's a need. For people outside. They can. They can help outside.
Speaker 3: Like an indoor cat and an outdoor cat.
Speaker 1: Indoor dog, outdoor dining.
Speaker 3: Okay, so as I understand it, there are three security guards, but one is clearly defined as being responsible for the exterior 24 hours a day. And then the other ones can certainly aid that security guard as needed.
Speaker 8: Okay. Then I can withdraw that that comment.
Speaker 3: Okay. All right. So I believe, Mr. City, Attorney, we have three conditions that we would add to the motion. Thank you.
Speaker 8: So that's correct. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Austin.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. And I want to probably second this motion. I want to thank all of the residents. Will come down in in speaking, in favor or in opposition. It is always healthy to get feedback. Believe it or not, a public comment is my favorite part of the evening coming to city council meetings because I learn so much from our public. I think this urgent care center dealing with mental health will help expand our capacity for health care. Our network in our city. And the impact will be positive on our neighborhoods and not negative. I want to belabor what has already been said about many mental health professionals before.
Speaker 0: Us that have.
Speaker 1: Extolled the merits of why this is necessary. And I certainly will agree with that. I speak from experience dealing with family members who have had a mental health crisis. I think it would have been very, very beneficial to to us to have this facility when that both those episodes have occurred in the past. If I think it was mentioned that 10% of the the those participating or who will be benefiting for the services of this this facility are homeless. And that's unfortunate. But I think the other number that we need to pay attention to is the 90% that do have homes. Right. And where are they going? They're your neighbors. They're your family members in and into that. With that point, I think, again, this facility is desperately needed and I think it will go a long way to improving the quality of life for for for residents throughout the city will improve our ability to deliver public safety resources and improve our capacity for for health care overall. And and I would just say that if this was a dialysis center, I don't think we'd have this conversation. If this was a medical marijuana facility, we wouldn't be having this kind of conversation. So, again, I'm happy to support it. And I want to just take my colleague, Roberto Durango for for standing up and being courageous in making this motion. Obviously, this is not going to be something that's going to be met with joy from everybody. But I think the greater good of the city will benefit for having this. So thank you very much and I'll be supportive. Thank you. Councilman Pearce.
Speaker 7: Thank you. I definitely want to say how proud I am of our council and our staff. Kelly Colby, Doug Halbert, so many people that have really pushed this conversation. They deserve a round of applause because they do. This conversation, sir, I believe you can sit down. I don't think there'll be. Unless somebody asks you to stand back and have a seat in this conversation on how we handle mental health is a conversation that for so many people, we look at people that might be homeless and say, Gosh, why are they homeless if they only could have gotten help somewhere? So this is not about how many people we're serving that are homeless. It's about how many people were saving from becoming homeless. This is about being able today to take a vote on something that could save somebody's life tomorrow. I want to say thank you to everybody that shared their personal stories of personally struggling through mental illness. Kathy, I really appreciated hearing from you. It's hard for people to share that. Mental health is something that we don't talk about, like we talk about cancer or anything else. And because of that, it is that much harder for ourselves, for our coworkers, for our family members to find a resource because we're not talking about it. We all want to say, well, I know somebody five or move that struggled with that. You know, I grew up in a household where my I had mental health issues all around. My biological mom was murdered. So they struggled with mental illness and her relationship. My adopted mom passed away in 2009 because she committed suicide. And so I've struggled with my own challenges in dealing with that. So I'm really proud of our team today for doing this because it's a good step in the right direction and it makes us talk about it.
Speaker 4: And I know. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. And I know it's not supposed to be the cool thing to do to cry behind the dais, but I want you guys today after this vote to talk about mental health. Right. And if there's a tough conversation and someone seems like they're not connecting some dots, that it's really important that you talk about it and find out how you can get them some help to continue to talk about it so that we can be healthy all the way around. So thank you, everybody. And I.
Speaker 4: Of course, support this.
Speaker 1: We're going to go and go to to a video here. I just want to just try to wrap up a conversation. I want to thank everyone that came out and spoke today. I also want to echo the comments that Councilmember Pearce said, particularly people that shared their their own stories around mental illness. And it is an illness just like so many other illnesses that are physical and that we all deal with every single day. And certainly I also I do appreciate I think it's important for us to all understand that all folks, even those folks that had concerns, I mean, there are that people have legitimate concerns. People have sometimes issues around their neighborhood and want to ensure that their families are safe. And I think we should all appreciate everyone's concerns. And to them, I think I know it's our commitment as a city is to ensure that we have safe spaces and we're going to do everything we can to ensure this facility, as is as intended by the upwards, is a is a safe, welcoming and healthy place for everyone. And I do also just want to note that one thing that makes me incredibly proud of of this this council in the last few months especially, is that everyone has taken an opportunity to lead and try to address the challenges around mental illness and around homelessness. Remind our room, remind us that Councilman Andrews is working on building what will be a fairly comprehensive and large mental health facility on Long Beach Boulevard in the six district that he welcomed with open arms and work with me. John, I think it's important to note that that councilor, Vice Mayor, Vice Mayor Richardson saw a need for a permanent year round shelter opportunity as well as transitional housing. And in North Long Beach, we are now going to have that have that facility as well. It was only a few years ago where Community Hospital, which is currently in the fourth District, also changed its model to ensure that they were able to do more of this work. And it was a difficult decision at the time as well to allow that work to happen at community hospital. But the council also did the right thing then as well. And so this isn't a challenge for any one part of the city. I think it's it's incumbent if we're going to help our families and our neighbors, because these are our neighbors and our family members. And if we're going to help them, that it has to be the whole city that lifts up people. And I think at the end of it, at the end of the day, I think we all know in our hearts that it's the right thing to do. And so I just I want to I want to I want to thank I want to thank all of you for office, for your hard work. And we will continue to do this work. And one last project that didn't get a lot of mention, but I want to also thank both Councilman Austin and Councilmember Gringa. Just last week, we opened up an affordable housing complex, a unit on the border of the seventh and sixth District for people for a young adults that have developmental disabilities. And and the reason I bring this up is it's the kind of it's the kind of project that sometimes a lot of cities fight and don't want to have folks that are that have their own struggles in different ways in their community. And that was a project that was that was welcomed and supported by both councilmembers. Councilmember Austin, in your district, I believe, and in Councilmember Durango, right across the street, I believe, from your district as well. And so I want to thank everyone for being a part of the solution. And councilmembers, please cast your vote.
Speaker 3: Motion carries.
Speaker 4: Great. Thank you. But.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. So we're I know there was a long hearing. We're moving on to our second item, but I know most people are here for which is item 22. And so if I can have everyone else that's not here for that item, I can go ahead and exit from this last item. | Public Hearing | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, accept Categorical Exemption CE-16-267, and consider appeals from Douglas Otto, Rick Ivey, Naphar Isley, Troy Carmon, and Allan Stevens;
Uphold the Planning Commission's decision to deny a request for a continuance by a third party at the Planning Commission hearing of March 30, 2017; and
Uphold the Planning Commission's decision to approve a Conditional Use Permit for a behavioral health urgent care center located at 3200-3220 Long Beach Boulevard (Application No. 1611-08). (District 7) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0400 | Speaker 1: Thank you very much. So we're I know there was a long hearing. We're moving on to our second item, but I know most people are here for which is item 22. And so if I can have everyone else that's not here for that item, I can go ahead and exit from this last item. I'm not sure if there's more folks from item 22 in the outside or not still. There might. There are. So we're going to let them come in. And item 22, Madam Clerk, item 22.
Speaker 2: Item 22 is communications from Vice Mayor Richardson, Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilman Andrews and Councilmember Younger. Recommendation two requires the city manager to work with Department of Public Works to conduct a study exploring options to improve the private commercial waste hauling system in Long Beach.
Speaker 1: Okay. We're going to go ahead and. And start. Hey, guys. Hey, guys. I know there were. I need everyone to please. Conversations outside. Conversations outside, please. Thank you very much, Councilman Pierce.
Speaker 7: Yes? I have to recuse myself from this vote. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Please continue.
Speaker 0: Is the item up. It's sort of the American.
Speaker 1: It's over now to Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 6: Thank you. And while we get set up, I know I know we have a presentation cued up. If we can have it. Place the presentation up. We'll get started. Okay. So let's go ahead and kick this thing off. So we're beginning we're beginning a conversation today about how to improve privately collected waste and recycling systems for larger businesses and apartments to make it cleaner, more modern and more responsible. Over the past year, community members from all across our city have stepped up and brought this issue to our attention, demanding that we give it a closer look. And as a major Californian city, it's our responsibility to do our diligence to make sure we're setting a standard for the region and driving a dialog on good jobs, a clean environment and a state sustainable community. And that's why it's important for Long Beach to take a good, hard look at our own practices internally as it relates to commercial waste hauling. So currently in the city of Long Beach, there are two different waste systems. The city of Long Beach responsible for collection. That's single family and small multifamily dwellings, less than ten units and separately, the city permits 15 waste haulers to collect waste and recyclables from commercial haulers and larger, larger apartment buildings over ten units. And while Long Beach's municipally collected system provides award winning service, including recycling for all customers. There are opportunities to improve the performance of the privately collected nonexclusive franchise system in our city, and indeed, in doing so, improve the public safety, reduce pollution and community impacts like wear and tear on our roads and improve local jobs . Three Family Sustaining Careers in the Current System. Customers set up their own contracts with one of the 15 different nonexclusive franchise haulers. Long Beach residents, particularly those in multi-family residences or that live near commercial corridors, are exposed to quality of life impacts due to inefficient, overlapping waste routes. This means some of our communities are overburdened with trash collection seven days a week rather than having just one trash day like the majority of us. This is this is a single issue. This is an issue of particular concern in dense neighborhoods where families without private yards or near parks may play. You know, families and youth may play along sidewalks, streets and alleys where these trucks constantly pass on a daily basis. These overlapping truck routes are not only a public safety concern, but also a concern for impacts on local infrastructure, according to a report commissioned by Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission entitled The Pothole Report and referenced by the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego during their studies. Heavy vehicles such as trucks and busses put more, far more stress on our pavement than does a typical car. In fact, pavement engineers have found that one trash truck pickup exerts 9000 times the stress on pavement than does a typical SUV. This, you know, this waste, this wastes taxpayer dollars by damaging the very, very roads that we're attempting and elected to repair.
Speaker 1: With misery.
Speaker 6: And undermining and undermining our investments in our bike infrastructure and our walkable pedestrian improvements and in our efforts to make create a more livable city. Many of our communities, many of our communities are already overburdened with with air pollution and air quality problems as well. Overlapping truck routes can also contribute to higher levels of pollution. While city requires private haulers to have CNG trucks, these trucks are not zero emission contrary to people's belief, and release significant carbon dioxide into the into the environment. Overlapping routes also contribute to significant noise with trash trucks, industrial engines, machine arms and backup alerts disrupting our neighborhoods multi time multiple times a week. Here's a real example of my district in the neighborhoods across from Highland Park.
Speaker 1: Hey, boss. 1/2. Can we get. I'm hearing a lot of noise from outside, so I don't know. Someone from our staff and someone close the doors. Is there someone from the staff.
Speaker 6: I can barely hear? I'll just proceed.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 6: So here's a real example. In my district, a neighborhood adjacent to Highland Park, across from Horton Park, where we have a number of multifamily apartments anchored by two shopping centers to the north and the south. There are seven different trash companies in just a few blocks, less than a third of a mile. 12 different companies, 12 different contracts with these seven companies. And let's say, conservatively, that these hog haulers pick up waste twice a week. Some of them do more, but let's say conservatively, only twice a week. That would mean an estimated two dozen trips just in this small neighborhood every week. The pavement stress of that, you know, of the overlapping is like having a quarter million SUV trips each week in terms of wear and tear on our streets, in terms of air quality. Those 24 trips are equivalent to burning £32 of coal per mile, and some of them are hauling that trash as far as Orange County or Sun Valley. And in terms of quality of life, those particular neighborhoods are disrupted by loud trucks pretty much every day of the week. This is not just a public safety issue and a quality of life issue. It's also an environmental issue. Long Beach is one of the few large cities that currently doesn't have a zero waste plan. And while I know it's been in discussion, it's important that we leverage the commercial waste sector, divert and recycle as much as it possibly can. Right now, the private recycling rate is less than 20%, according to reports. Trash company submitted to the city as recently as 2013, while at the same time a residential program which is managed here in our city is exceeding state requirements, with a 74% diversion rate, 74% for residential, less than 20% reporting on commercial. That's a dramatic difference. The city requires private haulers to provide recycling at no additional cost. However, surveys concert conducted by Cal State, Long Beach and UC students, UC Santa Cruz students and the low recycling rate reported to our city signal that not all of our businesses and our apartments have recycling options available, and private haulers are sending over 100,000 tons to landfills each year in the city of Long Beach. This means our businesses are losing out on the savings that they could get by increasing recycling, which will allow them to significantly reduce how much trash the trash pick up they actually need. The low recycling rate will keep us from our goals and also emit greenhouse gases, undermining all the good work Long Beach has done to curb our emissions and to fight climate change. Most of the businesses in apartments, food and green waste ended up in the landfill in lots there instead of going to hungry people or being composted into new soil. And because of this rotting food and waste, landfills are the second largest cause of methane, which is the second largest contributor contributor to climate change. That's how it's all connected as a city. There are recent state laws that we need to get ahead of and we need to be able to lead as a city . Long Beach has been an environmental leader. We can do better by holding the private sector accountable to the same high standards that our great programing and education that our city provides with our residential waste system. But we're not alone. The state of California, according to AB 341, has a state waste reduction goal of 75% by 2020. AB 1826 mandates that organic waste recycling services for businesses and large apartments by 2019 and for most other businesses by 2021. There's also a state mandate to get organic waste like food and yard trimmings out of the landfill and either compost it or get what's edible to people who need it. A study from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that waste and recycling refuse collection ranks fifth among the most dangerous industries nationwide. And because of the race to the bottom in terms of pricing, pressure is placed on haulers to cut corners on basics like safety equipment, vehicle maintenance and training. Working conditions at certain in certain certain environments are unsafe. And for, for instance, in recent years, Long Beach has suffered a partial amputation and a fatality while on the job . And because there's not the city of Long Beach, but, you know, in the city of Long Beach with our commercial waste program and, you know, but there's an opportunity to for these jobs to become careers if they're safe, family sustaining. And, you know, and, you know, if they continue to maintain high standards. The problems we outlined are not going to create themselves. We have to build the. Systems to make the commercial sector cleaner and safer while placing Long Beach on course to improve the quality of life in our neighborhoods. There's only one way to address overlap in truck routes, and that's with the zone collection system. Using an exclusive franchise, the study. We should study this system to see how we can make it work for the city of Long Beach. Other cities like Anaheim, Seattle, San Jose, Santa Clarita, West Hollywood all have this type of system. San Diego, Glendale, Pasadena, Burbank are all exploring this system in this type of system, instead of every different building, having a separate set up, a separate contract with a separate waste holler. There will be a limited number of haulers per area. So using our same example of the neighborhood adjacent to Halton Park, a conservative twice a week average, this could mean going from two dozen truck trips per week to just two truck trips a week. Let's say four truck trips a week. This means more efficient routing safer, more consistent trash days, air and air and air quality and noise quality improvements, and genuinely, generally a safer, healthier neighborhood for both renters and homeowners alike. In this system, we can drive our recycling goals, work with our businesses to increase their recycling, roll out compost collection to those who want it or require to have it. Many cities like San Diego, New York, Los Angeles have found through studies that this would be the best type of system to meet their zero waste goals. The city of San Jose saw the commercial recycling rate triple after they adopted this type of system. Like I mentioned earlier, this can be dangerous. And this, you know, the drive to the bottom could create low paying jobs, but they can also be sanitation careers under the right conditions. These type of jobs could provide a young person from a neighborhood with the means to support a family, even if he didn't go to college and establish him as a local hero and part of people's everyday lives, doing important work to keep our city clean, our streets safe. I'll give you an example. When I was a kid in Alabama, I knew my local school bus driver. His name was Odie McCracken. And, you know, while he had a funny name, people respected him. Everybody knew their driver. And the reality is, simply put, driving was and still can be a very respectable trait. And right now, an 18 year old currently currently has to navigate a number of different companies where we are in a position as a city to create a direct pipeline. And I would rather see our 18 year olds, our young adults being assisted to have to find a skill tree to provide for the family rather than being left on their own to to sort of navigate these systems on their own and slip out a slip out of the pipeline. And with an exclusive franchise system, we can explore how to work with companies through the request for proposals process to create a pipeline through educational institutions like our current truck driving training program at Lobby City College for a local training and jobs pipeline. By the time the new system would be in place five years from now, this could be a $60,000 a year job based on existing what people are paid today. Five years from now, this could be $60,000 a year jobs with benefits and retirement. Additionally, studies have shown that recycling can create about ten times as many jobs as disposal. And there are also opportunities for small businesses and community organizations, including women and minority owned businesses, to subcontract and partner with haulers for things like e-waste or community outreach. In this in this type of system, the city has more tools to keep haulers accountable for these good quality jobs, for recycling and composting, and for high standards for community service. Haulers don't just risk losing 1 to 1 contract if they underperform or if they're not doing a good job, they could lose an entire zone. So they won't. So they are financially inclined to make the system work and work well in order to keep that business. It's a great system for haulers too, because they can save money by being more efficient. Good. Good terms on loans have more certainty in the marketplace, and most haulers that do business in Long Beach have have multiple contracts in other cities. In this type of system, the city can also cap dramatic rate increases and negotiate with haulers to have transparent, fair and stable rates. So who do we think will? Who do you think will get a better deal? A local coffee shop negotiating on their own for weekly collection rate or working together with the entire zone on behalf of thousands of customers. Simply put, small guys don't have the buying power to drive down rates or achieve economies of scale like they could if they were if they were put together like the health care exchange. If they negotiate together, you can get a better rate. Experts have found consistently that types of debt, this type of system that we're considering, could stabilize customer rates. In our current type of system, there's no baseline rate. There's no consistent price for service the way that there is for gasoline or milk. L.A. County cities with exclusive franchise and waste systems have been able to protect customer rate payers with an average rate increase by less than a cumulative 9% from 2000 to 2010 and real dollars compared to dramatic increase increases in the industry costs. This was in a study of over 30 exclusive franchise cities in L.A. County. Eight exclusive franchise cities, including Beverly Hills Salt, saw rates decrease from 22 to 2010. Rates remain stable for exclusive franchise customers because contracts prevent haulers from dramatic rate rate and could increased rates. Haulers submit competitive bids from the City Review and approve, and the city negotiates rates and potential increases in their contracts. Like example fixing it to the rate of inflation. Long term exclusive agreements allow haulers more security efficiency, access to low cost financing, the ability to amortize costs, helping to continue to keep rates low. So we should be in a position to lead in our city and not follow. We should be able to get ahead of the requirements in terms of organics collection, diversion, recycling, and leverage this to create real job opportunities. A vision for a cleaner, more responsible system. Haulers will put pen to paper to innovate and create programs and benefits in order to win our contract and win our business, such as establishing job training programs or working with our food recovery groups to rescue edible food because before it gets thrown away. A great example of an opportunity that I know means a lot to some of our fellow council members is around food recovery. We've got some great organizations here in Long Beach already doing this great work, but there's even more work to be done. The most conservative estimates of what what's possible when it comes to food recovery is that we can recover over 620,000 meals per year if we were able to recover 20% of our food waste and give it to hungry families as laid out by SB 1383, it can mean over 8 million meals per year. And that's that's just on the commercial side. It's more more than enough to feed every family on Long Beach. Three meals a day. 20%. So 20% of the states estimate that nearly a quarter of Long Beach commercial waste is food waste. So, you know, that's where that metric comes from. So so let's let's take a minute and just, you know, have a conversation about setting the record straight and distinguishing between the myths that have been out there and the facts. So first, one myth has come up and I received a lot of emails and phone calls with a lot of just mistruths and facts out there. So I figured, let's just go ahead and try to address them and maybe maybe hit a set a lot of minds at risk. So one, this proposal one myth is that this proposal will impact city jobs. Well, the fact is, this proposal is for one side of the business. This is for private nonexclusive franchise collection system that serves larger businesses and apartments. Only city crews. Our city crews still have the ability to service commercial large businesses as well and maintain a residential program. Myth number two, this wouldn't be competitive and would lead to a monopoly. Monopoly. Number one, the proposed system would be highly competitive and ensure only the highest performing companies operate in Long Beach. Number two, we're not prescribing a specific model. We are going to we're going to come back through the process of this study and further define what this model looks like. Next, six of the 15 permanent haulers are really one company, and just three companies do around 70, 75% of the business in our city. So the market is already consolidating. So the argument of going down to $3, that doesn't make any sense because we're already naturally going down to three companies on behalf of thousands of businesses. The city will able to.
Speaker 1: Hold hold.
Speaker 6: Haulers accountable for the best customer service and most customer rates, most fair customer rates. And let's remember, there's already a public option in our city without our city haulers who are not burdened to drive corporate profits and help stabilize the market. There's nothing that keeps if someone says, my, my rate skyrocket that you can always go with the public option, the city option that helps regulate the pricing. So so that's a myth. And there are so many things we can do to help regulate that next. This will put waste haulers out of business. Let's have a conversation about that. So, number one, this system can be designed in a way that works for Long Beach, such as a zone for smaller to incubates, incubate smaller companies, smaller haulers, or subcontracting opportunities for smaller haulers. The larger haulers would be fine. Some of these large companies own millions of dollars worth of landfills, and processing facilities have lucrative contracts. And dozens of other cities. They're not going out of business. Next, anything you hear about how much rates will go up is an unsubstantiated rumor. This system can protect customers from future rate increases and dispersal costs as dispersal costs increase due to closing landfills and as customers are required to sign up for organic services. The city can set caps on rate increases and negotiate establishing of fair rates to make sure no one gets gouged, such as for new state requirements for composting and collection services. Transparent rates also benefit small businesses. These type this type of system ensures rates are more stable over time. So moving moving forward, I just have a number of just, you know, sort of focusing and directing questions that I just want to give to staff. So, so on the issue of the five year notice, I've heard a lot about whether we need to do this five year notice or not. And I and I want to put this within the context of a timeline. So, number one, city manager, how long did it take us? Does it typically take us to craft reforms to large systems? And let's use an example of the billboard ordinance. How long did that take?
Speaker 1: I'm going to.
Speaker 10: Bring Craig back, the Public Works Director, to answer the questions regarding refugees, regarding the billboard company after the city council. Had a direction to actually do electronic billboards that took about two and a half years.
Speaker 6: You concur? Correct. Mr.. Public Works Director. Two and a half years. Sounds about right. Ah, no.
Speaker 0: I wasn't involved.
Speaker 1: In the Billboard program. I think doing a study as you're proposing this evening would probably take in the one and a half to two and a half year range. Okay. Analyze, bring that to council and implement.
Speaker 6: So, so let's say two and a half years. Let's say that we go through a process and evaluate and study and then the city council in a smooth way and a smooth process. We we agree. And two and a half years on what this model looks like. And at that point, we put forward a five year notice. Now you're talking about seven and a half to eight years before anything can even be implemented. And implementation typically takes a fair amount of time. Would that be fair to say, Mr. City Manager.
Speaker 1: Again, depending on the type of changes that we're talking about. Yeah, there is going to be a transition time frame. If you look at what the city did with the refuge contract we had allocated somewhere in the 6 to 9 month time frame, if in fact the city went with a different vendor than what was currently servicing the routes.
Speaker 6: So we did two and a half years to study and then a five year notice and then nine months to implement. We're at we're over eight years until anything changes in the city. And for that reason, that would place us, you know, well into 2025. And our state mandates are required to be implemented in 2025. Other mandates are required prior to that as early as 2021. So that's why it makes sense. It makes reasonable sense to do your study and your five year notice concurrently if we're going to make it. If the idea was to stall this thing, then that would make sense. What our goal is to actually tackle this issue and put forth a model that people can live with. Then we should evaluate and issue notice while we do the study concurrently. So we make a decision. We are ready to pull the trigger and begin implementation next. I know there's a lot of models and options that the City Council can consider. What will be the next steps and and with the Council have an opportunity to weigh in and suggest elements to include in the study before we actually move forward. So what are our next steps after today? Should this motion pass?
Speaker 1: Well, I would anticipate, Councilmember, that the next steps would be, depending on what is ultimately voted on here tonight, is that we would put together a team that would evaluate how to move forward. We would look to some of the cities that you listed here this evening for the plans that they put in place. We have a big brother next door in L.A. who's who went through a similar effort. And we would evaluate how they were able to successfully do that and where they had challenges. And we would come back to council and make a recommendation on how best to move forward and implement and try to provide to the best of our ability where there would be challenges and where we think there would be successes.
Speaker 6: So so would there be additional opportunities for the City Council to provide input on this, whether it's through the budget process or through the process we're prescribing?
Speaker 1: As far as I understand what you're proposing. Yes. That Council is only directing us to come back with a recommendation study the study what you're proposing this evening and come back with a recommendation and how potentially to implement it. At which time the council would take action on either, yes, implementing an exclusive franchise system or not implementing an exclusive franchise.
Speaker 6: And I would think there would even be a step before that. I mean, a study could theoretically require have cost the city council that they would have to sort of vote on that study and how we fund that study through our budget process. Correct.
Speaker 1: I think depending on the course of study, yes. If it exceeded the manager's threshold and yeah, we would have to come to council and request approval to enter into a contract to conduct a setting. Okay.
Speaker 6: And with that contract, come the city council. Does that depend on how much how much it costs?
Speaker 1: Correct.
Speaker 6: Okay, great. So we could very easily say, look, before the contract goes out, bring it back to city council. That's something that would be fair to say, right?
Speaker 1: Correct.
Speaker 6: Okay. So. So there will be additional opportunities for the city council or anyone else to say, hey, these are elements I want to make sure are encompassed in this study. So we have a full range of options before we select our model next. There's been rumors that some that this is somehow an underhanded attempt to contract out the city's waste residential waste program. Let's be clear. We have the ability to have a conversation and study one side of the business, the commercial side, without impacting the residential side. If there was an impact, there are legal processes we have to take before that happens. So, Mr. City Attorney, is there a way to bifurcate and say, we just want to talk about commercial waste, we're not impacting city jobs, city workers or the city or anyone who's comfortable with their basic single family residential program. Is there a way to bifurcate and make sure we focus on one in a way that doesn't impact the other?
Speaker 10: Mayor Member City Council The way I understand the council item and the recommended action, yes, you are in essence bifurcating that tonight. If you wanted to look at or discuss the city municipal waste system, you have a charter section 1806, commonly known as Prop L, and you would have to take additional steps to and make certain findings before you could consider that contracting services.
Speaker 6: So given those those provisions of the charter and Prop L, it's safe to say banning additional some intentional action, though that side of the business is safe. We're exploring uniquely one side of this business, just the commercial waste portion, correct?
Speaker 10: That depends on how the motion goes tonight. But as I understand it, that you've articulated it so far.
Speaker 6: Sure. Great. So. So, look, you know, this is an important conversation. It's obviously impacts multiple businesses. It impacts residents. But it's important conversation to have in a city our size. And rather than run away from the conversation or to villainize one side or the other. Let's be adults. Let's have an honest conversation about it and go through this process together and make a meaningful, meaningful recommendation, put forth a meaningful model, and try to create some good public policy. So so I submit my motion as written and asked for my my colleagues support. Thank you.
Speaker 4: Okay. Thank you. We have a.
Speaker 1: We have a second on that motion, which is Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 9: Yes. If it's okay, I'd like to go to public comment. If we can do that first. I know a lot of people have been waiting, so thank you for being so patient and coming back.
Speaker 1: Okay. We're going to go ahead. Go ahead. And a public comment on this issue. Please come forward. I am and just listen. And just so everyone knows, we actually we're going to lose one of the council members in about an hour. And so I'm going to go ahead and limit public comment to 2 minutes from from the get go. And if I have to limit to one minute, we'll go down to one minute. I want to make sure that for council's here to discuss the issue. So let's add any objection. Okay. Go ahead. Thank you. This is Robert Fox, executive director of CONO, the Council of Neighborhood Organizations. I appreciated having a private conversation with councilman of the ninth District. And I believe that we came to an agreement that a study would be an interesting thing, and I'd like to be part of that . A number of business people in the city would like to be part of that conversation and not left out. We want to see the city come back to a community based management style, and I think we came to concurrence with that. And I hope that you're nodding to say that. Yes, that's true. The question that, of course, I still have on the table here is giving the five year notice. So I understood your timeline as you just articulated it. And it was one of the reasons I called our city attorney this morning to find out was there a deadline that we had to give that five year notice today? And according to Mr. Parkin, we do not have a timeline where we have to do this at any time. It's our choice. It's a political choice to make. Here's my concern and the concern of. If we give a five year notice, which is basically a termination notice to contract as it is, because that's the only way it's written in the contract, there will be companies who have consolidated already and decided maybe this game is already tilted to the wrong direction or to somebody else's direction and they will exit the market. So at the end of our five year term, we will only have one hauler left to deal with. Our concern is to keep a market competition in the city of Long Beach to avoid any kind of a percentage increase. Because unfortunately, I do have a disagreement with your percentages of increase in other cities which have adopted such a plan. We've seen a 200% increase in trash hauling from Los Angeles, and they're not even implementing the program yet. It'll be two months to six months before they're done. Thank you. We should study that first before we make it five year. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, city council members.
Speaker 9: My name is Linda Serafin. I'm on the board of the Aluminum.
Speaker 3: Beach Neighborhood.
Speaker 9: Association and.
Speaker 3: Which is a member of the donation. Which coalition? I really appreciate the presentation.
Speaker 9: I'll be reiterating some of those points.
Speaker 3: I'm committed to.
Speaker 9: Improve the quality of life for the community and see that the city of Long Beach reaches its full potential. My vision for Long Beach is for it to have a structure to support citywide recycling and eventually composting while creating good green jobs for all. One of the ways we can achieve this is to have a.
Speaker 3: Structure to supports. One of the ways we can achieve this vision is by transforming.
Speaker 9: The way we deal with our waste and increase access to recycling in our commercial.
Speaker 3: Sector. Some of the complaints.
Speaker 9: I hear from fellow residents is includes overfilled trash bins and lack of access to recycling. This results in waste being washed into storm drains and into our oceans, all the while making our streets look dirty and unappealing. If more folks had access to recycling and organic compost bins bins earlier for less quickly and more jobs would be created as recycling creates ten times more jobs. Landfilling. Lastly, our commercial system suffers from insufficient and inefficient truck routing, which we saw in the presentation. There are 15 companies who.
Speaker 7: Service our commercial sector, and this creates chaos.
Speaker 9: On our streets and in our alleyways. We see firsthand how waste trucks contribute to the erosion of our alleys.
Speaker 7: While causing air and noise.
Speaker 9: Pollution. We like to see more efficient routing as it will help preserve our neighborhoods and increase quality of life. We support the don't waste line which campaign because we see the positive impact it would have in our neighborhood.
Speaker 3: If we're serious.
Speaker 9: Serious about reaching a zero waste goal and the vision I've described here. It is really important that we issue a five year notice today and work towards a zero waste goal. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. I own 851 Grand Avenue and it's a four unit apartment. We have 26% expenses in four years. We put 100% back. Any increase is detrimental to our business. I had an opportunity to invest with my daughter up in Oakland and we experienced a similar plan. If everything works like Councilman Richards says, it'll be a beautiful thing. However, in Oakland, rates went up 150 50%. The bins are smaller. You can't even get material in it. A lot of people just dump on the street. That's the reality. There's a $101.5 billion lawsuit. Okay. And I have that lawsuit and I'd like to distribute that to the city council. It's definitely not the best practice. OC And but if you can make it a better practice, I can cheer you on and I hope you can. And thank you for the opportunity. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening.
Speaker 2: Council members and Mayor Garcia. My name is Saucony. I am the volunteer coordinator for Surfrider Foundation in Long Beach chapter and we are also a member of the Don't Long Beach Coalition. I also live in Long Beach all my life and that's a total of 26 years, believe it or not. So Surfrider Foundation is a nonprofit environmental organization dedicated to the protection and and enjoyment of the world's ocean waves and beaches through a powerful activism network. And we are committed to preserving our beaches as such. I have been part of several beach cleanups in Long Beach and have noticed how much trash and polystyrene litters our local beaches . Part of what contributes to this pollution is that we have a commercial waste and recycling system that doesn't provide everyone with access to recycling and and results in more materials being wasted or washed down our storm drains and onto our beaches. The city should take strong action in areas that are under the city's control, such as the waste and recycling system, and ensure that everyone in Long Beach has access to recycling. Currently, our city does not have a local zero waste goal and uses an outdated framework that does not include strong goals or benchmarks to ensure that we increase cycling. I encourage you.
Speaker 0: All.
Speaker 2: To create a local zero waste goal and transform our current waste hauling system by adopting an exclusive franchise model to ensure that we protect our environment, including our local beaches. But this can only happen if you begin the process by passing a five year notice. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker. Is.
Speaker 5: Hello. My name is Shane Whitehead. I live in an area called Midtown. I formed a neighborhood association about six months back, so I'm very interested in keeping the neighborhood clean. I am very interested in zero waste. I am very interested in seeing a clean neighborhood. My concern, like Robert said, is the timeline that you're implementing and that the numbers I'm seeing don't match up to some of the things that you're suggesting. Also, another one of my concerns is when you talk about overlapping routes and the terrible condition of the knot, that's just not something that I've seen when I don't get my trash collected. I wish there were multiple days that somebody would come back and get it, but quite frankly, it's always there until the next week. So some of the things you're describing are not things that I've witnessed in 20 years of living in Long Beach. So while I really agree that you absolutely have set a wonderful goal and it's something that we need to see in all our neighborhoods, I'm not sure that the five year notice is the most effective way of doing it, and I don't think it's necessary right now. Thank you for listening to me.
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Mayor and council members. My name is Mike Murchison. You know, I represent quite a few rental property owners and businesses in Long Beach. I can tell you that we've had long discussions with the vice mayor. We applaud his passion for this issue. We are concerned. Moving forward, however, we are going to support the notification as we believe that's probably the most effective way to get information at least discussed between all parties.
Speaker 5: The biggest issue I think the vice mayor needs to be.
Speaker 1: Careful of is what's going on in Los Angeles. If there's ways to get factual information out of L.A. as to what the impact is financially on those businesses and real property owners, we need to hear it, number one. Number two, and rest assured, vice mayor, as we go through this discussion over the next 18 to 24 months, rental property owners and businesses are not going to be supportive of anybody that has a sole source opportunity in a zoned area. It will have to be a competitive environment. It will have to be something that the city does not set the price nor the bar. This has to be done through the private sector. I encourage you as you move forward with open dialog. I appreciate that. I hope it works out for you. Thanks. Thank you. Thanks, Speaker, please. Yes, my name is Robert Pete from California. Great again.
Speaker 0: And Mayor.
Speaker 1: Hey, that was cool. I use the black folks pictures up there, but come on, this ain't taking black folks out of the depression. We're not at all. That's going to bring prices up. This is a union issue. Straight union? Oh, yeah. There's going to be union. And, you know, you hooked up with some union stuff. You know, that's what I heard. I don't know. I could be wrong, but, hey, this is no good, no new. You put this on at any rate. Hey, this is no good. No good, no good. It's going gonna put the little man under. You didn't talk about the little guys losing job get ran out, and the big the big guys just taking over. This is basically socialism. What happened to free market? This used to be America. I mean, I'm a little older, but you younger generations, all of a sudden just want a socialist on us. I'm not for that. I'm a capitalist. I'm free market. Let's keep America red, white and blue, not red with a hammer. Sickle. No, no. This is going to hurt me. I don't I don't own a red mass that's going to go up. And what about the other renters? All of the same owners. So, hey, you know better than this. This ain't going to help no black folks. And that's what I was last time. I don't see too much line. It doesn't hurt black folks if I'm the head of the black coalition. Now, come on now. And you just said, man, we got to do what's right, Hussein. Right. Just like some other stuff. Just cause eviction ain't right. Can't get rid of a drug dealer. Oh, what a start. Rent control. Hey, right now, you know, it's going to do it's going to do the same thing we did in Frisco, New York, Santa monica. So come on, get in socialism.
Speaker 0: Let's stay with.
Speaker 1: Free market and capitalism. And I got about 10 seconds. What's up with Jeanine Pirro saying happy birthday? You guys know her? Ask her why she said happy birthday to Karl Marx. This is America. I'm through. Yeah.
Speaker 0: It makes me happy. I didn't know it.
Speaker 7: Good evening. My name is Annika Swenson, and I'm speaking on behalf of Long Beach three.
Speaker 1: Would you mind just to make a little bit closer? Thank you very much.
Speaker 7: My name is Monica Swenson, and I'm speaking on behalf of Long Beach 350, which is a proud member of the Don't Waste Long Beach Coalition. Our core principles focus on establishing a healthy climate and a prosperous and equitable world built through the power of ordinary people. We're excited that Long Beach is taking the initiative to become a more sustainable city. But essential to becoming a more sustainable city is establishing concrete goals and benchmarks to measure our progress. The city should take strong actions in areas that are under its control, such as the commercial waste and recycling system. The city has the opportunity to ensure that everyone in Long Beach has access to recycling in compost collection and that we work towards zero waste. Currently, as the vice mayor pointed out, our commercial recycling rate is less than 20%. Long Beach does not have a local zero waste goal and uses an outdated framework that does not include strong benchmarks to ensure that we increase recycling. Unless we change this, we cannot expect to improve our commercial recycling rate. And as we know, when our recycling rate is low, we increase our dependance on an ever shrinking supply of natural resources, which is unsustainable for Long Beach and for the planet. We encourage you to create a local zero waste goal and to transform our current waste hauling system by adopting an exclusive franchise model to ensure that we meet this goal. And as the vice mayor pointed out, other cities are similar in size to Long Beach, have already adopted exclusive franchise systems and are reaping the benefits of increased recycling rates. We believe that we can achieve the vision set forth by Mayor Garcia, which includes having access to good jobs in a clean environment. But in order to fulfill this vision, we need to establish concrete steps that help us move forward. We need 21st century solutions for 21st century problems, and that begins by passing a five year notice. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Council. Mayor My name is David Hernandez, and I just came to offer some little bit of information. Over 40 years ago, a Hispanic husband and wife with the pickup truck and a couple of trash cans started the first Hispanic trash company in City of Los Angeles. They, through hard work and good service, they accumulated 300 customers in West Los Angeles and have over 600 trash bins out there. The husband died last December, leaving his wife and two sons to run the business. They did not receive one of the franchises in Los Angeles. The company that did it was a large company that got three franchises, Jones and $1,000,000,000 contract. She and her family got nothing and is going out of business. What I bring to you today going forward, where Los Angeles did not look at going forward when they were in the position you were in, is that you as a chartered city and Los Angeles, as a charter city, can do what you want to do, especially with these noble goals and objectives. But there is a state mandate with Proposition.
Speaker 0: 218.
Speaker 1: That lays out the constitutional guidelines on how it can be done, which Los Angeles did not do. And you as a municipality can take someone's property through eminent domain.
Speaker 0: How and.
Speaker 1: Turn it over to another private company for the Keough decision. But they have to be compensated for their loss of property and business. So going forward, in listening to what the assistant city manager said. Absolutely. Watch what Los Angeles did and did not do. The lawsuit that is about to be filed against Los Angeles for a violation of Proposition 218 and unlawful taking. Watch the decision going through the courts in Santa Barbara. And then as you go forward, go forward and set the example of how to do this correctly. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next week, a police.
Speaker 3: Good evening, council members, community and Mayor. My name is Karen Reside and I'm a proud member of the Long Beach Gray Panthers and not be a part of the Don't Waste Long Beach Coalition. I have dedicated most of my working life working to ensure our senior citizens receive access to resources that allow them to live full and meaningful lives. I joined the Don't Waste Long Beach Coalition because I see the flaws that exist in Long Beach, says current commercial waste and recycling system and how it impacts people in my neighborhood. Thank you for showing a picture of our alley in your presentation by which we have 4 to 6 trucks a day going through that alley almost on a daily basis, disrupting our peace and quiet. I live in an apartment complex directly across from that L.A. Park Pacific Tower on seventh and Pacific. And when we took surveys of the tenants for our tenants association, the number one issue they wanted to see was recycling in our building. Although the city has a requirement that large buildings, multi-family buildings have recycling available, we do not in our building. I truly believe that Long Beach can do better and we can't afford not to. Having a more efficient system and greater access to recycling would bring many benefits to our community. In order to achieve this lofty goals, we need to begin the process today. Council Members, I encourage you to be bold and to take the first step by passing this five year notice. Let's put language on a clear path.
Speaker 1: Towards.
Speaker 3: Zero waste. Our city and planet depend upon it. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: My name is Roman. I'm from District five. I'd like to compliment Rex Richardson for. For bringing this forward. I, too. I was impressed with the presentation that he made only well in the fact that many of the concepts that he put forward are very similar concepts that I have that I did with many of the companies that I work for in terms of process improvement and spms, which is supplier measurement systems that I put in place. A lot of my my work has become in the industry standards as well. A lot of the buzzwords are there. You know, I haven't seen any of the physical documentation that's there, but I, I support you know, I understand supplier reduction. That's another thing that, you know, I help put forward. He said a lot of stuff about the systems and stuff, which I haven't seen actually the system that he created. I've worked also with governments on a higher level and more of a federal level, but I do agree with this one. PRESENTER When he did mention Proposition 218 in. An awful taking or unlawful notice. So I do agree that that we need to hesitate a little bit on the five year notice. And I don't want to see anyone make a lot of mistakes. And in going forward, this also doesn't take into account some of the roofing contracts. This is a commercial thing, roofing contracts and some of the landscape type people, the small guys that are helping with some of the other things, their commercial, I assume they fall into that category. So I mean, that's about it. I don't have much time, but I hope that we can work together with with RECs and and helps work on the statement of work. Thank you very much to move.
Speaker 1: Forward next week or please.
Speaker 5: Hey, good evening, Mayor. City Council Members. My name is Walker Rivera, program director of Libra. I want to thank Vice Mayor Richardson for the wonderful presentation, all the great research, all the stats, all that wonderful copious note taking. And thank you very much for the myth busting. Oh, that was fantastic. I really, really appreciate it that I am speaking today in favor of the policy recommendations and the five year recommendation as well for improving our waste hauling system. As Lieber, you all know that we advocate for renters and we're continuously supporting anything that will benefit renters of Long Beach in our work, we constantly see the costs being passed down to our renters from utility increases, maintenance and repairs, and in many cases, refuse collection. So we see this more often with smaller mom and pop property owners who often have to pay higher rates while subsidizing the larger property owners. And of course, these higher costs are typically passed down to the renters, and an exclusive franchise can ensure rates don't explode on an annual basis and further passing them down to our renters . A more efficient system which protects our infrastructure and is more environmentally friendly, will make it safer and healthier for our renters to live. Setting caps not only protects our renters, but also landlords from rate gouging, especially for smaller mom and pop property owners. For those that say that they are in support of renters and the cost of their living, if they really do care, then they should be here supporting this policy recommendation along with things such as just cause and rent control. It's shameful to hear that these folks are hiding behind their own renters. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening.
Speaker 3: Mayor and council members. I'm Janice future and I'm representing Long Beach Town Center at 7575 Carson Boulevard. This evening, I think we've heard a lot about the noble pursuit of the city, wanting to find ways to figure out the best way to recycle, the best way to avoid pollutants, the best way to keep things out of our landfill. The point I would like to make is one size does not fit all. And I think that we have various cities and municipalities that have tried a lot of different things. And I would tell you that they're on the bleeding edge versus the cutting edge. And I guess what I would like to say is that I would hope that who could not be for a study? I think a study is a wonderful thing to do, but I would hope that we would engage stakeholders in the community that have a vested interest in small businesses and the success of those small businesses as they're driven out of our park city, in our state, owing to high prices and regulation. So what I would like to to suggest is that we one, as we consider this study, that we do not put the cart before the horse and that perhaps we come up with the plan before we give a notice about a plan . So thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please stop being reasonable.
Speaker 9: Good evening. My name is Diana.
Speaker 3: Lyon and I am vice president of Food Finders.
Speaker 9: Fruit Finders is an organization.
Speaker 2: That is.
Speaker 3: Serving the community of Long Beach for 28 years. We also serve L.A. County, all of L.A..
Speaker 9: County, Orange County and San Bernardino. I am also a resident of District five. I've been in Long Beach now for 23 years.
Speaker 3: We're also a big partner in Don't Waste Long Beach food finders is recovered over £131 million of food.
Speaker 9: In our 28 years of.
Speaker 3: Operation. We're proud of what we do, but we still have a very long way to go. Food makes up 40% of what ends.
Speaker 9: Up in a landfill.
Speaker 3: Every year. 40% could feed a lot of needy people in Long Beach. This food provides this food can provide much needed food to those in need. A zero waste policy in Long Beach will change how we deal with waste. It will require retailers serving Long Beach to partner with food agencies like food finders. As part of the zero zero waste policy that passed in L.A., we were able to partner with a holler that received a contract. Through this partnership, we.
Speaker 9: Received enough money to purchase a brand.
Speaker 3: New truck, pay for a driver, and also pay for the maintenance of this vehicle. We would not have been able to get that money without this contract where we're now going to be able to pick up a lot more food in L.A. County. We're going to be able to feed a lot more people. Today, we encourage our city council to pass this five year notice and transform our commercial.
Speaker 2: Waste and recycling system.
Speaker 3: We really can't wait. It's going to take eight and a half years before we even see anything. That's too long. Our current and future generations depend on us to make sure that Long Beach passes a zero waste policy.
Speaker 9: Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker, please. A video address on file. I'll be brief. The one thing that caught my attention was the aspect of providing a $60,000 job for the people that would be driving the trucks. I think that's really great because then I think he'd be able to pay the trash bill. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, honorable mayor and esteemed council members. My name is Jeff Snow. I'm with Republic Service and I am a native son of Long Beach. This is a great city. Growing up attending Birmingham Elementary School, I thought the sky was brown. Today the sky is beautiful and blue here. We have done great things in improving our air quality and environmental conditions for our children in the city. Recently we've seen lots of great white sharks and we've seen pods of orcas and we have an otter paddling around Huntington Harbor. These are all incredible achievements for us as we've cleaned up our coastal waters. Now it's time that the City of Long Beach address our natural, solid resources. Some people call them trash. We call them resources. Burning and burying these resources. Throwing them away after using them one time is not the right thing to do. We support Vice Mayor Richardson's motion and item 22. All this is is a simple exploration of options to be able to explore becoming more sustainable and improving our environment. It's the right thing to do for the city of Long Beach. It's the right thing to do for the future. It's the right thing to do tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. MEMBERS My name is Kelly Astra Ostrom, general counsel for the Los Angeles County Waste Management Association. There are aspects of the recommendation that I think the association can support. The problem that we have is not that you want to value add options, not that you want to explore different systems. We'd like to see you work first through a task force model with your incumbent haulers. They deserve the opportunity to show you what they can do. The five year law is not a mystery to me. My father wrote the five year law. I've been representing trash companies for 35 years. My law practice involves a concentration in that area of law. If you wait five or six months to issue your five year notice, you're not then committed to an eight and a half year timeline. That is wrong. The five year law simply says, when you've committed to go into an exclusive system, the horrors have five years within which they can remain in business in order to help amortize the extraordinary capital costs it takes to be a trash hauler. If you decide to issue that to adopt an inclusive system, you issue the five year notice. You don't have to wait five years. You can introduce that system sooner. It's just the new franchise takes subject to the continuation rights of the claimants that were there for the five. But I think it's a bad idea from a whole different perspective. Wait just six months. Mr. Vice Mayor, a great deal of your presentation. I was interested in all of it. And I do appreciate your passion. A great deal of the emphasis you placed on rates. Wait and watch. Have the benefit. Learn what happened in L.A. You'll see all that come to pass in the next six months. That will greatly inform your decision. I'll close with this recommendation. Your study must really, respectfully needs to include a task force. Give us six months to organize that. All the stakeholders can be involved from Surfrider Foundation to the trash haulers to Lane, whoever you want involved. Get all the opinions out and then make your decision. In the meantime, please do not issue that notice. And please recognize we have haulers in this community. Been working here for several generations. The thanks to them should not be that they're given a waiver on the way out. Give them a chance to. Thank you very much to go into your new system. Thank you again to ensure we're doing time I'm going gonna go down to one minute without objection just to ensure that we have a full council to discuss this issue.
Speaker 3: Great. I'll try and Mike, keep it quick. Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson, for all of your efforts in that very comprehensive study. I am asking you to vote yes on both of those initiatives you presented forward to the other council members. My name is Stephanie Berger. I'm the founder and executive director of the U.S. Zero Waste Business Council, which was recently acquired by the U.S. Green Building Council and now the global director of Zero Waste Programs. And I say that because I want to be a huge resource to the city of Long Beach and expedite your study, keep the costs down, bring all those resources as part of the Don't Waste campaign and part of the Don't Waste Long Beach. And this is a very important initiative. Waste haulers have known what they needed to do for the last two years, five years and ten years, and they haven't stepped up to the plate. And we need you to help them step up to the plate. The businesses need it and demand it. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hello, Mayor and Council. My name is Sylvia. I'm from District eight and 23 year resident and a small property owner. I know the agenda is based on a commercial study, but if the study shows a financial cost of the reason to change services, then if it's based on that decision that what's going to happen to the residential waste services I think will follow suit. That's my opinion. So right now, currently the residential refuse is both May's Waste Management for the purple bands and the city handles of the brown bands. So I presume at that time there was a cost factor, decision splitting, the split in the services several years ago and I provided some data that there's two critical items that I want to address based on the data that I provided. One of them is that the death counts were higher in the private sector than the public sector, and I tend to believe that had to do with worker's comp issues. Basically, safety and training is probably less in the private sector than there is in the public sector. And also, there was a $30 million settlement to the Securities Exchange Commission that allegations of a gregarious industry fraud that seem to have been brought up by underpaid relative to the city, and that waste management reported variances between the state environmental department and the city. Also, there's information out there there's a1a half billion dollar lawsuit in Oakland. Thank you. Oh, okay. Thanks.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Hi. My name is Nick Cook. I'm the owner of RCO Material Reuse.
Speaker 3: I'm one of the small haulers that.
Speaker 9: Folks keep talking about tonight. And I'm here actually to support the.
Speaker 3: The five year.
Speaker 9: Plan. I.
Speaker 3: I created Arco tires five years ago. We have about a dozen.
Speaker 9: Employees, most of whom are formerly incarcerated. In the last four.
Speaker 3: Years, we've recycled all about a million tires, which comes out to about 22 million gallons of oil.
Speaker 9: One way to think about that is we've recycled more than twice the volume of the Exxon Valdez spill, and we've kept that out of landfills and we made it into new products. Now, we've also worked very hard to make sure that these jobs are good jobs, jobs that pay above the.
Speaker 3: Minimum wage, jobs that have a path towards stable housing and home.
Speaker 9: Ownership. Our foreman just recently bought his house. Half of my employees live in the city of Long Beach.
Speaker 3: And I don't want to go into competition with people.
Speaker 9: That are not abiding by our rules for compliance with OSHA, for compliance.
Speaker 3: With proper disposal.
Speaker 9: And I think that this is a good plan to start really looking at how people are.
Speaker 3: Exercising their waste. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Very much.
Speaker 3: Thank.
Speaker 1: Speaker, please. Thank you, Mayor. Members of City Council. My name is Ron Saldana and the executive director of the California Waste and Recycling Association. A minute is certainly not enough time to cover anything, really. I'd just like to say that I echo what has been said before me that I think it's so important to have a task force. Don't put the cart before the horse, have a task force, bring in the stakeholders, know what's going on, get all the facts, see the facts, and then make your action from there. Because to do so tonight under what's been said and what hasn't been said, I think would be a big mistake. And I think later on you'll see that it's a mistake. Let me give you one example on race. Look at Los Angeles. They're going through a process now to switch over to exclusive. They their race sheets have been posted. I gave those rate sheets to my haulers here in Long Beach. I said, compare those L.A. rate sheets with what you're charging now. The price came out about double what they're charging now. Thank you. Thank you. Speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Good evening, Mr. Mayor and council members. My name is Louise. I am a former resident of Long Beach, and I'm also representing the Angeles chapter of the Sierra Club. And we approve of the notion to extend the five year notice to the haulers. We are the largest and oldest environmental organization in the country, and we support zero waste efforts such as these. Going with a franchise arrangement is just sensible, it's efficient. And among the many reasons that Councilmember Richardson mentioned in terms of the safety and the preservation of the streets. There's the noise factor. It's noisy to have so many trucks and haulers around a street where one or two could efficiently pick up the. Thank you. So we thank.
Speaker 1: You very much for five here. Thank you. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. Next speaker, please. Good evening, council members. My name is Crystal Wicky. I'm here representing Homeboy Recycling.
Speaker 5: I'm here to speak.
Speaker 1: In favor of the five year notice. Our company began as Isidor Electronics, recycling a small woman down electronic recycling, social enterprise in an industry that's.
Speaker 10: Dominated by male.
Speaker 1: Owned businesses. As with any industry, it's difficult to gain a foothold when you're small and first entering. We've had our fair share of challenges. Certainly an interesting opportunity came along our way when the city of L.A. decided to do the exclusive franchise model. With this system in place, we are we're partnering with Homeboy Industries to create Homeboy Recycling. And this is allowing.
Speaker 10: Us, our small.
Speaker 1: Business, to expand and diversify in many exciting ways. Most importantly, we'll be able to continue working to create job pipelines into disadvantaged neighborhoods.
Speaker 10: And employing people who face barriers to work.
Speaker 1: So thank you. We're in favor of this. Thank you very much. Next week a. Good evening, Councilor Persons and mayor. My name is Maurice Thomas. I'm a 20 year resident of Long Beach and a 20 year employee of the waste industry. I've been able to afford a decent living, living and working in this industry. And what I see that currently that is.
Speaker 0: Currently.
Speaker 1: That is currently available is this exclusive franchise needs to be be signed by tonight because if you don't set the standards at a high rate, then everyone, even with this five year notice, they have time to meet meet that high standard. Thank you. Thank you. Inexplicably, in Long Beach, Mr. Vice Mayor Richardson, I really respect your passion also about this. But however, you mentioned that you're going to have $60,000 of your jobs in five years, probably be 70,000. And the only way those jobs are going to come here is unionization and a theory of unionization. But you never once mentioned the word union during your speech. In order to have those wages, you're going to have to convert these people to unions. What union hires what union represents the most drivers in this country, the Teamsters Union. And I think that's the last union we need in this city.
Speaker 0: Actually.
Speaker 1: I saw someone describe them as a criminal enterprise. All right, sir. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Okay. I'm just going to get straight to the point. My name is Brian Sims. I've been a resident of Long Beach all my life. And when I first heard about don't waste efforts in to increase recycling in the city by how can I put this who get nervous. The only thing I say is this. I apologize. I'll just say this. I heard you all just to pass this five year notice today to help transform Long Beach commercial waste and recycling system. And at the same time, I will say this because I had a whole little thing going, scuse me for a second. It would be beneficial to the residents of Long Beach if you guys pass this, because one thing it will do. It will create job opportunities. And that's the thing that the citizens do need in Long Beach is job opportunities. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Mayor Council. My name is Gideon Krakoff, environmental lawyer for nonprofit Waste and Recycling Association. Thank you, Vice Mayor, for welcoming, initiating honest conversation. The association represents many of the ten haulers in Long Beach, and they share the same goals as our friends at Lane Environmental Recycling, Compliance, fair wages and recycling, compliance rates and service that are excellent. Many are small local Albers who have been here for generations in Long Beach. Are they concerned about the five year notice kicking them out of the city that could render the routes worthless? Of course. Wouldn't you be? Do they feel we could all work together, all stakeholders on a task force to ensure that your program is the very best to vet all those statistics in the Vice Mayor's presentation? Of course they do. And do these small businesses want to be here continuing to work in your city? Of course they do. Thank you for your consideration tonight and in the months and years ahead.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening. Johanna Cunningham, executive director for the Apartment Association, California Southern Cities. I simply would like to be sure that we state that the owners would like to be involved and at the table we think it's important they have a viable part and piece in this proposal. And we want to be sure once again that there is competition, that there is a competitive rate that is maintained, and that owners should continue to have a choice in these options. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Speaker Good evening. My name is Patricia Chen and I'm a longtime resident of the fifth District in Long Beach. Um, I just wanted to provide some context for some of the remarks made here tonight by sharing with you testimony made by Gideon Krakoff, who we just heard speak to the City of Los Angeles Board of Public Works regarding LA's exclusive franchise policy. And I quote, It's been years since we have been working on this exclusive franchise. What a success it has been. We have tough environmental standards, a focus on customer service and fair rates, and equitable and transparent business improvement district process with the cream rising to the top. A partnership with labor and room for haulers and contractors big and small, like me. We urge you to move this forward. This is a groundbreaking vote today for the city, but not just the city, but for the region, the state, and really indeed the whole nation. A true model for sustainability in the 21st century. Our coalition could not agree more. Thank you for your consideration.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker Time's Kevin Johnson. Work for the public works and the work for refuse. I see trash every day. I just go off just for a minute.
Speaker 5: Go long, long routes. So why we don't we getting brand.
Speaker 1: New trucks already coming? We have got another brand new trucks already out at the yard. We got a lot more trucks. I don't know why we can't cut half them down and paint them different colors and put green, green trash cans around and put our logo on. And we have to worry about contracting out. We can do it ourself, you know, and we keep.
Speaker 5: Jobs in the city for for the people.
Speaker 1: Why we can't do it ourselves. Because because I was the filler, I was the LNG filler to a came from the Friedman area and then LNG is the the cleanest gas we got and CNG we, we already put burning posts inside a lot for food and. Thank you, sir. Time's up. Thanks for coming.
Speaker 5: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. And council members. Name is Tony Demicco. I'm the co-director of Long Beach Fresh, and we operate as a local Food Policy Council nonprofit trying to build a more sustainable and equitable food system. I want to thank Vice Mayor Richardson for his leadership on this and the very thorough report. And just briefly highlight, you know, that's very beneficial to urban farms and community gardens to be able to capture compost. And while we've had a successful pilot program, that program is not scalable. And we certainly need something more comprehensive, like an exclusive franchise model to set those goals and get us into compliance with state policies. I also, as a teacher of argumentation and debate, I must say that, you know, you've heard a lot from the opposition, particularly ad hominem attacks, false dichotomies, hasty generalizations. And I think from our side, you've seen why this is a very reasonable, logical thing to do right now. So I would urge you not to delay this vote and certainly to vote for the five year notice right now. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thanks. Next speaker, please. Hey, guys. Sir, the booing and stuff. Please don't do that. Okay. Well, we're getting through the public comment. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Good evening. My name's Christine Fisher. I've been an owner of a condo here in downtown for about a decade now. And I'm a fourth.
Speaker 9: Generation Californian who also grew up under those brown skies. We also had days where we weren't allowed.
Speaker 3: To go out and play. I came up to talk.
Speaker 9: Because I wanted to say, you know.
Speaker 3: You guys have been very good about trying to accommodate everybody. There's no reason that a five year notice can't take into account the fact that it's a five year notice.
Speaker 9: Pending what the result of your study is. You already say you're doing a study. You already say you're going to actually proceed with that.
Speaker 3: Cities nationwide are starting to benefit from large scale composting, where methane is captured and and used for power generation. So there is another way that this actually does benefit us locally as far as power costs are concerned. Also, new investors in Long Beach, like the LLC that purchased Cityplace are interested in Long Beach as a progressive model city. Not looking backward. Looking forward.
Speaker 9: Please take this into consideration because we are trying to be something heading forward and actually working together. Thanks.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, mayor and council members. Thank you so much for your attention on this important issue. My name is going to Kim and I'm a researcher with the East Long Beach Coalition. And so I'd just like to, as somebody who thinks about these things all day, like to clarify some of the questions that have been raised. We've studied.
Speaker 7: Dozens of different types of systems and have not ever seen an example where a five year notice led to all of the other.
Speaker 3: Haulers leaving the market before the contracts are awarded. Also, around rates without set rate, small businesses, as has been mentioned, actually end up.
Speaker 7: Subsidizing large businesses because they don't have the negotiating skills or leverage. This has been found in multiple cities across the nation actually, that this happens in a non-exclusive type of system. There are currently no limits on how much a hauler.
Speaker 3: Could charge a customer as opposed to an exclusive franchise. It would be fair and set the speaker concerned about the four unit apartment complex.
Speaker 7: We hear his concerns, but to reiterate, this would only affect the private sector. That gentleman would have city collection so he wouldn't be affected in any way.
Speaker 3: Regarding jobs, San Jose recently transitioned to this type of system. Not only did they see there there they saw jobs created, too. Thanks.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Good evening, Mayor Garcia and members of the council.
Speaker 5: I know it's late. We've got one minute, so I'll get right to the point here. Simple. We have a golden opportunity before us. We have an opportunity to actually.
Speaker 1: Improve our.
Speaker 5: Environment by boosting recycling rates and actually having guaranteed access to recycling. You've heard from several residents today. We we're supposed to have it. They don't. Something needs to be done. We need a guaranteed system. We can reduce air and noise pollution, reduce street traffic and preserve our roads and not undermine measure of funding that we're currently getting . There are numerous examples throughout the city where we have a simple four corner intersection with four separate haulers on each of those, or even upwards of five. In fact, there's a single strip mall in District five where there are four haulers in one strip mall alone.
Speaker 1: We can prioritize food recovery for people.
Speaker 5: Instead of landfills, and we can add more opportunities for Long Beach families. Recycling creates jobs, as Lauren just said, and we can raise standards in the industry and make sure that Long Beach residents have access to these good green jobs. If we think that this is important and this is something that we can improve our city with, then we owe it to ourselves to pass the five year notice tonight. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker, please. Hello. Thank you. It was a very fine presentation.
Speaker 5: But I don't think you've really convinced me or a lot of the people who are opposed to this that exclusive franchising is the only solution. I mean, it is a monopoly. It's you're going to have three different sectors. I'm not too sure on what the number is.
Speaker 6: But the fact is.
Speaker 1: We've already heard from Ms.. Gill herself. You've said that it's.
Speaker 5: Commercial only and you know, you talked about it, but we've heard from her that it's also going that their plan is to go to residential.
Speaker 1: So, I mean, if you're.
Speaker 5: If you're going to be using Lane, that is their goal to be going to residential and you're saying it's going to create jobs.
Speaker 1: But that this this country isn't about job security. It's about being able to raise up through from the.
Speaker 6: Lower class and the middle class. We need.
Speaker 1: To have people who are going to lose the their businesses that they've.
Speaker 5: They've been in Long Beach for four generations doing trash. And, I mean, it's it's a well-paying job if you own the company, if you if you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please. Come on. Hello, everyone.
Speaker 5: My name is Mikey Reading and I just want to say that my dad has been a small city trash hauler for 30 years and we had no idea this meeting was going on. I really wish that you guys would care more about the small city haulers. You. You had a little agreement right here.
Speaker 1: With the city attorney. I appreciate you confirming.
Speaker 5: That they're not going to affect the those small city haulers, but I appreciate a little bit more concern, a little bit more caring for the small businesses, because without scrolling my social media three days ago, I wouldn't even have known about this. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Last. Last speaker, city council.
Speaker 3: My name is Johnny Weir and mayor. Sorry. I'm a Long Beach property owner and a member of Better Housing for Long Beach. We represent thousands of property owners and renters and we do not support this letter. I'm I'm here on behalf of also of my tenants at 1152 East Second Street. I don't I don't know if you're aware that some properties, the tenants pay their trash directly. And so this is going to give them an increase immediately. So if we're trying to deal with affordable housing, why are we raising more fees on the on the renters of Long Beach? I mean, I'm surprised at home is supporting something that's going to negatively impact renters in Long Beach. I mean, this is not a good plan. I mean, what's the rush? Why do we need to rush? If this is the right thing, why rush it? So anyway, I'm all about the environment, but I just don't think this is the right solution right now. Read a little bit, get the facts, find out how this lawsuits all pan out. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Bye bye. Great. Thank you. Okay, we've concluded public comment. We're now going to go ahead and go to the council. I had left it off at Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 9: Okay. Thank you. I want to thank everybody for for being here. I know you've waited a long, long time, and I really appreciate everyone's patience here. So thank you very much. I think there was over 150 people here from the Don't Waste Coalition. And I want to thank them, especially for for all of their hard work on this and just for being here. You know, since 330 or so. So thank you. And thank you to all the stakeholders as well. And thanks to Vice Mayor Richardson for bringing this forward. I know that this always seems like a scary thought to change the system and kind of disrupt the system. And I certainly am one to agree that it certainly in the front end looks a little scary. But I think if we look at it, there are some positives and I see a few things. So of course we've talked about it and I won't belabor the issues, but efficiency. We also have an opportunity for creative cooperative purchasing vehicles. Sorry, my voice is a little shaky here. I'm a little sick. Education and stakeholder engagement, which I believe the Vice Mayor has envisioned through this whole process. We will certainly offer stakeholder engagement for all parties during the five year notice. And finally, something I'm certainly most passionate about and many people are sustainability. Refining, refining our system and consolidating the system to lessen GHG as well as truck trips, as well as, you know, make sure that our infrastructure is intact. And as we know, recycling is at an all time low. 20% is not a good rate to be at. We are Long Beach was certainly better than that. And in other cities that institute voluntary diversion programs such as San Diego, they've shown that voluntary just does not work. We have to do more. And so this is the reason why I'm supporting this policy. I think it is absolutely imperative that we move forward with with a five year notice with stakeholder engagement along the way. In addition, I know that being a downtown resident myself and a representative of downtown, so many of us do not have recycling. And I live in a beautiful building on Pine Avenue where we have trash collection, of course, but we do not have recycling. And so many of my neighbors, we know with millions of dollars in investment in that building. No, no recycling. It just seems like there's a huge miss there. We need to be able to focus our efforts on commercial and multifamily premises. And in fact, as I mentioned, the cooperative purchasing vehicle. I think this is a very unique idea that we have to look at a little bit more in D.C.. I know that there were 12 churches just about that saved about $20,000 just for consolidating their waste haulers. And in doing that, they created, in addition, a cooperative purchasing alliance that was able to help them not only with services, with waste haulers, but all additional products and services as well. So, you know, definitely pulling the buying power together will certainly help. And I think we can see that in addition, negotiating higher standards in both labor and environmental practices. So many progressive cities are already working on these alliances and I think that would fare well for us. And it also keeps haulers, I believe, closer to our community by ensuring that the standards are high, but also making sure that they are focused on our residents wishes and concerns such as recycling and composting. The baseline rates, I think that is something we can certainly look at as well. I know that the rates, we're all scared of them jumping up 200, 300%. But certainly looking, as I mentioned again about the cooperative cooperative purchasing vehicle being more efficient, having haulers working on and working with just a few businesses versus a multitude of businesses in zones. And so I see this being a huge win for us. Either way, I know that will have a lot of input from stakeholders. Much of the input that was taken now I'm taking down and certainly certainly writing notes about and I want to make sure that we're learning from other cities as well. Los Angeles, yes, they're going through that process. But there are a multitude of other cities that have this in place, and we have to be able to learn from them to make sure that we're doing the right thing here in Long Beach, incumbent haulers is something that was also discussed. Private sector setting the prices. Absolutely. That should be something that is a private sector decision, but certainly making sure that we're setting the standards for labor and environmental practices on the back end and the market competition as we discussed. So all of those are going to certainly be taken into consideration, I think, Vice Mayor Richardson, for bringing this forward. I think the council officers that have been supportive of this, the Andrews and Robert Otunga and I think many of you I know this is a good thing we're headed in the right direction. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Council on Mango.
Speaker 7: I hope that this microphone doesn't sound too harsh because the front part fell off. But I just have a couple questions for Vice Mayor Richardson. And is item you'd mentioned in your presentation that the number of haulers that actually own all the potential. Current licensed organizations in Long Beach is how many?
Speaker 6: There are 15 slots owned by different businesses. Some of those have consolidated into larger ones. So, in fact, 75% of the hauling slots that we have are owned by 75, owned by three haulers. So three companies make up 75% of the business, which creates very little opportunity for small guys to get in. Which is why we can create, you know, we can actually write into the RFP opportunities for small guys to have a better shot at doing business in our city.
Speaker 7: And then currently on the agenda item from many.
Speaker 3: Years ago where it listed all of those 15 providers, they each had expiration dates. So if I could get some clarification, I know I've talked to the city attorney about this and a few others, but I still think that it's important for public record. Why is it that if we already have licenses for the contractors, a majority of which expire within the five year period, why would we need to continue those licenses if if it's 75% are owned by three? Why wouldn't we adjust our policy and consolidate those to be more transparent to the public of who they're really hiring?
Speaker 10: You could certainly do that as they expire. There are some that expire, I believe, in 2018. Correct. And so on in 2019. And if the council votes to put the notice through today, you could as those came. Obviously, they have the opportunity under the five year notice to continue operating. You could. Clean up that issue.
Speaker 3: So the Council has a current policy though that we would have up to 15 or it's unlimited. I thought it was unlimited.
Speaker 10: I'll let director of Public Works.
Speaker 3: I know we had this talk back in november. It's been a long time.
Speaker 1: Mayor members of the council. Currently there's 15 in that is in the municipal code. So that is our current cap. If we were going to change that, it would take action by this body.
Speaker 3: And so potentially what we would want to do to maintain and ensure competition is to not allow the majors to own 75% of the holding options, almost as if we should work into our discussion that as licenses expire, if they're owned by another licensee, that it would expire and not potentially be renewed. Right.
Speaker 10: Well, I think you would. You could certainly look at that during your study on how you would and how they would control and how you would offer those services. If it's by his own or if it's by multiple carriers and you could establish, you know, as the if they are purchased or taken over by other carriers, how that would affect their ability to continue operating.
Speaker 3: Because if only three haulers eventually ended up owning all 100%, and we'd be moving towards a monopoly in a way, from the competition. Great. Next question is related to. The way in which we currently collect trash at our resident are multi-unit residential. There was some discussion today about that. In some cases, if the city collects, it is a part of their bill. I know that we had some dialog about that in the last week. If you could better explain that. So that for that, for the study, we can enter into a discussion around this component of it.
Speaker 6: Pose a question directed.
Speaker 3: To the Public Works director.
Speaker 1: Got it. Sure. Councilmember Mongo. Essentially, we approach it in two ways, and it kind of depends on how an individual multi-unit residential building is set up. Some have what we call a master account. So the building owner would have the trash would have the waste contract and they would be charged depending on the amount of waste that's generated. Some multi-unit buildings have individual accounts. So let's just say I'm an apartment renter. I may have an account directly with the city and that account would be typical of most residential customers. So it really depends on how the unit or the building is set up.
Speaker 3: Wonderful. And so in the spirit of reducing our overall trash usage, there is a lot of talk at the state level related to water. And if a person actually sees their own water bill, instead of it being absorbed by a whole building, they are naturally more likely to see their water usage as a direct component of their life and then reduce their usage. And potentially on the same side. We would be able to in this study work in a way in which, whether you're using the city provider or the non city provider, that that would be able to be an option on both. So that in the goal of reducing waste, people would see trash as a component of their use. So I have a couple of friendly amendments in consideration of those items. One would be to add to the study the dialog related to how public works could ensure that no matter who you provide as your provider, that a visualization on your current gas bill shows what trash does cost, whether it's absorbed by the landlord or not. Just so people are aware of that.
Speaker 6: That should absolutely be included in the study. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Wonderful. A pro-business component of competition that the study include a component of dialog related to as haulers are cannibalized on the 15 that we look at how to ensure that the small guy has a chance to gain one of those those licenses.
Speaker 6: Absolutely. And that's one of our one of our goals. We don't want to limit the study so much to be to prescribe it. But I would hope and if I need to include this in the motion, I will I would hope that we look at opportunities to create more opportunities for the small guys than what they have today. We caucused a moment ago about, you know, of those 15 slots, and we know that many of them are consolidated. We need to better understand how many of those we may call them small because they're independent. But how many are actual small businesses by the federal definition? And how many of them are minority owned, business owned? Because, you know, without understanding that we could at this point have absolutely 0% of our work going to actual small businesses. We don't have that information today to say it.
Speaker 3: Is certainly not just small businesses or minority owned businesses, but Long Beach resident owned businesses specifically.
Speaker 6: We can totally look into that. Absolutely. Let's throw it in the study.
Speaker 3: And then I've done a lot of research. I appreciate I know we've had a lot of dialogs. We've pulled together some meetings in the community already together on this issue to really better understand it. Two parts. One is, after discussions back in November, I sat down with the Long Beach Town Center to try to create our own consolidation so that there wouldn't be four different providers serving one business area. Unfortunately, without a city requirement, there is no ability for them as a landlord to get all of their tenants on the same page, especially because a lot of these tenants are national or regionally managed. And so within the study, I'd also like to include a component that since we are hoping strongly to still maintain competition to keep rates low for everyone, that there be some kind of dialog about complexes or commercial corridors of a certain size, that even if we maintain competition within the system, that those corridors are consolidated into a unified one for all of them. They can make that choice who it is, but that they hopefully can we can study what that looks like.
Speaker 1: So I don't I.
Speaker 6: Don't necessarily know that it needs to be a friendly. What you're explaining is what we hope the study will achieve. Someone made the statement earlier. One size doesn't fit all. I would agree. Long Beach Town Center is a major shopping center. And how does it actually impact a residential, you know, apartment building outside of that center? It's a town in and of itself, so I would hope that staff comes back. We want to maintain some order, some exclusivity in areas where it makes sense to deviate. From what we've seen in other areas, let's let's study it. So I would say absolutely. Let's let's look at all of our options.
Speaker 3: And then I called around to the other cities and have spoken with some public works managers about the different components that have led to the cost increases. And a lot of times.
Speaker 7: The cost increases are not coming.
Speaker 3: From the consolidation of the number of participants, but actually because members of their city council or the body that came up with the solutions put in so many additional new restrictions. So whether it be we need seven coordinators of.
Speaker 7: Recycling versus.
Speaker 3: Utilizing a goal that the consult the the haulers get to it on their own. And so I would just ask that we work towards a option where we put the least amount of additional burden of costs on anyone providing these services.
Speaker 6: I would think as a part of this process, we, you know, it's it's value engineering. You start with, hey, these are the things that would be great. And then these are things that are actually feasible without, you know, corrupting the system or making the system too too heavy to bear. So the hope is through the process of, you know, five years, we start with these are the great things that we we can achieve and pare it down. Some some things may not cost very much money like the job pipeline. It already exists in Long Beach City College. This is a matter of writing into an RFP to draw from the well that's already established. Right. So some things we don't prescribe, we set a goal out. The RFP doesn't have to necessarily say these are the specific things you should achieve. They could say these are some goals. How best would you address these goals within your business structure and allow them to have some flexibility, some innovations? You know, be smart in how they approach, how they solve some of these things. So all of that is on the table. But I don't want to say, you know, this study should be too narrow. We want to sort of be broad about the system.
Speaker 3: And then finally, I would say that in being broad and especially in those discussions when we talked about the number of haulers, even into whether it's the town center or the Spring Street corridor or the Atlantic corridor. Trash trucks get full. And so there are a number of there's a threshold you're never going to get below. If every time a bin left, it was all using the same company, there's still a threshold, whether it's a fast food facility or a restaurant that needs pick up more often, or a more commercial business that does mostly just boxes and things like that that could be picked up less often. I want to just be sure that we work hard to maintain competition and recognize that if we can't get lower than five truck trips, then maybe we don't need to work as hard to eliminate providers below five and so on and so forth. And so in my final comment, I would just ask that that were fair in looking to ensure that competition remains, because right now.
Speaker 7: We have providers that are contractors in our cities.
Speaker 3: And on a regular basis our residents call my council office and are upset with the services provided and we are on a long term contract with some of these individuals. And so we're on the phone regularly with their management about missed pickups or other things that are just not acceptable. And we have no alternative. And so I beg the the study to really put an emphasis on ensuring that we have that competition so that when a provider is not doing a great job, you can switch. There has to be an option to switch and not just to a city provider or a non city, but within the competition of keeping rates down. That that is on the commercial side. With that, I appreciate that. And my final request is I'm understanding that all the costs of these studies would be coming from the Enterprise Fund and that no general fund dollars would be spent on this.
Speaker 6: That's not in this motion and not as I understand it. But I would prefer that if we have an enterprise find a refuge fund, it should come from there. So I would say.
Speaker 3: Craig can come.
Speaker 6: In. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 10: Mr. BECK We certainly would have we would look at that, but I assume it would be refused. But that information and decision will be made when the contracts brought back to the Council for perfect.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Okay. We're going to go to Councilman Ranga.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mayor. And I want to also thank Cosmo Richardson for bringing this forward. The I met with him a couple times. I raised my concerns. He addressed them. And I want to thank Councilmember Gonzalez. She wrote she emphasized something that I wanted to emphasize, which is, let's get stakeholder input on this, because it's really needed. Everything that I heard in the testimony was the fact that there are some haulers out there that would love to participate and give their input on the study so that they can ensure while we can ensure that their all their concerns are also being addressed. And I also want to recognize Councilmember Mungo's comments regarding the the revenue and the competition that would be in place with this. And I hope that this study will address that. It's very important that we maintain competition and that we give those smaller haulers an opportunity to continue to serve. One question in regards to the five year notice.
Speaker 1: You called it.
Speaker 8: A bifurcated way of doing it. We did a study with a back friction that a five year study over the five years been in place during the study. Is that correct?
Speaker 6: Well, what I'm proposing is concurrently we study and we issued a notice or we're in the position to implement and refine as soon as possible.
Speaker 8: Okay. And that would total, as we said, about a year and a half study. It will be about 7 to 8 years before we actually implement anything.
Speaker 6: So by concurrently, what I'm saying is that we start the clock now on the five years we work. This does not here to take any action. We may not get it right in five years. Billboards from the time the City Council actually got on board with it. It was two and a half years, but it actually took a decade just to get city council on board with it. So the earliest would be five years. That's just the earliest legally.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 8: And what about the if the study reveals that maybe the five year notice it was is was too much and we started losing some contractors during that that during that process, is there an alternate way that we can address that in the in the case of having some some a male from us? I mean, let's face it. I mean, I've talked to some of the haulers as well. They met with me. Their concern is that in the five years that we put out the notice that they're not they're not sure whether they can gear up with their equipment to make them compatible with what we're requesting them to do, especially when we're talking about zero waste, because that's our goal. Obviously, they got no issue with that. I'm just wondering if the smaller type of haulers would have to make an expense in order to stay in business, and then we lose them because they're not able to make that expenditure to update their equipment, to make the standards that we're at. We're not going to be asking them to meet.
Speaker 6: So let me try to address that in turn and as as best as I can. Number one, this the scope of the study should consider implementation and what burden would be on someone who is going to attempt to respond to an RFP. We've gone through processes like that and I think they're very different in terms of the Clean Trucks program in the port. Those things were considered in terms of implementation. Now what we're talking about, the majority of the haulers already use are already required to use clean trucks. That's not a significant equipment burden. But if someone isn't already sort of operating at the at the standard that they're required to the RFP, the competition will expose that because there's already a standard here, that level of competition through an RFP. If anything, it just strengthens and helps hold people accountable to already established standards. Now, if the city council adds additional standards, that's a public policy discussion after we study it. If they add additional standards and I will hold, based on the conversation with Councilwoman Mongo and things like that, that we're you know, we're modest in requiring overly burdened, burdensome requirements on trucks. So frankly, this is a conversation that happens later. It isn't the conversation that happens today. I don't think it's because the notice was submitted. It's just it's the nature of a competitive RFP process in itself, in my opinion.
Speaker 8: Okay. Well, I hope that we're able to, again, go through this study with the input of stakeholders, including aspiring owners and business owners and everybody else, so that we could get a study that is going to be complete and not have to deal with any kinds of negative impacts. Regarding the the study itself, because of the fact that we did not do enough outreach to our stakeholders. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Andrews. Thank you.
Speaker 5: Mayor. You know, I I've listened to most of everyone on the dais speak on this issue, and I will be in support of the motion, because today I believe in protecting the environment and increasing the number of green jobs available. Because for my residents who really need these jobs. You know, a study has shown that recycling creates ten times the amount of jobs that are created, you know, by landfill and by this. I really feel like these are the type of jobs that the residents in my district have been waiting for. And we need the jobs and pipeline that can be created within this item moving forward. And I would hope later as we go on and get into this time of night, we will be limited to one minute with our conversation also. Thank you.
Speaker 1: I like that, too. I'm happy to tell time, everyone. I love that. Councilman, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 0: 30 seconds.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to try to do mine in 30 seconds. I agree. First, I'd like to just just live my support for this this motion before us. I want to also recognize somebody who's not here, Janine Pearce, because she's the first person that brought this item to my attention about a year and a half ago. I know Lane, the Teamsters that the coalition don't waste. Long Beach has done a lot of great work in the community to generate and build support around about this. I want to address one of the comments earlier regarding I thought it was very disparaging toward the Teamsters organization. My grandfather was a Teamster, by the way, and he wasn't a criminal. Okay. And when it comes to when it comes to actual man in Wisconsin, you can go take it, take a left Fishbone. You have to take a seat. It's not your time to speak. Mr.. Mr.. BOLAND You said afterwards that you had no Confederate comments over you to take a seat. You. Mr. BALL. You have to. You have to take a seat. Thank you. Mr. BALDWIN. Thank you very much, sir. And I think this council should be unapologetic when it comes to supporting and creating good jobs. And we shouldn't by hide behind the fact that we might be creating good union jobs either. So I want to be clear that. So I'll say it out loud. And obviously my comment, my colleagues and many of the speakers have told the benefits. I think there are some risk. I think I support a robust study with robust stakeholder input. We do not want to create unintended consequences long term and obviously this is an issue that just starts the ball rolling . The future city councils are going to ultimately decide what's best for Long Beach.
Speaker 0: What's best for our residents, consumers. And it's going to.
Speaker 1: Be a business and economic decision that that's going to have to make good economic sense for for our city. Ultimately, when we get to that decision and so I'll be supporting tonight and again, hopefully I was under one minute. Thank you very much. Thank you. Shelter in place.
Speaker 9: Thank you. I'm going to be very quick. I want to. We've had a lot of friendlies, so I just want to confirm a few of them. So this report is going to include the possibility of allowing for more than one trash hauler to hold contracts in the individual zones. Correct. It's going to be overly broad to include that.
Speaker 6: Absolutely. It can include that in the study.
Speaker 9: Okay. And then would union and nonunion haulers have the opportunity to compete for these contracts?
Speaker 6: Thank you for giving an opportunity to speak on that.
Speaker 3: So you're limited by 35?
Speaker 0: Absolutely.
Speaker 6: So at no point does it say, does this recommendation say put forth a model that is exclusively union? It doesn't say that the standards are going to define the work, the working conditions, you know, all of those things. The standards are going to help define that. Now, if a company has labor issues, that's on them to sort of work out. We do want to make sure that we do maintain some level of labor peace in our city. And that's something we've, you know, we've done on our civic center and other areas. Those are things we want to study as a part of this. So at no point are we saying, you know, we are putting forth a process that says only union and not other, you know, nonunion haulers and other and other processes. You know, what you found is nonunion haulers also, you know, end up with a piece of the work. Now, whether that leads to them ultimately being organized or making the choice to go union, that's what ultimately between them and their members.
Speaker 9: I want to echo the comments that my colleague, Councilman Urunga, made regarding the task force or the stakeholder task force. I think that's really important. I'm assuming that's also included in this process, because Councilwoman Gonzales also mentioned it.
Speaker 6: So what we heard, we heard. Task force from the public. But what we heard from our our coworkers was stakeholder engagement. I want to be very clear that I don't want to predict. Like when the consultant comes on board, they're going to be able to select what the best format is that's want to make sure it's a part of an official process. So we're not going to say it's a task force, but there will be stakeholder engagement inclusive of the partners that were, you know, have spoken here today, Council on Business Associations, shopping centers, apartment owners, residents who are impacted by the change, food systems, experts locally. Those are the people that we want at the table to help craft the best policy for Long Beach.
Speaker 9: So we want to give some discretion to our consultant in terms of how that process is unfolding.
Speaker 6: Absolutely.
Speaker 9: Okay. And then lastly, I just want to thank and I think Lauren from Lane. I got my first briefing on this issue probably a year ago maybe, and they've kept me in the loop. And I really, really appreciate when people respectfully take the time to educate you and answer your questions and show you the same respect that they expect on a Tuesday night when they come here. And you guys did that. And I just want to thank you for that. I was really, really impressed at your outreach. It was very respectful. And the one thing that they highlighted, they did their research on the council districts as well. And the one thing that they highlighted in regards to their conversations with me was the density of my some parts of my district and their proximity to business corridors that the kind of inefficient truck routes and the multiple.
Speaker 3: Truck routes, that the potential.
Speaker 9: Elimination of that would be a positive for the residents in that area. And that really had an impact on me. So I want to thank you guys. You should be commended on your very professional, respectful advocacy. I really liked it.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Carlton. Membership now. Okay, thank you. I'll also be brief if you'd like to start the clock. We can do that now. Is it up there?
Speaker 5: Yeah. Okay. I just want to follow up the.
Speaker 1: Point that Councilwoman Pryce just brought up on the stakeholder group and how that is integrated into the study. And if you look back at, let's say, the Jacobs engineering study on the files, stakeholder input was concurrent and separate. And if you can find a way for the consultant to integrate it into the study, I think that's the key. So we're getting that stakeholder input and somehow it's making a difference within the study. So that would be my desire. Thank you. Thank you. We're going to go ahead and go to a vote here in just a sec. Let me just make a last comment. One, I think this is a great opportunity to address our climate change goals in the city, and I think we have to get serious about waste. And I thank you all for being partners in our climate change goals and our climate initiatives. This gets us there in a very, I think, important way. And I want to thank you for that. I think that we have to be honest, all of us, including are those that are apartment owners and those of us that are trying to ensure that we still have competition, that the current system we have is not efficient. And so when you when you have multiple carriers on streets and alleys consistently all day, there is wear and tear. That's just a reality. And so if we can come up with a better system by working together, I think that's a really good thing. And I do also want to note that let's also, I'll be honest that some of the systems that were created early on, some of the cities that were mentioned actually have do have some flaws. And I think even if you talk to our friends that are part of the campaign, I think we can improve on what other cities have done and ensure that we end up with, I think could be the model system in the country and I think that's what we want. How do we increase recycling? How do we increase ensure that we have good routes that are being efficient, that there is competition, that we're taking care of the workers? All of that needs to be a piece of this puzzle. And so I'm very supportive of city staff ensuring that we include all of our stakeholders in the conversation and let's come up with the best possible system that we can. And as part of as we're looking at this issue around the study, there's been a lot of conversation around the kind of the larger hallways and the smaller cage. But we also have that group of midsize homes that are that also sometimes get caught in between. And I've heard that a lot in the in the L.A. process and others. And so I just want to make sure that we're addressing that group as well. And you guys did a great job in, I think, getting the community involved in this campaign. And I really hope that we can all work together and come up with a really great system. So I'm very supportive of this. Vice Mayor Richardson, we're going to vote. Just a final.
Speaker 6: Thing. I just want to say, you know, this was not something that I didn't wake up and say, hey, I'm coming off maternity leave. And I want to take on one of the most controversial issues in our city. The courage from this didn't come from any of us here. It was you all in the community. We've had conversations on both sides. It's an important issue. And I just want to say thank you all for enduring this first step in a process. And hopefully we have a better system and a cleaner and safer Long Beach as a result of this. So thank you all for your participation.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And members, please go ahead and cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Okay. It's unanimous. Thank you very much. Thank you. And as you exit, please, if we can just have the conversations outside, because believe it or not, we're only on our third item of the night. And so if everyone can please just quietly exit. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay. Okay. We're going to go ahead and hear just the next order of items is we're going to have item 23, hearing number two and item 27 on the harbor bonds. Those and then we have a very long agenda after that. Believe it or not, this is going to be the longest meeting we ever had. So next up is 22. Real quickly, Madam Clerk. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to work with the Department of Public Works to conduct a study exploring options to improve the private commercial waste hauling system in Long Beach, placing an emphasis on limiting inefficient overlapping truck routes, environmental, heath, and safety impacts, unnecessary wear and tear on local streets and alleys, and establishing a pipeline for local jobs and training.
Secondly, request City Manager to issue a 5-year notification to City-permitted private waste haulers pursuant to California Public Resources Code Section 49520, and report back to the City Council on the progress semi-annually. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0381 | Speaker 2: Councilmember Mongo. Councilmember Andrews wishing Karis thank you.
Speaker 1: A hearing to please.
Speaker 2: Heritage an item is a report from financial management recommendation to receive supporting documentation to the record, conclude the hearing and grant an entertainment permit where the conditions on the applications of Shannons on Pine to one Pine Avenue for entertainment with dancing district to end it is required.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 6: And we will begin by.
Speaker 1: This does require.
Speaker 6: A note so you want to go ahead and begin with the oath because.
Speaker 2: Anyone wishing to speak on this item, please stand up and raise your hand.
Speaker 0: Now.
Speaker 2: You do solemnly state that the testimony you may give in the cause now pending before this body shall be truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. America.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Vice Mayor. The staff report will be given by Brett Yuccas, our business license officer. Good evening, honorable mayor and members of the city council to me have a for you an application for entertainment with dancing for Shannon's on pine ink doing business as Shannon's on pine located at 201 Pine Avenue, operating as a restaurant with alcohol in Council District two to provide some background information, this business owner has operated a restaurant with alcohol at 209 Pine Avenue, Suite A since 2006. They recently recently expanded their operation to include the corner space adjacent to their current business and modified the address for the entire site to be 201 Pine Avenue, the first floor of the business still undergoing renovations. However, the second floor has been completed and the business owner would like to start up, would like to start to offer. Entertainment staff has added a condition to the entertainment permit that allows entertainment on the second floor until all of the renovations have been approved, at which point the entertainment permit will be applicable to the entire site of 201 Pine Avenue. This will allow council to take action tonight for the entire site, while ensuring that entertainment in areas under renovation are only permitted once the work has been completed. All of the necessary departments have reviewed the application and have provided the recommended conditions as contained in the hearing packet, as well as the police department stand ready to answer any questions Council may have. And that will conclude staff's report.
Speaker 6: Thank you. And we are going to go to public comment at this moment. Is there any public comment on the hearing? Seeing no public comment. We're going to close public comment, take it back behind the wheel. Council Member Pearce.
Speaker 7: Yes, I want to thank staff for all of their hard work on this and we have our business owner here today. You didn't want to make any comments again.
Speaker 1: Know, I was a little slow getting, I guess.
Speaker 6: Okay. Well, we will reopen this if you want to come down before we give our comments. I didn't notice.
Speaker 7: Until sometimes.
Speaker 6: I got out.
Speaker 7: Till 1130 that you had an opportunity.
Speaker 1: To go. I just wanted to assure the council and the community that I'm not a fly by night operator that's come in here. Our family lives here. I came to downtown Long Beach about ten years ago. Long, downtown Long Beach has been very good for me. Even though we came at the beginning of the recession, we we doubled our size. We had a 13 foot wide bar at the time behind a stairwell, 20 feet off the sidewalk. We didn't have a sign for a year and a half on the front of the building.
Speaker 5: But in the next three.
Speaker 1: Years, we doubled our space, continued to grow.
Speaker 5: And then in 2015.
Speaker 1: We managed to purchase the property from the corner all the way down to Johnny Rockets became a huge responsibility. My my wife, my son and daughter work in the business with me and some great employees. We knew right away that we wanted to restore the building. So back to the 1930 original look. So we added the 27 clear story windows that were taken out before we put the new we put the display windows back and that were there before we started putting up the plaques or medallions that go between the window sets. We had those fired in and colored and so on. So we're doing an awful lot to try to restore the way the building looks. I took all those windows at the top of the building out, had them rebuilt and replaced. So we have a lot more work to do, but we are putting the work into into the building. I think when we get finished here, you'll all be very proud of it. It's in a very important.
Speaker 5: Location downtown, being right on Broadway and.
Speaker 1: Pine and I know it's important to the city is as it is to us, the the upstairs location that we're wanting to open now with with our entertainment permit was once Berlin West, which is nationally famous jazz club and it's 6000 square feet. It's a multipurpose venue. So we will we will be doing corporate meetings as well as weddings and wedding receptions. And we do sports up there, which is something maybe new and Long Beach. My son is really in charge of doing that and it's been coming along fine. So I guess that's the main thing. I just want to tell you that we're here to stay and we want to be an asset to the community. Any questions? Great. Thank you very much. And I'm going to turn this over now to any other public comment for the hearing.
Speaker 0: Just.
Speaker 1: Okay. And just making sure this is this has to be on Shannon's on the entertainment permit. Okay. We can do public, general public comment after. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you, Councilman Pearce.
Speaker 7: Yes. I want to again applaud staff for working on this, but I really want to thank you for having the vision. I had the opportunity to take a tour of the entire establishment. And I think when we think about downtown and revitalizing downtown, it's it's celebrating our history and not removing that while also being new and innovative . And so I can't wait to be one of the first events there. And seeing you guys be responsible business owners, I think we are a really good place in downtown to have you investing as much as you have. And so I'm really looking forward to your success. So I encourage my colleagues, please, to support me in this vote. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilman Gonzalez?
Speaker 9: Yeah, Ron. Just want to say thanks so much for your investment in downtown as well. I know this was a long road for you, but congratulations in everything you've done.
Speaker 1: That from Durango.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mayor. I think other than maybe Thandie and maybe Superman, I remember Berlin West. I used to go there. Really looking forward to the reactivating of that area into something that was very nice back in the day and. And looking forward to being there. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Great. Ron, you've got a good spot already. So we're looking forward to that expansion and we're very proud of you and the whole team. You have a great team over there and you know that. I always tell you that. So a members. Bruce Gordon cash for votes.
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. We're going to hear item 27. | Public Hearing | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the
record, conclude the hearing and grant an Entertainment Permit with conditions on the application of Shannon’s On Pine, Inc., dba Shannon’s On Pine, 201 Pine Avenue, for Entertainment With Dancing. (District 2) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0406 | Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. We're going to hear item 27.
Speaker 0: What is that?
Speaker 2: Item 27 is a report from Financial Management and Harbor Department recommendation to a resolution authorizing the issuance of harbor revenue bonds by the Board of Harbor Commissioners on behalf of the City of Long Beach in an aggregate principal amount not to exceed 200 million's district to.
Speaker 1: And we're going to go ahead and hear a staff report, brief report from our treasure, David Nakamura. Thank you, sir. Honorable mayor and members of the City Council before you as a recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, adopt a resolution authorizing the issuance of the Harbor Revenue Bonds Series 2017, A, B, and C in their principal amount not to exceed $200 million and authorize the execution of all necessary documents. The purpose of these bonds is to facilitate the Harbor Department's capital improvement plan. Proceeds from the series 2017 bonds are to pay to reimburse the harbor department for construction costs related to various capital improvement projects, including the Gerald Desmond Bridge and the Middle Harbor Harbor Terminal. City Council action is requested on May 23rd, 2017, in order to facilitate the Harbor Department's Capital Improvement Plan. The Series 2017 bonds will be secured by and solely payable from harbor department revenues. The city's general fund will not be liable for the debt service payments of these bonds. These capital improvement projects are expected to create approximately 4000 jobs in the five county area over the next five years. Representatives of the harbor department are available for questions. This concludes staff's report. Thank you very much. Let me go ahead and see if there's any Councilmember Pearce. Okay. Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 9: Unrelated, but related. I didn't get to formally welcome Mario Cordero. Congratulations on your new position and really excited to start working with you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 6: That's exactly what I cued up to do. Mario, we're really proud to have you here. And this is just our first opportunity as a council to publicly say that welcome home and you're hitting the ground running already and, you know, being here till midnight on your on your item. And that's just a testament to your commitment along be so, so welcome. And we look forward to continuing the good quality jobs generated by this bond and other infrastructure investment. So keep up the good work.
Speaker 1: Councilman Price.
Speaker 9: Thank you. Welcome as well. I do have one question about the item two. We expect that this amount of money is going to cover the anticipated expenses. Just a minor detail.
Speaker 1: Mr. Mayor. Council members. My name is Chuck Adams. I'm the acting managing director of finance and admin. It will cover this until next year. We'll be coming back for another bond issue the next four years annually.
Speaker 9: Same amount of money.
Speaker 1: The next four years will probably hit another $800 million.
Speaker 9: Over the course of the four years. Yes. Okay, great. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Councilmember Andras.
Speaker 0: Excuse me. I'm having my breakfast now.
Speaker 5: I just wanted to tell you, Mr.. My your releases that I knew you was coming back because the kind of staff you have, you have to come back. You couldn't leave us out that long, so congratulations again. But I didn't think would be at this time I would be doing this. But congratulations and good luck with the.
Speaker 1: Counting of your income.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Bienvenido. Welcome back.
Speaker 1: Come to reverse.
Speaker 7: See, I was trying to save us and get us out on time. But since everybody else spoke, I've already congratulated you. But I just want to thank you guys for all the work that you're doing on this. I think Long Beach is going to be in a much better place with good jobs, clean air and lots of awesome infrastructure. So thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. One thing that wasn't mentioned that I think is really important is that Long Beach housed the Pentagon, which is the largest capital public infrastructure program in the entire United States when it comes to ports. And we are building more public infrastructure, creating more jobs and rebuilding more of our ports than anywhere else. And so that's something to be very, very proud of. Mr. Cordero, we're very proud of you. You know, we've talked, but I'm thank you for being here. And, you know, this was the fourth item, and I didn't realize it was going to be the fourth item at midnight. So next time we'll rethink that a little bit. And with that, there's no other public comment on this. No, no other questions except for Mr. Boland, who's standing up. So let me just let Mr. Mollenkopf speak. I'll make this real quick. Congratulations, Mr. Cordero. It's a shame you have to hear what I have to say tonight, but I want to get it clarified. I read somewhere that Pier F or pier is it? Pier E is overbudget by a billion. Inner Harbor is overbudget by a half a billion. And that we just went, what, 170 or 270 million over on the Gerald Desmond replacement bridge. Now, when the Gerald Desmond replacement bridge controversy came out several years ago, a PR guy at the port came up with a spin. And here's what the spin was for the rest of us. The spin was that the money that was lost on the Gerald Desmond Bridge by having to relocate those posts, which Caltrans had a lot to do with, was not taxpayer money. And that was supposed to make us all feel really good. And one of my good friends there, and I won't say his name, actually said it in a press release that the money they lost was not taxpayer money. And I wanted to call the gentleman and say it was public money. That's a 170 million. You won't have to build another pier. That's money. You're not going to have to dredge. And now I hear we're going to ask for $200 million a year for the next three or four years. And if you add up all the overbudget, I think that needs some more clarity so that we understand where did all that money go and is Middle Harbor and Pier E really that much in debt? Thank you. Thank you very much to the motion. In a second, please cast your votes.
Speaker 3: What increase? | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolution authorizing the issuance of Harbor Revenue Bonds, Series 2017 A, B, and C (Series 2017 Bonds), by the Board of Harbor Commissioners on behalf of the City of Long Beach, in an aggregate principal amount not to exceed $200,000,000, secured and solely payable from Harbor Department revenues, and authorize the execution of all necessary related documents. (District 2) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0402 | Speaker 1: Thank you. Back to item five of the consent calendar.
Speaker 2: Item Pfizer Report from Development Services Financial Management Recommendation two What the contract to KLA Corporation for Downtown Long Beach Area Parking study for total contract amount not to exceed $269,000 one and two.
Speaker 9: Councilmember Gonzalez Yes, I just had questions. We didn't you know, this item was really light. It didn't really include a lot of information. I know this is relative to the TAPS group. So can we get a staff report on this item and some more context around what exactly the boundaries, the scope of work, etc., please?
Speaker 5: Amy Bodak.
Speaker 3: Mr. Mayor. Members of the city council. Good morning. With this is a scope of work that was reviewed as part of the settlement agreement between TAPS and the city of Long Beach for three downtown projects. The settlement agreement was very specific on what the survey areas would be in the scope of work, and an RFP was drafted that was reviewed by TAPS and their attorney as part of the settlement agreement. We went through an RFP process and interviewed firms. We shared the the proposals with TAPS. We met with TAPS in accordance with the settlement agreement to get their comments on their preferred vendor as well. And we selected Chloé to do this study. It includes downtown Long Beach, but also Alamitos Beach. There are two slightly different scopes of work related to the contract, and there's a certain timeframe that we are committing to to implement this this parking RFP study.
Speaker 9: Okay. Thank you. Was there ever a it was there a two from four that came out with this information? At all or I know it was. There was an RFP and there was through that process.
Speaker 3: This settlement agreement did go to the city council. I believe in closed session. And within the settlement agreement was the entire scope of work. Okay.
Speaker 9: And. Okay. That is all the information that I have. At this time. Thank you. Sure.
Speaker 1: Any public comment on the item saying that? Please cast your votes.
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 2: Vice Mayor Richardson wishing Karis.
Speaker 1: Out of nine, please. I'm 18. It's yours. | Contract | Recommendation to adopt Specifications No. RFP DV17-040 for a Downtown Long Beach Area Parking Study; award the contract to KOA Corporation, of Orange, CA, in the amount of $245,232, authorize a 10 percent contingency in the amount of $24,523, for a total contract amount not to exceed $269,755, for a period of 18 months, with the option to renew for an additional six-month period; and authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to enter into the contract, including any necessary amendments; and
Increase appropriations in the Development Services Fund (EF 337) in the Development Services Department (DV) by $269,755.
(Districts 1,2) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0399 | Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Adam.
Speaker 2: 2121 is communication from Councilwoman Mangum recommendation to consider renaming the El Dorado Neighborhood Library, then the Ernie and Jackie Calle Neighborhood Library in honor of late Ernest Eugene Ko, junior city of Long Beach. First elected mayor.
Speaker 0: Councilman. Mongo.
Speaker 3: Thank you. I hope that I will have the support of my colleagues in starting a process to discuss the naming of the Eldorado Park Library on behalf of our first citywide elected mayor and his also committed wife, who served as a vice mayor of the city.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Vice me, Richardson.
Speaker 6: I wholeheartedly support this motion and I hope we can count on the Library Foundation and others to support this motion as well.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Public comment, please.
Speaker 3: Sounds like you may not mean to make comment at this time. Honorable Mayor Garcia and members of the City Council. My name is Elaine Hutchison. In my address is on file. And thank you kindly for this opportunity to speak in support of Agenda Item 21 to request the City Council to consider renaming the Eldorado Neighborhood Library to the Ernest and Jackie Hill Neighborhood Library in honor of the late Ernest Eugene Kell Jr, the first citywide mayor to be elected mayor in Long Beach. Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo, for bringing this forward. Mayor Kell was a visionary who worked hard for a Long Beach during the mid 1980s. The city was in decline. The previously strong shopping district on Pine Avenue was all but boarded up. When the stores moved to the malls, the car dealerships that line Long Beach forever moved out to Cerritos and Signal Hill. The red card no longer brought shoppers to Long Beach. There began to be discussions that Long Beach needed a way to bring focus and leadership for solutions for citywide issues. Representation in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. was urgent. If Long Beach was to compete with other cities, Long Beach was the only city our size not to have a citywide elected mayor in California. One proposal for a citywide mayor was put before the voters of Long Beach, but it failed at the polls. Mayor Calvin, a councilman from the fifth District and mayor elected from the council, envisioned that an independent charter amendment citizens committee should study whether there should be a citywide elected mayor. And if so, what model? Following months of study as chair of the committee, I had the privilege of bringing our report to the City Council, which was unanimously approved and the Charter amendment placed on the ballot. At the next election, the voters approved this recommendation by a margin of 2 to 1 for a citywide elected mayor. Two years later, the election for the first citywide elected mayor was held, and Ernie Keller was elected as the first citywide elected mayor. Because of Mayor Killorn, we have, among many things, our convention center, which was conceived, funded and begun during his tenure. Further, we have a legacy of wonderful mayors who have followed and each of whom have moved our city forward, including Mayor Beverly O'Neill, Mayor Bob Foster, and our own mayor, Dr. Garcia, who is overseeing our new city hall complex. Many new developments and new apartments to house our residents all highly talented and have endowed Long Beach with their unique accomplishments. It is fitting that we remember the team of Ernie and Jackie Kell, both of whom served two districts as council members of the fifth District and made many contributions to the residents of the district and therefore renamed the Eldorado Neighborhood Library to the Ernie and Jackie Hill Neighborhood Library. I respectfully ask for your support. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Oops. Sorry about that.
Speaker 5: Yeah. No, it's all right. Don't worry. I know it's late. I can see Darrell's barely surviving right there in his seats.
Speaker 0: I will.
Speaker 5: I'm going to make this for three people. How about that? Two ladies beg me to say this one thing for them regarding this item, and I'll just throw my name in there. They want to have there's a current parks guideline that says that you can't that you shouldn't be able to put forward this after until a year after the person dies. And I know that Stacey, I mean, Councilwoman Margo is trying to speed things along and she's trying to do her outreach. But I'm just saying what these ladies want me to say it and I support that. I like Ernie Keller. I think he's a great guy. But I think that there's also people that may be more worthy of of that honor that are have been more closely associated with the library. I acknowledge all the good things that both the locals have done. That's it. I made it quick.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So, you know the public comment. There's a motion and a second. Members, please cast your vote. I think this is a great way to honor both the council. Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Vice Mayor Richardson. Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next step is item number 25. Homelessness 20th five. Sorry, we did that. 125. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to approve renaming the Convention Center Exhibit Hall as the “Ernie Kell Hall” at the Long Beach Convention and Entertainment Center. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0407 | Speaker 2: He that Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next item is.
Speaker 0: 28.
Speaker 2: Item 2080s report from Financial Management Recommendation to approve the Fiscal Year 2017. Second Department. All department and fund budget appropriation adjustments citywide.
Speaker 1: Mr. Weiss.
Speaker 5: Lia Eriksen.
Speaker 3: Good evening or good morning, Marin City Council. This is the second department and Fund Budget Appropriation Adjustment Report Prep Y 17 and it reflects changes in revenue operating conditions that require appropriation adjustments. Also, it includes, in many cases, item appropriations for items that were previously approved by a city council such as 1.5 million, a measure, a structural funding for the restoration of paramedic rescue 12 and police academy operations, as well as the implementation of labor ammo use, among other items. Another example is a state cop's grant for front lawn price, lion face law enforcement efforts, and also a grant for State of California. Board of State and Community Correction for Homeless Outreach and Mental Health Assistance in the Police Department. This concludes the staff report, and I'm available for any questions that you may have.
Speaker 1: Thank you. There's a motion and a second. Is there any public comment on this? Please cast your votes count. Summary Ranga. Sorry.
Speaker 8: Yeah. I want to thank the city manager for also including in there a $500,000 reallocation for the building that burned down at the Well Springs Park so that we could build a pavilion and get the Will Springs Park activated. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: If you were to cast your vote.
Speaker 1: Would go ahead.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Price.
Speaker 3: Sorry.
Speaker 2: Which increase? Item 29 is a report from Parks, Recreation and Marine Financial Management. Recommendation to execute amendments to contract with Azteca. Landscape and Merchants. Landscape services for ground maintenance services extend the term to February 28, 2018 and increase the aggregate contract amount by 26 2.6 million citywide. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to approve the Fiscal Year 2017 second departmental and fund budget appropriation adjustments in accordance with existing City Council policy. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0408 | Speaker 2: Which increase? Item 29 is a report from Parks, Recreation and Marine Financial Management. Recommendation to execute amendments to contract with Azteca. Landscape and Merchants. Landscape services for ground maintenance services extend the term to February 28, 2018 and increase the aggregate contract amount by 26 2.6 million citywide.
Speaker 6: It's been moved and seconded. Is there any public comment on this item? Yes. Thank you. Please come forward. You have 3 minutes.
Speaker 5: I'll make it quick. Put the supervisor amendment here. Okay. This is for two ladies that asked me to speak for them regarding this. They oppose the extending the contract. I guess they're saying that they're using Roundup, a poison that is a suspect carcinogen as a weed killer. The active ingredient is in Roundup is like Goliath phosphate originally used in Vietnam. It's Agent Orange and they're saying that the Huntington Beach and Irvine areas have Boundary Band Roundup and we should use those cities as a benchmark in how to handle weed killing. I'm not going to read this any further. That's it. I actually. And for me, with with this contractor, they they haven't done they haven't fulfilled their contracts. About 50% of what they do doesn't seem to be be working. And or they don't seem to be fulfilling about 50% of it. I'm tied to just nonperformance issues or double billing. I hope that we can resolve some of this stuff. I know I'm not going to I'm just letting you know there's a problem with the contract. We've had audits. You know, we know the contracting department is really nonfunctional. They've failed their contract. So I. I don't know what to do that poor Mary Knight has got a lot of stuff on her hands that aren't even really her responsibility. But she's dealing with it. So. I think I put all three in one and I hope everything works out well, but they oppose it. I kind of I know that it has to be done. So life goes on. Have a great day.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Count on mango.
Speaker 3: Just as a point of note, in the future, when people have comments they want entered into the record. There's an online tool that they can use and they can make their own comments so that you don't have to feel responsible for making comments for other people. Furthermore, the Huntington Beach data is incorrect. Huntington Beach does not ban Roundup. They have the same policy we do that we don't use it in playgrounds. We don't use it in play areas. We don't use it in rental spaces. We don't use it on fields. We use it in certain areas that we haven't found another solution for. And we are in certain areas of the park in Eldorado Park specifically try and alternatives. Furthermore, please don't take what I've said and try to retype it on next door in a way that confuses people and causes more confusion . I don't even care about this. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 3: I'm not very familiar with this particular. Contract. But it does bring me to wonder, to extend it for so many months, for so much money. So I also I thought, well, if it if they didn't finish what they needed to do within the contract period as opposed to amending it, why would it be too difficult to have brought that for business here in Long Beach as opposed to extending for $2 million, almost, you know, almost $3 million for businesses not located in Long Beach. That's all. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Any other public comment? Seeing none. Okay, members, please cast your votes. Madam. Critical. My screen's not working anymore.
Speaker 2: Just press on this. I went to sleep well.
Speaker 1: And I'm doing a lot of sign pushing.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Sabina.
Speaker 1: What? Can you come over here, please?
Speaker 2: Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 0: You.
Speaker 2: Bush and Kerry's. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute amendments to Contract No. 33071 with Azteca Landscape, Inc., of Ontario, CA, and Contract No. 33259 with Merchants Landscape Services, Inc., of Santa Ana, CA, for grounds maintenance services; extend the term to February 28, 2018; and, increase the aggregate contract amount by $2,635,454, with a 10 percent contingency of $263,545, for a total aggregate contract amount not to exceed $6,764,331. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05232017_17-0417 | Speaker 2: Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 1: Stories. The devil. Next item, please.
Speaker 2: Item 32 is communication from Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilmember Pearce and Councilmember Durango, recommendation to authorize the city manager to send a letter of support for SB 705 the Ocean Pollution Reduction Act.
Speaker 9: Councilman Gonzalez Yes, so I'll be very quick here. I, you know, just in alignment with what we've done in the past, I know the Styrofoam ban in the city is currently going through its process. This would just be in alignment with that as it's, you know, parallel to what we're doing here locally. But SB 705, authored by Senator Ben Allen, would take a similar approach to our local process. And in 2011, we actually supported this as a city when then Senator Alan Lowenthal proposed the same bill. We do have people or I'm sorry, organizations such as the Heal the Bay Sierra Club and Surfrider that are on board with this , among many others. And I didn't take this to the state legislative committee just because of its timeliness. This will be in the Appropriations Committee in two days. Senator Ben Allen just had an event this past Monday to discuss the item, so it's moving pretty fast. So that's the reason we brought it to council first. So I'd appreciate support on this item and look forward to the future.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember Ringa. Actually, Councilmember Pearce first. Sorry. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Yes. I want to thank my colleague for bringing this item forward. And I think any time that we're doing something at the local level, the question always comes up. But what are we doing at the county level, the city, I mean, the state level? And so I wholeheartedly support this and encourage my colleagues to do the same. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Franco.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mayor. As a member of the Coastal Commission, I totally support this item and I hope that it could get the support of my colleagues. Thank you. I thank you for bringing it forward, by the way.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Okay. And is there any public comment on this? Members, please cast your votes. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to authorize City Manager to send a letter of support for SB 705, The Ocean Pollution Reduction Act. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05162017_17-0375 | Speaker 0: So why don't we hear item six as well and we'll just make it one on item madam quick can you without him?
Speaker 2: Six Communication from Councilwoman Gonzalez Councilmember Pierson Council Member Urunga Recommendation to request the city attorney to draft a resolution declaring the third week of May as LGBTQ Pride Week.
Speaker 0: Okay, Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: Great. First, I want to thank my colleagues who have signed on to this. So Councilmember Pearce, who could not be here tonight, as well as Councilmember Ranga as a strong ally of the LGBTQ community. It is a tremendous honor for me to offer this item and officially declare the third week in May as LGBTQ Pride Week in Long Beach. And it's no secret that Long Beach has a thriving and diverse LGBTQ community. We have, after all, the very first of the nation's very first Harvey Milk Park, which is also a source of pride for us. And before I go any further, I want to pay respects to the LGBTQ leaders who have passed away and who couldn't be here today, because I know that there are so many of them, local leaders, national leaders that have contributed greatly to our community. And it is their shoulders that this community was built on, and it is their shoulders that provide me as a voice, as an ally on this city council as well. We live in a new world with our new administration. We must take advantage of every opportunity to celebrate our diversity. Thank you to everyone who continues to serve on our community, in this community on a daily basis. From the LGBTQ center of Long Beach, who provides social services like crisis counseling, HIV, AIDS, test and attend meetings for people of all ages to the AIDS Food Store. For the past 30 plus years have been distributing food to people living with HIV AIDS who might not otherwise be able to obtain food to the Imperial Court. And yes, I do actually we do have a crown as well, but I didn't bring it tonight. And who dedicates their free time to raising money for other LGBTQ communities to ensure they are able to continue to operate? To Long Beach Pride, who we also have a presentation for Produce of the second largest event in Long Beach. But it is committed to serve the community 365 days out of the year through scholarships to youth and low income housing for seniors and many others and newer organizations like we've seen just recently, like Project Alpha, founded by two new, which helps the LGBTQ AAPI community and does tremendous work in that scope. This list goes on and on. There's so many more people that we can recognize and it is beautiful that we are here today, recognizing this week as LGBTQ Pride Week. With that, I asked my colleagues to support this item and I think everybody for their tremendous work in this case.
Speaker 0: Any public comment on this item saying none. No public comment. And did you want to have were you going to present the presentation to Pride?
Speaker 2: Yes. And so we'll go on to the presentation as well, since this is and then we also have a video to show also. So as everyone knows, as we talked about the third weekend in May, we've just like to support and get the support in obtaining the first week in May or the I'm sorry, the third week in May as the city of Long Beach Pride Week, this annual event is the city's second largest event and brings 80 to 100000 attendees, 200 floats and millions of dollars in revenue to our city. It is hosted, produced and managed by the all volunteer team at Long Beach Lesbian and Gay Pride Inc. These individuals work throughout the year to ensure that each pride celebration is better than the last. What you may not know about them, we've sort of alluded to before, is that past. Over the past 34 years, Long Beach Pride has given over $1 million back to the community. They've also own and oversee hospice house and low income housing units in Long Beach. They also host an annual toy drive where they are able to donate thousands of toys each year to children throughout. Long Beach. President Dennis Newman is here, as well as vice president of administration La Ronda Slaughter and everyone at Pride. I'd like to thank you individually and collectively for your dedication to the LGBTQ community and for all the hard work and dedication you bring to Long Beach. And with that, the mayor and I have a beautiful presentation for you. And while we're doing that, we also have a quick video to show the whole audience.
Speaker 8: It really is just.
Speaker 3: A bumpy road.
Speaker 4: A year ago, we were fighting with a man who didn't want to see us on the city street.
Speaker 3: Of course, your cities weren't meant to be the artillery. The mayor at that time of Long Beach called us. We was like rats. When you turn the lights on, we all run and hide.
Speaker 4: Back in those years, we were at city council and I was running at the mayor. It was already banned. The slogan Tell me.
Speaker 3: But we.
Speaker 4: Cannot. In the city. I finally said, you know, this is just not good enough. I'm sorry. We're going to do whatever it takes.
Speaker 1: To get on the streets.
Speaker 3: Our streets.
Speaker 1: And have a parade.
Speaker 3: Are key people. The founders that rode on that float at. The advice of the police department. But there will be protests because there was a very real fear that somebody who felt that anything gay or lesbian being that out and that public was not acceptable to the point that they'd pull out a gun.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you so much. And so I'd like to introduce Denise and the whole Long Beach Pride team to come up and say a few words and let's give them a big round of applause for all they did.
Speaker 1: Fair, Honorable Mayor Garcia and fellow city council members, city manager and assistant city manager and city attorney, members of the audience, thank you for this evening. We are actually celebrating 34 years of pride. And what you just saw on the video is one of the things that in passions me or gives me that desire to continue to move this organization forward. One of the founders is still a member of the organization and it's rare that you can join an organization and actually link with the founder. From him. I started to understand and grow up basically sitting at his knee. What? Long Beach, lesbian and gay pride was really about and it was never about an individual. It was always about a community. It was about a vision that people should be seen. By what they can contribute. And we've worked for 34 years to to bring that to the city of Long Beach. And so. Councilwoman Lena Gonzalez, thank you for recognizing us and thank everybody here for the years of support that has been given to Long Beach Pride.
Speaker 0: Denise, and thank you very much. And just one obviously on behalf of of the city, we do know that it's that it's pride week this week and.
Speaker 5: Three days away.
Speaker 0: And we know that we were honored to host a reception last Friday night with pride, of course, in the center. And we just want to wish you the very best this upcoming week. And, of course, we also know that it's a very complex event that is put on every single year. And so I know there's hundreds of volunteers and including all of you, and we just wish you luck and know that the community should know that the more successful the event, the more pride is able to give back to the community in the numerous grants and scholarships that you provide so many organizations around senior issues or homelessness or access to services. And so we just want to thank pride for for always giving back to the community. Thank you. Thank you very much. We'll have a certificate for you. Okay. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Folks. My name is still Shawn. I'm the senior VP of staff. I just wanted to support Dennis and the team and to let the council. Robert, good to see you again. We went to a lot of state together, man, with everybody that we do major events. We're a.
Speaker 9: National corporation that's.
Speaker 3: Grow Long Beach Grand Prix, the Coachella, Stagecoach, Academy Awards, Grammys, etc.. Dennis has brought us in to do all security crowd management and control for the Pride Festival. We're excited to be a part of it for the first time. We're excited to be part of Long Beach, and I just wanted to support Denise and her team to know that this group is a class act organization. And we're glad to work with you. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you very much. It's been a round of applause and we'll do the certificate.
Speaker 1: This. Right over here. Three. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. We are going to be hearing the pool item here in just a minute. I know most folks are here for that. We are taking up item 7/1 and then we're going to go right into the hearings that we have for the evening. So item seven, please, Mayor.
Speaker 3: As an item six, we need a motion.
Speaker 0: And second. I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: We didn't. You had asked public comment.
Speaker 0: I didn't ask for public comment already. And there is a motion in a second which was Councilwoman Gonzalez, and I'm not sure who was the second on that. So cast your votes on that.
Speaker 2: Yes. Motion carries. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to authorize City Attorney to draft a resolution officially declaring the 3rd Week of May in the City of Long Beach as LGBTQ Pride Week. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05162017_17-0376 | Speaker 2: Yes. Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Okay, we'll be doing item seven, then hearing item two and then hearing one.
Speaker 2: Communication from Vice Mayor Richardson, recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund and the Legislative Department by 25,000. Offset by ninth Council District f y 17 one time infrastructure funds to be used for events and outreach efforts to support community improvement and beautification projects.
Speaker 0: Q Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and have a brief presentation. Last week, last year, we partnered with the Arts Council for Long Beach residents, local artists, business owners and property owners to launch the Creative Corridor Challenge. The Creative Corridor Challenge is a community effort to beautify blighted areas throughout District nine corridor through art. We identify the sites most littered with graffiti and most service by graffiti abatement program. And over the course of a nine month period, murals are placed on markets, apartment buildings, other local businesses and properties. Leaving this labeling this project project a success is an understatement and resulted in improvements of spaces along most of our corridors and received positive attention across the region. One of the best the best success stories is the mural at the Golden State, Humane Society and U.S. Storage, which covers about 300 feet. And in the year 2015, the area was tagged with a total of 101 tags and graffiti. And since the mural was installed in February 2016, the sites only been tagged two times. The the six other sites have gone have remained untagged since this project began. Another important component was community engagement. All of the artists that participated were local, and for some of them this was their first opportunity to place large scale artwork in a public space. Hundreds of residents and youth were, you know, were on hand bringing these muralist murals to fruition. So I got new retainers and I'm stumbling a little bit. Many of our volunteers were neighborhood association members, students from Jordan High School and Hamilton Middle School. The project also resulted in a spinoff mural project, an adjacent project that was not funded through us, an adjacent project at the Golden State Humane Society. Through being exposed to the first cycle, some business owners have taken interest in further improving their site and participate in participating in the Facade Improvement Program as a result of this. So it's no secret that District nine residents are eager for the second cycle of the Creative Corridor Challenge. I'm happy tonight to set aside District nine one time funds to to implement Cycle two, and I'll make my motion in a moment. But I want to go ahead and show a quick recap video that highlights the amazing art and community engagement process. And so I want to go ahead and signal to tech services. Any revitalization strategy is going to be successful. It has to have a few elements, which is integrate art.
Speaker 3: It needs to integrate the local community. It needs to serve a purpose. Working on my mural here for the Creative Corridor Challenge, the title of it is Dreams. Hopefully it'll inspire a few dreams.
Speaker 2: Public art is such an important type of art because it's in the public sphere and free for everyone to enjoy from his opinions and really helps turn a blank space into a plan.
Speaker 1: So our mural is the panoramic landscape of Long Beach and the people running, skipping, jumping Long Beach.
Speaker 4: Actually, someone just today said that he.
Speaker 5: Lived here his entire life and had seen this.
Speaker 0: Wall change so many times. But this was the first like proactive change that happened to him.
Speaker 5: I'm in a place we all like it.
Speaker 4: Neighbors walking up and down.
Speaker 1: Looking people with their kids.
Speaker 2: Telling them about the mural. People who want to be artists telling me that they also love to paint and draw. And it's just been so great. Like every time I do a piece of public art and it gets this kind of reaction, it just makes me so happy. As a child, I was inspired by art, and I think it's really important to continue that domino effect with children. So that's why I decided to paint happy children with bright colors. I think it'll just brighten up the neighborhood and in return, hopefully inspire other children to, you know, just have a great day or want.
Speaker 4: To do art.
Speaker 3: And I know from firsthand experience just how important it is and how it creates a cultural capital for the city. Having these pieces of public artwork but also involving community in it, that's a big, important fact that.
Speaker 5: Made it impossible, which is obviously not that magic too massive to fit the topic. Imagine the reaction to finding out that it's only a grant. I want phenomenal love. I crave more. So when you look at.
Speaker 1: Somebody, the first thing you see is their eyes and I like to think of it as looking into someone's soul through your eyes. So I wanted to represent that here.
Speaker 5: What grass makes it possible? That track within the blue band action on the track that we gang like who? That Black Wolf. I never heard of him before. Any kind.
Speaker 3: Of you. We should thank the use of that we can tag on our walls because what they're.
Speaker 9: Doing is telling us the areas that need our focus and our attention to art is a way for us to reclaim our.
Speaker 3: Community and reclaim these void of these local artists.
Speaker 5: The local needs. When the youth.
Speaker 3: Jordan High.
Speaker 9: And the youth from our community and our neighbors.
Speaker 3: See a quarter transformed with art and beauty, we're going to have more violence in their lives.
Speaker 9: They didn't know that they took part in that and.
Speaker 3: They played a role in the collective.
Speaker 9: Revitalization.
Speaker 3: The Renaissance is happening in their own neighborhood. This is a.
Speaker 5: Power at its best and a place to be all the place that is home freed. And we know what we can show feeling in your hands.
Speaker 8: And your hands.
Speaker 9: Thank you. Thank you. And I want to just take a moment to thank the artists who participated in the first year's program. So that's Daniel Miller, Daisy Rosas, Guillermo Abalos, Jose Loza, Katy Phillips, Marcel Selle Blanco, Maria marie Young. In tracing the great day in our in our Partners of Arts Council and Squeeze Squeeze Arts Collaborative. And with that, I make the motion as written with one amendment. I'm going to increase it by $10,000 to make sure that we have enough funding for the community outreach and the communications and, you know, all those other activities that go along with this. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Is there a public comment on this, Mr. Geary? Here, please come forward.
Speaker 3: Larry, could you Clark, as we ask, this is certainly an outstanding program, and I would hope that we see this throughout the city. And to protect these programs that if they're approved, sanctioned by the city. I would have no problem with having a special unit at the Long Beach Police Department trained as Sniper Jones Strange, trained as snipers. And since most tagging is done at night, they can be posted wherever they want on rooftops or whatever, and take the perps out. Period. Thank you. Okay.
Speaker 0: Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Thank you. Very inappropriate, by the way.
Speaker 1: That's hard to follow. My name is BURNETT Amazon with the Hamilton Neighborhood Association. I drive by many of.
Speaker 2: These murals every day.
Speaker 1: And I got to say, when I drive by a graffiti, I hang my head, get the Long Beach app out, report it and just really upset. But when I drive by these new murals and this art and it makes me happy, it makes the whole neighborhood happy. The whole neighborhood gets together and and, you know, it just it just changes the whole atmosphere of the neighborhood. To have art in place of graffiti. And I just I wanted to come by and show our support for this program. We're very excited to have a second round.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next week for.
Speaker 3: Police. Hi, I'm Jerry Fink with the Hamilton Neighborhood Association. Also, the biggest thing, the biggest positive thing I saw come out of the creative corridor challenges is the involvement from the neighbors, from the whole community getting together and and some people for the first time. And it's just great for a community to get together and create art and make make our neighborhood look better. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Give a speaker, please. And these will be our last two speakers here in line. Thank you.
Speaker 5: My name is Ramon. I saw this video. It's an outstanding video. I go through this part of the town a lot. I love seeing the change that's taking place. I just want to give Rex Richardson a thumbs up. This is great. You know, you're doing a great job over there. I think I also saw some some programs that you had that were actually taking advantage of some of the the tree planting stuff that was there. And so I like to compliment the mayor on on some of that stuff as well as well as you. So fantastic. Great job. Thumbs up. Keep up the good work.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening. City Council members and Mayor Garcia. My name is Cynthia Loewen. I am the education and community programs manager at the Arts Council for Long Beach. I am currently project leader for the Cambodia Town Rail Project and it's an initiative to install eight public art murals along the Anaheim corridor along a one mile stretch. And last year, when the creative corridor happened, I was fortunate to be on the mural tour that vice mayor conducted. And I thought it was amazing to see community members visiting all seven murals and experiencing different conversations with the artists. And I'm here today to voice the Arts Council's full support of Vice Mayor's Item for infrastructure funds to support community improvement and beautification through cycle two of the Creative Corridor Challenge. And we know that public art, such as murals, is an important facet to a thriving and vibrant neighborhood. And through the process of facilitating the Cambodian Town Mural Project, I've found that several organizations coming together can really make something beautiful happen. And that's what the Creative Corridor Challenge did last year. And so we hope that this current mural project will meet the expectations that the Creative Corridor Challenge has set. And we invite you to come to our celebration tour in August, Sunday, August 13th. And you can learn more about that project at Art Selby Dawgs Camp. Thank you so much and go Beach.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. And our last speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Ray Gavlak, eighth District Vice Mayor Richardson. I just have to publicly tell you what a fantastic job you are doing. I know that we have been trying to bridge the gap between north and south of Delano for 15 years. And you are making so much happen in uptown. I just I'm very proud of you and I want to publicly support you. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Well, there's a motion and a second. Members, please go ahead and cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Excellent. Thank you very much. We're we're going to go ahead move on to the hearings. But let's start the meetings here. We're going to do 2/1 and then hearing one. Hearing item two is the pool. Let me go and have the clock read the hearing item. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund (GF) in the Legislative Department (LD) by $25,000, offset by the Ninth Council District FY 17 one-time infrastructure funds to be used for events and outreach efforts to support community improvement and beautification projects in the Ninth District through Cycle 2 of the Creative Corridor Challenge. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05162017_17-0371 | Speaker 0: Excellent. Thank you very much. We're we're going to go ahead move on to the hearings. But let's start the meetings here. We're going to do 2/1 and then hearing one. Hearing item two is the pool. Let me go and have the clock read the hearing item. And then I want to just kind of explain the process for everyone. It's an it since it's a hearing and it's a little bit different than a regular agenda item. So, Madam Clerk.
Speaker 2: Report from Development Services Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, consider appeals and uphold the Planning Commission's decision to adopt resolution certifying IIR zero one Dash 16 Approve the Mitigation, Monitoring and Reporting Program and approve site plan review c p standard variance and local coastal development permit entitlements for the construction and operation of the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center at 4000 East Olympic Plaza, District three.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. Just so we all know, the order is we will begin, of course, with the staff report. And staff has a pretty extensive report to go through all of the obviously the presentations and the process and the timeline of where we are today surrounding the pool project and after the staff presentation, we will have the appellants or those that actually filed the appeal. Each appellant, the four appellant groups or four separate appellants. Each appellant group will receive 15 minutes to do their appeal. I will. And I did discuss this with with the city attorney. There's one of the appellant groups before tonight asked for an additional 3 minutes. For 8 minutes. That's an Cantrell. So I will allow and control 8 minutes on her presentation. We think that's a reasonable accommodation and and then after all all four of the presentations, three at 15 minutes, one of 18 minutes, we will then go into public comment on the pool and then we will have any additional comments from staff, and then we will from there go back to the City Council for deliberation and action. Okay. So that is a process. It's a lengthy process, but we're going to go ahead and go through through it and hopefully we can get everyone to just stick with with the process and trust off by going to. Mr..
Speaker 3: West Thank you, Mayor. Councilmembers. We're here tonight to take another critical step on the Belmont Beach, an aquatic center which began in 2013 when the Belmont pool was closed for safety reasons. This is one of the more exciting and complex projects that we as a city have worked on creating a $100 million aquatics facility for the entire city to enjoy and to use. Long Beach has a strong history of aquatics producing Olympic athletes and a number of aquatic sports. But most of all, this project is for our residents to have a replacement for our legendary Belmont Pool and a place to learn to swim, to be healthy, to be active, and to enjoy the beach . This project would not be possible without the Tidelands dollars that can only be used in the beach areas. So we are thankful for having that as a financial resource. You will hear tonight a very complex analysis of everything that went into design of the Environmental Impact Report. And I want to thank our entire team for the work they have put in to get us to this point. Tonight is not the last that night that you will see the project. It is just another step on the journey to create one of the most unique and spectacular aquatic centers in the United States. So with that, I'm going to turn it over to our assistant city manager, Tom Modica, and also our development services director, Amy voting. So, Tom.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. Manager. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and members of the City Council. If the clerk can bring up our staff presentation, please. Thank you. So, as the mayor mentioned, we have a fairly lengthy staff report that we need to go through to give kind of a project overview and to talk a little bit about this project . Also, the council is sitting and deciding on whether or not to certify an environmental impact report. And so there are things that need to be read into the record. So this will be a fairly detailed report to go through the entire project, the design in the end, the environmental impact document. And so to start off the Belmont Beach, an aquatic center is designed to be a world class facility that serves all aquatic needs. It's designed to serve all neighborhoods, our entire city, as well as the region, state and the nation. As the mayor and the manager mentioned, tonight is another step in this project, an important step, but it is not the final decision. We will be going over the overview of the project. You'll hear from the appellants in public testimony. Then the council will decide on whether to certify the air if they decide to certify the air. The next step will be the Coastal Commission. And then after all of that, it will still return back to the City Council for decisions on whether or not to proceed with this project. So to talk a little bit about the project history, not many of us remember this, or maybe some of us do, but voters actually voted to put the Belmont Pool in its current location. That vote happened in 1962, and it was to set the location of the Belmont Pool, and there was even some eminent domain associated with placing the pool at that location as the as a site was assembled specifically for the Belmont Pool Project. It was constructed and finished by 1968 and served the state's and the region's needs for 45 years. Until in January 2013, the city was forced to close the facility due to seismic issues and to close it fairly quickly due to a loss of water space in the community. This council acted very, very quickly. The council, within a month, had directed staff to not only create a new temporary facility, which was done in record time, about 11 months, which is what you see there today, but also directed staff to design a replacement facility. And so, as I mentioned, the council has seen this project many times in the past. So in February 2013, there was that direction to begin the design. And that actually included some direction on certain elements to be included, including the indoor dining, well, some of the features and to begin that process. The council awarded a contract to Harley Ellis Devereaux and a number of other members of the team in March 2014 to start the design process returned in June 2014 for a study session to really review the project options. And at that point they did something above and beyond. Our normal process is because it was such an important facility with a lot of different needs and created a stakeholder committee representing aquatics groups but neighborhoods and businesses and citywide representation in order to help inform City Staff's recommendations on this project. October 2014 The City Council unanimously approved the programmatic design, which was influenced by that stakeholder committee, and city staff came forward with a recommendation that the Council ultimately were approved. And then in June 2016, the Council saw this again as we went through the conceptual design in the E.R. kickoff. So the Council has established a number of goals for this project. First and foremost, it's to create a facility unlike any municipal aquatics facility on the West Coast. It's a facility that is supposed to be in harmony with the neighborhood. It will employ an iconic and sustainable design. It needs to meet the needs of our local residents. We want it to be able to support competitive events as desired, and ultimately it needs to support the Coastal Act. So taking a look at a little bit of the project, it is a project for all user groups. Again, we want it to serve the entire city as well as the region's needs. There are six main bodies of water which is accommodating all the aquatics needs and will see the design and a little bit. First and foremost, it is designed to be a recreational facility. While it can support competition and competitive events, it is designed to be a recreational facility. It also enhances recreational access over what we had in the past by providing simultaneous use. And by that I mean our product, our pool in the past had served about 90 days a year, competitive events. And when we did that for whether it was high school swimming or high school diving, we ended up closing the facility to the public. This new design allows for simultaneous use so that the public and the competitive events can symbiotically exist in the same facility. It's designed to serve all age groups from infants to older adults. It has ample parking. 1050 parking spaces available is accessible by transit. It is accessible by bike. It has a restaurant independent of the facility. It has restrooms independent of the facility. And it was also designed to enhance the beach experience. And so we expect users from across the city will be coming to enjoy the facility. Public outreach is an important thing that we all know.
Speaker 0: And so I just want to make sure for our tech folks in the back, the presentation is not coming up on these screens. And it was. But I just want to make sure that what the public is seeing are is well, we love to see Mr. Modica. I just want to make sure the public is seeing the actual slides. So. For our tech folks. Thank you. Not and not your public. I mean, the ones that are watching on on the TV. So they weren't they weren't showing all up on the television for people watching at home. So thank you.
Speaker 6: So public outreach is an important component of anything we do on a project, but on a project this size, it's particularly important. So we'll reveal a little bit of the public input. In the past, we had some initial meetings with the aquatics groups. We talked about the study session and that general public input. In June of 2014, the Stakeholder Advisory Committee. We held public meetings in September of 2014, and that's when the council approved the baseline design. Throughout the entire process, we've had 16 public meetings to date, including the design team selection, programmatic requirements, conceptual design and online design survey with 506 responses. And of course the study sessions to the EIA are common period. So let's take a little look at the site plan. It is a 5.8 acre site, 125,500 square foot pool complex with indoor and outdoor aquatics facilities. It has five 55,745 square feet of passive parking landscape areas surrounding the facility, including improvements to the former Olympic Plaza right away. It has a detached cafe and restroom buildings, and it also removes the outdoor pools and temporary pools that are there right now and reconfigures the lot of the parking lots slightly programmatic requirements. This is the Florida design. It has an indoor 50 meter by 25 yard pool. That's the one on the bottom left. An important component is the movable floor. One of the things we heard from some of the stakeholders is the ability to host competitions indoors. But if we do that and create an indoor competition facility, it really precludes public access and public recreation because it's ten foot water. And a lot of people, a lot of kids, a lot of people learn to swim. Even those who are more adept at swimming also like the ability to stand. So we have created a movable floor which allows it to go all the way up out of the water as well as all the way down to the bottom or anywhere in between, including at a at an angle. This includes a separate diving well, with all of the diving platforms and springboards. It has an indoor dove spa. It has indoor therapy and teaching pools. The therapy teaching pool is a warm water pool for kids that want to learn how to swim. For therapeutics for disabled individuals. It has 1250 permanent indoor seats, which allows the facility to essentially serve the competitive needs of just about every competition. There's just a small handful that require maybe 1500, but the vast majority require 1250 or less outdoor 50 meter pool by 25 meter pool and an outdoor recreational pool, which we'll talk about in a little bit. The proposed facility capabilities. This really shows you that the pool is very flexible and can serve any and all aquatic needs. For example, the diving bay, while could be used for diving, can also be used for water polo, can be used for swimming, can be used for scuba diving as its deep water can be used for public safety training. So the facility is really designed to be configured in any which way because we have a lot of different uses that all use the facility differently and a lot of demand for that water space. You also see on the lower right the outdoor recreational pool. This is something that doesn't exist in Long Beach right now. This is designed to be kind of a kid's play area with equipment and fun jets and things that can be played with. And you'll see some images coming up. You haven't seen that in the design yet because we're really not at that point in the design. That comes later after we get to the level of schematic design. But that is going to be something that doesn't exist in Long Beach today, and it's going to be a new activity for our for our kids. So here are some examples of what some of those projects could look like. You know, again, we're not at that level of design, but we are looking at how do we make that outdoor recreation pool something that is spectacular and fun and draws kids from across the the city to come and enjoy this facility. We can serve all ages. You'll see, you know, a number of different user groups in this picture. And also to the top right, you'll see that moveable floor. And in that case, it's actually all the way out of the water and people are standing on. It can also go all the way down. So it's an example of the moveable floor. It can host nearly all competitive events. And a lot of times people think of competitive events as adults coming to swim, which certainly it can do that. But also we have a tremendous amount of youth events, including high school and younger groups that come to compete and then training in alternative uses. You can use these bodies of water for a number of things. We've seen other facilities use it for kayaking or for scuba diving, for synchronized swimming, for a number of different uses uses . So one of the important aspects of the design also was outside of the building and how this fits into the to the area and also the existing open space and the vegetated area, the green space. That's something very important to the neighborhood. There's not a lot of green space in that area. You have the beach, but you have open space and green space. And so the former project had about 119,000 square feet of existing open space. The architects were able to come up with an increase in open space under the new design of 127,000 square feet. That's primarily by reorganizing the site to be much more efficient. And also with the closure of the of the current street and creating Olympic way, allowing that to become open space, it had 45,000 square feet of existing vegetated area in the park. And again, by reformatting the site, we've increased that amount, even though it's a larger facility to 55,000 square feet, which is a benefit to the neighborhood. We know the design area. That noise is a concern for some of the residents because there are residents nearby and the facility has been designed. With that in mind, a lot of the activity will be indoors inside of the the natatorium. But we're also looking at 12 foot high transparent sound walls at the north and east sides of the pool. The outdoor pool is specifically designed with no external seats for competition. However, we have noted to be able to accommodate competitive events, up to 3000 people can come to an event here while bringing in temporary seating. So you would bring in the seating, have the event and then take it down again. So the Coastal Commission plays a very important role in this project as they were a regulator under the Coastal Act. While the City Council is going to take action on this project, the Coastal Commission also needs to take action. We've had seven meetings with coastal staff since inception of this project, before it even came to the Council four in October of 2014. We reviewed the programmatic design. We have since reviewed the conceptual design with the with the Coastal Commission staff, and they also sent in an environmental impact report comment letter to which the city responded about six pages of comments. We received a recent letter on May 11, 2017 regarding tonight's item, where the Coastal Commission raised a number of issues that they want the council to know about in our discussions with them. They really have sent that letter to inform the Council that they there will be things that the Coastal Commission will be paying attention to. They want the Council to be fully informed of those and for staff to really present and make sure the council is aware of the issues. Those include things like the alternative analysis, what sites we have looked at and we were prepared tonight to go through how we actually went above and beyond to look at alternative sites in addition to the site that is proposed, looking at height and view water issues, looking at local coastal plan conformance, and also about sea level rise and wave operation. You'll hear about all those items tonight. We take the Coastal Commission input very, very seriously and we will continue to work with the commission if this goes forward in the process. So before I turn it to Amy to go through the air, I do want to say that we posed a challenge to the architect. We essentially asked our architect and said, We need you to do a number of things for this project. It's a very complex project. You need to incorporate the project goals and we want you to incorporate all the community input that we've heard. And you need to meet the programmatic outline set by the council, and you need to use appropriate materials for the site and you have to adhere to the Coastal Commission requirements and you have to mitigate any environmental impacts. And then ultimately we want you to create a beautiful facility. We believe we have one of the best teams around doing this. They did a spectacular job. And you're going to hear about the design and the Environmental Impact Report next. And with that, I will introduce Amy Bodak, our Director of Development Services.
Speaker 7: Mr. MODICA Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Members of the City Council. I'm going to go through some of the more exciting regulatory aspects of this project. I know you love hearing about ERs when we talk about them, so feel free to take notes on this. So first I want to talk to you about what you're hearing tonight. The city council is being asked to render a decision on an appeal of the site plan review a conditional use permit that would apply to the restaurant cafe only a standards variance related to the height of the facility and a local coastal development permit for that portion of the project, which is within the city's jurisdiction of the coastal zone. I also want to point out throughout this process, this is a replacement facility for one that previously existed on this site. But the project site does cover two zoning districts, both the Belmont Pier Plan Development District and the Park Zoning District. Those come into play when we talk about air consistency. As Tom said earlier, Prop seven, approved by the voters in 1962, allowed Tidelands funds to be used for a future pool project, which is essentially establishes established the public purpose and use for the site. The Belmont Plaza pool opened in 1968 after acquisition of several parcels that were necessary for the site. And then it was closed. The NATATORIUM was closed in January 2013 due to seismic safety issues. And then, as you know, it was demolished two years later in February 2015. It's important to note that the Sequoia process began while the old facility was still in existence, and it was very clear that the demolition of this project was for a replacement facility and that the square document was also for a replacement facility. Tom walked through the site plan. These are a couple of elevations. I'm just going to go through them very quickly. We do have the architects here who may touch upon these later, but it is essentially a half bubble facility where it covers an indoor portion and then there is an exterior portion of the facility as well. This indoor portion covers the one competitive pool into inside as well as the diving wall. And then the exterior has another pool, the teaching pool, the recreation pool as well. Again, these are some elevations you can see that it's a half dome portion of the facility is exterior. The other portion of the facility is on the interior. So this is the site we wanted to show you as part of the air, the esthetic analysis that we did to see what the environmental impact of this project would be from an esthetic standpoint, which is required under Sequoia. We took several photos, films from various locations, and you can see where those locations are on this diagram. And I'm going to show you the before picture of what the pool looked like from that position as well as the after picture. Again, the same. This is from Bennett Avenue and Ocean Boulevard. The before picture and then the after picture. Before a picture. This is further down on Ocean Boulevard, right near Prospect. After the after picture. And then the last one is actually from the pier. So this is the before picture and then this is the after picture. These are important images to understand because we are very cognizant of the potential esthetic impact and view quarter impact that the proposed facility would have on this. So we also looked at how the views were actually enhanced with the new facility, the yellow. The yellow rectangle that you can see under the half dome facility was the old pool. You can see that it was a very rectangular structure and it blocked views. The new pool actually expands views in the blue zone and increases the availability of views to the ocean.
Speaker 4: Past.
Speaker 7: The facility from various locations. This shows the height differential of the old pool structure and the new pool structure. The old pool is on the bottom and then you can see it superimposed on the top image in red. The old pool was at about 60 feet high. This new pool is at 78 feet high. And I'm going to go into a little bit more detail on that as we talk about Coastal Act consistency. So it is not much different from the overall height of the old facility, but you can see that the massive bulk is different and that this facility as proposed actually has a more narrow profile than the old pool did.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 7: So I want to talk a little bit about coastal consistency week as part of the air had to look at both consistency with the local coastal plan which is within our jurisdiction. And then we also had to look at the Coastal Act for those portions of the facility that are within the coastal zone and the original jurisdiction of the Coastal Commission. Part of that consistency is looking at in particular chapter three, which relates to access. The Coastal Commission staff wrote a letter to the a comment letter to the air during the comment period and specifically asked us to focus on five sections of the Coastal Act to ensure that we were compliant with those five sections. We did that and more. We actually looked at 16 different sections of the Coastal Act within Section three and looked at that consistency. And our analysis demonstrates that not only are we consistent with the Coastal Act on the five areas that Coastal Commission asked us to look at, but that we are actually consistent with all 16 areas that we looked at in our land use analysis. This project site is clearly suitable for public recreation. It's been a public recreation site for the last 45 years and it is a replacement facility. It is a year round aquatics facility serving the same population in larger numbers as the old facility. This new project will, however, be fully ADA compliant, which will actually increase the accessibility over the old facility. We do have the ability to have competitive events which would allow us to draw folks from the region and from the state to our coastal zone who may not otherwise come to our coastal zone if it was only a local facility. And we also have local access that has been greatly enhanced through the addition of a bike lane augmentation on the beach path, and then also the bike lane on Ocean Boulevard. This facility is also very accessible from the greater community through all different modes of accessibility. And as we've been discussing over the last two years about increasing mobility and livability within the city, this project falls in line with those goals as well.
Speaker 4: From a local.
Speaker 7: Coastal zone perspective. We also have to look at consistency with our local coastal plan as part of our land use analysis under the air. And we have clearly demonstrated that the ocean views are actually enhanced through the facility design and that closure of Olympic Plaza to vehicular traffic will allow us to increase our open space, as Mr. Modica demonstrated on an earlier slide. We also heated coastal discussions about the cafe. Coastal is very clear that they did not want an internal café only serving the pool and the people who are visiting the pool. That is an intentional position of staff where we moved that cafe and public restroom facilities outside of the pool so that they are publicly accessible to anyone who wants to visit the coastal area and not just limited to people who are visiting this facility. So as I said, we're here to talk about the E.R.. We did have an initial notice of preparation in 2013. That initial notice of preparation sets the baseline under secure. At that point forward, everything that we're focusing on is related to the baseline. Under secure, the building that was there existed when we put the notice of prep out. We made it very clear in the notice of prep that this was a replacement facility. We did prepare a revised notice of Prep in 2014 because the facility had increased in size based on direction from the city council. And we did feel that it was important that that increased program be incorporated into a new notice of prep. Also, you will notice that that was done in 2014. The pool facility was demolished in 2015. So again, under the two notice of preps that we issued, the pool facility was still in place, although it was closed to the public. We drafted in air. It was circulated for 65 days in 2015 I'm sorry, 2016. And then we've been working on responding to comments throughout this process. We took this project to the Planning Commission. There was a noticing requirement in our municipal code to put a story poll up. We did put a story pull up that story. Poll decision was appealed to the Planning Commission. The Planning Commission ruled that our plans for installing a storage pole were sufficient. We then proceeded with noticing the public hearing to the Planning Commission had that Planning Commission hearing in in the fall. And then we're here for the appeal hearing this evening. The drafty air has to look at all of these topics. It is a requirement under Sequoia. We have to do something called the secret checklist. We certainly have to look at all of these issues and if they are not applicable, we need to understand and explain to the public why this is not applicable. A draft ESR is a public disclosure document where we need to disclose all of the environmental impacts of the potential project on the environment. So the ones in red are those areas where there were less than significant impacts. That means that under land use, which includes consistency with the local coastal plan and with the Coastal Act, that our project had less than significant impacts and did not necessarily require mitigation. We looked at. Those in red here did require some mitigation. And with mitigation, the those impacts were also determined to be less than significant. I'm going to briefly go through these each and every one for the public record. But the but the the conclusion that I want to state, which I'll also get to, is that with mitigation, every single one of those significant impacts are reduced to less than significant impacts. This project does not have any outstanding significant impacts, which would require you to overrule those impacts with the statement of overriding considerations. That means that with mitigation, this project complies fully with CEQA and you are not being asked to make any overriding considerations that the project should overrule any of these environmental aspects on a statics. We do have to have a mitigation measure which requires the maintenance of construction barriers during the construction process. We do have to look at both of the one time impacts of a project during construction and then we also have to look at the cumulative impacts of a project over time. And the impact for this is maintenance of construction barriers. Biological resources. We did look at this as well. We went ahead and had biologists go out there several times. There is a and in a claim by the appellants that we are violating the Federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act. We believe that that is not the case, that with mitigation we will be in compliance with that requirement as well as other biological requirements. Same with cultural resources. We are not we do not know of any cultural resources. If there are any discovered, there is a mitigation measure that would require us to retain an uncle paleontologist in case a cultural artifact or resource is discovered during construction activities. Again, geology and soils. We did require conformance with the recommendations of a geotechnical study and that study was very important in the actual design of the facility and the design of the foundation, which we'll get into later as it relates to a coastal zone, sea level rise and wave up rush. Hazardous materials. We are not aware of any hazardous materials that are on site. We do not believe that there will be any unusual use of hazardous materials during the construction. But if there is the case, we do have contingency plans and we also had pre demolition surveys that were done for the demolition of the pool related to asbestos and led. Hydrology and water quality. There is the potential for soil erosion during the construction process only. So there are mitigation measures required for that and also for impervious areas, drainage patterns and the eastern half of the site in flood zone. A So we do have some mitigation measures with the compliance of those mitigation measures. This project would reduce those impacts to less than significant noise. Noise was an issue that was raised repeatedly through this process, both from a construction perspective, but also from an operational perspective on how the pool functions and the potential impacts of noise on the operations to the surrounding neighborhood. So during construction, we do have standard conditions for the construction equipment as well as pre-construction meetings with the community so that there can be an understanding of what's going to happen when, etc.. We also have to comply with the noise ordinance which does not allow construction activities to occur before 7 a.m. or after 6 p.m. and also not on Sundays. Normal operations would not impact sensitive users, but there could be special events in the pool that may impact those sensitive receptors. As such, during special events, we do have mitigation measures that would that we would be requiring them to reduce noise levels from the outdoor speakers to a level below the city standard. Traffic. We did look at this. There is no impact during construction, but we do have a mitigation measure that certainly requires emergency access to the site at all times. And we also looked at the study intersections operating at an acceptable level of service for particularly Bennett and Ocean and then Termino and Ocean. There have been comments that have been raised about the road diet that happened after this project was proposed. That road diet would not have occurred if the level of service was going to be impacted at those intersection levels. So the thru intersection traffic continues to remain at acceptable levels of service, even with the road diet in place and putting the pool in place as well. However, during special events there is the potential for significant traffic impacts and one of the mitigation measures is that there has to be an event traffic management plan for any event that requires more than or expects more than 450 spectators. As you probably know, the Ocean Boulevard Road Diet did not actually reduce the width of Ocean Boulevard. It just added parking at a diagonal and then added a bike lane. That's just paint. So part of the special events mitigation for traffic impacts for a large event could be that two lanes of Ocean Boulevard on both sides must be maintained for entering and exiting the facility. That can be easily accommodated through a special event traffic management plan and does not reduce the level of service at those intersections . We also had to look at utilities and service systems. There are no new major facilities required. We did have to look at what our hydrology mitigation measures would be, and we clearly have to require a hydrology report, groundwater discharge permits and swamp regulations to comply with all of those regulations. We also need to have de-watering permits. But again, with mitigation measures, these impacts are less than significant. So again, this is a significant project. And with this air, it was concluded through the analysis that there are no significant impacts when we add all of the the mitigation measures. Again, that means that this city council is not being asked today to adopt a statement of overriding considerations. We did have a number of EMR objectives that the project applicant put forward, and the point of the project objectives was clearly to replace the former facility with a more modern state of the art aquatics facility to minimize time without a permanent pool, provide a signature design which you will see that that this project meets, that fits that bill. If you will generate revenue to cover cover some of the operational maintenance costs, implement the land use goals of plan development PD two, which is the Belmont Pier Plan Development District, which specifically calls out the pool in this location. So we are consistent with land use again, particularly under the zoning for PD two. This is much more sustainable, much more energy efficient. We clearly demonstrated that we are minimizing view disruptions and we're actually increasing view ability and access to the coast. We're serving existing users and bringing new users into the site and we're maintaining and actually increasing the amount of open space. Part of the ER process requires us to look at alternatives and we looked at a range of alternatives and went above and beyond to those that are required under sequa. Sequa does require you to look at alternatives, including the no project, no build alternative, but it also requires you to publicly disclose those alternatives that you looked at that may be rejected for various purposes. This project is a Tidelands project. It is a it was a Tidelands facility. It is a Tidelands facility. And because of that, the sites that we looked at and the alternatives that we looked at are in the Tidelands area. We do not have any general fund sites that were considered for this project because this is a Tidelands project. We also eliminated a number of sites that had insufficient acreage. Remember, we were given a specific programmatic requirement by the city council, and so we had to find sites that actually accommodated that acreage. We did look at three alternative sites, the Harry Bridges Memorial Park, which is near the Queen Mary, otherwise otherwise known as the Special Events Park. The Queen Mary site itself. And then the elephant lot is what we euphemistically refer to a large parking lot on Seaside, way adjacent to the convention center. So the Harry Bridges Memorial Park, we cannot build an enclosed recreational facility on this site. And this site was raised during the public comment period by members of the public who suggested that this was a legitimate alternative location for the project. The answer is it is mitigation for the Aquarium and Rainbow Harbor, and the requirements of the Federal Act that protected this do not allow for enclosed recreational facilities to be built on this location. Additionally, the site is too small to be accommodating the programmatic requirements that the City Council set forth. The Queen Mary site. We have a current lessee and we had a lessee at that time. The lessee was approached. The lessee said, no, they're not interested in this. They are interested in redeveloping that project site according to the lease that they had with the city. And so that site was rejected because we did not want to interfere with our contractual obligations with the private operator and their plans. Similarly, the elephant lot at the Convention Center is also encumbered with a lease for parking. Aside from that lease for parking, it is required parking for the convention center. Putting a facility in this location would be geo technically challenging, as challenging as putting it in the Queen Mary site and the Harry Bridges site because it's on landfill . It is also in the tidelands area as the other two sites were. But since this has required parking for the convention center, the facility, if it were to be built here, would be required to construct replacement parking for the convention center. That would be an additional cost for the facility that we do not have to bear at its current location because of the current lease and because it is a private lease between two entities. We did not include this site for further consideration. These are the alternatives we did consider Sequa does require us to have a reasonable amount of alternatives that can be viewed as a reasonable being. Number three. In fact, we did five alternatives and we looked at three alternatives locations. So we believe that we far exceeded the reasonable amount of alternatives that sequa requires. Alternative one is a requirement under sequa that you look at the no project and no development alternative. Alternative number two was looking at maintaining the existing temporary pool and just having auxiliary uses around it, making that pool permanent, adding permanent restrooms, permanent facilities to support that temporary pool. Alternative three took the proposed facility and eliminated the diving well inside and moved it to the exterior with the idea that that might hopefully reduce the height of the building. Alternative four actually got rid of all of the outdoor components, so we looked at that facility to see what it would do for environmental impacts. An alternative five was that we eliminated the diving realm and eliminated all of the outdoor components and essentially had an indoor pool, one single indoor pool facility. Alternative one clearly does not meet the objectives and the backfilled sand area would remain unchanged, but it does not result in a new development as at all. Alternative two is maintaining the temporary pool. That temporary pool has a life span that has maybe 1015 years to it. That lifespan would would need to be accommodated in a more permanent facility. And then we would also need to replace the parking that the temporary pool is currently taking up. Alternative three is removing the outer. Moving the diving wheel to the exterior. This would potentially reduce the building height by maybe five feet. All other components would remain the same. It did not have significant environmental benefits compared to the project. Alternative four is eliminating all of the outdoor components. This would significantly reduce the footprint of the pool structure. It would increase the open space and park area. Many of the facilities, the amenities would remain and the indoor pool would remain. There would still be required to have a height variance for this because the diving well would still be located within the pool structure itself. Alternative five is reducing the project to eliminate the diving role and reducing it to eliminate all of the odor components. This is similar to Alternative four, but it would actually reduce the pool building as well. It would essentially be a single pool facility in a single building, which would not meet the programmatic requirements that the City Council placed on the project. These are the project objectives and how they meet the project objectives versus the alternatives that were considered. And you can see that those five alternatives do not meet the majority of the project objectives, nor does it meet the programmatic requirements that the City Council required of this project. We did receive written comments. We had 57 comment letters from interested persons, and then we had three from state or local agencies, including Caltrans, the Coastal Commission and the County Sanitation District. All comment letters were responded to in the final year. As I said, as I said previously, the Coastal Commission did provide a comment letter. We addressed their comments in the final EMR. As Mr. Modica said, they also sent a letter last week related to sea level rise and wave of brush and the height of the building and view corridors. I've addressed the height overdressed the view corridors. I'd like to now address what they're calling a protective barrier, in their words, not ours. This proposed project is a replacement facility and has been a replacement facility, and we've been very clear in all of our public disclosures that this is a replacement facility. The Coastal Commission was required to issue a demolition permit when we tried to demolish the building. That demolition permit was again very clear and that the project was going to result in a replacement facility in that location. So we were very clear in our disclosures to both Coastal Commission staff and to the public that there would be a replacement facility in this location. There is a plinth or there was a plinth on the old facility. There is a plinth on the new facility. The old plinth was one foot higher than the van, the new plinth. The old plinth had a longer longitudinal footprint on the sand than the new facility does. The for those of the proposed plinth is narrower on the on the seaward side than the old plinth. And when I speak of plinth, I mean the razed portion of the facility. You can call it a platform, if you will, but it's essentially the foundation that raises the pool facility up. And the reason that we have a plinth in both the old facility and the new facility is it provides easy access to the substructure of all pools for the equipment, for the chemicals, for maintaining the pool as well . And so the old plinth, as I said, was one foot higher than the new plinth, the the most seaward portion of the facility. And the plinth is in the exact same location as the old facility. And I want to talk about beach nourishment and sand replacement. There have been discussions from the Coastal Commission related to sea level rise and the impact that this facility may result in related to sea level rise. The wave up study did look at sea level rise per the Coastal Commission's guidance documents and it assumed absolutely no mitigation measures at all when it looked at sea level rise. We believe that the Wave Brush study demonstrates that this facility will not be impacted by sea level rise without mitigation measures during this process. This is the diagram for the plinth. You can see the red outline on the sand is the old facility in dark red was the building and then in lighter red is actually the plinth that surrounded the facility, the platform that surrounded the building itself. The blue outline is the proposed facility and you can see that the southernmost boundaries of both of those boundaries actually align and they were in the same location. So we are the same distance away from mean sea level as the old facility was as well.
Speaker 4: Again, we are narrower.
Speaker 7: On the beach front than the old facility was and our plinth is one foot shorter than their proposed than the old facility. With that, I'm going to turn it over to our architects who are going to quickly walk through the proposed facility, design, touch on some of the programmatic features, and then turn it back over to Mr. Modica for a discussion about funding. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much, Mr. Vice Mayor and council members. My name is Brant Miller. I'm an architect that has worked on the project for the past three years. I'd like to take a couple of minutes, walk you through a little bit more detail the the plans and the site plan for the buildings itself. So what I'll start with, though, is an overall what we call go back one place is overall bird's eye view of the project. And what you can see is we're looking towards the ocean. You can see the beach in the background. Oh, my. Hold on. Let me get a pen that works here. It sort of make it that far. Okay. Not close enough. So what you have is looking here at what is Olympic Y currently. You've got the peer to the top, right, the peer parking lot on the right and the beach parking lot on the left. What you're looking at is the facility. You can see the outdoor pools and then you can see the covered entity on the right, which really housing the indoor pool and the supporting facilities for that pool itself. You have a front entry along the bottom, right, and you have a drop off on this upper left area. And what was referred to earlier as the plinth is this raised area that actually is at the level of the pool. And let me try actually one more laser pointer. Sorry. I think it's just the distance is too far. So as I walk through the site plan, you can see if I orient you. You have once again on the left, you have the pier parking lot on the right, the beach parking lot. You have the beach to the bottom, which is basically south for the project. You have an entrance across from Bennett Way that allows for the drop off zone here prior to entering the parking. If you're on this side of the facility, if you're to go from parking your car. And from parking your car, you'd be right. You would park here. You'd walk up through this facility, through the sidewalk. There are stairs and a ramp that would get you up to the upper plinth, which would be the main entry for the facility. This shape here is what we talked about as being the covered entity and the indoor activities, and this would be the plinth with the outdoor activities. So as I start to walk through the plan once again for orientation purposes, you have the beach to the south, you have the drop off here and then Bennett way up to the top, right? And so in more detail, you can see this entry sequence where you have the ramp and the stairs coming into the main entry where you'd have a reception area. This area is for the offices and meeting spaces of the facility. As you start to move down through the facility, you start to get into the locker rooms and really what we call the dry side of the facility versus coming out the back side, which is the west side of the facility. If you come through the locker rooms and you turn to your right, which is our left, you have on the interior, you have a 50 by 25 yard pool with the removable floor that we talked about earlier. And at the top, you have the dove well with a variety of platform options and then right at springboard options as a part of that diving well configuration. And so that really represents the indoor part of the larger pools as we start to move down through. We have the. I apologize. It's hard to move down through. We have an indoor teaching pool and a spa. And then the last small body of water we have on the interior is up here on the top, which is really a warm whirlpool for the divers themselves. So that really represents, on the ground level, the indoor portions of the facility. As you start to move to the outdoor. We have our 50 meter by 25 meter outdoor pool. And then the recreational pool that we talked about earlier, where programmatic will still determine exactly how that works as we move for the project. And I think from this plan, you can start to see once again the edge of the plinth that we talked about earlier. And so it's this area around here that really has the facility slightly up in the air from the surrounding area. And then over to the right is that cafe area that we had talked about. As we move up through the facility, you have the options of stairs off that main lobby below or an elevator that brings you up. And this is what we call the first level mezzanine. So the mezzanine is really an outdoor deck that overlooks the pool area with access either internally or exterior or externally from the pool deck itself, allowing for programs such as summer camps or other activities that you want to get off the main pool deck but still have your own area to do programs within. And within that it also has its own toilet rooms associated with it. As we start to move up through the facility, we're at the second floor now. So once again, you've either access this by coming up the stairs or the elevator. And this is really the main visitors part of the facility in which you access the 1250 seats that are for viewing of the the activities below. And so you would enter through a variety of different areas at the back. Come in and choose your seat. We're slowly steps down to the first row that still is above the pool deck itself. Also on this level is a concessions area for food and drink, etc. We also have the additional bathrooms and storage areas up on this floor as we move up through the facility. This is really the top floor, what we call the second level mezzanine and this is really what we call the roof deck. So above the concessions area that we just saw, we have an outdoor space which is to the right of this line, which once again allows for really beautiful views of the city and the ocean and of the pool below. And then to the left of this line is then the indoor viewing deck up at the second level mezzanine, which allows you to overlook now not only the seating area, but the diving well and the 50 meter pool itself. And so with that, I'll turn over to Michael Rotondi to walk us through the exterior design of the facility. City Council members. Thank you. And I'm Michael Rotondi. I'm working with HPD. I'm the design architect for the project. Well, you see, this particular image is the recreation pool. It hasn't been designed yet, but it's it's going to have all of the things that will attract basically everybody, adults and children, to want to be in there. The on that level, right there is a deck that overlooks everything. Okay. On the inside from the the spectator area, you're seeing the diving pool on the right. And then in the distance is the is the regular pool. And then on the outside of the building, one, one of the things that I think is important to to know about the project that besides trying to make things work in a practical way and then to move it into architecture, as we say, the esthetic into the poetic, what's really important, especially a project of this of this size in a location like this, in a city with such a wonderful history for not only swimming but for beach life, is to make a civic urban space. And I think that's really what the plinth allowed us to do. The first pool basically had had an eight foot high wall. The seven foot high plinth steps down to the beach and then all around this building, there are different ways that you can hang out here. Our swimmers will definitely come here. But I also believe in all of my experience of not only doing buildings but doing civic urban space that non swimmers are going to want to want to hang out here and basically watch everything that's happening on the beach, the bikes, the volleyball out to the to the horizon and perhaps even some of the ships passing by. Whoops. Is that the last one I. And then Olympic way, we were able to, by eliminating the road, bring a great lawn that was on the beach all the way around. And the places to sit outside, to look inside. And then a building that lights up below moonlight in the evenings. And one final comment is the creative process is one where there's many, many variables, and all those variables are to solve a problem in a very practical way and solve the technical problem. But I think more so, it's a come up with a workable, coherent and ultimately a beautiful project. And one final comment is all of the civic the focus groups that we had are, I think, really added to it, contributed quite a bit to the project, not only in terms of making the project better, but I think it also turned a creative process which tends to be coming from a more a smaller group into a civic event, which I think is really important. Thank you.
Speaker 6: So thank you, Michael and Brant, for walking us through the design. I'm the last speaker from staff. I know you've had a lot of information that we've been preventing presenting to you. So I do want to talk a little bit about funding and next steps and the staff recommendation. Tonight is not a decision about funding. The council doesn't have that in front of them. They're not making decisions about funding. But we believe it's important to give you as a city council an update about where we are on the funding. So the city approved in October 2014, $103.1 million project budget at that time. Well, was it about 99 or $100 a barrel? We had about $60 million in cash already set aside, and we were expected to fully fund the project at $99 million within one year of oil money coming in. The council, through the programmatic design, actually added about $4 million with a cost based on staff's recommendations. But we also offset it by taking $4 million with cuts in other areas in order to have a sustainable project while the council was making that action. Oil prices were actually dropping in that moment. So within the course of about four or five months, oil went from $100 a barrel to about $29 a barrel. What we do have set aside is still $61.5 million. So the $60 million was set aside previously. It was preserved during the Tidelands prioritization process as we looked at all of our needs. And then last year, the Council added an additional $1.5 million the city has spent to date, about 7.3 million of that amount. And 3.1 of it was on the demolition of the pool. So when we talk about the 103 million, but 3.1 of that was demolishing the old structure. And the balance of that amount. Up to 7.3 million has been to fund the project, design and air to get us to this point. We are developing strategies to address that. Revenue shortfall primarily will be oil. As oil rises, that will be a funding source. But we will also be recommending that the council look at private fundraising, able to have philanthropy assist with this project. It is unique and that's this project. And this poor has touched so many lives over the years that we believe that there are people that are going to want to give back, give back to the funding, to the aquatics community to let others have the same chances that they did. So we believe that's a very robust opportunity, up to $50 million that we'll be pursuing with the consultant to help us to see what a realistic amount is and what we can raise. We do know that construction cost escalation will affect the total cost. There is some escalation already budgeted in that 103, but additional escalation may be there as well, and that the costs really aren't certain until a design is ultimately approved by the city and the Coastal Commission. And at that time we'll be going back, looking at the design, looking at all the design elements and the cost escalation, and then we'll bid the project. So economic impact. I do want to point out that, as you said, the programmatic design also looked at some of the economic impact of this facility because it can draw regional and national events. We believe it can generate up to $30.6 million in economic activity and then every fourth year, up to 19.9 million. There are certain events that don't happen every year that the big ones that happen every four years. So we looked at hotel stays, food and lodging, and that the facility could generate up to $1.5 million in hotel bed tax or tot annually. And to put that in perspective, we would be looking at maybe about 10% of current overnight activity could be generated by this facility. So what are the meaning steps if the council votes to move forward tonight, are the city and the Coastal Commission both need to go through a coastal development process review and approval. The city goes first and then the Coastal Commission does their action for their jurisdiction. If the Coastal Commission makes any changes, that would come back to the City Council for acceptance of the coastal changes. If that if that occurs, we would then prepare construction documents, finalize the funding strategy, and the Council would see that again before giving us direction on the funding and also to better move forward once it moves forward. The construction time is relatively quick. It's about 18 months. So on March 2nd, the reason we're all here today is that the Planning Commission held a public hearing on the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center, and they voted unanimously to adopt a resolution together with findings and mitigation, monitoring and reporting program, and to certify year number 01. or dash one six and they approve the site plan review, conditional use permit standards variance and local coastal development permit entitlements. We did within the ten day local appeal period receive and that followed that meeting for qualifying appeals. And the reasons that those appeals were filed include that the project had inconsistencies with the California Coastal Act and local coastal program policy, that the project entitlement findings were not supported by facts. That inadequate project analysis occurred an the environmental impact report and improper public noticing for the Planning Commission hearing. And so our last slide is that as staff makes our recommendation to you, we would like to recommend that you receive the supporting documentation into the record, that you conclude the public hearing and consider the third party appeals from Jeff Miller and Melinda Cotton, Joe Weinstein and and control the Long Beach Area Peace Action Network and Anna Christiansen and Gordana Cager. And that you uphold the Planning Commission's decision to adopt a resolution certifying er01-16 approve that mitigation and monitoring and reporting program and the site plan review conditional use permit standards variance and look course for development permit entitlements for the construction operation of the Belmont Beach Aquatic Center. And then finally, with the recommendation that you allow staff to move this to the next stage, that we can work with the California Coastal Commission on their comments regarding the project. I believe we've handled and discussed those, but we we do take those very seriously. They are an important body in this decision making process. And we asked for the opportunity to work with them. And with that staff is concludes our staff report. Thank you for listening to a lot of information.
Speaker 0: Okay. Well, thank you very much. So we know that was a very extensive presentation, but I know we wanted to go through all the staff work and I want to thank, of course, staff for that. We do want to go into the appellants. So as a reminder, they are for appellate presentations. So and the Melinda Cotton presentation will have will be 18 minutes and the clerk will set the time ahead. What did I say? Because I was okay cause I'm looking at different people here and it's going to be 18 minutes. And and so the first appellate court, please come forward.
Speaker 5: President Clinton.
Speaker 3: Good evening. Mayor Garcia and council members and citizens of Long Beach who are here tonight and watching at home and especially all of the young people who were here earlier, a few remaining who want nothing more than a place to swim or dove. I'm Jeff Miller. I've lived in Long Beach for four years. I ask that you reject the Planning Commission's decision and uphold these appeals. Each of the other appellants will be speaking about various aspects of this proposed project. The city attorney suggested that the appellants consolidate their presentations in that spirit, and for the record, each appellant will present positions and evidence on behalf of all the appellants. Will the City Clerk please let each of us know when we have reached 15 minutes of our time? Here is tonight's Real Question. Is Long Beach the aquatic capital of America? What does it take to be the aquatic capital? Will City Hall provide and maintain adequate beach and tidelands facilities for Long Beach to be the aquatic capital of America? The Aquatic Capital of America Foundation lists these activities on their website, which I quote. Beach Volleyball. Yachting. Beach Tennis. Boat Racing. Congressional Cup. Beach Water Polo. Naples Island. Swim and stand up paddling. And these objectives, I'm quoting, again, promote Long Beach as a destination for visitors seeking to participate in the myriad of aquatic activities offered in our city, promote water safety and education, increase the number of aquatic facilities, unquote. This is a good list of objectives and I support them. I believe we can all find a way to work together to make this happen. Wouldn't it be wonderful to see Long Beach make a success of this? It won't happen with this plan, however. There is so much wrong with the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center proposal that it must be put on hold, revisited and moved forward in a way that will be a success for Long Beach and be built before all of the young swimmers and divers who were in the audience are adults. The most obvious problem with the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center plan is its location on a beach subject to expected sea level rise, wave action and shoreline erosion. That was addressed in the letter from the Coastal Commission that was mentioned briefly. The letter received just days ago. Two or three points were noted in that letter, but this sentence was not read from that letter. Quote, Commission staff believes that the best practice is to avoid locating new development and hazardous areas subject to sea level rise and shoreline erosion. In the case of this project, our staff has previously recommended to the city that it consider relocating the facility to a site that will not be affected by sea level rise slash way of action for the expected life of the development, unquote. This is the primary reason why it is so expensive. Simple logic and reason leads to the obvious question Why build it on the beach? The letter also states the letter from the Coastal Commission also states other concerns about the location, such as the impact on coastal views. At 78 feet tall, this structure would be far higher than anything else in the area. It would tower over the trees. Despite claims in the city staff report and air, it would not be transparent. It would be visible and interfere with coastal and ocean views from every direction. From many blocks around. The base alone would be a seven foot tall block of concrete. A beach location is problematic also because of the impact on coastal access due to increased traffic. The commission staff recommends the city choose a different location and the Coastal Commission does matter. As pointed out, there will be a Coastal Commission hearing and the city must gain their approval of this or any project in the Tidelands area. Coastal Commission concerns the excessive cost and lack of additional Tidelands funding are all major factors that will likely prevent this facility from ever being built on the beach. And that excessive cost is all attributable to the poor choice of a beach location as currently proposed. The city must raise an additional $43 million beyond the $60 million of tidelands funds it plans to use. Why not build the pool at a suitable location where it would not require the expensive, deep foundation pilings and a seven foot tall concrete platform? Then it would likely cost far less than the projected $103 million. For example, the mayor has previously offered a downtown property for the George Lucas Museum, but that museum selected a different location. That property has also been offered as a venue for the 2024 Olympics. The Aquatic Center could be built at that same downtown site. In this scenario, there would likely be some tidelands money left over for the other currently unfunded needs at the beach. Even if there were sufficient tidelands funds to build at the Belmont Beach location, which there are not. It would be at the expense of the many neglected and delayed and unfunded beach area projects that are well documented that are dependent on the same part of Tidelands funds. These currently add up to $358 million. These projects are necessary to support the very items listed by the aquatic capital of America. These include rebuilding or renovating the Belmont Pier, building a lifeguard and Marine safety headquarters in the second District, replacing the Leeway Sailing Center, Marine Stadium repairs, water quality improvements and maintaining the beach, pedestrian and bike paths to name only a few of the specific items. Additionally, many millions of dollars of Thailand's funds are needed to repair the crumbling Naples seawalls. The increased operating and maintenance costs of this facility, designed with an elaborate mobile roof and expensive removable floor in the pool and a separate pool only for diving would be a huge strain on the city's budget and would greatly impact the ability of the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department to maintain the city's parks. The figure given by the city for the additional maintenance cost of the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center pools is $1.8 million annually. Back to the plan for the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center. How did we get to this point? Why are we headed down a dead end path with this project? The citizens of Long Beach never had sufficient opportunity to provide input on this. The city never asked us. The stakeholder committee that designed the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center had only one neighborhood representative. Most of the other members have specific interests in the private and commercial aquatic enterprises that want this facility built in only this location. That is another one of the reasons why the air is flawed. It gave no real consideration to other possible locations or sources of funding. Much of the public never even knew what was being planned, and they still don't know the details today. The public never had a realistic way to evaluate and comment on the design. There was insufficient representation of the location, size and height of the structure. For example, how many people understand this structure would have a 33 foot tall vertical elevator tower almost touching the bike and pedestrian paths. How many people know the Belmont Beach? An aquatic center would be nearly three times larger than the old pool building. How many people know it would be 18 feet taller? How many people know the plan to seat 4000 spectators there and parked their cars there? Beach parking is limited and already impacted. Where exactly could parking be provided? Even after the design process was completed and the public could evaluate the design and comment on it at the zoning hearing and the Planning Commission hearing, the city did not follow its own ordinance, which requires informing the public of the proposed variance from zoning height limits by erecting storey poles at the project site. Using story poles to demonstrate the height and footprint of a structure is a common practice throughout California. When the city was called out for this lapse, they still failed to comply with the intent of the law. Only one single pole was erected to represent the entire proposed structure of over 125,000 square feet. And that poles, 78 feet tall, did not have a marker or a flag to show the legal zoned height of 30 feet . Why were there no poles around the edges of the building site showing how much taller it would be above the 30 foot limit as the drawings that you saw in the air show, almost the entire perimeter of the building is taller than the legal limit. At the outset of the design process, we were told repeatedly the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center would be built entirely with tidelands funds. We know now that is not true. There has been mention of tapping into the city's measure funds, which are intended to be used for public safety and infrastructure. There is talk of using L.A. County parks funds, which are intended to be used for enhancing the city's parks. There is talk of using federal infrastructure funds. The new impacts on available parking places and increased traffic at the beach are recent conditions that require an updated air traffic study. For example, there's already greatly increased parking usage by the new Olympics Fitness Health Club next door to the site. They have a permitted occupancy of more than 500 people and no parking of their own. And the Ocean Boulevard Road diet, as you heard, has narrowed the street to one lane in each direction in the area of the project. In conclusion, the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center will not in itself make Long Beach the aquatic capital of America. It will not be feasible to hold events to accommodate the thousands of spectators planned by their beach and swimming and tidelands needs would be delayed or neglected. Parks throughout the city would not receive the funding needed. It is likely that the Coastal Commission will not approve this beach encroachment, as detailed in the May 11th letter to the city from their district director. Don't let this happen. Don't waste more time. Uphold these appeals and revisit the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center plan. Let's work together to make a plan that will make Long Beach an aquatic capital. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. We're going to go to our second appellant, please.
Speaker 5: Hello.
Speaker 3: Do you want to do you need the the quicker to move the presentation?
Speaker 5: Well, yes.
Speaker 3: I guess we do. Okay. So that's backwards and forwards. Okay. Need to point it right at the screen up there.
Speaker 1: At point.
Speaker 3: Pointed at the screen when you want to advance the slide. Yeah. But screen pointed at that black screen. When you want to replace the black screen with the words on it.
Speaker 5: You're going. Do I go first?
Speaker 3: I don't need it at all. So just write. Good evening. Members of Council Mayor, fellow citizens of Long Beach. I am Joel Weinstein, president of Citizens About Responsible Planning or Carpe for short. KARP As a new organization, we're committed to promoting responsible planning in Long Beach and toward this mission. We have resources and 501c status so that we will be able to participate in local political campaigns and other relevant activities. Now, we definitely support upgrading the swimming and aquatics for our city, and we believe that responsible planning can achieve this. But we are appealing and we are supporting all arguments by the other appellants where we are appealing because compared with available alternatives, the approved project needlessly. I repeat that needlessly embodies serious negatives big extra risks thank to the site quake liquefaction, sea level rise flooding and wave action huge extra costs, extra access time, inconvenience and traffic congestion which will affect everybody, whether local residents trying to come in to swim or people visiting for the day or people in the hotels. This project really needlessly shortchanges everybody swimmers, aquatics participants, users of worthy and needed, but now underfunded tidelands facilities and other Long Beach taxpayers. And it seems to have come about because project planners put on nostalgia, inspired blinders to preselect an inferior cyc. You know, a replacement doesn't have to be physically at the same site. We're talking about a replacement and enhancement of function, not necessarily, you know, blindly following what looked like the right side of 50 years ago. This. The stakeholders selected were a stacked deck against basic recreational and instructional swimming, and the Planning Commission easily rejected considering impact of costs, even though their key duty is to protect facility users, the neighborhood and city taxpayers from eventually being stuck with a dysfunctional white elephant and the project air is legally defective. Now, please bear in mind that approval or disapproval of the air is of course, not the same thing as approving or disapproving the project. You can approve the air and reject or postpone the project. Conversely, you can approve the idea of the project and disapprove the air and fix it. But whatever you do, and no matter how many.
Speaker 4: Folks clamor.
Speaker 3: For or against a project, the air must be judged on legal adequacy of its information. Now, here is an Cantrell to tell you some of the details about that air.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor and Council and Control. I'm another director of Carp. See if I can make this work. Karp is appealing the long March 2nd planning Commission approvals of the. Belmont Beach Aquatic Center, namely the ER Site Review Standards, conditional use permit and local coastal development permit. Our original concerns included inadequacies pertaining to story polls, height variances.
Speaker 4: Traffic studies, alternative.
Speaker 1: Locations.
Speaker 4: Geological, biological.
Speaker 1: Sea level rise and the study of e t f e plastic. We also agree with and support the issues of the other appellants. First, the air traffic studies must be redone and recirculated. This is a picture of the road diet. EIA or mitigation requires that during construction traffic be limited to one lane to a car to allow for construction vehicles. That means leaves no lane for motorists. There must be a new traffic study done, taking into consideration the current one lane effect on construction, public safety vehicles, motorists and bike users. The study seemed to assume all traffic would be coming from downtown. There were no studies done for traffic coming off the four or five freeway or from Second Street or ocean from the east. None of the traffic studies were done on the weekend, in the summer when the highest number of traffic goers a presence nor during any beach or pool events. The mitigation for events with more than 450 aspect haters is, quote, create a traffic mitigation plan, but no plan is given. It was suggested that shuttles might be used, but no mention of where the public would park to use these shuttles. Tonight it was stated that the striping is just paint. As I remember it cost $80,000 to put in the striping. Does that mean it's going to cost $160,000 for re striping. For a before and after events.
Speaker 4: We are also.
Speaker 1: Concerned about alternate locations. The Air considered three alternate locations. All were dismissed without environmental study for trivial reasons. The Queen Mary site was rejected because of a lease with a private operator. However, this operator is currently searching for recreational uses in this area. What better use than a world class aquatic center? And you can see we have an iconic.
Speaker 4: Structure already.
Speaker 1: In place, the Spruce Goose Dome. It certainly is large enough to hold multiple pools, spa's diving well and even a banquet room and sit down restaurant. In this same area is the Harry Bridges Memorial Park, which has frequently been used as a parking lot for large events. The Air States it can't be a pool location because it's parkland mitigation and must be used for outdoor recreation. However, the conceptual plan for the Queen Mary shows the park is slated to have an amphitheater for live concerts. Surely an outdoor swimming pool would serve more of the public, especially children, than an amphitheater or a parking lot. The third location is the elephant lot at the Long Beach Convention Center. The main objection to this site was that it was currently leased until 2030. However. I think he skipped. Oh, yes. This lease did not stop Mayor Garcia from offering this site to George Lucas for his Star Wars museum. When Lucas chose another site, the mayor was then quoted as saying, Long Beach is ready to host multiple events as part of the L.A. 2024 Olympic bid. Sailing, water polo, BMX racing and other great events will be hosted right here at our Waterfront Olympic Sports Park. And in the middle of this Olympic sports park is a swimming pool. The aquatic center could be built here in downtown with hotels, restaurants, freeways saved from sea level rise and better availability for a larger number of visitors and residents. And it would cost as much as $50 million less to build the facility, even on landfill, than on sand. Which brings us to another concern. The current location has seismic, geological and sea level dangers. In 2014, the council was told by staff that building on the beach was like building on a bowl of Jell-O as a side is on sand in a liquefaction and earthquake zone with rising sea levels. However, according to the staff information, given the Planning Commission on Geology and Soil quote, there are no geological hazards and the project is feasible. The EIA admits that eventual sea level rise could flood.
Speaker 4: The lower levels of the pool structure.
Speaker 1: But not to worry because there would be no people, only equipment there. The conclusion, quote.
Speaker 4: The proposed project.
Speaker 1: Would not be adversely impacted by sea level rise due to climate change. No mitigation is required, unquote. Here you see some of the damage done in Belmont Shore by the 1939 hurricane. I remember this clearly as saltwater killed our lawn at 101.5 Claremont. This was before Long Beach had a breakwater to protect the beaches. The air did no studies to compare sea level rise with or without the breakwater, which is another glaring inadequacy. The city has many pictures of the site plan and pool design showing an attractive plastic bubble. However, no study was done on the problems with the chosen bubble. E. T f. E. Plastic. And there are many. Even ETF e manufacturers do not recommend its use on or near the beach. Plastic can be damaged and corroded by blowing sand, sand, chlorine, solid air, port.
Speaker 4: And bird.
Speaker 1: Pollution as seen in this photo. Especially trained rock climbers must be hired for cleaning and repairing the roof. ETF e roofs are recommended for cold climates as they retain heat and can warm.
Speaker 4: Up large.
Speaker 1: Structures such as greenhouses in football stadiums in Southern California as a cover for heated pools. The heat will be unbearable for those not in the water and requires extreme air conditioning. Another problem in our climate is condensation. Air Scope, a manufacturer of ETF, EA says, quote, Locations which have cool nights and hot days.
Speaker 4: And a general high.
Speaker 1: Level of humidity are particularly susceptible, unquote. What has higher humidity than a heated pool? ETF The reflection confuses birds and they crash into structures such as happened at Viking Stadium headlined as the, quote, bird killing stadium. Birds are killed daily by flying into high rise buildings. Well, a 78 foot plastic structure on the beach in Long Beach have the same results. ETF. EA buildings can damage birds, but birds can also damage buildings. Another quote from airstrips.
Speaker 4: Birds loved to.
Speaker 1: Land on rooftops and peck at their food to break it up. The bigger the bird, the more powerful the pecking action. It is widely known that ATF roofs installed nearby or close to the sea suffer the worst of this. This is because.
Speaker 4: Seagulls use the roof as an ideal.
Speaker 1: Platform to peck at shellfish and the occasional stolen.
Speaker 4: Chip.
Speaker 1: Another manufactured tennis set states. We discovered that many etouffee roofs were damaged by birds. They create holes by pecking it with their beak. It's a very serious problem and a strong argument against the use of ETF EA for roofs. In rejecting the three alternate locations, one of the objections cited was Project Objective 12. There must be a view of the ocean from inside the facility.
Speaker 4: However, this.
Speaker 1: Facility will not be transparent. As you can see, this is what? The Etefa plastic looks like because of a California Energy Code requirement to block 91% of sunlight penetration. The ETF must be solar dot imprinted. Thus the view of the ocean inside the facility will be like looking through a cataract. So the ETF is formed into pillows, much like these used for packing. These pillows are each filled with air and require a machine to be kept in place. Inflating holes and too many pillows can cause the roof to collapse. And I will demonstrate with this Pelican Peak what happens to play to these pillows when they're picked by birds? This is the train station in Manchester, England. Here is one of the many holes in the Manchester ETF roof which eventually caused its collapse and injured two people in October of 2016. A six month study determined the holes were caused by gulls drawn by the smell of the McDonald's. Inside a plastic roof would be an extremely poor choice for a pool on the beach. With our many gulls. Here is the park at. Here is the current park at Belmont Pool. Karp would like to see it remain as parkland. Carp is not against swimming pools. In fact.
Speaker 4: This looks like.
Speaker 1: A wonderful swimming pool. We'd like to see a pool in every district.
Speaker 4: Carpio asks.
Speaker 1: You.
Speaker 4: To vote to uphold.
Speaker 1: Our appeal and deny the Planning Commission's approval of this very costly.
Speaker 4: Vulnerable.
Speaker 1: Pool. Please find a more appropriate and public serving location for the Aquatic Center. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. We will now have our third appeal. A third appellant.
Speaker 1: And I think I there's some extra time left maybe for the other appellants.
Speaker 0: I think we've got 15 minutes for each. Appellant And then your presentation received an additional 3 minutes. So I think it's 15 per.
Speaker 5: Appellant Well yeah. Okay. What? Oh, that's okay.
Speaker 0: Hey guys. There's no there's no commenting from, from the audience yelling please. So let's just continue. So let's have the time up and the third.
Speaker 4: Time go time. Anna Christiansen, Long Beach resident representing the Long Beach Area Peace Network and appellant for Long Beach Area Peace Network opposes the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center because it fails to provide the social and racial equity that the residents of Long Beach deserve and are entitled to by law. Additionally, both the Long Beach Peace Network and the US Swimming Foundation agree that the systemic lack of diversity in aquatics can only be overcome by providing equal access to facilities and programs that focus on public health, safety and recreation as well as competitive aquatics. Now let's hear from our history making Olympic champion.
Speaker 3: Gold gold.
Speaker 4: Medalist salmon. Manuel. Oh, so she's not here. We have to watch a video for these. Very. You can. You can meet my friends. My. Really great. Maybe from my. Parents wanted my older brothers and I to be safer around the water. She goes to a different set of goals is really important for me. Dreams really do become reality when you work hard. I have been inspired by so many other people to get to this point. Colin Jones I saw myself in them sometimes. I was questioning if I was in the right sport because I didn't see people that looked like myself.
Speaker 8: They really inspired me. She did. USA Swimming has definitely been an.
Speaker 4: Amazing resource for all of us.
Speaker 1: It has helped post-collegiate athletes get financial support to continue to.
Speaker 4: Realize their dreams as Olympians.
Speaker 8: The Rio Olympics, a mom became the first African-American woman to win an individual.
Speaker 4: It's just a testament to how far our sport has come. We're starting that trend to get more minorities into the sport who don't.
Speaker 8: Know how to swim. I think it's extremely amazing that the USA Swimming Foundation has a goal of teaching a million kids how to swim.
Speaker 1: It's the most rewarding.
Speaker 8: Thing to see someone get into the pool and learn how to float, kick on their back. They've achieved something so important, but also they're just having a fun time.
Speaker 1: You know, splash splashing.
Speaker 8: In the water. The numbers are extremely staggering. 70% of our. Latinos and 40% of Caucasians. History. Making history builds great. It's extremely humbling to be an inspiration to someone. Inspiration to give back. The next generation of kids who get into the sport and love. Foundation for saving lives and building champions.
Speaker 4: By the way, we are Parks and Rec is a partner in the Make a Splash program. Statistics show that Americans, especially children, are at risk. 100 million, 100 million Americans don't know how to swim. As Simmons said, the statistics are true. 70% of African-American children, 65% of Asian American and Native American children, 60% of Hispanic children and 40% of white children can't swim. Nine children drown every day and every year. 5000 children under age 14 are hospitalized due to near drowning. Drowning is the number one cause of death for children under five. And the number two cause of injury related death for children under 15. Minority youth are far more likely to drown than their white peers. Long Beach, the aquatics capital of America, has no public pools. In six of its nine council districts are three. Public pools must serve almost one half million residents to build a Belmont Beach, an aquatic center, a massive competitive aquatics facility with two Olympic pools, two recreational pools, two spires, a high dove in the affluent third district. When six districts with higher population density and more low income and minority children have no public pools at all. Not only violates the public trust, but also local, state and federal laws. There is a new sheriff in town and the BBC is under arrest. Resubmit amendments to the code to act. Include the legal definition of environmental justice as the fair treatment of people of all races, cultures and income. With respect to environmental laws, including the sea, air regulations and policies, the Coastal Act, therefore sequel, now explicitly prohibits discrimination and promotes equal access to the beach and coastal zone, as well as to any program or activity that is conducted, operated, administered or receives financial assistance from the state. The Coastal Commission's report on climate change and sea level rise acknowledges disproportionate impacts on people of color and low income communities. Civil rights and environmental justice concerns in the coastal zone include access to recreation, beaches, parks and the ocean, public health and wellbeing, public participation and decision making discrimination including unintended consequences based on income, wealth, race, ethnicity or culture. So move it or lose it. The BBC is out of compliance with the Coastal Act requirements for recreational facilities because it doesn't need to be built on the beach. On the proposed site. The BBC would deny public access, certainly to the sand beneath it, as well as risk. Further degrading our shrinking shoreline are shrinking by adding acting as a barrier. Not that the city wants to call it that, especially as the sea level rises. Those designing and approving the BBC either fail to consider or rejected alternative sites and designs that would be less discriminatory towards low income and minority residents, especially those living in north and west Long Beach. The stated purpose of the Belmont Beach, an aquatic center to serve existing users in the same location as the old pool, fails to address the city's history of racial and economic discrimination. The BBC also violates our city healthy communities policies, which states that neighborhoods with historic barriers to health, wellness and safety will be the first to have new recreational facilities. Guests who didn't get invited to dinner, low income and minority residents were not equal participants in the design and review process of the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center, as required by Sequoia and the Coastal Act. The 14 member Stakeholder Advisory Committee appointed by city manager Pat West and former third callus councilman Frank Colonna, was dominated by those involved with and benefiting from a competitive aquatics venue, remaining on the same site as the old Olympic pool. The the committee had no representatives from underserved communities of public or public health advocates such as our own building healthy communities. Long Beach. No community meetings were held outside of the Third District other than the ones at City Hall. So no local, no district community meetings, third district community meetings focused on architectural elements and limited discussion on alternative sites with respect to equal access. A history of discrimination has created a lack of equity today throughout much of the 20th century in Los Angeles County. And this is a hidden history of racially discriminatory measures. Limited access by people of. Color to beaches, housing, job, schools, playgrounds, parks, swimming pools, restaurants, transportation, and other public accommodations. Public beaches were basically off limits to people of color. Blacks could enjoy only the inkwell a half mile stretch of beach in Santa monica and a two block long resort of Bruce's beach in Manhattan Beach Public Pools limited access by people of color to a rare international or Mexican day, after which the pool would be drained. In 1907, white residents in Long Beach block the development of an area used by African-Americans for picnics and outings, calling it a colored Coney Island. In 1917, over a protest by the black community, the drowning, the I can't say it N-word game at the pike continued operating. The city attorney held that there was no legal method of permitting it unless it could be shown to be a health hazard. And the city council of that time also failed to oppose it, referring the matter to committee. In the 1940s, black residents and businesses in predominantly white areas were firebombed and vandalized. In the 1950s, people of color could still not own property. Where I live in the third district where the BBC is located. Today we reject such overt acts of discrimination. However, de facto segregation and economic disparities continue to divide Long Beach by race and class. So now it's showtime. Tonight, the Long Beach City Council, you or elected representatives can move Long Beach toward greater equity, diversity, unity and health by acknowledging the truth of the appeals before you. Will this Council certify the Environmental Impact Report? Approve the site plan review, conditional use permit standards variance and local.
Speaker 3: Coastal.
Speaker 4: Development for the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center. To do so would kick the can down the road to the Coastal Commission, leave the city liable for the negative impacts of this project, including delaying and denying other projects deserving of Tidelands and other public moneys and open the city to lawsuits? Or will the Council come to terms with the fact that, unfortunately, the Stakeholders Advisory Committee, our wonderful Development Services Staff and our esteemed Planning Commission have greenlighted a project.
Speaker 3: That is both.
Speaker 4: Legally and morally indefensible. The Long Beach Area Network says, Please put health equity and public safety first. With respect. I'm sorry. I was distracted by Mr. Parkin says put health equity and public safety first with respect to public aquatics facilities and beaches. As regards the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center project, Mr. Modica. Shrink it, split it, move it or forget about it and build community pools instead. Okay. So I just I just want to make one comment since I got 3 minutes here. You know, when they're talking about as Mr. Modica came to my community about, now we need more money. Where are we going to get this money? We're going to get it from people who love swimming in the pool. Well, where did the city already look for it? I attended those last budget meetings. I was out in Mr. Richardson's district when seniors asked if they could just get a field trip, you know, and then somehow our city manager came up with a half a million dollars left over, just leftover money. Those seniors didn't get any field trip last year, last year, but there was money left over. And so it was Mr. West that I believe that suggested that we put that extra half a million dollars in the pool savings account. Now, in a meeting this week, I was told by I won't mention names, but one of the staff members that they fought back because they needed it for senior meals for low income seniors. Now it's getting a little crazy and we want the Olympics, but they need that pier fixed. All right. And this so-called savings account, $4 million a year needs to be put in it just to keep it even. You know, in the length of this meeting, that's about a thousand bucks every day that we don't put 11,000 bucks into that pool account. It's a money pit. I know I'm not supposed to talk about money, but it's rude, I guess. But anyway, it's just reality. It's. It's really reality. And, you know, what's what's real. What brings me to this is my young friends vision, which said, don't end it. Just don't always talk about what you don't want. What do you want? I said, I don't want kids to drown and I do want kids to swim. I just believe in community pools. I believe in this community. I believe that we can we can do that for each other and for our children. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And before we had the last appellant I just wanted. I'm talking to Mr. Mays. Just make sure we're doing the, the, the timing. And so there was about a little under or about 3 minutes left over of the appellant before and about two and a half of the appellant currently. And so Mr. Mayes also was informing me that if the appellants want, they can use those minutes however you want at the end of the presentation. Or if you want to extend that, that's fine as well. So in the appellate bank, I think currently we have about 5 minutes. Okay. All right.
Speaker 1: Put on a thank you for that, mayor. That was one of the issues that most of us were discussing the last couple of moments, which was our understanding was that we were able to share our time. So good evening, Mayor and City Council. My name is Gordana Cager. I'm one of the four appellants to the Planning Commission on March 2nd, 2017. You have my complete written comment. I've had to extract much of what I wanted to say this evening because of the time limitations. So let's start. Okay. Standards variance. A standards variance was approved by Planning Commission for this project. The Planning Commission's approval of the Standards Variance was not based on facts and fails to support the requirement under the Long Beach Municipal Code to approve a standards variance. This is terribly boring stuff and so I apologize. Code to 1.15.2890 defines standards variances. A standards variance can't be used to intensify the use of a lot. Sorry. There we go. Code to 1.25.306 is required findings and now we go. These findings must be based on fact and analyzed made in adopted before standards variance can be approved. Most important, the project must be found to comply with all four of these findings there behind you, not just one or two, but all of them. And here they are, condition number eight. The staff report argues that the project site is unique because it is split zoned plan development PD two maximum height 25 feet park zone maximum height is 30 feet. It goes on to give a history of the former Belmont Plaza pool and then describes all the areas, the buildings, the beach , parking lots, the paving all around the site. Then the report says the presence and location of these existing improvements act as site constraints that limit the ability to design a facility in compliance with height limitations. None of this uniqueness makes it impossible to design a 25 foot to 30 foot pool building surrounded by the existing buildings, the parking lots in the sand beach. The staff report fails to support the argument that split zoning and the site's surrounding structures and amenities or designation as a special use park can only be satisfied by this new pool project. This standards variance is not supported by fact and cannot be approved for condition B. The city is clearly not experiencing hardship or being deprived of their rights to use the property as a park or PD two zoned area. Other properties in the same zone are being used as a park are public beach, for example. The staff argument is based on the former use of the site, not on the use of other properties nearby or on other properties. With these zoning designations, there is no evidence that nearby improvements forced the approval of this structure on this site, and the city's inability to use this property in a manner as other properties impede to or park, and that the city is experiencing a hardship is not supported by fact. The standards variance cannot be approved and d in the coastal zone the variance will carry out the local coastal program. And in fact this project actually violates the city's local coastal program. And this is it style a our building should be in harmony with other existing styles in the area. This building is clearly designed to be iconic. It is an iconic building and by definition, not in harmony with other buildings. Height. No building can be over two storeys high or 25 feet above grade. This building is 78 feet high. The curved roofline is more than 25 feet high over the majority of the structure. Lot coverage. No building shall cover more than 50% of its site. Now, here's the math. Here's the plinth, the foundation of the structure. This pool complex sits on a seven foot high foundation. The plinth covers 130,034 square feet of the project site. The mass behind you. The project site is 5.8 acres or 252,648 square feet. Half of the project site is 126,292 square feet. And the project exceeds the maximum. On this site by over 3700 square feet. Last, there's a special design standard. There won't be any unobstructed views through this site toward the beach. The pool structure is built on a seven foot high plinth on the beach. That seven foot wall will obstruct views through the site toward the beach and the ocean. To sum up the standards, variance cannot be approved as three of the four findings of fact have not been met. The City Council cannot uphold this approval of a standards variance for this project. If you do your violating your own code, the local coastal development permit findings the staff.
Speaker 4: Report deliberately.
Speaker 1: Ignores critical elements of the LCP. From Mel Nutter's testimony on March 2nd, 2017 at Planning Commission. The city as the applicant is asking itself as the permitting agency to violate its own LCP rules. The proposed coastal development findings speak generally about coastal policies and LCP policies. The findings do not mention the requirement of its adopted LCP that the coastal development permit issues be found consistent with its implementing ordinances such as the standards variance just described. The standards for granting a variance in the city's coastal zone are included in its LCP. Therefore, a failure to apply those standards would violate the local coastal program requirements. The City Council must overturn the Planning Commission's approval of a coastal development permit for this project. Violations of the Coastal Act. There are coastal policies for this project which were never identified or analyzed in the air. This is a violation of secure, which mandates that the air identify and fully analyze important Coastal Act policies. For example, the proposed development violates 30253amb of the Coastal Act. This has to do with protective devices and policies against coastal armoring from that section behind you. New development shall do all of the following, and it goes on to explain. This pool is built on a seven foot high pedestal, the plinth foundation. This is a structural protective device specifically designed to address flooding from foreseeable sea level rise. The air fails to identify, much less analyze, the Coastal Act policies prohibiting protective devices. This is a violation of secure and a violation of the Coastal Act. Protecting use of the ocean. The beach are also important elements of the Coastal Act. The air is supposed to analyze potential impacts, evaluate them properly, and identify the negative impacts. Under section 30231. From the air esthetics. Important factors in determining whether a proposed project will block views includes height, mass and location relative to surrounding land uses. The air then lands this whopper the sea. The city has not adopted defined standards or methodologies for the assessment of esthetic impacts, and that's a false statement. The city sure does have a defined method to identify esthetic impacts and its municipal code. 21.20 1.302.5 B Building height variance applicants shall erect storey poles plural, which accurately represent the full extent of the proposed structure. The city chose to install a single storey pole 14 days prior to the March two, 2017, Planning Commission meeting to satisfy the city's public notice period. And after the close of public comment for the IIR, the pole only recorded the height of the new building 78 feet and the height of the former building 60 feet. All views of the former building and proposed building. These key views from the air were Photoshopped into one dimension images. And here's one example.
Speaker 4: Artificially.
Speaker 1: Reducing the visual impacts of the proposed building in these images.
Speaker 4: The E.R. ignored the public.
Speaker 1: Vista, which will be blocked from Belmont Plaza adjacent to the Belmont Brewing Company by the bubble building looking east by Southeast. So would this project have a substantial adverse effect on a scenic vista? The air tells us no. The curved, elliptical shape of the bubble and the change in the building placement on the site. Now north south, formerly east west. With the reduced structural mass from the bubbles, elliptical design would not result, quote, in a substantial adverse effect on scenic vistas. That is a subjective statement with no basis in fact provided in the air. Further, however, the proposed quote project design appears to have.
Speaker 4: Comparable mass.
Speaker 1: Scale and height to the former Belmont Pool complex. That's another subjective statement with no basis, in fact. Further quote The visual character of the project would not be substantially degraded with implementation of the proposed project. Another subjective statement would no basis, in fact. A letter from the firm of Chaton Brown and Carstens dated February seven, 2017, to the city further details the sequel violations resulting from the city's refusal to include information obtained from Story poll installation. The public was not given an adequate method to assess and comment on the impacts of this project on any scenic vistas under the city's own municipal code. The EMR should be recirculated after the installation of story polls that documents the full size, shape and mass of the new project. Allow the public to identify and comment on the impacts to scenic vistas as required under section 300231 of the Coastal Act. Now more on air. Global climate change. The project was analyzed in the air for impacts on greenhouse gas emissions and the impacts those emissions have on sea level rise. And there aren't any. The air suggests the project may in fact be vulnerable to the effects of sea level rise. The city commissioned a wave up study in October 2014 to analyze the site's vulnerability to rising sea levels. And the air offers this table. With projections from the study on the project site. Then the air gives us some good news. Everything above the pool's main deck is safe. That's because the main pool deck is elevated 17 feet above me. Mean sea level. The waves will only reach 8.2 feet in the year 2060 and 10.4 feet or greater in the year 2100. Here's the bad news. The lower level of the building, the pool equipment and the storage and the parking areas are expected to be below projected waterline. The air then makes these two amazing conclusions. Visitors to the project would not be subjected to the impacts of sea level rise, and therefore the proposed project would not be adversely impacted by sea level rise due to climate change. And how does this project square with the city's policies on sea level rise climate, climate adaptation and resiliency? It doesn't. The city's own Climate Resiliency Assessment Report in December 2015. Sea level rise is 1.5 feet. Flooding from a 100 year storm expands to cover almost the entire peninsula. All of Belmont Shore and Alamitos Bay. Table four from that same report. Adaptation strategies for New Developments. New developments. This is a new development. Mandatory setbacks, required warning notices for developers on the potential impacts of future sea level rise and smart growth. Now let's hear from the state of California. This is the state's Ocean Protection Council report dated April 2017. Rising seas in California. It's the state's guidance document provided to state and local agencies such as yourselves to incorporate sea level rise projections into planning, permitting and investment decisions. The April 2017 report cites recent advances in ice loss science and projections of sea level rise from the report's key findings. The rate of ice loss from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets is increasing. New science and evidence has highlighted the potential for extreme sea level rise. The April 2017 report shows a chance of sea levels rising higher than ten feet in 70 years. That's two times higher than the sea level rise projections identified in this air. And here are some images of what that might look like. On the site. These are provided by Cal State University, the Department of Geology students. The air must be recirculated to analyze the the latest sea level rise science projections released by the state of California. The IIR alternatives. Additionally, quote, funding for the proposed project is entirely sourced from Thailand's operating fund. That's a false statement. The project site alternatives were artificially excluded based on the proposed funding for this pool, with 103 million estimated construction budget and only 60 million budgeted from Tidelands. This project requires alternative public funding sources for over 43 million, and whereas that 43 million to come from. That money, wherever it may come from, is more than enough to build this project inland, away from unstable sand, away from the threat of sea level rise. So let's hire a consultant. Let's do the fundraising. And let's build this pool complex inland. 50 million is proposed from that fundraising effort. We can build this and build it exactly as designed in another part of town. The EIA was announced on April 11, 2016, asserting full funding of Thailand's funds. Assistant City Manager Tom Modica was quoted in the Press Telegram on April nine, 2016. 60 million and tidelands funds are secured. He noted the falling price of oil and that the city was working to identify other funding sources. The city failed to correct this false assertion about tidelands funding in the air. Even when they had the opportunity, the air must be recirculated with alternative sites identified outside of the coastal zone without consideration for funding sources. Thank you for your time this evening and I'm available to answer any questions. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Did. Did you want to use any of the remaining time that you have? Thank you. Nope. Okay. Okay. So we'll close the appellants and the four appellants have now spoken. They've not using any of the additional time. And so now we will come back and we're going to go ahead and go through public comment. But before we do that, I know that we have any sort of any staff rebuttal. Mr. Major. That's correct. Correct.
Speaker 10: Yes, Mayor.
Speaker 0: Okay. So we're going to look at the staff rebuttals and we'll go to public comment.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So we have just a few topics to provide some additional information on. We believe the E.R. covers a vast majority of the comments that you've heard. We believe the air is solid. The air provides a tremendous amount of information and addresses those concerns that were brought up. But I do want to bring a couple of points up. One, we have heard that potentially, if we were to pick up the building and to put it in an alternate location, that tremendous amount of savings could be had. We have had our engineers take a look at it, and that is simply not a true statement. We are looking at approximately 3 to 5% of the total cost is what would be saved by moving it to a different site in the as condition. That's approximately $4 million in savings. But I do want to give an example. If we were, for example, to not do it on this site and do it on, for example, the elephant lot, if that were an available site, which we've gone through the alternatives analysis on that. There are other costs that come with sites. For example, you heard Ms.. Burdick talk about the need for replacing parking. Since you would put that in a parking lot, you'd have to build a parking structure. So while you may save some cost, that $4 million on the beach site would be potentially things like not having to deep water that particular site or use corrosive protection from some of the elements or have the plinth at seven feet. You're still going to want a plinth because you want to be able to get under the building. So those costs are going to be transferrable. So there really isn't a tremendous amount of savings from moving it to another site. Again, 3 to 5% of total costs. One thing we've submitted a letter into the record, a a comment letter back to the Coastal Commission to provide some additional detail on sea level rise and and sand management or a sea level rise and wave up rush. So we do have our coastal expert here today. We have Russ Boudreau from Moffatt, a Nicole, who can answer questions if the council has any. But essentially, we found a very innovative solution that we'd like to discuss with the Coastal Commission. We currently have an active sand management approach where we are moving sand from one area to the other. This is unique in Long Beach, where most cities lose their sand to the ocean and they have to actually import new sand to put back on the beach. Long Beach doesn't lose sand. We essentially it shifts and it moves around on our beach. We believe there's a great opportunity to continue what we're doing with sand management to be able to meet the Coastal Commission's needs of having an active beach many years into the future in front of this facility through either additional beach nourishment or even just sand management. And we may be a beach in many years into the future that actually is still very, very robust, where other beaches are going to lose a tremendous amount of sand. And additionally, with sand management and sea level rise, we also have to look at the life of the facility. How long is this facility going to be along and how does that line up with the you know, with sea level rise? And of course, all of this is included in the EIA ETF. We have studied that material in depth. We've got our architects here. If you have additional questions, it does stand up in marine environments. We've seen it work very, very well and throughout the country in a lot of different areas. It is not so sensitive that a pelican is going to break it if it lands on it. But if you have additional questions, we have our architects here learn to swim programs that were talked about. We absolutely agree with that comment. They are vital. They are important. We do do those within the city of Long Beach. We would love to do more, of course. And this facility is that is one of the goals and functions of this facility is to have people learn how to swim and be active. There was a comment made that there are somehow barriers to access, that this pool would be discriminatory and not allow individuals into it. I just need to say very clearly that is absolutely not the case. This is a facility open to anybody and everybody. There are no barriers to entrance. The site is fully accessible. We have heard about this concept about putting other pools in areas in in Long Beach. It's a very a great idea. I think we would all be embracing the fact of having additional pools. It simply is a funding issue. There are no additional general fund that would be available to be able to do that type of infrastructure project. And legally, we are legally restricted from taking Tidelands dollars and using them outside of the title ones area. I will ask Mike Mayes to answer a quick question about the alternative location analysis so that you know what square requires a little alternative location analysis and how we've gone a little bit beyond that. Actually, in our in our our document and the MISMO deck has one or two things to add as well.
Speaker 10: Mayor and members of the city council. As Tom mentioned, there were some comments made about the alternatives discussion in the air in addition to what is contained in the executive summary within the ER that does discuss the alder alternatives. There's a full 36 pages in the environmental document, the air that discusses the alternatives. And as any pointed out in her presentation, not only does the Air discuss alternatives that were considered and initially rejected. It also discusses at some length alternatives sites and additions to also alternative sites that were discussed actual alternative configurations for the pool itself . You heard discussion about a pool without a diving. Well, a pool with the diving. Well, on the outside of the facility. There is no magic number in square law in regard to what how many alternatives that are studied. Typically, you will not see more than four, including the no project alternative, which was included in the sea air. So in our view, this you are more than adequately discusses a reasonable range of alternatives for the Council to consider both alternative sites and alternative configurations of the preferred project, which is the subject of the discussion tonight. So we're satisfied that the alternatives discussion is by.
Speaker 7: Sir. Mayor, members of the City Council, I'm going to add a few things to some of the comments that were made. One of the comments was the city never asked us. We never had any ability to discuss the design. Mr. Modica did discuss the public outreach meetings that had occurred. There certainly was a steering committee stakeholder excuse me, a stakeholder advisory committee. But in addition to that, there were numerous public meetings, three study sessions, an online design survey as well. So those were not limited to just the stakeholder advisory committee. There were also numerous opportunities at both the Planning Commission and the City Council to have discussions related to this project and the design. Also an ER document is a disclosure document. So by virtue of the fact that there is an air, there's also an opportunity for discussion about the design and all of the impacts of that design within the air document. Another comment was that we did not follow the story whole process and did not comply with the intent of the law. The applicant, the appellant in this case will.
Speaker 4: Recall.
Speaker 7: That the city staff was willing to install additional storage poles, but the Planning Commission ruled that one story a pole was more than adequate to to address the height of variance that was being requested by virtue of the intent of the storage pole ordinance. The story pole ordinance was put into place with the intent to focus on residential properties and that were in Belmont Shore, Belmont Heights, Naples and the Peninsula. This project, those projects typically do not have to go through a EMR requirement. And so the approach by virtue of installing a story pole that.
Speaker 4: Would allow the members of the public to.
Speaker 7: Understand what the potential impact of that residential project would be by the storage pole installation. In this case, a story pole was in addition to all of the sequel requirements and the disclosures.
Speaker 4: Of all the environmental.
Speaker 7: Impacts under SEQUA. As I stated just now, the Planning Commission.
Speaker 4: Ruled that.
Speaker 7: One storage pole was adequate and that is what staff complied with. There was also some discussions about maintenance of ETF plastics and that it is only appropriate in cold climates. We have reached out to various users of ETF and their facilities and we have spoken to Arctic in Anaheim, which is the Anaheim Regional Transportation Something Center. It's a transit center in Anaheim. That facility opened in 2014. They have had no bird issues and they have not yet had to clean that facility due to the nature of the ETF. We also recently spoke to a facility in Boca Raton, Florida, which is the Waldorf Astoria Boca Raton Resort, which has a large ETF structure and systems similar to what we're proposing. It is on the ocean. It has been there since 2007, and they have told us that they have absolutely no problems, nor have they had any issues being at a beach facility, nor did they ever have issues with birds puncturing the membranes or any challenges keeping the roof clean. Boca Raton, Florida, is not a cold weather climate at this point in time. Mr. Mayes addressed the alternative locations. And then I want to focus on protective devices, the definition of new development, and then standards, variances and lot coverage and coverage requirements for the newbuilding more than 50% of the site. That would be true in this location if this location were not in split zoning. And so there is a park zone that covers the southern half of the site and the park zone does not have a 50% lot coverage requirement. The lot coverage is determined by site plan review committee. So we are very comfortable with the findings that we've made related to the standards variances, including the requirements for hardship, harmony with other buildings and obstructed views.
Speaker 4: I would like.
Speaker 7: To point out that there are no designated, locally designated scenic vistas in the city. So as the diagram pointed out, the old facility blocked the view from the Belmont Brewing Company. And the new facility is in the same location as well. But that is not a scenic vista. Locally designated scenic vista.
Speaker 4: We also want.
Speaker 7: To talk about protective devices. We did include this, that this is not a protective device under the definition under the Coastal Act. This is a foundation. A protective device would be if you were required to construct a seawall in front of the pool facility to protect the facility. We are not having to develop any protective devices to protect it from sea level rise. Likewise, this is not the definition of new development. New development does not include improvements to any structure which do not change the intensity of its use, which do not increase.
Speaker 4: Either the floor area height or.
Speaker 7: Bulk of the structure by more than 10%, which do not block or impede public access and which do not result in a seaward encroachment by the structure. This new facility meets the criteria and is not considered a new, new development. Those are my comments to address some of the outstanding comments that were raised by some of the appellants. Mr. Monica, do you have anything else to add?
Speaker 6: Yes, Ms.. Burdick. One last thing. We heard about Tidelands and the source of funding. That is absolutely been the primary intent, is that this would be tidelands funded. Of course, we always look for additional funding sources and opportunities, especially when funding comes not in as anticipated. Oil is still an option to be able to fund this pool in the future. We obviously still have a process left to go before we are at the point of construction, but and we are looking for other types of sources, but the main, at least the majority of the of the funds, over 50% currently are tidelands and we expect that to continue. So again, this this really is a Tidelands primary funded facility. And with that, Mr. Mayor, we turn it back over to you. Thank you.
Speaker 5: Excuse.
Speaker 0: Thank you for this next portion of the hearing. We will do public comments and and then we will go to the council.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Mayor and City Council. My name is Bill Thomas. I am a resident in the Almeida's Heights area by the lagoon. I'm here to speak very much in favor of the project, although it may be tarred and feathered on the way out. From what I've heard so far, I fully understand what Tom and Amy said in their presentations. They could follow it. I had trouble following the rest of it, but I'd rather taken a different approach looking at history, more time, and any mentioned history in reference to the project. And so I'll use that to perhaps give another a picture. I came here in the mid-fifties and it was a navy town. I was a Navy pilot stationed at Los Alamos airbase, and I left in the early sixties and didn't come back for over 30 years till I retired. And that was 15 years ago. And I was amazed at how this time the city had changed in the positive in all areas. And when I was in high school, I had a fellow by the name of the forgetting, getting the name Jesse Owens, who came to my high school and talked about how the Olympics affected his life. And he affected my life, got me involved in track and field. I would assume that all these Olympians that we have in our area would be more than willing to go to every high school in the city at Long Beach and explain, well, why all the kids in all areas to come on down the beach and get into swimming? And I think that it's a very positive point that can be made. And the other point, as far as history is concerned, I was stationed at Los Alamitos, as I said, and so I bought a house and I made sure because it had per diem, because there weren't facilities at the at the air base . And I paid $8,000. And I so at the end of 59 for $16,000, and I came back 15 years later and they asked asking for 600 or $800,000 for that house. So I know prices have gone up and I have to realize we have to expect that. But I think we have a fantastic project going and just the idea of having a facility that will put Long Beach on the map. I have some friends back in the Chicago area where I went to high school and they even know about this project and what's going on and it's going to bring a lot of traffic here. And from my sales background, you can't build a whole bunch of pools around the city and expect to bring in income and traffic and keep the image of the aquatic capital. When I first came back, I'm over time. Yeah, I've got up there. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. And we've got a lot of speakers. I'm gonna just try to get the time here. And next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Hi. My name is Ella Jorgensen, and I'm almost 14 years old and I've been swimming with rock and fish for a total of about four years. I currently use a temporary outdoor pool in place of the old Belmont Olympic pool. I understand there are many reasons on why the new pool plans should not be built. For example, time and money. You may be thinking I'm just a kid and I won't be able to understand whether or not this new pool is really worth it. If you're thinking that, it's fine. But many passionate swimmers like me would agree that the new poll does matter. To me, swimming is a sport that I can relieve my stress and frustration while having a great time. By working out in a pool, I can reach peace from daily life. I enjoy being with my team and letting loose of all our daily demands in school. My fellow rocket fishers come from different parts of Long Beach and nearby cities to meet at the barber pole nearly every day. These new poles will be roping communities, families and friends together. We can all agree that we wouldn't have it any other way. When you join rocket fish, you become part of a strong relationship for life. Rockfish is my second family and the bomber pulls my steak at home. I've had the privilege of swimming alongside other teams such as beach swim, water polo, Wilson, High School, water polo and every community water exercise classes that I know the new pools are important to them and our entire community as well. Memories are made at the Boba pool and will continue with the new pools. My mom grew up at the Olympic pool in the seventies. That pool was where she learned how to swim. That pool is where she realized her courage and took her very first jump off the high dove as a young girl. That old Olympic pool was where she took me as a toddler to learn to swim. Little did I know that that was the start of my passion for swim. I still remember the big Olympic rings on the side of the building and telling myself I will get there someday in that very same pool. It is important to me to encourage the community to live a fun, safe, healthy lifestyle. That is what my coach, Hank Weiss, has always taught us. That is why building this new pool center is so important to me and my team and the community. Thank you for your time and considering the new Belmont Pool Beach and Aquatic Center. Please deny the appeals and pass the air.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hello? Council. Mayor Staff. My name is Seamus Ennis, I. I'm a coastal engineer. I'm licensed by the state of California as a civil engineer, practicing coastal engineer since 1995. I represent the beach chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, and we support the appeal. And we wish that you don't approve the EIA because we think mainly the pool shouldn't be built on the beach. The Surfrider Foundation. Our mission is to protect the oceans, waves and beaches for recreation and for nature. By protecting beaches, what we envision is natural beaches unpaved, undeveloped with wildlife and people playing on them. In the last four years, we've lost over eight acres of our beach to development. This is through the the bike path and bathroom restoration. And with this project as proposed, we're going to lose another two and a half acres. So with you're familiar with the phrase death by a thousand cuts, as we go along this path, we're going to keep losing more and more acres of our beach. So there's a good opportunity for you to change direction and actually start what other coastal cities are doing, which is a concept called managed retreat, whereby instead of building on the beach, you get stuff out of the way because we're on the sea level. Rise is coming, flooding is coming. It's going to be very expensive. It's it behooves us to be prudent, mature adults and start planning for this and getting material out of the way instead of actually making the problem worse in the future. Appreciate your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Dr. Garcia and members of the council. I'm a long term member. My name is Pat Nielsen. I'm a long term member of the Long Beach Grunion Swim team. For many years now, we have been host to the Seven Pacific Masters Championship Swim meet at the Belmont Pool. This is a big event. 53 teams bring 600 swimmers and their families to a three day meet. These visitors sleep in our motels, eat in our restaurants and shop in our stores. They also remember Long Beach as a friendly city. As an example, a couple of months ago, many of our swimmers went to a swim meet in Vancouver. The Canadian swimmers made the remark. Please rebuild your Belmont. We miss it. 2012 was our last meet in Long Beach. In 2013, our pool was gone. We did not give up. We took our Long Beach mate to the end of the Aquatic Center and the City of Commerce. Two years later, that pool was being remodeled. We took our Long Beach meet to a lovely outdoor swim complex in La mirada. It was a risk a three day outdoor meet in December. But the gods were with us that weekend. The weather was about 80 degrees. Last year, we returned to the city of Commerce. The Belmont was host to many activities other than master swimming, water polo, high school league finals in Kiev. A few years ago, I had spinal surgery. I could hardly walk at the Belmont. A mechanized chair put me in the pool where I did the water exercise class. Sometimes I worked with other post surgery people. In the shallow end, we called ourselves The Walking Wounded. After a short time, I left the walker, the crab cane, and I was well, my Girl Scouts and my Cub Scouts did their badge work at the Belmont when I was working with Red Cross Small Craft Safety Program. The deep end is where we learned how to do an Eskimo roll in canoes. And what about the little child from the inner city who is lucky enough to have someone take him swimming? He probably can't put his head underwater, but he can jump, splash, kick and have feelings of joy. Long Beach has many special attractions the Queen Mary, the Aquarium, the Grand Prix. And of course, our wonderful university. The members. And we also had a wonderful indoor pool. We, the members of the swim community, trust you to make wise decisions and believe as we do. Thank you. The Belmont is a valuable asset to our city.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 4: Thanks for listening, Pat Nielsen.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Pat. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: My name's Joe Gibbs. I live in Belmont Heights and I've worked as an environmental consultant for many years, including a focus on coastal zone management and related EHRs. I respectfully disagree with some of the rebuttal from your staff. First, describing this new building as a modification of an existing facility under the Coastal Act is is just wrong. That isn't how it works. The Isle now alternatives analysis is also inadequate. You're required by sequel to analyze a reasonable range of alternatives and the final superior alternatives has to meet the basic objectives of the project. The project proponents often write a list of objectives so prescriptive that only their proposed project will meet all the objectives. That's not the basic objectives. That's a wish list with no legal meaning. There's an implication that two of the basic objectives in this project should be fully funded by the title and funds and on the same site in the coastal zone. That fails for a couple of reasons. First, funding isn't a basic objective. Second, it's also not a basic or fundamental requirement that aquatic centers be in the coastal zone. The competitive swimming world is full of aquatic centers, far away from any coast. Nonetheless, the air can find that any site outside of the coastal zone would be financially unfeasible, but not the way you did it here. Financial feasibility can't be tied to an overly prescriptive objective. The feasibility conclusion would need to be supported by a review of alternative sites outside the coastal zone and findings that those sites would not be feasible. You can't just conclude alternatives are financially feasible without doing a financial feasibility analysis of alternatives. Here's the bottom line. You can't exclude alternative sites by writing overly prescriptive objectives, and you can't determine an alternative is a financially feasible one without doing the analysis. Finally, given some of the comments on the draft and the recent letter from Coastal Commission staff, the sea air can't be improved. I think your staff is missing the point of the letter. It's a comment on secure adequacy. You know, a recent quoting from a recent Supreme Court decision, the quote, banning ranch decision decided a couple of weeks ago. Quote, chic. The guidelines specifically call for consideration of related regulatory regimes like the Council Act when discussing project alternatives and air must describe a range of reasonable alternatives to the project or to a location that would feasibly attain most of the basic objectives but avoid substantially or substantially lessen that significant impacts. Coastal Act violation very much by definition significant impacts.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. What we're gonna do is. I'm just. I'm going to let somebody that's up there go ahead and speak and go ahead and speak up there, and then we'll come back down here.
Speaker 4: Good evening. My name is Susan Miller. I have lived across from Belmont Pool since 1993. I was one of the 13 members of the pool advisory committee. The IIR is flawed and lacking in common sense. The parking lots currently flood as shown in these pictures. As the appellants have noted about responses to comments in the air. The lower level of the pool in the parking lots would be the low water line. However, these areas would be not open for public use. And how is a parking lot not public? The parking lot flood now. Sea level rise will impair parking further. No parking is a significant impact. Parking needs mitigation. The water table has changed. In the last 24 years I have lived across from the pool. More development has left Los less porous ground for water runoff absorption. The water rises to our front doors now. Flooding is a problem currently. The addition of massive concrete plinth pool with sea level rise makes this not sensible location through the Air Esthetics Session and the local coastal program include policies for retention of existing terminal and Bennett views. Visual impacts are part of the secure the cafe and restrooms located at the end of Bennett Avenue obstruct public view. The location of the cafe is under Coastal Commission jurisdiction. A seven storey bubble building pool in a neighborhood with a three story building height restriction is not compliant. There is a depiction of the $100 million plus pool as ill look with sea level rise. No parking lot, no access to the pool. My last slide shows the bird pack damage in an ETF material. The birds peck my clay tile roof every morning to drink condensation and break apart their food. The bird pecking has chipped out our clay tile so the ETF roof of the pool will suffer this damage to and at a greater degree. Also note in this slide, the Solar Dot imprint on the ETF material, the California Energy Code requires blocking 91% of all light passing through, thereby making the roof nearly opaque. Who attendees will not have a clear view of the oceans? The seven storey High Bowl pool bubble structure is not transparent, nor will it blend into a three storey high residential neighborhood. I also visited the Anaheim Arctic train station and it does have a leak. I have pictures and it has a duct tape patch on it. I ask you to uphold the appeals and deny the Planning Commission's approvals.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Speaker, please.
Speaker 4: My name is Rene Lawler. I'm a native of Long Beach and I'm also a swimmer. I spend an average of 5 hours a week in a local public pool, and I assist patients that have EMS on a person to person basis, allowing them the opportunity to participate in water aerobics exercise class. I do so with the support of the local National Multiple Sclerosis Society chapter. While I'm a swimmer and I support the idea of adding modern facilities, I also ask you to uphold the appellants and deny the approval for the project of this pool at this location. I wish to touch upon some social injustice issues and also to provide accurate information with respect to Tidelands, because there have been erroneous statements made in regard to Tidelands. There seems to be the idea that Tidelands is only subject to the coastal zone. However, the sovereign lands and the Tidelands includes submerged lands not only out to shore three nautical miles, but also lands that have been filled that are no longer underwater, but were at the time that they were created as sovereign lands, which basically means effective as of 1850, when we became a state in 1911, the city was granted sovereign title to Tidelands. But this also based on case law, means that there's trusteeship to handle and and address assets of public lands that are subject to tidelands that are upriver. So the IRA didn't adequately address all the land opportunities that are up land that could be more appropriate locations for a pool facility of this sort. The Public Trust Doctrine provides that these types of lands, if they're on, for instance, navigable waterways, which the U.S. EPA determined that the L.A. River is a navigable waterway, could be subject to Tidelands. The when you look at that fact and you look at the fact that the L.A. River was only channelized effective as of 1950. Flee Inn in Long Beach. The bulk of the river lands are outside the channelized canal, which means there are a number of locations upriver that should be considered. If you look at historic datum and dams and markers in reference to the high and low mean tide lines, there's also plenty of evidence that dates back to the time of sovereign lands that show that there is, at least up as far as the Dominguez Gap wetlands opportunity for lands to reconsider another location. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 1: Hi. My name's Carelessly. I'm from the fifth District and I'm a new director in the Corp organization as well. I didn't do the the study that the rest of my folks have done here. I just came into that organization. But I did do a couple of commonsense things. I went to look and say, Who else has thought a pool on the beach is a good idea? Who's done it and what's the outcome? And I did find one very close up in Santa monica. They put in a a public pool. They didn't have enough money to do it. They really had a desire to do so. They went and got charitable funds and they put one in. There's isn't fancy. It doesn't have it's not indoor, it doesn't have dove pools and such, and it cost $30 million. But when I looked at the commentary that goes with that website, you know, it was supposed to be a public pool. And what the commentary was was that the public really doesn't use it. The reason being that it's $10 for access to that pool, and most people can't afford that. If they've got a family of four or five, that's $50 for one trip down to the pool. So you're not going to learn to swim there. In terms of that being a public pool that becomes lip service, then the pool that you've put in really is something for the privileged. So you and I can swim there, but that doesn't mean that this will service all of Long Beach.
Speaker 4: The other thing I looked.
Speaker 1: At was the the topic of risk. Having been in the business world for a lot of years, you look at how things are going to play out in terms of return on investment and in particular what are the risks. And this particular location is just fraught with risk. I mean, no no organization that is profitable would dream of investing in this pool because you can put a $130 million into it. And Mother Nature comes by and cracks it, you know, what are you going to do with that? So in terms of the location on this, I just can't see that it's logical to do this. And that has nothing to do with the law or anything else. It's just, where is your good business sense? Curt There's an organization, you know, we're supposed to be here, you know, for citizens about responsible planning. I personally think that's your job. I don't know why I'm doing it.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Hi, I'm Marsha Olsavsky, mayor and city council and staff. I'm a longtime resident at Long Beach. Tonight, I'm representing the Long Beach Area Peace Network, and I'm on the steering committee and I totally support and the Christensen's testimony today. We're about peace and social justice. And we hold vigils we have tabling in Belmont Shore and Bixby Knolls. And we want you to oppose the NRA because of social justice issues. And I just had a couple of little comments. It would seem that the city staff and the Planning Commission doesn't really recognize global warming, which is kind of a it sounds very familiar to me, and it sounds like the president of the United States. So so it's sort of you know, it's I know Long Beach is a very liberal city and we have great liberal politicians . And but I don't know how we came up with no global warming. The other thing that I'm concerned about is that we do have a member on the Coastal Commission and I'm wondering if this all goes through whether Mr. Urunga will recuse himself from the Coastal Commission because he's famous for firing the executive director and also voting for developing the last wetlands in Orange County. So anyway, I just tend to throw these barbs out here because we have to think about the environment, we have to think about social justice. And I think it's just very important that you reject this environmental impact report. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. My name is Debbie McCormick. I'm coach of the McCormack Divers. I'm a member of the Long Beach Century Club and on the board of the aquatic capital of America. Now, to me, I'm just passionate about sports. I'm passionate about kids. I'm passionate about fitness. I'm so passionate about this. I've been here eight or nine times. I started. This four years ago going.
Speaker 2: I read it in the paper and said.
Speaker 4: You were going to rebuild a pool. I was devastated. I got this city hall packed with Olympians. Greg Louganis, Dr. Samueli was here six times, everybody. There's so.
Speaker 1: Much support.
Speaker 4: For this facility in everyone, in aquatics, not just diving, which is my passion, but swimming, water, pool. People need to learn how to swim. We need water safety. And just keep in mind that this pool benefit hundreds and thousands of women, children, kids from every area, every district. I coached kids in almost all of your districts. I've had every ethnic variety. I've had all of my kids that stay long enough have gotten college scholarships to USC, UCLA, Stanford, everywhere. And I think we do really, really good things for your children. I would love to coach your grandkids, even the people that are opposed to this pool come down. I'll teach your kids how to dove and get getting something different to do. If we get the 2024 games, I just think that it would be more impetus to get this pool. We could host possibly the Olympic diving trials and if nothing else, at the very least, we could use it as a training site for the Olympics. I think the design of the pool is unbelievable and I love what they've done. And please consider the majority of the aquatic community and everybody that I've talked to, we need this pool and it'll be so positive and it will make us the aquatic capital of America. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Good evening, Mayor. City Council members and staff. My name is Allison Gallagher. I'm here today on behalf of Assembly Member Patrick O'Donnell, who is in Sacramento. Mr. O'Donnell is a strong advocate of this project. The Belmont Pool is a place where our kids can learn and grow while learning competitive aquatics in a positive community environment. This pool is necessary to ensure our community supports our youth and remains on the global aquatic map. For decades, this location has been home to afterschool and weekend programs promising young athletes and the Olympic trials. The bond pool served as a source for revenue and attracted thousands to the area supporting local businesses. This proposed project will serve as a destination for aquatic athletes, enthusiasts and coaches seeking to train in a world class facility. We need not delay this project any further. The original pool earned Long Beach, the title of aquatic capital of America, and this new pool will make sure we keep that title. Assemblymember O'Donnell supports the Belmont Athletic Aquatic Facility and asks the council to deny the appeals. Further. He urges the council to come up with a funding strategy to ensure that the pool is completed in a very timely manner. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much, Nick Speaker.
Speaker 3: Good evening. Good evening, Mayor Garcia and city council members. My name is Tony Azevedo. I'm a five time Olympic water polo member, Long Beach resident and a Long Beach Wilson grad. I support the Belmont Plaza. You know, I learned to swim at the Belmont Plaza. I learned a dove at the Belmont Plaza, and I learned to play water polo at the Belmont Plaza. But it was the the events that the collegiate events, the international events where I got to meet my idols. And it was those idols that made me the person I am today. So this is about the youth. Please deny the appeals and let our future have the same opportunities. Thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Good evening.
Speaker 3: Mr. Mayor. City Councilman Michael Kirkpatrick. Obviously, you know, you've taken a lot of time to hear from both supporters and detractors of the pool. I appreciate you taking the time to do so. I think you heard from your city staff who is in strong support of this pool and has done a lot of research on it. Thank you, city staff, for all the time and effort you put into this. You also got to hear an hour's worth of appeals. That's obviously a long time to hear a lot of negative energy. I hope that you're hearing a lot of positive things from those of us who are coming down the aisle. There are many, like myself here in line who are thrilled about this pool and very excited about where it's going. I've had said already, I'm a resident of District three. I'm here as part of the Rockfish swim team. I'm also a coach for the Rocketeers Swim Team. I coached Masters as well. I've been a lifelong swimmer. I've competed in the former Belmont Olympic pool. I love this site. I love the sport. I love this city. There's no question that we can dissect the E.R. and debate each point in excruciating detail. I know your staff has looked through all of this excruciating detail. Your staff, architects and builders in the future as to operating maintain the pool are also going to have a lot of work ahead them. So don't underestimate the work ahead of you. That said, there's no issue, a concern that was presented tonight that should sway you to oppose the pool and therefore encourage you to do what's on your agenda. Uphold the playing committee's decision. Adopt the resolution certifying the Environmental Impact Report. Approve a mitigating monitoring and reporting program, and approve the site plan review, conditional use permit, standard variance and local coastal developed permit entitlements for the construction operation. The Belmont Beach Aquatic Center. Thank you for the long title.
Speaker 5: There is a multiple.
Speaker 3: Multitude of users for this new pool. I know you've heard from a lot of them. You've got high schools, youth and adult swim teams, water polo teams, adult aerobics, recreational labs, swimming. Learn to swim programs. I'm at this pool. Monday through Friday and sometimes on Saturdays. If you haven't come down to the pool and seen how busy this pool is, it is busy all the time. We are constrained on pool space. This new pool allow us to have a lot more space to do what we want to do. You've heard a lot of also talk about sea level rise, about parking and about the location and a lots of other things. I do hope I think sea level rise is real. I hope you do, too. I think there needs to be more thought put into that than just we don't build a pool because the sea levels may rise. I think there's a more holistic level of planning that should be thought about because if all the Belmont Shore floods, you got bigger ponds in the pool you just built is underwater. When it comes to location. I think your city staff has done a great job looking at alternative locations. I don't think you're going to find a better location. All Long Beach, and I appreciate the time and consideration you've done to put it where it is. Thanks again to city staff, to city council. Again, encourage you to to support this vote. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. And I'm going to be closing the speakers list. So if there's a whoever wants to get on the speakers list, now's the time. It's we have we still have probably an hour worth of speaking. If we keep going, I may limit down to 2 minutes midway through here. So talk to the attorney about that, but please continue. 3 minutes. Okay.
Speaker 1: So why the Belmont poll matters to me. By the way, my name is Shane Fowler, and thank you for having me here. From when I was about 4 to 11 years old, I felt defeated in life and as a human. I grew up in Wilmington and I got beat up for being white. We moved over to San Pedro when I was about 11, and I got beat up again and this time I fought back. But of course, I lost because I was a scrawny, scrawny little girl. But I had this passion in me. I don't know where it came from or.
Speaker 4: What it was, but I knew I.
Speaker 1: Had a passion in me. And I found somehow I was at a pool and I did a flip up, a diving board, and someone said, You need to go into diving. And I found this sport in it here in Long Beach, and it provided me with a home, with a family. And I wasn't hanging out at the local parks filled with drugs and doing what all my so-called friends were doing and were diving gave me, as I'm the first person in my family to go to college and the first person to dove in a Division one college, and the first person in my family to graduate. And I'm a successful business owner, all because what diving gave to me, it gave me work ethic and ethic. And if you want something and you believe in it, you go for it. This is what the Belmont Pool gave to me. And I honestly, I don't know where I would be if I didn't have this community or this pool. After I graduated college, I never look back. Most of my friends didn't graduate high school. They went and a lot of them went to prison. I honestly might be there with them if I didn't have this pool. 2013 the pool was destroyed and knocked down. That has been a long time. How many dreams have been? They haven't been accomplished because this pool hasn't been here. You guys, this is this isn't this is not a new pool. This is an existing pool. Pool was already there. This pool should be there because we have so there's so much passion in the sport of aquatics. Please don't let it die here. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor.
Speaker 0: Just so you know, the speaker's list is closed. So the gentleman in the back.
Speaker 3: Is.
Speaker 0: Actually the gentleman. The back with the curly hair. There is the last speaker was already in line to your right. You were in line earlier. I'm not with Joe. Okay. Go ahead.
Speaker 4: Laurie Angel.
Speaker 1: I'm one of the directors of Carp citizens about.
Speaker 4: Responsible planning.
Speaker 1: I live on Platt Street in North Long Beach.
Speaker 4: We don't have too many pools around.
Speaker 1: I started swimming.
Speaker 4: When I was eight and got my Red Cross certification. I believe in swimming. I learned to body surf at a very young age and you're lucky.
Speaker 1: You have an entire ocean out there that most people won't even see. Most of the kids that live north of, say, PCH don't even have an opportunity to get down here, much less be in a significant pool. So I think it's nice that everybody wants for the aquatic center. I think that's a wonderful thing. But we do have some information here from.
Speaker 4: Mike Nelson, who's the facilities development director from USA Swimming, and he indicated that.
Speaker 1: Because cost is kind of an issue.
Speaker 4: For the location of this swimming pool, if this project was built at almost any other location.
Speaker 1: An extremely extravagant exterior was more normal.
Speaker 4: It would be in the 35 to $45 million range.
Speaker 1: Case in point, the new facility at the University of Missouri at Columbia.
Speaker 4: Was 32 million. And cost is a factor here.
Speaker 1: I know that you don't want to consider that.
Speaker 4: But part of it is.
Speaker 1: The city's insistence on.
Speaker 4: When they put an air.
Speaker 1: Together.
Speaker 4: Is they point and they do create a specification.
Speaker 1: Such that there is only one location that's a viable location when in fact this could be put in in in numerous locations.
Speaker 4: At a fraction of the cost.
Speaker 1: The 3 to 4% reduction in cost, I don't know where that's coming from.
Speaker 4: But we do have this from a facilities person that develops facilities.
Speaker 1: For.
Speaker 4: Swimming that indicates that it would be a significant savings if it was done elsewhere.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 4: I personally think that it's kind of critical and.
Speaker 1: Criminal actually to invest this much money to benefit so few people.
Speaker 4: I mean, there may be 5000 people in the city itself that will use this facility, which is less than.
Speaker 1: 1% of the population. And the amount of money.
Speaker 4: In budget that.
Speaker 1: It's going to take up just to.
Speaker 4: Maintain and operate the pool is going to be taking.
Speaker 1: Away from Parks and Rec, and that's another issue. So I think learning to swim is really important for people, but this.
Speaker 4: Is not accessible for most. You can say, well, just drive down. I mean, some people don't have cars, they don't have.
Speaker 1: The fare to take the the the.
Speaker 4: Blue line down. So why don't you.
Speaker 1: Put it in a place where more people can get to it? You have an entire ocean out there. So please allow the appeal. I think it's a reasonable thing to do. And deny the air thing.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Hello. My name is Heather Lindros. I live in the second district. I came to support my sister and going to here with going out of the pool. I didn't really expect to speak to everyone, but after hearing anything, I felt like I should. There's a lot of concerns that I guess I have about the pool. My primary concern, I guess, is the diversity issue, its location, and and I get the nostalgia aspect of it. In the latter part of my youth, I swam competitively, I played water polo competitively. I swam at and competed at the Plaza. So I completely understand the nostalgia. But, I mean, I used to take the.
Speaker 1: Bus all the time, too, and to take the.
Speaker 2: Bus from North Long Beach down to Belmont Plaza. That can take over an hour, you know, and then you get there and then you have to pay to get in or I need to get the transit center. I mean, that can take about 30 minutes when you get to the transit center to get to Belmont Plaza. So I just feel like it's very I don't know, I don't feel like it serves all of Long Beach. I feel like it just serves this one section, the section of Long Beach that everyone thinks about, but no one thinks about the other part of Long Beach. And I feel like it's kind of painful because I feel like we're a very like, loving city and people say we're so diverse for whatever reason.
Speaker 1: I don't know why we don't think about that part of Long Beach as.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: Worth those types of things. No one should sit on a bus.
Speaker 2: For an hour to access a pool in our city.
Speaker 1: I think it's a little bit.
Speaker 2: Ridiculous to me. So I would hope I mean, I'm for pool. I think pools are great. I swam, I competed, I get it. But I don't know if it necessarily should be where it is right now. And there's other aspects as well. But I mean, that's kind of my primary concern. I mean, I think everyone should have access to it. So I appreciate your time. I know it's been very long, so I hope you have a great evening. Thanks so much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. We're going to.
Speaker 2: Be for my.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Unless there's counsel. Objection. We're going to go down to 2 minutes. Okay. All right. Continue. 2 minutes.
Speaker 1: Good evening, mayor and council members. My name is Heidi. Shibley and I represent the Surfrider Foundation. And on behalf of the Surfrider Foundation Long Beach chapter, I'm expressing our opposition against the current plans for the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center Development and our support for the pending appeals of the Environmental Impact Report and Coastal Development Permit. While we are not opposed to development of an aquatic center or a public pool in Long Beach, we are very much opposed to the site chosen for this project. The proposed Belmont Pool violates important Coastal Act policies, mainly prohibition of development and hazard zones and use of protective devices for new development. The proposed development includes a seven foot high pedestal plinth foundation. It is clear in the project documentation that this structural protective device is specifically designed to address flooding from foreseeable sea level rise. And the project itself was necessitated by geologic instability from known risks of seismic activity. Yet the er a discussion of foreseeable flooding from sea level rise fails to identify, much less thoroughly analyze the coastal policies prohibiting the proposed protected protective device. This failure in and of itself is cause for a reversing the Planning Commission certification of the air and issuance of the C DP. In conclusion, the CDP violates several Coastal Act policies because the structure will be built on land regulated by Coastal Act policies. The CDP is inadequate and must be vacated by the City Council. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Next Speaker.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Counsel. And Mr. Mayor. My name is Terrence Anderson, and I am President. Of the Belmont Shore Residents Association. The Belmont Shore Residents Association's mission is to represent the residents of Belmont Shore on issues that may impact their quality of life in the neighborhood. To that end, the city's proposal to replace the old Belmont Pool, which frankly, many of the residents claim they miss, they enjoyed swimming there. It was their local pool in their minds. But the city's proposal to replace the Belmont Pool with the BBC has created a lot of discussion, and much of it has been negative. Chief among the primary concerns is the expected negative impact on parking and traffic in the area of the shore during aquatic events. At the new venue, with a capacity of up to 4250 potential spectators and hundreds of participants. Subsequent to the original EIA air being circulated for comment, significant changes have occurred in the direct vicinity in Belmont Shore. One of those changes was the Ocean Boulevard Road Diet. Where our road is has been turned from two lanes in both directions to one lane in both directions in order to slow up traffic. The second change is the opening of the Olympics Fitness Center at the site of the former Yankee doodles. And that new facility has a capacity of more than 500 people with zero dedicated parking for clients and staff. So therefore, the Belmont Shore Residents Association Board hereby requests that the EIA be revised with a new traffic and parking study analyzing the impacts of these noted changes, and then for it to be recirculated for comment before the city proceeds with any approval of this project.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: My name is Mary Parcell. I'm a volunteer with the National Audubon Society through my local chapter that's called El Dorado Audubon. And the reason that I'm here is we wrote a letter earlier for the Planning Commission, which we circulated again for this. And we're concerned about birds, safety, building design and healthy communities. The Minnesota Vikings stadium is made out of the same material as what's proposed for this pool. And what happened is the the worse thing, even though they were that was warned, monitors, fine numbers of bird casualties. You saw the dead birds in the slide that was shown by one of the appellants. It's a sad thing, and I don't think you have the the studies. You need to really study this to figure this part out. This is not a good thing. Also very concerned about the loss of nesting nesting habitat in the mature trees that are in the park that's around that is in there right now. And there are many trees that have been lost in the last ten years, ten, 15.
Speaker 1: Trees at least.
Speaker 4: We have been monitoring the nesting for the last 15 years and we know that for the last 22 years the.
Speaker 1: Birds have been there. So where are you going to put them? Where are you going to put some trees?
Speaker 4: I've asked city staff this for the last two and a half years. I've asked anybody I could think of so that we could propose something and I don't see it. That's a question. So next stop and there are black crowned night herons and snowy egrets there, and they're in the big tree by the temporary pool. But you still lost park, land and trees, so putting in a little saplings isn't going to make it. And I just. I don't have a solution for you anyway, that those are my.
Speaker 1: Comments for El Dorado. A lot of fun. Thank you very.
Speaker 4: Much.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Highway marches in was the second district. In the second district. I'll start this by saying that seems like you guys want a pool and you make it happen. You're being called to uphold the Planning Commission's decision to adopt a resolution certifying event in the air. 0-1601. Dash one six. How come you didn't adopt an earlier resolution that indicated that it would be unwise to build the new pool on that site because of the liquidation factor which was brought up by other people? Climate and climate change is happening. We know the Trump administration disregards climate change, but the truth is it is happening. As in earlier, about maybe seven years ago, we are stated in light of the fact that sea levels have rose and would contribute to the liquefaction of the waterfront sand where the pool was planned to be built. They advised not to go ahead with the project. City staff involved also agreed with that. However, that's apparently been destroyed along with sea life. Rising levels are contributing to sand ification. There will be more rains that will also contribute to qualification of the area as well. Now closed. The previous one was closed due to seismic safety issues. Why are you going to build when there are liquefaction issues? You need new air does nothing to address the liquefaction factor and you folks don't seem to want to agree with it. Side note Let those stakeholder businesses that want to have this built put up the extra money. You say over 50% comes from the Tidelands monies. That could mean only 51%, which put us on the thing for about 49%. Thank you, sir. 48. I don't know.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. America's city council members and especially a staff who's done so much wonderful work on this project. My name is Lucy Johnson and I'm a resident of the fifth District. First of all, I want to just ask you to deny these appeals. It's been very thoroughly vetted through the are all the questions that have been raised have been answered by staff this evening.
Speaker 5: And I think that.
Speaker 4: The count, the appeal is just simply don't want to listen. This was.
Speaker 1: Forgot my reading glasses.
Speaker 4: So sorry this has not been said is not a new facility being built on our beach. It is a replacement for the original facility there. My players Olympic pool, which set in exactly the same location for over 46 years with the seaside bathhouse, which was constructed about 1912 and is replacement the language plant.
Speaker 5: Thanks very much.
Speaker 4: The Long Beach plunge off the pike, which replaces the seaside bathhouse. There's been a large aquatic facility on our beach for over 100 years. Some of the issues about the seismic problems on the old facility were more due to deferred maintenance and also to what I've understand to be that the roof was never tied to the walls . So if you looked at some of the stuff that was posted a few years ago, it shows pictures of the deterioration of the foundation. I know some of you think that this is a District three project only, but I want to assure you there's truly a city, citywide, region wide and even nationwide and will bring huge benefits . Only one of our three municipal pools is the third District and District seven. Not only has one of the three municipal pools, but also one of the three school district pools that could be a high school that's open to the public too much each summer. Consider the District.
Speaker 1: Six as one of the three municipal pools districts.
Speaker 4: One, two, four and eight have no public pools, and five and nine have only the other two high school.
Speaker 1: Pools just for two months each summer. So please support us. Thank you very much for your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Hi, my name is Barbara Queen.
Speaker 1: Thank you for taking this under consideration.
Speaker 4: I am encouraging you to support the ER findings and the project. I support my 5:30 a.m. crowd.
Speaker 1: He gets up in the morning, we go to the pool and there's a pretty long line of people who use this pool.
Speaker 4: I get on a bike.
Speaker 1: And and take our wonderful.
Speaker 4: New bike lanes down there. So I encourage you to keep that type of support for.
Speaker 1: For the local community going.
Speaker 4: So thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Next Speaker.
Speaker 3: Very good. As I said the last time I was here, I fully support this. I'm not a swimmer or a diver. I'm a voter and I look at this as a draw to bring down people from all over the city to be introduced to the full range of boating activity for windsurfing, rowing, sailing's stand up board, paddle board, the full nine yards. Not just sailing. Not just swimming and diving. A number of people have, in my view, inappropriately have played the race card. There's no question that the figures and I don't argue the figures of the relative numbers of the people that get are drowned. All right. But playing the race card is not the way to go. They say you can't have it here because it's a race. It's the people. We need to learn how to swim out here, but yet they have no problem. No problem putting it in the three locations in the downtown area, period. I'm a firm believer in the fact that we're going to have an earthquake. Sea level is going to rise, period. So let's call moving bands. We'll all move up to Signal Hill. All right. Close down, I believe to say the city staff has done a good job in taking the needed actions to mitigate and to prevent any damage period. And I urge this Council to support the recommendation of the Planning Commission that included the former city engineer who pointed out that the if this goes, if we have a pandemic all of downtown, then beach goes. Period. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mr. Mayor and esteemed council members. My name is Liz Carlin. I'm a member of the Long Beach Grunion, which is the Gay and Lesbian Aquatics Masters Program here in the city of Los Ah, sorry, the city of Long Beach. I'm so used to L.A., where I live with 90 members, many of whom live in the second Council District as I do. Our team, our nonprofit board of directors, took a took a vote to support the staff recommendations and support the Belmont Project. We want to go on record. We're a part of the International Gay and Lesbian Aquatics Federation as well. And as such, we represent the city of Long Beach. When we travel as we are going to be going to Miami next month and next year when we're going to be going to Paris. Our other members are here in support of the Belmont complex. I want to thank you, the members, for your time. I want to thank staff for all the work, and I appreciate all the work you're doing. I ask for a yes vote.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: My name is running. I'm with the fifth district. When I was a kid, I think I was about eight years old. I was one of the guys who got kicked out of the Belmont pool. I jumped off the high dove.
Speaker 5: You weren't allowed to do that. I came back and.
Speaker 4: I.
Speaker 3: You know, the police officers were really nice. I was really impressed with those guys because my parents weren't around. It's only like eight years old. And so I got to play around with the cars and stuff.
Speaker 4: And then when you let me go.
Speaker 5: I ran off the pier. You know, I.
Speaker 3: Did that a couple of times as a kid. And, you know, as I grew up, I would run from my house to Belmont Pool. And I didn't know you weren't allowed to jump off the Second Street Bridge.
Speaker 5: But I did.
Speaker 3: So it was like a 18 mile jaunt, you know?
Speaker 0: And so I would have told him, always get.
Speaker 5: Kicked out of the Belmont pool, you know.
Speaker 0: But I enjoyed it.
Speaker 3: I taught my father how to swim there, and he's from India. He doesn't know how to swim. So I was trying to give you guys some humor because you've been hearing all this other stuff. So as I grew up, I became a manager in a Fortune 500 company, and I did a lot of big projects. And one of the things that I used to say was I used to use the term Crystal Cathedral complex, where you build things too big and you try to have these goals like that, Mr. Tom Modica articulated. And I'm just hoping that we don't go off and do something a little bit too big, but I mean, it's a grand scale thing. So all I'm trying to say is that based on what I'm seeing from the people who have presented reports, I hope that that setting yourself up for a lawsuit, I hope that everything works out. But I'm kind of against it just because of what I've seen presented from the.
Speaker 5: The people that are against it. So that's about it. Don't jump off any bridges or anything like that.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next speaker.
Speaker 5: Please.
Speaker 0: I already did that in college as well. So we have the same.
Speaker 3: Mr. Mayor, City Council member, staff. First of all, Mr. Good, I'll give you a compliment. I fell down there, and that was great. I don't. I don't swim. I don't dove. I just try to use common sense. And I would like a pool in every one of your districts. Everybody deserves a pool. Tonight, we have very few pools in this city of Long Beach, and I think it's important that residents experience the pleasure derived from visiting a pool. But the pool, the Belmont Building, that pool, that super pool in Belmont Heights is too expensive. It's too expensive for us to do that. And, you know, I didn't want to pull out the race card, but, you know, it is. It it is. People talk about social justice, that the minority of the minorities in our city are not going to be able to use that pool. They're not going to be able to get down there that if we want more minorities, this diversity to use pools, we need to put them where they can swim, where they can get to them. We're not doing that. The Tidelands money should be saved for more important coastal projects like the Belmont Pier. And there should be no suggestions of major aid money to be used for any shark short financial problems with the building areas, but spending it on the pool or anything else other than what it was intended for. You know, did I hear city staff say something about financing for this super pool will come from the increase in oil prices. Hallelujah. You know, if you do have that crystal ball in city hall and you know, when the oil prices are going to go up.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Joe.
Speaker 3: Please let us know.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Hi, Mr. Mayor.
Speaker 1: Staff from Jessica.
Speaker 4: I thank you very much for all of the work that you've done. You've answered all of the repetitive, repetitive, repetitive questions that are denying this.
Speaker 1: What we need to.
Speaker 4: Do is deny the appeals. My kids took two busses to get to the Belmont Shore pool.
Speaker 1: To train.
Speaker 4: Five days a week. They didn't live in District two. Now, the kids who are part of McCormick divers have to train at the Martin Luther King pool, which is in the most diverse neighborhood. So people saying that people will not be able to use a pool because it's a Belmont don't understand what they're talking about. I lived in Australia for five years and the pools, there were a huge draw from the community. They had community days, they had community activities. They had some of the things that they were talking about where people came specifically to join the facilities there and to enjoy them even if they weren't taking swimming lessons.
Speaker 1: This already cost us a fortune. In 2000, when my son started diving, this was a $10 million project which.
Speaker 4: Got put off, and now it's $100 million project. The more we put it off, the more it will be. My brother is a contractor. He develops properties for Suffolk Construction.
Speaker 1: When I asked him about this, when the pool first closed in 2012.
Speaker 4: He said The weight of the water will be a problem anywhere in California. It's not the beach that's the problem. It's that you have earthquakes in California. So moving the pool is not going to help but keeping there. We've already lost $4 million from just diving trials on their own. We need to keep that here. We need to bring that money to Long Beach to pay for all those other things because all the people who come to visit will be spending money in our city. So please deny the appeals.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Mr. Mayor. City Council staff. My name's Richard Foster. I'm the president of the Aquatic Capital of America Foundation. I've also a 12 year president of United States water polo and four years with United States aquatic sports. We are the quarter capital of America. We took a hit when Belmont Plaza went down. You can talk to any swimmer, diver, synchronized swimmer or water polo player in the United States and say, I swam at Belmont or I played at Belmont. They know exactly where it is part of the city's identity. And we need this tremendous enhancement for the city. This new pool is going to be fantastic for recreational, competitive and just general wellness. I am an attorney, so I see arguments on both sides of issues all the time. And I got to tell you, I am just overwhelmed by the competence, the precision and the dedication of city staff on this project. I mean, they have taken care of, I think complied with federal and state laws. They just did a great job on this project. I'm overwhelmed by the architects and the designers of this facility in my positions in the quarkxpress. I've got to travel across the world and see facilities all over the world. I can tell you they have done they have designed a facility the city will be proud of. It will it will retain the city's identity not only in the country, but worldwide. I've heard the comments about racial equality and I can tell you in pools and the history, Mr. Christiansen is right. There have been problems over the years with racial profiling, with pools, but all aquatic sports, USA, swimming, USA diving, synchronized swimming, water pool . They have outreach programs for minorities. I think the city would just jump in and be part of that whole outreach program. As a start, I think we would like to see the temporary pool be installed in one of the other districts in the city. But we heartily urge you to deny the appeals and approve this E.R.. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: And good evening, everyone. Thank you all for your hard work, especially city staff to an awesome job. My name is Hank Wise and I live and work in District three. I'm a lifelong swimmer and I swim across the Catalina Channel four times in January 2017. The quite a couple of America selected me as Waterman of the Year. I'm down at Belmont Plaza probably 300 days out of the year with with my adult team and with my youth team and the Drew's folks as it's all about recreation. I see it every single day. People from the community are down there every single day. And it's ludicrous when I hear claims like, Oh, there's only going to be so many people down here that use it. Everyone in the city will use it. You know, we're not building an airport in every district to, oh, it's super rich. We're going to build an airport over here now. This is a hub for the whole city. It's a hub for the nation. It's a hub for the world. This is Long Beach. People think of Long Beach and aquatics in the same breath. And we're fortunate enough to have this opportunity, a beautiful pool organized by organized by these wonderful architects and, you know, gone through all the steps and I hear all the appeals. And it kind of makes me a little angry, you know, because what they're trying to do is shut the door on thousands and thousands and thousands of excellent aquatic experiences. I swam for Stanford for for my four years. Right. Guess what? Packed tens every year high school championships when I was at Wilson every year. And that brings together so many people. And yet we have to go through all this to get this wonderful facility. It's worth it. Keep up the good work. It's a good fight. Let's go.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Ray, average eighth district. Well, I did not swim any channel, but I did have the opportunity to sit in the seats that you're sitting in, seated in today and have to make very tough decisions that affect our entire city. Just for a little more levity, I was thinking, okay, ask access to the pool for all. Is that like access like DC is saying access to health care for all. Only if you can afford it. Well, you know, we've heard that from from both sides that this is not supposed to be just for one specific group. But the reality is, is that we do have kids that live in various parts of our city, the sixth district, the seventh District, the eighth District, the ninth district, probably the first district that well, no, not the first district, sorry. Everything north of the four or five freeway that they've never even been to the beach. They don't have the money for bus fare to go to the beach, much less to pay to get into a swimming pool. I think that the $40 million that you still have to look for and I think it's probably going to be 40 and 60 million could better serve the entire city by building pools across the city for pools could be built similar to the one that's at the Belmont Pier, the temporary pill that cost 10 million. That could be made permanent for 2 million more. You could have five more pools, again, available across the city for the residents of Long Beach. How would your constituents react to that additional amenity providing swimming for all people of all ages? We've taken away so much from recreation in this city. I think it's time that we start looking at giving programs back. The one thing that hasn't been mentioned tonight is the newly approved Long Beach City College Olympic pool that can serve our professional swimming population perfectly and for the aquatic capital of America, who have lobbied for the high dove edition since I sat on the council. They can work to raise the additional funds to make that happen at Long Beach City College.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Okay. We have we have closed the hearing and we're going to hear from counsel now and have some deliberation. So there is a motion any second by Councilman Price and Councilman Austin. I'm going to start off with Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 2: Thank you. So just a couple of questions for staff and I'll start with the. Latest point that Ray raised, and that is regarding the Long Beach City College pool. If staff can comment on that. What has been our outreach and our efforts to collaborate with Long Beach City College? And is that a viable option in terms of a public resource for a city of this size?
Speaker 6: Thank you, Councilmember. Yes, we did reach out and talked to Long Beach City College. We wanted to explore if there was maybe some synergy, if they had money to build a pool and we were looking to build a pool as well, can we perhaps find a way to to work together? They were open to the concept, sat down and discussed with us, became very clear very quickly that our programing needs are both so immense that we would not be able to make that happen. They are essentially going to be programing their pool full time with their college athletic type programs and teaching programs. We had actually looked to see could they maybe come down into our site and we would work it into this. You know, is that a possibility to work it into the design or to have them use one of the pools? They found it to be not feasible because you'd have to add students then coming that far and going right back to class. So they are going to have the availability of on that site. We hope that that will be accessible also to the public as another benefit. But it would not work down at the Belmont site.
Speaker 2: Right. So my understanding is that they're building their pool with bond money that they will be expecting. And so.
Speaker 4: The the.
Speaker 2: Population that they're going to be servicing is their students first and foremost. And my understanding in my latest discussions with them is that hopefully they'll be an opportunity for public use at some point, but that has yet to be determined since their primary focus based on the bond is to service their students first. That's correct. Okay. So which would make sense to have a pool at the college? The other question I wanted to ask really is for staff in totality or collectively, is there anything that you heard discussed tonight by any of the appellants or any issues raised at public comment that caused you to have any questions regarding your own recommendations this evening?
Speaker 6: So anytime we make a recommendation, we make sure that we've studied every topic, that we look at all the different data. For example, when the Coastal Commission letter came in on Thursday, we did spend additional time looking back to see does our recommendation change and know anything that we've seen, all of the evidence that's been presented. Staff continues to recommend that we allow this to move forward to the next step.
Speaker 2: And although I don't want to go point by point on any of the comments made through by the appellants, it seemed to me that there were a series of very technical comments and arguments made to staff feel that your position and your analysis on each and every one of those technical comments is consistent with your recommendation.
Speaker 6: Yes, we do.
Speaker 2: Okay. So I want to start by thanking staff for their work on this project. This is a very technical project and necessitated extensive knowledge to design. And we are very fortunate in the city of Long Beach to have a very experienced and highly interested and and engaged staff working on this project. I want to thank our architect, Michael Rotondi, the design team, the coastal experts that our city has hired for the purposes of preparing for this air and responding to coastal comments. And the project manager, Dino, and all the consultants that have helped us through this project. We have a lot of people here tonight with different opinions and different considerations. I want to first thank all of the people from the Cortex community who came out to support the pool tonight. I know that they didn't get to speak, but I did note that earlier in our meeting we had about 60 children here holding up signs in support of the pool. No doubt some of them would have liked to speak, I'm sure, but it is a school night and we didn't get to public comment until well after the 7:00 hour. So I want to acknowledge those families who made an effort to get their children here. I want to also thank the appellants who are here. I appreciate the passion that you bring to the table on many issues. And I appreciate the education and the effort that you put into researching the issues and presenting your point of view in a respectful manner. I think that's very important, and I know some of you have taken time out to me to meet with me regarding issues that are important to you. You've asked me to meet with you to hear about issues that are important to you. And some of you even gave me the courtesy of letting me know what your thoughts were about this project before tonight. Because I think you wanted to share with me knowing where where my passions are in regards to this project. And I thank you for that. And because I think having that dialog and that respect in advance of the meeting really helps us get on the same page. And I think, although.
Speaker 4: There are a lot of really.
Speaker 2: Great points made, we're going to have to agree to disagree on some of the points that were made this evening in terms of how they apply to this particular project and this particular source of funding. I have a great deal of faith in our city staff. While we may not always agree with all of their recommendations on every project, I think that one thing we all agree on is that we have a team of experts working in our city departments and where they don't have sufficient expertize, they obtain expert guidance through the use of consultants. This is a highly technical project and it necessitated technical expertize at a very high level through every step of the project, including where we go from here. I've been involved in this project since 2014. By the time I was elected to council, the efforts to rebuild the pool were very much underway. I have my predecessor, Gary DeLong, my former colleagues, Patrick O'Donnell and Susan Lowenthal, and the many people who are here tonight to thank for advocating for this project and making a priority before I ever took office. Both Patrick O'Donnell and Sunil Lowenthal served on the council with me and continued to make this a priority after I was elected into office, which is the only reason we were able to set aside such a large sum of money to save for this project. Like I tell everyone, building an infrastructure project of this magnitude is not that different than a family saving money for a house. It's money that we've had to put aside. We've had to be very.
Speaker 4: Frugal with our.
Speaker 2: Spending in order to make sure that this huge project of this magnitude that is really a city project, as I'll talk about in a moment, comes to fruition. And it can only do so if we set money aside and save it. And it is true that at the time that this priority was put into place and the programmatic elements were voted on nine zero by this council. Oil was trading at 90 to $100 a barrel. So we do currently have a funding gap that we're working to address through non general fund dollars. I assure you the mayor and the city staff and I meet regularly to talk about funding alternatives and finding viable funding solutions that are not general fund dollars. I think it's important to note, although we're not talking specifically about funding tonight, that staff has considered alternative sites. They haven't just talked about it. They have researched alternative sites and evaluated the feasibility and the viability of the alternative sites.
Speaker 4: Even if we could get.
Speaker 2: A long term lessee to agree.
Speaker 4: To build a pool.
Speaker 2: When they've previously said they're not interested in a pool.
Speaker 4: And even if we could figure.
Speaker 2: Out how to mitigate a landfill and terminate a lease in order to.
Speaker 4: Build a pool, and even if we get around all those.
Speaker 2: Speculative even if's, the cost savings that we're looking at at an alternative site is 3 to 5%, and a project of this magnitude that's a negligible amount of money. Immediately upon taking office, I requested a meeting with the Coastal Commission staff. I met with them on August 1st, 2014, about two weeks after I had taken office. At that meeting, we talked preliminarily about the demolition of the old pool and making sure that we were not embarking upon a project that would be considered a nonstarter by their team. We also committed to working with them throughout this process to make sure that we settle on a project that everyone is satisfied with because of the process and the steps that are necessitated. Coastal has not yet had an opportunity to weigh in on the technical aspects of this specific project. They can only do that if we move to the next phase of this project. Staff has looked at Coastal Commission's comments and looks forward to working in collaboration with Coastal to address their concerns and address any recommendations that might be made through the process.
Speaker 4: Yes, sea level.
Speaker 2: Rise is in fact a major issue. It's a major issue that affects many communities in my district. And at the time that the pool is under water, we will have a lot of.
Speaker 4: Other very.
Speaker 2: Serious issues because we'll have the communities that.
Speaker 4: Live right there.
Speaker 2: That will also be underwater. So sea level rise is absolutely an issue that we are looking at and have accounted for in the air. Staff has looked at coastal conditions in order for this project to move forward and for the $7 million we have already spent on the demolition of the old structure and the design of the new structure, we need to move to the next phase of this project so that we can engage in a meaningful dialog with Coastal Commission staff on what the actual project will look like. And I'm fully open to any and all recommendations, mandates and guidelines that they provide to us. I. I'm personally very excited about this project. I feel optimistic about the project because in this city of Long Beach, we churn out more Olympians in the area of aquatics than any other city.
Speaker 4: Our youth.
Speaker 2: Learn how to swim in this community, and we support an environment where they can continue to.
Speaker 4: Pursue that sport through.
Speaker 2: Low cost access in some of our community pools will in all of our community pools. I would love to have a pool in every district. Absolutely. And I've shared that with Mr. Christiansen on multiple occasions. But that would be my personal priority. That may not be the priority of all of my council colleagues.
Speaker 4: Surely we all.
Speaker 2: Support each other's priorities in our communities. Districts in the city are given recreational facilities based on their own priorities, not as a requirement that every district have a pool. They may choose to spend the money on new parks, new community centers, new libraries, new educational institutions, new baseball fields, new facilities that are a priority for their community . A pool may not be a community priority for every community. And in fact, when we look at our infrastructure projects and priorities in every.
Speaker 4: District, I was the.
Speaker 2: Only council district that had a pool listed as a priority for my district.
Speaker 4: So while I would love and vote tomorrow.
Speaker 2: On general fund dollars to go towards a pool in every district, that would have to be a passion that's driven by the council member representing those districts. Not my personal passions. I love the video that Anna showed regarding the Olympian. I have not met her. When the video first started, I had hoped that it was going to be somehow related to Long Beach or this project, because I know that every Olympian I've met and every student athlete I've talked to will tell you that the facilities available in their cities are a source of pride for them. When other athletes come to compete or to participate in events in their city.
Speaker 4: We are the sixth.
Speaker 2: Largest city in the state of California. We call ourselves the aquatics capital of America.
Speaker 4: We have a rich.
Speaker 2: History of producing amazing student athletes, and we need a a city facility that represents the identity of the city as an as a location that churns out aquatics Olympians.
Speaker 4: We are a beautiful city.
Speaker 2: With a big vision in every district. We have big visions as a city. Our mayor has a big vision that takes us and elevates us to a different place to this region. The pool will represent Long Beach.
Speaker 4: It will be associated.
Speaker 2: With this city, not with a district. People who come here to attend events at the pool won't care or know whether they are in council district one two, three.
Speaker 4: Four, five.
Speaker 2: Six, seven, eight or nine. All they will know is that they are in the city of Long Beach and they are in a place that is a world renowned, iconic facility.
Speaker 4: That people will.
Speaker 2: Be talking about with a source of pride. So I am very excited about this and I.
Speaker 4: Look forward to.
Speaker 2: The next phase where we can work hand-in-hand, collaboratively and productively with the Coastal Commission to.
Speaker 4: Move this project.
Speaker 2: Forward in whatever way it comes back to us. I will support because I think that collaborative process will be important. So I urge my colleagues to support this project. But more importantly, I remind my colleagues that the vote tonight is really.
Speaker 4: About.
Speaker 2: The air. And if there's a deficiency in the air, I encourage my colleagues to seek counsel from city staff who have the expertize to speak to the specific issues that they may have of concern. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. So I'm going I'm going to make a couple comments and then I'm going to go down to the speakers list for the council. So I just want to say a few things. And one, let me just begin by saying that I support this project and I know that there is and I would agree with Councilwoman Pryce. I think that obviously the appellants, I believe, love Long Beach and believe in social equity and are coming at this from a good place of wanting to access for the pool for everybody. So I appreciate that. But I will say also that I'm someone that went to the pool growing up as well. And so I've been to the pool my whole life. I did it when I was growing up. I did it in college. It's a special place for people that know Long Beach. And I went with all sorts of kids of every color of all socioeconomic backgrounds. I was a low income kid and I love that pool. And so I just take a little bit of pause when I hear that the pool is not going to be for everyone, because it was a place that I enjoy. And I think that a lot of kids from across the city will enjoy it. I also think that as a as a community, we should think big and iconic. And I want us to have the best pool in the country. So when I think about what we can build, if we're going to spend the kind of resources on this kind of project, we should ask. And the. Mand and expect the best pool in the entire United States and one of the best pools in the world, which is what this pool will be if we build it. In 1932, in 1984, and hopefully in 2024, this community will be host to an international gathering of athletes and aquatic athletes, as we know, through the Olympics. This pool has and this location has an incredible Olympic history. We have produce, like Councilman Price said, endless amounts of aquatic Olympians and hopefuls of the Olympics as well. And so while I understand the concerns of sea level rise, we I believe in climate change. It's real. Sea level rise is real. That is all happening. But I would agree that we are also not building a new structure on new beach. We're replacing a structure that already existed prior to us demolishing the old pool. A couple quick couple a couple of points I think are important. The issue of cost came up, but I think it's important to note that, yes, structures, particularly these types of structures today are expensive. There is no question about that. There's also no question that that I and I know the council, through our federal legislative committee or through our state legislative committee, will do everything that we can to get funds, additional funds to help support this process as well. If there are infrastructure dollars that are out there through the federal process, through the state process, through fundraising that hopefully we will engage with and as a community as well, we want to be involved in those. I know there's a price tag out there. We know that that price tag is not also set in stone and we know that the Coastal Commission itself will. There's no question it will change the project in some ways as well. There's a couple other factors I think are hard to. There's there's not there's no data around. But I think they're important to to bring up. While we don't have clear economic data, I think there's no question that the pool would be a huge economic driver for the city of Long Beach. So I think there's a stronger economic benefit, but more importantly, I think there's a historical and cultural benefit to having a site that produced so many Olympians once again continue to produce more athletes and scholar athletes and Olympians and community members learning how to swim in seniors, learning how to learning how to swim, and all those basic functions that community pools should do. So I support not just building a pool. I support building the best pool in the United States. In addition to that, I think there's the on the public access question and this is also sometimes I disagreed with folks when I was on the Coastal Commission, but I believe that bringing a pool to that location where there was already a pool will actually dramatically increase public access and crawling, not having anything on the site. So if we actually want to bring people to the coast and we actually want to bring people to our beach, then let's bring the thousands and tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of people that are actually going to go to that location and come to the coast and enjoy it, because we actually have a facility that they will actually access. And I think while having a open space is absolutely lovely along the coast, I'm not sure personally at that of that that has the impact that providing public access to the beach , then having the pool would would have. And let me also say that I think it's a my my perspective as a as a as a former coastal commissioner. And having read the letter and talked to some of the folks at Coastal, including staff as at the commission. For those of us that are advocates for the pool and I'm what we're one of those hats we also have to be prepared and know that this is a process and the Coastal Commission at the end of the day is going to make some significant findings, whether it's changes, whether it's substantial changes, whether it's suggestions, but they're going to be a partner in the development of this pool. And and so what we have today, what we all while we a lot of us maybe not all, but or many of us may love what we have today. That will also change when Coastal weighs in and gives us their suggestions as well. And so we all have to be prepared for that partnership as we move forward as advocates for the pool. And so I do support moving forward today. I support the project as presented, as designed. I think personally, I think it's a beautiful design. I think it's iconic. I think that it it it puts the city on the map in a way that is that is moving the community forward. And I'm proud of our aquatic history. And I think that this pool only adds to it. And so I do support moving forward. I support working in partnership with the Coastal Commission and then from there coming back to the council with what will be at that point a final project with the support of the Coastal Commission. And so with that, I'm to turn this first over, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 3: Well, thank you, Mr. Mayor. After Councilmember Price and your comments, I don't know if there's much more to be said of how I see declarative, but you're going to have to indulge me anyway. I would like to just just comment on the presentations all the way around. I think our staff did an excellent job. The design team, the architects have presented a pool that will be iconic, exciting and appealing in every way, no pun intended to to anybody that comes to this city. And for those who live here, this is.
Speaker 9: It was mentioned that, you know.
Speaker 3: This is a difficult decision. This is not a difficult decision for me. This is this is a project that I support. I was one of a few council members that are here who supported it initially. I think this is this is this is something that that we have a real opportunity to do. I think there's some confusion in terms of the funding vehicle for this this pool. I'm listening to the comments and the comments about access and equity. I'm encouraged hearing so many people out here talk about that. And that tells me that we are certainly headed in the right direction and we have a great mindset from our residents here in the city. But I think the term access has been a little bit misplaced access in terms of funding for that pool. You know, it would be great. I would love to have a pool, a community pool in my district. I actually do have some nonprofit pools, but I would love to have a pool and $10 million. I think we'd all like to take $100 million and divide by nine and figure out how to do something really nice. But Mr. City Attorney, does everyone have access to title insurance?
Speaker 10: Councilman Arsenault As was explained during the presentations, just those areas within the Tidelands, not uplands.
Speaker 3: And so I think that that is the real issue here in terms of the cost and the access. When we talk about access, it's access to the funding. And this is a rebuild of a pool that is has a lot of history and that will hopefully continue to to produce history here in the city. We're limited, and I trust me to talk to residents in District eight and Long Beach listening. If we had access to those funds to to do this type of project up north, we would certainly be be doing that and going after those funds. We are limited those those funds can only be be spent along the coast. We talk about access. I don't think City Hall is accessible to everybody in the city based on the diversity of the comments here tonight. I don't think City Hall is even accessible to everybody in the city. Our Animal Services Department is accessible to everybody in the city. Golf courses aren't accessible to everybody in the city. I mean, we have we and I will just say, in terms of priorities, we were here for a few hours just last week talking about housing needs. If if there is available space to build anything in our city, I think we're going to be prioritizing housing and some other things as opposed to two pools. And so this is a unique opportunity. I really respect the comments all the way around from parties on both sides of this issue. For and against. Some of the comments were very predictable, but I think this is a rare opportunity. I don't see any reason to to to deny the or I'm sorry, not support the air. And I look forward to doing so. And I agree with the mayor's comments. This is a first step or not. This is a step in a process. There will probably will be design changes and comments and challenges along the way. But I would also say that continuing to appeal this will also add cost to this this project. And so please keep that in mind moving forward as well. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Councilmember Dillingham.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mayor. This is a coastal act of 1976. This is the city's LCP, which was submitted in 1980. This is the final environmental impact report that we're looking at today. It's a lot of reading, a lot of study, and I'd rather commend staff for looking at each one in their development of the air and how they're going to proceed forward with with this. I wouldn't call it a project, but it's on the air and it's been referred to as a replacement. It's a rebuild by definition. Or the Coastal Act. It's a new project. It's not a replacement. It's not a rebuild. There was a project there that predated the Coastal Act that was built in the 1960s and where before the Coastal Act was put in place. So many of the current Coastal Act requirements don't don't apply. They simply don't apply. This is a new project that has to conform to what the Coastal Act currently says. So I'm having a difficult time with that because when we look at a project, we're talking about a project where we're looking about rebuilding and replacing and putting back what we had before is not the same because it's , it's, it's a project that is basically new to the coast. Based on the rules and regulations as they currently exist since 1976. The. What are the other things that we have to look at is that, you know, I'm going to have, as it was mentioned before. I'm going to have to to bite at this apple. I have it here as a city council member, and I want to have it again as a member of the Coastal Commission when it comes to to review there. And there's something that concerns me the most is that there's going to be there is going to be conditions, there's going to be changes that the Coastal Commission staff and probably the Commission itself is going to make regarding the EIR, regarding the project that is presented personally, it's a beautiful project. My guy that you know, you're talking about, about to pool two Olympic size pool, you're talking about a training pool, you're talking about a pool where the kids can enjoy and have fun and you don't. You're talking about a diving well where people can learn how to dove and take advantage of it and build their skills as swimmers and become that Olympic champion that we are so well known for and had a facility that would be top notch and state of the art and one that would be the envy of any city. The. The. Air that currently that has it right there is the fact that, you know, there are some issues in there that are non-conforming to the Coastal Act and some of the rules that are there. Example, the one that comes out real quick, it's the height. You know, the height is what, 19 feet over what the LCP says. So that's going to that's going to require another action. That's going to require that the city probably have to go and get a a LCP amendment that would raise the height along that shore. And that could be precedent setting, not only for Long Beach development along the shore, but in other another areas up and down the coast as well. Because when you raise it for one, you raise them for all. And that's going to be an issue. I'm sure that's going to be an issue and that will probably would not be allowed. I'm almost predicting that the height limit is going to have to be adjusted. It's going to have to come down. It's just too it's just too big and we're afraid it's too high. Maybe it's another issue. So when it comes down to where we're at right now, I mean, I'm really conflicted because I really want the city to build this pool. I really do. But when you're looking at the issues of sea level rise and the impacts of that, you're building these what's there to protect turn up was use a flint flipper splint or whatever we were. That was never the term before. So I don't know really all the other I'll admit my minority, the major minority on on that issue. But the bottom line is that it's going to be a retaining wall. It will eventually be a retaining wall when the sea level comes all the way up to that building. And, you know, parking lots are going to be underwater and the building will still be there. I'm just having a hard time. I think bottom line is that there is a project here. It's just not this project. And because of that, I don't think I can support the, the, the, the project as it is and I would have to a to support the appeal on this case. And I hope maybe it's the question here with with this, if the appeal were to be sustained after, I guess, or is it one or two, I'll need a clarification on that. But the does that basically stop this going forward as a project? Would we still do another project with another ESR that would be more amenable towards having a project there on the beach? Or is this is this like the the the end of of of a building, a pool there? And we would have to look at how to re reconfigure, use whatever the the talents funds that are already there for it.
Speaker 10: Councilman, you're I'll try to answer that. The hypothetical, if the appeals were sustained, that would effectively stop the pool from moving forward at this juncture. I would assume that if the appeals were sustained, it would be for a particular reason or reasons as articulated by one of the appellants, and that the council would give staff direction to go out and make additional studies, make additional findings, and bring back additional information for the Council's consideration. So it wouldn't necessarily stop the pool altogether, but it would certainly stop it tonight unless another step are taken.
Speaker 3: Well, like like I commented earlier, I think that there is a project here. It's just not this one. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next up is Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to start just.
Speaker 9: By, you know, as a council member, I want to thank my council colleague, Susie. I know how hard it is to inherit a project and pick it up and give it your all. But you and your staff have been very available to discuss things and to talk through concerns and to have conversations about this. And I don't fault you or your constituents for going big. I think, you know, you have to have a big vision and started the big, big, big vision. But at the same time, you know, I do understand value engineering. You sometimes start with a big idea where you finally end might be a different place, but that's the process. And I'm going to try to go through this process here today. I want to thank city staff. It's clear you've done you know, you've done your study and you've done your diligence. It's clear to me how hard all of you have worked on this project and has received a full court press and attention from the highest levels in our city. Now, no question that the the concerns here, you did go through a process to vet. It's a beautiful design. It'll be a great addition to the neighborhood. I have a couple questions and a few concerns. So first, is this pool considered a citywide city serving asset like the civic center, the aquarium or the Long Beach Convention Center?
Speaker 6: Yes, it is.
Speaker 9: So has there been any outreach or community input meetings in northwest or central Long Beach?
Speaker 3: So we did have.
Speaker 6: The 16 various meetings that we talked about. We did not have any specific ones in those locations, but there have been opportunities for everyone who wants to be a part of it. But no, we did not have specific outreach opportunities in those areas.
Speaker 9: So I remember having specific outreach opportunities in those areas for other city serving assets like Long Beach Civic Center. Why didn't we make that choice here?
Speaker 6: Civic Center really was a unique project that we really did extra effort. We went even beyond what we normally did. I would say that under the Belmont here, we actually went beyond what we normally did as well, and we were following direction from counsel to create a stakeholder committee that really looked at those issues. And so when the council gave us direction to create that stakeholder commission committee, they gave us suggestions on how best to do that. And that was how that extra outreach opportunity happened at the time.
Speaker 9: So if the council says we're going, we want to do limited outreach, we don't take it upon ourselves to go do additional outreach. We just do what council directs.
Speaker 6: No. We as staff are responsible for making sure that we're reaching out, that we're having people do outreach and having that opportunity. We've been willing to speak at this about this project at a number of community meetings that we go to. We do listen to council when they create a specific kind of direction. On the stakeholder committee, we pay very much attention to that. But we do spend time looking for other opportunities where we can. At some point, it is a finite amount where where you where you decide this is the kind of outreach that we're going to do. So that's, you know, part of what we've done.
Speaker 9: I think it's safe to say that the outreach was very minimal and targeted to very specific groups. And this and the input does not reflect true opinions from residents who, you know, fairly venture outside of, you know, the typical neighborhood association meeting or things like that and other here's the town. So so my next question so I know so with respect to serving citywide, I know that the the existing Belmont pool that closed in 2013 was utilized by both Long Beach residents and residents outside the city. Do we have any data? Did we ever conduct an analysis to determine the levels of utilization from our residents in northwest or central Long Beach?
Speaker 6: We have some data about where people that utilize the facility are. I can ask Lori Gamez to see what she has available with her today. But we have taken a look, you know, in the past we do look at data that we do have for people that visit the facility is if Lori has anything to add, you could ask her to come up to the mic.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor, and members of the City Council.
Speaker 4: My name is Lloyd Gomez.
Speaker 1: And I'm the recreation superintendent that oversees the aquatics programs within our city. The information that I have this evening is related to.
Speaker 7: The.
Speaker 4: Partnership program.
Speaker 1: That is funded through the 84 foundation that we conducted our facilities.
Speaker 4: That is one of the only.
Speaker 7: Programs that we.
Speaker 4: Actually track and capture zip codes.
Speaker 1: As well as ethnicity for participation. It's part of the grant reporting process. So I do have that information, but I don't have information regarding general use at the Belmont Pool related to the the groups that you're asking about.
Speaker 9: Okay. So outside of this and so, you know, what percentage of usage does this one program make up in terms of like overall usage of the facility? Is that a small fraction or is this the majority of the people who use the programs to use the use the pools through this program?
Speaker 4: The EL 84 program.
Speaker 1: Is a ten week summer program that takes place each summer. So the pool does operate year round. So it is a it's somewhat representative, but there is a ten week summer program that I have information from this evening.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 9: Well, I want to hear it. If it if it's a true sample of how it's used, I want to hear it. If it's not a true sample, I don't think it's helpful to the discussion. So if you feel it's a true sample sample, then I'll hear.
Speaker 1: I would. I guess it's a matter of how.
Speaker 9: Is it representative of the unit utilization of the citywide it.
Speaker 4: So Councilmember, what Lori is referring to is that for our summer program, which we offer the learn to swim at all.
Speaker 2: Pools except for the Belmont pool.
Speaker 4: We have those.
Speaker 2: Statistics we don't track.
Speaker 4: And our Belmont Pool or any of our other pools, ethnicity or zip code usage during the regular open swim time. And we can say, though, that during our summer programs that we are tracking and that's at our other pools, we serve approximately 86% minority at those pools.
Speaker 9: Okay. I didn't ask about race, but so so let me ask a better question then. Do we have specific partnerships with Jordan High School or Cabrini High School?
Speaker 4: Yes, we do. We have we offer programs. And I'm sorry, what your question.
Speaker 9: Elaborate on what those programs look like. Is it a seamless afterschool prep? What are these programs with Jordan and Cambria?
Speaker 4: The program, the programs that are offered at Jordan High School again are a summer program. And it's where we were based there during the time that the the high school is out of session. We offer.
Speaker 1: Recreation.
Speaker 4: Swim, swim lessons and water exercise there. In the last calendar year, from.
Speaker 7: May 16th up to 2016.
Speaker 1: To May.
Speaker 4: 16th of this year, we served 4191 participants at Jordan High School. We also have a program at Cabrillo High School that is conducted during the summertime.
Speaker 1: The same ten week period of time each year.
Speaker 4: And our numbers at that facility for the same period of time were 2848 participants. And those are those are tracked based on our participation. Both schools have L.A. 84 programs. The Cabrillo High School program is also supported by the Long Beach Unified School District and.
Speaker 9: The El 84 program. That's a program the City Partners with through CDBG funding, correct?
Speaker 4: Oh, no. That is the L.A. 84 is an endowment grant competitive grant program that comes from the 84 Olympics. It supports Summer Swim and they also support other sports. We participate in the Summer Swim program that includes learning to swim lessons, water polo, synchronized swimming and dove team.
Speaker 9: Okay, so I know that there's a program we support through CDBG and after school program with the high schools is then eligible. Can we put requirements since we provide that CDBG funding? Can we put requirements that those afterschool programs integrate some usage of the citywide pool?
Speaker 7: Vice Mayor Richardson We do support CDBG through CDBG. We do support afterschool programs to the tune of $379,000 a year. Those funds are given to the Parks and Rec Department, who then turns around and partners with Long Beach Unified School District. They're not related to necessarily high schools, I believe they're elementary and middle schools, and they are specifically for afterschool recreation programs in CDBG eligible areas. To answer your question, I believe you're asking, though.
Speaker 9: If the question is do we have the ability legally to place requirements on that funding, that they utilize this facility as a part of a seamless after school program?
Speaker 7: So I think that we may not legally be required to tell them how to spend the money, but we certainly have the ability to work with the school district to determine how those kids that participate in those programs could utilize this this facility in the future.
Speaker 3: Great.
Speaker 9: Thank you. Next, when the last city council in 2013 authorized the beginning of the design process, was the direction to design a replacement pool, or was the recommendation specific enough to warrant the design of a $100 million replacement pool?
Speaker 6: So I'll take a first step at that. Pardon me while I look at the actual motion. So the direction was to and and we're kind of, you know, some of us have changed on to this project. So I wasn't, you know, on this project at the time. Understandable. But from what we understand is that it was direction to move forward with a replacement of the facility. City staff brought forward a kind of a approach that looked at kind of what was feasible on, say, what was funding for from a funding perspective. The city council actually gave some specific direction to enhance that and enhance that model to really look at including, for example, an indoor diving. Well, that was a very specific motion. I can actually read the motion to you. It was to move forward with the following plan changes to integrate the necessary infrastructure into the design and cost estimates so as to maintain platform de living inside the facility. Excuse me, Mr. Good. You give me a second, please, so as to ensure a segregated area for platform diving and create a separate going round to ensure final indoor pool designs include a minimum of 30 meters of eight foot plastic water depth, if practical, and to evaluate the benefits of ten foot water depth. I'm going to paraphrase a little bit to request city staff to return to council with a plan to expedite the design, design and procurement and construction of a temporary pool to require city staff to return with the expedited design and procurement of a permanent pool with incentives for early completion and and some other direction about both the therapy pool and the moving pool for moving pool floor. So a lot of those enhancements were asked and directed by the Council at the time in February 2013 as we moved forward with the planning process.
Speaker 9: And I think it's important to tease that out. This $100 million plan was directed by city council in 2013. And, you know, given the majority of council members have changed. You know, I think it's important to note city council asked for $100 million pool. And I know that this hearing is specifically about planning, but not necessarily budgeting. Budgeting has come up. So I want to talk about that a little bit. So what is the fund balance? Entitlements. And how much do we have that we can spend on this project?
Speaker 6: So I answer that by going back to the prioritization. When the City Council did their prioritization back about two years ago, we had about $99 million at that time of cash for projects, and we asked the City Council to go through a very robust prioritization process to determine how to spend that money. And when the when we were done with that, based on staff's recommendations and council's direction, the pool kept the $60 million that it had. It didn't add any money. It didn't lose any money. And the rest of the $30 million was allocated to high priority projects. Some were defunded, some were added. And so that 99 million was really the amount we've drawn down some of that 99 million as we move forward with projects. But those are roughly, you know, what was what is available minus what we're spending right now.
Speaker 9: So what stops us from using the $60 million as currently budgeted and just building the pool with that and living within our means?
Speaker 6: So essentially the plan that we have designed it was based on the October 2014 vote by the Council. And you asked a good question about the 2013 direction, which kind of started us down this path. This Council actually, when we went in June back to the Council of 2014, directed the stakeholder committee. And then that's how the $100 million plan came up was through the stakeholder committee and voted on by the Council on October 14. The you know, at that point is when the council established the $103 million project plan as well. So that's what we've been designing to. That's what we have done the R2 and designed to if you know, one of the things that's important here is we're not making funding decisions but we are certifying er by certifying the er that is recommended by staff you are actually certifying at the highest level of project. There are alternatives within the project and the way secret works and Mr. Mays can explain this probably better than I can. You can actually, once you have a certified document, you can go down and you can look at lesser impacts, including a smaller amount of power, if that's what the council wants to do in the future. But if we so that's that would be our recommendation is to adopt the c iir. If at some point we do not have the funding, we obviously can't move forward with the project that isn't funded.
Speaker 9: Obviously, I get it. So it's safe to say, you know, we aimed high, there was a big vision or the last council aimed high. This was prior to the, you know, problems we've had with oil revenue. Correct. Those problems happened and what 2015.
Speaker 6: Corrected happened at the end of 2014 into 2015.
Speaker 9: So it wouldn't be unfair for the city council at some point to say we aimed for the circumstances are changed now we've aim for that.
Speaker 6: That is certainly the council's prerogative.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 9: I want to pivot from questions and thank you so much for answering those questions. And, you know, I bear with the public and everyone to listen, and I want to sort of have my time to sort of go through and do my own diligence here. So I think there's a big picture we need to consider. And in frankly, we need to think about the message that we're sending to our residents, all of our residents. I'm not great at being a critic. I'll admit. I typically try to be supportive of things and I try not to criticize without offering recommendations and solutions. So that's what I'm going to try to do now. So so we're considering so last week we considered a $10 million loan to the Aquarium Pacific. Today, we're considering a $100 million aquatics facility in one of the poorest neighborhoods of town. Some may attempt to diminish. That was a joke. Not personally, but it.
Speaker 3: Was a joke.
Speaker 9: Some may attempt to diminish these legitimate content concerns as a way to pit one neighborhood against the other. And I think it's the alternative, frankly, when we take on too much and, you know, and don't pay attention to to the rest, we we are in a position where as district representatives, we sort of have to represent you know, represent certain perspectives and interests. And I wish it hadn't been that way. I believe this should be a conversation about ensuring that every neighborhood feels more connected to our city and every neighborhood has an opportunity to to thrive. And so, frankly, I would love to see the next generation of Olympic Olympians, swimmers coming out of Long Beach. I don't necessarily agree that the solution is to build world class facilities that they can't access. And when I say access, let me be very clear about that. The best way for you to make investments in the neighborhood is to make investments into youth, is to invest directly into their neighborhoods, acknowledge the barriers that that they face. The location is pool is about as far away as you can make it from youth in our city. It's about as far from the majority of youth in our city as well as far as ways you can make it, how they're going to get there. I think these bikes, our bike network doesn't have it. It's not connected yet. Our Bikeshare program doesn't even go past what PCH. Definitely doesn't go north of the four or five. So we haven't built that. And I haven't heard a clear timeline as to when we're going to expand bike share to North Long Beach. Somebody under 18 years old doesn't even have access to bike share. You can't check it out unless unless you're kids can even access our bike share. It doesn't connect. Are we talking about busses? So we're going to say we're going to add another financial barrier to youth to access a city wide asset. That doesn't reconcile with me. And to be fair, I really you know, and I know the conversation came up about whether or not this is a priority for certain council districts, whether access to a pool is. And frankly, I haven't really advocated for creation of a pool in North Long Beach. And there's a clear reason why why it doesn't really register on the Maslow's hierarchy of needs for me. And North Long Beach. I may have to fight for basic things like spending over a decade to open a library or failing a failing 100 year old community center out in park or very, very limited open space. So if you sometimes give our residents a choice, it's not a it's not fair proposition to say, do you want to fight to add a pool when you have other hierarchy, different hierarchy of needs than certain other areas of town? And we need to be sensitive to that. For me, this is about making a real emphasis on equity for all of our residents. And like I mentioned earlier, I witnessed a full court press from staff on person as project law and along with other major projects. And it's good. I like to see a full court press. Our new civic center is a good value proposition for the city. Sparks Development and the downtown core provides local job opportunities. Significant steps were taken to make sure the whole city felt included in that process. Last week we did $10 million loan to the aquarium, the Pacific the aquarium. For the most part, people believe this is a citywide asset. I hope they host an annual night aquarium that's extended to every single council district. People participate in it. People are proud to have it. It's a good value proposition for our residents. This pool, in its current form and how we presented it, is not a good value proposition for our residents. And I'm going to explain why. And I'm going to add and I'm going to offer some recommendations. So so so first, I mentioned earlier, I'm not a great critic, so I want to make sure that I offer some very clear things in a spirit of fairness, because it would be unfair for me to criticize this project without offering some some some alternative ideas . Broadly, not just limited to the scope of this E.R..
Speaker 3: So first.
Speaker 9: The name. So citywide assets, for example, our Long Beach Civic Center, our Long Beach Airport, our Long Beach Convention Attainment Center are named after our city. The new pools should be no exception. The new pool. It demonstrates congruence with other citywide assets and makes a clear distinction between a citywide serving asset and a neighborhood serving asset. You know, pools, parks, libraries are named with input from those local neighborhood residents and reflect the character of those neighborhoods. And I think that's important. We got the naming process all the time on local neighborhood facilities. The citywide though my pool was branded after a neighborhood and doesn't reference or include the whole city. And while it may be important, think about the value it adds by just inviting people to talk about just the name of it. You may still get what you're intended to get, but you include so many more people in a process they can see them themselves in their own city reflected in that. Secondly, we have to double down on our youth. So to me, this isn't a a no, but no, you can't have a pool. But I need this. This should be a yes and conversation. Yes and proposition. So, yes, we need a pool to replace Belmont. Yes, yes. The kids we saw here, the rocket fish kids and all the stakeholders deserve to continue having an impact on future Olympians. Yes, they deserve that. And yes, all of our youth, no matter what part of town you live in or your socioeconomic status, should have access to quality public recreational opportunities in safe spaces. It isn't a secret. I've been pretty clear.
Speaker 3: That the La mirada.
Speaker 9: Municipal.
Speaker 3: Pool. I love it. I love the La mirada pool called Splash.
Speaker 9: I've driven outside of the county, La mirada. Take my daughter there. It's a great municipal pool because literally it's fun. It's built for kids. It's different, it's exciting. 50% of the facility, 50% is dedicated just to youth. It'd be great at the city's municipal pool here in Long Beach.
Speaker 3: Got our local.
Speaker 9: Long Beach kids excited about aquatics.
Speaker 3: From any part of our town. Now, I.
Speaker 9: Know the outside area hasn't been fully designed yet, and I've had these conversations with both the councilmember as well as well city staff. I think since it hasn't been designed yet, there's a real opportunity to and it hasn't been budget yet either. We need to invest a more significant part of this plan in this budget. Into enhancing the youth areas it needs to meet or match lavorato splash area in my opinion, and we need to create a seamless after school program with Long Beach Unified that eliminates transportation barriers for youth and encourages every Long Beach Unified student to have access to this seamless facility. When I say access, it is not access to say, if you can get here, we'll let you in. That's not access. Access is this is built for you. We've taken the time to build a seamless build a seamless system to make sure you let you step off your campus, you get on that bus or whatever, and you're a.
Speaker 3: Part of a.
Speaker 9: Program, an actual enrichment program. Number three, make a real commitment to ensure that this private project doesn't compete for funding with major infrastructure projects outside of the Highlands area that are not eligible for funding. So you heard it a couple of times. So tonight we've heard a couple of times that we can seek philanthropy grants and other sources for this project. But let's be honest, the funding for those are really depend on, you know, if the city really works, the city staff place a focus on this. And we already know that the majority of our city does not have access to these funds and they really have a proven need. So let's leave the federal the state grants and all those things to areas that actually lack funding, have a real need and a lack of recreation opportunities. We should divide and conquer it. Isn't that the pool isn't a priority. It just means that it doesn't meet the same threshold of the need as a non coastal project. And I believe residents should be compassionate enough to understand that this is not pitting my neighborhood versus yours. We should be compassionate to understand both needs and place a priority on both our leaders and our residents should understand that. So number four, we've gotten very creative on how to finance infrastructure in our city. We use public private partnerships with the Civic Center, the finance for the Queen Mary, the Gerald Desmond Bridge, the Middle Harbor Project . We're very complex, required a full court press. Simply admitting that Tidelands funds are limited to the beachfront communities is no longer an adequate excuse for not taking on big infrastructure projects outside of the downtown, the port area and the Titans areas. A better value proposition for residents means taking steps to actually address big infrastructure that's accessible to our whole city. So that means leveraging new resources, new sources of revenue like measure a L.A. County Measure A are the resources to put together a plan that doesn't just address maintenance of parks and streets and roads and alleys and sidewalks , big infrastructure. Some of these projects, we're struggling $1,000,000 at a time to find 10 million, $50 million to fix something like a 100 year old community center. That means we're not being creative enough and not making and taking risks on our own residents to make those investments. So, you know, we need to make it we need to demonstrate that all our constituents are not second class citizens. Your quality, your life, your recreation opportunities are not a secondary thought. They're a priority. It's a both. And I know. But and that said, I do understand I'm open with this I understand the idea of starting with a big vision, right sizing, value engineering. By the end of the process, I think we'll have something that's more balanced, something everyone's going to be able to support. And I hope that we become a better body and more respectful of, you know, how we present things as we move forward. So I do want to see this project move forward. So I'm going to vote yes tonight, and I have no reservations about that. But I'm confident and I look forward to hearing the I look forward to hearing the Coastal Commission's comments when they further the project. I look forward to continuing to be a part of this conversation to make sure that what we present is more balanced and the value proposition for our residents is a bit better. And so those are my remarks. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next up, we have like we have Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 1: Well, everything that could possibly.
Speaker 7: Have been said has been said in one way or another. So I'm not.
Speaker 4: Sure where to leave us except that, well, there are things that each of my colleagues said that I feel I identify with.
Speaker 7: I also appreciate.
Speaker 4: The number of community members that reached out and gave.
Speaker 7: Insights and opinions in advance of today.
Speaker 4: Well written letters. I couldn't comment or email every single person back.
Speaker 7: Because there were so many that came in, but I.
Speaker 4: Appreciate the comments on both sides. To that point, I would like to say that we are still at the beginning steps, and I also am excited about being iconic. There are so many people from everywhere along the city that when I'm riding my bike or walking the duck pond in Eldorado Park, they seem to make it from downtown to the east side. And we on the east side and or the north side can all make it downtown as well. It's not convenient, but it's also not impossible. We talk about athletic opportunities and many know that my mom was a single mom and my brother took two busses to get to practice. Every day, and that's what kids do when.
Speaker 1: They're in high school. It teaches them strength and.
Speaker 7: Independence and diversity. And those opportunities come because.
Speaker 4: Things are far apart where we live.
Speaker 7: We are fortunate to live in a very big city.
Speaker 4: And if it means.
Speaker 7: You have to go a little bit.
Speaker 1: Further to be able.
Speaker 7: To have something that's world class.
Speaker 4: Then it's worth it. So I will be supporting the motion tonight. I appreciate the extensive amount of staff work. I know that with little notice, I had meetings with all sorts of staff on Friday to clarify and better.
Speaker 7: Understand.
Speaker 4: The letter that came in on Thursday. I also want to thank.
Speaker 7: The.
Speaker 4: Number of people who reached out on Friday and really wanted to meet with me this weekend. My schedule was so packed. I had meetings all the time and I just told people, Here's where I'll be.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to come to any of those places, I'm happy to have a dialog.
Speaker 4: And members that are here tonight took me up on that opportunity.
Speaker 1: Interesting places that.
Speaker 4: We were talking about the pool, but those were what we're on our schedule.
Speaker 1: And we appreciate every community member who was willing to.
Speaker 4: Make the drive to the Eastside, even though they don't live there.
Speaker 7: Because they wanted.
Speaker 1: To talk to a councilmember.
Speaker 7: About their concerns. And so I appreciate that. And so with that, I want to thank everyone for their input. I want to thank the staff for.
Speaker 1: Being diligent in their review. And I'm very comfortable with this and I am excited about our future. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I'm going I have a couple more councilman with cued up. I do have Councilwoman Pierce is not here tonight. She did submit a letter that she wanted to read into the record. And so I'm going to turn this over to the clerk and to the clerk and read customer Pierce. She had a family emergency, which is why she's not here, but she wanted a letter. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Honorable mayor and fellow council members. I regret that external circumstances prevent me from attending tonight's meeting and having the opportunity to vote as the only other council member whose district has access to Thailand funds. I do not take this decision lightly. I have a number of serious concerns about the planning process up to this point. The PBA sees compliance with local and statewide Coastal Commission regulations and the project's future impacts on our environment. Given the information provided to me, it is clear that as a city we have not met the standards required under SEQUA to certify this IIR
Speaker 1: . As a result.
Speaker 2: Had I been able to be with you all tonight, I would be in support of the Appeals to the Planning Commission's decision. My concerns are as follows. One. To my knowledge, the ER did not identify and analyze compliance with Coastal Act policies such as protected devices as outlined in 30253 in the letter from the Coastal Commission. They stated that the structure itself could act as a seawall or protective device. This point should have been part of the analysis in the original ER document and given the opportunity to be circulated for discussion. To the current wave of brush study in 2014 does not account for the updated sea level rise projections, which were released last month. Furthermore, the study states that under a worst case scenario and 2100 conditions, much of the amount shore and the peninsula would be inundated as well, but does not discuss how the fixed structure could exacerbate this by permanently inundating our coastline. Three. Having reviewed the air, I do not believe enough evidence was provided to reject the elephant lot as a feasible alternative. I understand that there is a private lease that expires in 2034, an annual convention that takes place three days per year. However, a more in-depth analysis of this lot example parking mitigation efforts study of the highest and best use of the lot. Eminent domain should have been done before it was entirely ruled out, particularly considering the serious environmental concerns and extremely high costs associated with the beach location. In sum, I believe it is our responsibility to ensure that our public dollars are spent wisely for the collective good of Long Beach. I have concerns about building a $103 million Million pool facility on unstable sand in an area subject to SLR and erosion. When we could be building this project for significantly less money and an alternative location. Both the savings and tidelands dollars that will no longer be tied up as a result of the unfunded VBAC should go towards doing everything in our power to adapt to the very same sea level rise which threatens this facility. Respectfully submitted. Janine Pearce Council Member Janine Pearce Second District.
Speaker 0: Great. Next up is council member. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you. And I, too, would like to thank everyone for speaking tonight and putting the time and energy into this. It's kind of typical. I'm throwing out my original notes because I think Councilmember Saranga brought up a fascinating point, and I'd like to follow up on that. But first, let me go over a technical issue that came up earlier. And I think staff said that we have someone here from Moffat and Nichols. So I would like just one point address that one of the appellants brought up, and that was in reference to the wave up study, and a study was performed. And the point is brought up that we had some new research done in April 2017, and I was just curious if you'd like to respond to that or if your study, you know, encompassed all those issues. Good evening, Honorable Mayor, members of the City Council and staff names. Russ Boudreau, coastal engineer with Mark and Nicole. I've been practicing coastal engineering here in Long Beach for over 30 years now, so the wave up study was completed in 2014. It it used the current guidance from the Coastal Commission and now there is relatively new guidance that just came out. It's not published in the up rush study, but I did take a look at it. And what it does is it provides more information in terms of instead of just saying a sea level rise scenario is, you know, low, likely or high, it actually adds probability to it. And I looked at that in the context of the upper study, and I'd be happy to share with the the council what, what you know, what the results of that are. Just to give you a little bit of background, if it may be of use about the sea level rise study are that the wave up study it looks at the present condition of the beach and then then runs a 100 year storm event and then we raise the sea level various scenarios. And it wasn't until the year 2100 high sea level scenario where the wave up rush reached the structure. So I want to make that clear so that five and a half foot sea level rise scenario has been covered in the new guidance and the probability of that occurring in year 2100, depending upon the sea level rise scenario of of greenhouse gas emissions ranges anywhere from one in 50 to less than one in 100 chance that that will happen by the year 2100. Okay. So I think you're saying that you're aware of the new research. And if there were some red flag, you could let us know that. That's correct. I did not see any red flag. Okay. Thank you. Appreciate that. Now, I just wanted to go back to Councilmember your, I guess, point about this ultimately getting to the Coastal Commission and what would be the scenario if it were voted? Well, if we voted along with the appellants tonight. Now, Mr. Reyes, I think you stated that it would possibly come back from council in different iterations, that we would still we could come back with a different scenario. I think that's what I heard you say.
Speaker 10: Councilman Super. You'd have to give staff direction as to specific items that you felt were deficient within the ER so staff could conduct additional studies and then the air with that additional information could come back. If it turned out that the additional information that staff was asked to research created new, significant or discovered new significant impacts, which would not be anticipated. But if they did, it would be required to circulate the ER for a period of time and accept comments in response to comments in regard to the new significant information.
Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. So I have another question for staff then that that is related. We've talked about the $7 million spent so far, 7 million and some change. And part of that was the demolition. But I believe the other moneys we spent exceed $4 million so far on this project. And if staff could respond, I don't think that information gleaned from the $4 million is transferable to another location. Could you respond on that?
Speaker 6: So that's correct. Of the 7.3 million we've spent, about 3.1 is for the demolition. And then the rest, the 4.2 balance roughly is what we spent to get us to this point. So it spent on the design. It spent on the air. So if we were to select, for example, another site, we would, of course, always try to salvage as much of the information that we've spent money on as possible. But at that point, you really are looking at a new design. You're going to have to restart your square. You're going to have to look and start again at the design. And of course, we'd have to see what the programmatic design was that the council wanted to have either a smaller facility or a different sized facility. So a lot of that investment would need to be start over again. Yes.
Speaker 3: Okay. So if that scenario played out, we still we could go through the same motions and not have a definitive direction from the Coastal Commission. So, for instance, this this the letter, the May 11th letter has been characterized as the strongest so far. I'm looking at the language and terms like best practices to me don't connote strong language. What? I don't want you to give your opinion, Mr. Murdoch, but we need something more definitive than that, wouldn't we, as a final ruling from the Coastal Commission?
Speaker 6: Correct. And that's part of the staff recommendation. I think it's very clear that we think Coastal will change the project, that they'll have conditions on the project, but we really don't know what those are until we get there. They've given us some indication, of course, of the issues, but we need to file our coastal development application permit application to get to coastal. So that's why staff is recommending the EO to be certified because it is the maximum project that gives us flexibility to look at smaller projects and work on those with the Coastal Commission and to start that process, if we were to today go back and maybe the Council gives a different direction, we still are missing that input from the Coastal Commission. We could be in the same situation down the road, you know, and have a go to coastal and have it still come back. So we'd like in there in the interest of efficiency to move this forward to the Coastal Commission so we can start having those discussions.
Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. So that was the point I wanted to make with the councilmembers point that not being comfortable with moving this forward, in a sense, that's the only way to get that input from the Coastal Commission in a real sense. Also, I don't think any of us here would be for spending another $4 million and not knowing what that input is. So from that efficiency standpoint, I just want to bring that forward. Also, we haven't talked a lot about the we haven't talked at all about the narrow scope of the air. And we've talked about a lot of issues here that that don't apply. I noticed the story polls were mentioned, and that was part of a different appeal, was it not?
Speaker 7: Yes, sir, it was. There was a zoning administrator decision on this story polls because it required a local coastal development permit. That permit was that decision of the zoning administrator was appealed to the planning commission. The Planning Commission upheld the zoning administrator's decision. The story pole was installed. That was the end of that judiciary process.
Speaker 3: Okay. So we wouldn't be able to comment on that in this session, on this application. How does that work?
Speaker 10: I think legally you can comment on it. Okay. If you feel that that was deficient. But the Planning Commission basically gave its ruling that they felt that it was an appropriate use of the story pole at that particular location. And I think Tom mentioned the rationale. The Planning Commission was very clear that normally a story poll is used in a single family dwelling situation where the public doesn't have a lot of other information. And in this particular situation, with all the community outreach, the full environmental impact report, the renderings, the drawings that were available to the public, that a full configuration of storage poles was somewhat redundant and not necessarily the facts of that particular situation.
Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. And under the same kind of heading in terms of the scope of the e.r. We've talked a lot about social justice issues here. Now, I understand, Mr. Mays, that we're allowed to talk about him, but it's just not within the scope of the C.A.R., is my understanding.
Speaker 10: Indirectly, I guess it could be considered part of it, part of the consideration. Any white counsel certainly can take that into consideration, but by and large, it's a land use decision and you're looking at whether or not this particular project will cause any significant effects on the environment, whether the city has looked at those effects, whether they've implemented mitigation measures that would be suitable to reduce them to a level of insignificance. And that's what this particular E.R. concludes, is that there are not any significant effects that cannot be mitigated.
Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. I think that's all I have for now. I'll defer to another council member.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next up, we have two final counsel comments and we'll go to a vote. Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: Okay, thank you. I want to thank everybody for being here. And it's been a really long night and I'm sure all of us are very, very exhausted and tired. But it has been a great discussion thus far. And I think staff are putting this together. I do have questions as well. So the first question I have, which may have been answered, but I just want to make sure I'm clear, is in the Coastal Commission letter, as they have defined this area as a hazardous area, I guess how are we reformulating the argument, if this were to pass, that this is not a hazardous area, but given sea level wave issues, break water, you know, all of that shoreline erosion, how are we building a better case? And in that sense.
Speaker 7: So in our response to the Coastal Commission letter. Councilwoman Gonzalez we did address why we believe.
Speaker 4: That our way of approach.
Speaker 7: Study was appropriate.
Speaker 4: Why we.
Speaker 7: Believe that under the Coastal Act this is not the definition of new development.
Speaker 4: And why we believe that this is.
Speaker 7: Also not a protective device under the Coastal Act. Because of that, we believe we are consistent with the Coastal Act and that we have analyzed the Coastal Act, including including hazards under our land use analysis and Section three of the Coastal Act in 16 different consistency findings. So we do believe that our secret document.
Speaker 4: Is.
Speaker 7: Wholly adequate in addressing those issues.
Speaker 6: And then if I can add, we're also looking at some something new that has come up, which is can we be talking to the Coastal Commission about an innovative approach, which is the sand management and looking at beach nourishment that's not in front of you in the air. It's not needed, it's not a mitigation measure, but it is something extra that we would like to have that conversation with coastal about sand management plan so that we can preserve that beach in front because that's really what they're saying in their letter, is how if this site is going to be have some way of approach, how are you going to preserve the beach in front of it so that there is public access?
Speaker 2: So why wouldn't we include that in the in this report?
Speaker 6: So as you mentioned, after doing all of the studies, we don't believe we believe that we're fully compliant, that we are within the Coastal Act, that we don't believe that we need that as a mitigation measure because of the way that we've addressed sea level rise. But it is something that we can certainly talk about as something new in it. And in addition to it, because it's currently an operating program that we're doing today. We just have no need for it at the Belmont Pool. That is a very stable beach. It is not moving the way that the other beaches are. Peninsula Beach loses a lot of sand. So we are constantly doing sand management there, but we don't see that activity right now at the Belmont site. Of course, as as the years go on, we would look to do that. And it's just something we've talked to them about.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. And then I think there was some question as to the intensity of use. And so adding additional seating, would that add to the intensity of use? I mean, I think I feel like that would be yeah, increased seating. Of course, all of the additional recreation and sporting I know that has not only increased in costs, but certainly that would intensify the use of that.
Speaker 6: So I'll take the first crack at that and then you can jump in as well as Lori. The opera actually had more seating than what we're proposing, the old pool while it was bleacher seating. And it was it was a very strange configuration, actually had, I believe, several thousand seats, that 2500 seats that were available. We had 1250 permanent indoor seats and then 3000 exterior seats. That will be.
Speaker 3: Temporary.
Speaker 2: Okay. And then I. So in looking at the alternative locations, I feel that personally they do seem a little bit light. Do we have any financial analysis on any of the alternative options, specifically four and five, which seem to be less costly? I don't it doesn't seem like we have a price tag to that. So are we looking to include that?
Speaker 7: We do not have price tags associated with any of those alternatives at this time. We are at about 30%. Design, schematic design for the project. And we do not analyze cost as an environmental impact under SEQUA. So the idea of you certifying the air tonight does allow you to come back and give us further direction after we go to the Coastal Commission in vetting those issues out. If you and the Coastal Commission choose to reduce any of the programmatic requirements that the Council originally placed on the project.
Speaker 2: Okay. So the reason I bring that up is because it says in the air the following objective objectives have been established for the proposed project and would aid decision makers in the review of the proposed project and its associated environmental impacts. So number eight, although it doesn't specifically ask or state about the about the alternative options, it does include operate a pool.
Speaker 7: Facility facility.
Speaker 2: That would generate revenue to offset help offset the ongoing operations and maintenance costs. So I think costs should be considered. So as we look at that, what is what are the maintenance costs for?
Speaker 4: Correct.
Speaker 7: So you can place that as a legitimate project objective. But under the secret checklist, there is no analysis of cost or revenues under SICA. So a project.
Speaker 4: Objective.
Speaker 7: Is an objective that that project applicant places on itself.
Speaker 4: For.
Speaker 7: Determining what kind of project they want to.
Speaker 4: Proceed with. So but that does not require.
Speaker 7: Us, nor does it require, as a state law, require us to analyze revenue.
Speaker 4: For a.
Speaker 7: Project because not all projects generate revenue.
Speaker 6: And Councilmember, I think part of your question is have we looked at the operating costs and what would those be?
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 6: So we did do that. That is one of the city council's financial policies is before you start and embark on a major capital project, you need to be also looking at what the operating costs of that maintenance and that in that facility is. So we did that analysis that we brought to the Council back in October 2014. Essentially, the old port had an expense of about $1.2 million a year and about 300,000 in revenue for a net cost of $900,000 that the city was providing in subsidy. The new pool has more expense. It's 3.2 million. It also generates more revenue at 1 million. For that, net costs is about 2.2. So all told, we would be looking at a facility that would have an additional $1.3 million in Tidelands needed to support it. That is mostly from water cost and from and from chemicals. And the treatment makes sure that it's a safe facility, but also staffing as well. So that is something it is a rough estimate. It is something we need to hone more. The more that we get further in schematic design, the more that we can we can hold that number. And that would be something the council would look at before moving forward.
Speaker 2: Okay. So we're saying 3.2 million is what your overall operational cost would be, correct?
Speaker 6: We tend to look at it in net cost. So the net cost would be 2.2 million.
Speaker 2: Uh, 2.2. Okay. Thank you for that. And then would we. Let me see here. One more question. Okay. So I guess the final question I would have would just be to the recreational activities that were the recreational additions. To me, they seem a bit like an afterthought and I don't know how we could better approach this, you know, if this are if this is to pass. How can we better approach the community with adding additional input? I don't even know if that's possible, adding additional information or additional ideas for the recreational component, because as it stands now, I mean, I'm looking at the PowerPoint from back in 2014 and it's over a third of the costs seem to are specifically with diving competitiveness and all that. But you know, we only have a very like 2.2 million is for the outdoor recreational pool. So it's pretty I don't I don't see that we're really focusing on the community recreational side. So what can we do? Is is it maybe something that we can provide to one of our commissions or youth commission? I don't know if that's even for additional purview.
Speaker 6: So you can certainly do some additional public outreach on the components of the recreational design at this point, the sizes of the pools and kind of where they're located. That's all been sort of set through the process. But there are certainly the types of equipment and the types of things that children would find exciting and useful and useful within the bounds of the ER. We could certainly welcome more input on that. Again, that, that is a pretty specific level of design that we haven't gotten to, but we would certainly welcome some input if that's what the Council would like to do.
Speaker 7: I would also like to add that the both of the large pools are actually used for recreational purposes and not to just focus on the one pool that is specifically designed for children. So there are other recreational programs that are occurring in the large pools, including older adult swim, learn to swim for all, all kids. So that smaller pool that is outside is specifically earmarked for younger recreation. But that does not mean that that is the only aspect of the pool where recreation occurs. So recreation is not just related to youth. It is related to older adults as well as as middle aged folks and younger as well.
Speaker 6: And a lot of the recreation comes from programing as well. So it's not necessarily something that is built into the facility, but the way that the Parks and Rec staff program, the facility and as Amy mentioned, by adding things like the moveable floor was a big addition to make sure that the inside is actually programable for youth and for children as well. Without it, it would not be it would be very deep water. And that's going to limit the number of kids programing, the therapy pool, which is the teaching pool and what you can do in the diving well as well. So there's because there's a number of activities there that would be youth oriented, too.
Speaker 2: Okay. So how do we I mean, foresee that like what percentage would be recreation and what percentage would be competitive? I've seen that with other pools. And what are we forecasting in that sense?
Speaker 6: Well, we actually see it as 100% recreational, first and foremost. So the building is designed to be a recreational facility. It then has the ability to do the competition through the deep water pools and also the competitive seats. One of the things we mentioned early on was that we if you see the facility, you've actually have a central intake and you can divide the facility into two for the event. Now, if there is a competitive event happening, so that that's for the actual competitive events. That being said, there's also going to be requests from, you know, competitive swimming or, you know, whether it's organized swim or whether it's water polo to use the facility. And that's where we really rely on our Parks and rec staff to balance that, to make sure that we have a balance at any given time. That recreational facility is recreation is prioritized and that there is recreational access. Having the dedicated outdoor recreational pool, that is one that will not have competitive swimming in it. It is you know, that that is something we knew that we've never had before. We've always had kind of recreational swim, having to compete with all the other uses of the pool. And so we do see a big enhancement in the current design for recreation swim.
Speaker 2: Okay, great. I think that answers all my questions. I will just say that I, you know, I absolutely support a pool somewhere in our city, I think. I don't know that it needs to be of this magnitude, but quite frankly, especially after there has been really no community outreach to other places in the city, there really hasn't . And there are absolutely other pools, but they're not of this magnitude. And we just do not have the outreach that we should have had. I think 16 meetings, most of which were city meetings, I don't believe is sufficient for a pool of this magnitude. So but I know that so many people have been involved with this for so many years. I absolutely understand that. I also look at the community stakeholders, and there were six competitive agencies, five residents who also had competitive agency that were working with competitive agencies and two business stakeholders. So, you know, I would hope that when we look at creating development in the future of this size, of course, of this capacity, and I hope that when we are able to to do this, that we're in really encompassing all of our our community, just like the Civic Center, as Vice Mayor Richardson alluded to. And so I, I may be voting no on this. I'm still thinking at this very moment as to what I want to do. But there's definitely I know a lot of need for this is just how are we implementing this and at what price tag and all of the environmental impacts I think need to be considered. There are a lot. And so that's that's what I'll leave with. But thank you.
Speaker 0: To. And finally, Councilman Ranga, we'll get to a vote.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mayor. Just a point of history here. When the pool was taken down, the coast commission looked at at the line and they actually moved the coastal zone, passed it into what do you call that Olympic lane or Olympic with that street right there. So anyway, when I saw that, you know, I went to the commissioner said, wait a minute, there's supposed to be a pool there. You can't move the coastal zone that far without giving us an opportunity to look at the pool. So they moved it back to where it was before so that we could have a project there. So that's just a little point of clarification as to why we continue it, because if we had it, if the Coastal Commission staff recommendation of moving the coastal zone had stayed in place, we have no pool. Quite frankly. And you remember that time we talked about it?
Speaker 6: Yes, sir, very vividly. That's correct.
Speaker 3: So when it comes down to this project, I mean, I can see the the desire to move forward with the air so that the of commission and that's sort of like kicking it down the can kick the can down the road so that the Coastal Commission can review it. And Charles, what kind of project you get? You know, I have issues with that only because we're relying on a state regulatory agency to tell us what to build and how to build it. And, you know, I just have an issue with it. But I can also see where, you know, with this C.A.R., you want to shoot for the moon and hope you end up in Hawaii. But you know, we might end up in Gilligan's Island as far as I can see, because the changes that the commission might see will be so drastic that this council was going to say , there's no project here and we can't build this. And you're putting your faith at a commission that is going to say, you know, you have a project, but you have to put it this size. And is that going to be acceptable? Well, you have to be ready for that. And for those who are supporting the pool, you have to be ready for that, because that might be the recommendation to downsize it drastically, the way you say. Well, that's not that's no longer the the the iconic world class pool that we want. So you've got to be ready for that might happen. But in the end, what it's going to come down to is that the Coastal Commission is going to review our project and then send it back and I know there's going to be an appeal. I mean, there's somebody out there, there's a pilot, there's a pool today. There's going to be an appeal of not the project of the air. And when the air gets to court and the judge says, this idea that you submitted is insufficient because you didn't have that community engagement component in it, because it was insufficient because you didn't really go out into the community, into the other areas of Long Beach and get their input as to how this project should proceed. That EIA is going to be kicked out and you guess what? We're going to be revisiting it again. We're going to be back exactly to square one. So that's why I'm holding to the fact that we need to look at the sea air as an opportunity, but at the same time, it needs to change. I mean, it's insufficient. I'm not saying it's inadequate. It's just it's that is that is not sufficient enough. If we could, I would I would I would make a motion to send it back to staff how staff work continue to work with the Coastal Commission to I think would get something that's going to be feasible and be able to be workable . But if not, if we if that cannot be done because we're set with this current year, then so be it.
Speaker 6: And Mr. Mayor, if I'm able to provide some context that I think Councilmember Younger makes a good point about, the process is messy. And unfortunately, we don't know any better way to do it. What we're kind of stuck in is we have input from Coastal Commission staff, they from local staff, but they are not the decision makers just in the city of Long Beach. Our city staff are not decision makers. It is the council that is the decision maker. And so we're stuck a little bit in that they can give us some thoughts. They can't really accept our application and move forward until we have an air and have a culture development permit. And frankly, we don't know what the Coastal Commission as a body is going to do with that staff recommendation, especially since there is local staff and there is mid-level staff and there's high level staff that we've had various conversations on different aspects with each area. So that's what we're really asking. We completely realize that this is messy, but we won't know what we've got until we get to the commission. And that body gives us some direction to us to work, for us to work with.
Speaker 0: Okay. So we have my folks again. So let me go back through this limit first to the city attorney and then we'll go to Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 10: Mayor. I just wanted to clarify the motion. I can do that at the end before we get ready to vote.
Speaker 0: Okay. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 9: Sure. I just want to have some some clarity. So I get it that this is a messy process. But should this move forward tonight, what happens if the planning commission, what are the possible scenarios that the Coastal Commission can can decide and how would we respond to those scenarios? So they sort of, for example, if they rejected it, what is what do we do if we if they say make these changes? How do we respond if they approve it? What is the next step?
Speaker 6: So essentially, if you were to certify the E.R., we would then both prepare a local coastal permit, which the zoning administrator in Long Beach would hear for the for the portion that's in the city of Long Beach jurisdiction. We would also do a coastal development application for Coastal Commission to review. There's some interesting relationship between those two of them. They can be appealed to each other, but essentially we need to go through a city process and get to coastal. The Coastal Commission has a number of options they could certainly adopted as is. At which point it still comes back to the council to move forward. They could, which they'll certainly do probably put in which we think they would put on conditions which then could come back to the City Council for concurrence. They could also have design changes which then we would need to go through in the air process depending on what level of design changes if they. We've tried to design this to be maximum flexibility in the air so that there's multiple alternatives to work with. But if they came up with something completely different, we would then come back to you as a body, get your direction on whether you concur with that or want to bring it back to Coastal. And then we would have to probably go through an E.R. as well. So there are ways to do it. And it just it does take some some flexibility.
Speaker 9: So in every one of those scenarios, it ends up right back here in front of city council.
Speaker 6: Absolutely.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 9: And, you know, and I've heard a lot and that's why I think, you know, well, I want to better understand we will have an opportunity to talk about some things that are not limited to the air. Yes. Right. I mean, we've got air issues, but I've heard things that are, you know, outside of that scope that I really want to talk about, engage in, like, you know, programing, the name, additional, you know, connections, transportation, equity, things like that that aren't appropriate. What would be the appropriate time to talk about air specific or comments to coastal and then separate issues that are still related to this this project of this pool, but not directly related to any air.
Speaker 6: So we would recommend that we first get to Coastal and have that that sense of where they're going with this project if they are going to have changes. I think that would be a good time to bring it back to Coastal. You'll be out of the air process by then. You'll be able to see. We'll be able to staff to say, here's what we're hearing from Coastal. You can bring up any of those other issues then if you'd like, or also before we enter into any contract or decide on the funding as we're deciding what level of support we're going to have for this financially, all those are financial issues as well and those should all get talked about.
Speaker 9: So a motion like, you know, related to, let's say, no more than $60 million, everything else has to be other sources or don't compete with non non titling sources or projects. That's not appropriate here tonight. That's something that's appropriate in the future. Is that correct?
Speaker 6: That's correct. Again, I think it's you may not need to make a motion. Right. That if we if coastal comes back with a significantly smaller project. So that's again, why we would think that coastal kind of direction would come first. And then you, as the funding body, can have some decision making authority on how how you address that.
Speaker 9: So I mean, I'm going to maintain my vote, but I think it's important we just clarify this, that this is going to continue to be a long process and it will come back to us and we will have an opportunity. I've heard some teams from multiple council members. One more thing, additional outreach. What point is the appropriate time to do it? I don't know that we would say. I mean, when would be the appropriate time to go do more outreach? I don't know. But it's now I think it might be once we understand what happens with coastal. But but you tell me what would be the appropriate time to do more outreach citywide?
Speaker 6: I would say that after the Coastal finds, the project would likely be the best part to do it again. The Coastal Commission. If anyone wants to get involved in this project and be at the Coastal Commission meeting, that would be an a very appropriate time to do it. If there's other issues not related to coastal, you know, doing things like how do we how do we add in some of the recreation features or just get ideas of what kids want or what types of programing, you know, would be interesting. We can certainly look at that at any time with our Parks and Rec department.
Speaker 9: Okay. So, you know, I'm going to maintain my maintain for my support for the project at this point. But I do want to just say, I hope that our comments are considered into the process of the plan, and I hope that it doesn't. A prescribed motion right now or any other time to say, look, there needs to be more outreach at some point. And, you know, we want to make sure we're good putting the better, you know, value proposition to residents outside of the Highlands area. And I want to see that stuff reflected in the upcoming budget. Do we need to make a motion before the next budget comes out?
Speaker 3: So I think we're hearing.
Speaker 6: The council loud and clear. I think it's more than one council member we've heard for the additional ideas of how do we get additional outreach. Staff will definitely put together a plan. So no, we don't see that as necessary for the motion tonight.
Speaker 9: We'll continue talking off line. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. We have a motion in a second. Just to clarify, Mr. Mays, a vote of yes moves the project forward, supports that recommendation and denies the appeal. Is that correct?
Speaker 10: That's correct. And I just would like to add, Mayor. Yes, a yes vote does move this forward. It essentially denies the four appeals, upholds the Planning Commission's decision. And more importantly, the Council will be adopting the resolution that is in their packet, which essentially certifies that IIR and the other four entitlements that we've discussed tonight, the CPA , the site plan review, the standards variance, the other three, and it's all contained in that resolution that's attached to the package. So a yes vote passes that resolution.
Speaker 0: Okay. So I'm gonna call for the vote members to go and cast your vote on the project.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Okay, great. Thank you. Motion carries. We are taking a one minute recess. Are you serious? Okay, hold on a second. There's. There's no calls from your. Ringo said he presses. He pressed the wrong button. He said he's a no creep. Okay. So the vote still passes and it's, I believe, 6262 is the vote and the nays were. Councilman Gonzales and Councilmember Arango, we'll take a one minute recess and then we go back to the next hearing.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much. That is Christian McBride Trio right here. Members of Watergate, Gay Jazz, Cherokee, the name of that tune recorded live at the Village Vanguard from 2015. And Chris McBride Trio, they are coming here to Southern California on Saturday, June 24th at Disney Hall. And Christian McBride is going to be headlining the K Jazz Summer Benefit Concert five years in a row. And we are selling out. Tickets are still available at the box office at Disney. Also make it a point to do what you know you need to do. You want to be a part of it. Jazz. Go to jazz and blues, dawg. And we have some very important seats in the House. But go to the website and find out if it's still available. You'll have the best seats in the House, and we thank you for supporting your members support. Okay. Jazz before Christian McBride, that was Dizzy Gillespie exactly like you. That's from the music of John Birks. Gillespie And it is just a CD you have to have that. Has the essence of bebop got into that set with Kenny Burrell on the Guitar Girl Talk from his solo CD from 1967. And we're going to get into the music of Oscar Peterson. But first, Vince Giraldi right after this. Okay. Jazz, 88.1.
Speaker 1: With the jazz membership card, you'll be part.
Speaker 0: Okay. We're calling the council meeting back to order. If I can have the roll call, please.
Speaker 4: Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Pierce, Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 4: Councilmember Supernanny.
Speaker 3: Here.
Speaker 2: Councilwoman Mongo. Councilman Andrew's.
Speaker 4: Council Member.
Speaker 2: Younger Councilman Austin. Vice Mayor Richardson. Mayor Garcia.
Speaker 0: I'm here and I have a motion and a kind of a consent calendar motion in a second. I need a motion and a second on consent calendar. | Resolution | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing; consider appeals from Jeff Miller and Melinda Cotton, Joe Weinstein, Ann Cantrell and Citizens Advocating for Responsible Planning (CARP), the Long Beach Area Peace Network and Anna Christensen, and Gordana Kajer; and
Uphold the Planning Commission's decision to adopt resolution certifying Environmental Impact Report 01-16 (State Clearinghouse No. 2013041063), approve a Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program, and approve Site Plan Review, Conditional Use Permit, Standards Variance, and Local Coastal Development Permit entitlements for the construction and operation of the Belmont Beach and Aquatic Center, an indoor/outdoor pool facility with an adjacent passive park, cafe, and restroom buildings (Application No. 1405-01) at 4000 East Olympic Plaza. (District 3) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05162017_17-0172 | Speaker 4: Report from Public.
Speaker 2: Works recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record. Conclude the public hearing. Find that the area to be vacated is not needed for present or prospective use public use and adopt resolution ordering the vacation of the alley west of Cedar Avenue between Lorraine Away and Seventh Street, District one.
Speaker 6: Mr. Modica staff report was given by Sean Crumby, our Deputy Director of Public Works.
Speaker 3: Good evening, our mayor and council. The hearing. Number one on the agenda speaks to or seeks to move forward a vacation of the alley west of Cedar between Lorain away and Seventh Street. The recommended action is to conduct and close a public hearing, make a finding that the alley is not needed for public use and adopt the resolution for vacation of said alley. A summary of the actions up to this point for this vacation include general plan consistency finding on December 1st of 2016 and a notice of intent by the City Council on February 7th of 2017. This morning, staff received objections from surrounding property owners against objecting to the vacation. This alley vacations are applied for and supported by those surrounding typically by those surrounding properties. And so that's a little bit unusual and directly relevant to this situation. It is a significant change to the situation, and as such, the council can consider stopping the vacation from moving forward. With that, I'm available to answer any questions that you have.
Speaker 5: Okay.
Speaker 0: Okay. There's only any public comment on this saying none. We're going to go ahead. And because there's no public comment, will we have a motion in a second? And Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: Now, I just want to thank you, Sean. I know this was kind of a long process, but, you know, we'll we'll support your recommendation. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay, members, please cast your votes.
Speaker 5: I can't go to anyone. You heard me right down there. I don't have to move away.
Speaker 3: Do you have any staff here?
Speaker 5: No. No. You mean the mayor?
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 10: Just some. I'm not sure if we took a vote on this, but I just want to make sure. The recommended action is to approve the vacation, and I'm not sure if that is what the intended motion is.
Speaker 2: I thought he.
Speaker 4: Said I think I would think what.
Speaker 10: Mr. Crumby said was basically council could consider not moving forward with the vacation, but the recommended action before the council is actually to approve it. So we would need a recommendation to receive and file for instance, would put it to bed and there would be no early vacation.
Speaker 0: So there was a travel up to Councilwoman Gonzales to want to make a motion.
Speaker 2: Yes, we'll make the motion to receive and filed the lawsuit.
Speaker 0: This item that Mr. Mays. Okay. Motions to receive and follow the item. Members, please. Gordon And there is no public comment on this. Okay, we're going to close the hearing. Members, please cast your votes.
Speaker 5: Thank you. My. He didn't go that.
Speaker 0: Motion.
Speaker 2: Because.
Speaker 0: Motion carries. And we're going to go ahead and move on to there still. Now the agenda meeting is can reset here. No play good here to have a comment.
Speaker 3: Yes, Larry. Good. You clear as the address and turning to something that's not too controversial, i.e., those things are going to what are going down in Washington, D.C. this week and well, for the next couple of weeks. But there is some good news. | Resolution | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, find that the area to be vacated is not needed for present or prospective public use; and, adopt resolution ordering the vacation of the alley west of Cedar Avenue between La Reina Way and 7th Street. (District 1) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05092017_17-0366 | Speaker 1: The motion passes.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Item 22, please.
Speaker 1: Communication from Councilman de Andrews and Mayor Garcia. Recommendation to approve the use of the sixth District. One time infrastructure funds in the amount of 80,000 to support the preservation of the iconic world famous VIP record sign at the top of the building located at 1030 Pacific Coast Highway.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilman Andrews couldn't be here tonight, so he's asked that we move this item forward. And I know he's asked Mr. Kyser to do a short staff report for the council, and then we'll go back to the city council. Mr. Keisler. All right. All right, mayor, honorable mayor and members of the city council.
Speaker 7: Tonight I'm presenting a quick overview of world famous.
Speaker 0: VIP records.
Speaker 7: Sign Restoration. World famous.
Speaker 0: VIP.
Speaker 7: Is a longtime, locally owned small business.
Speaker 0: And a member of the Sussex District community. Over the past 38 years, VIP records.
Speaker 7: Has served as.
Speaker 0: Both a record shop and recording studio for talented young musicians.
Speaker 7: And many notable musicians got their start there, including.
Speaker 0: Snoop Dogg, Nate Dogg, Warren.
Speaker 7: G and others.
Speaker 0: The record store.
Speaker 7: And.
Speaker 0: Its iconic world famous.
Speaker 7: VIP sign is.
Speaker 0: An international tourist draw and an.
Speaker 7: Icon for the music.
Speaker 0: Industry as.
Speaker 7: Well as locally.
Speaker 0: It's located in can see in central Long Beach on Pacific Coast Highway near MLK. There's the picture on the right shows you.
Speaker 7: How close it is also to poly high school in in central Long Beach in the sixth district. So what we're proposing is that the city is going to support.
Speaker 0: Providing $50,000 to VIP's LLC to restore the world famous VIP record signed. This will include $30,000.
Speaker 7: For fundraising.
Speaker 0: Restoration costs directly related to the the requirements.
Speaker 7: To bring it back.
Speaker 0: Into its its condition and absorb the cost for the removal storage of the sign and assist with temporary storage.
Speaker 7: Until a permanent home within the city.
Speaker 0: Boundaries is established. World famous VIP records will retain complete ownership of the sign throughout the process, all intellectual property associated with the sign and has agreed to.
Speaker 7: Work toward restoring the sign within 24 months upon the execution of the.
Speaker 0: Agreement and any fundraising associated with restoring the sign over and above the amount that the city can provide. World famous VIP and Kelvin Anderson, the owner of the.
Speaker 7: Sign, have agreed to move forward with making this sign a historical landmark and maintain that the sign will.
Speaker 0: Stay in the city boundaries.
Speaker 7: Where it where all.
Speaker 0: This historic activity began. And ultimately our next steps are to move forward with executing an agreement.
Speaker 7: For both parties removal and restoration of the.
Speaker 0: Iconic sign temporary storage, and then identifying a permanent location and reinstalling it. So with that, I will end my staff report and be happy to answer any questions. Thank you. There's a motion and a second to make a public comment, and I'll go to you first. Okay. Is there a public comment on the motion before we go to the council? Please come forward.
Speaker 2: Go ahead. By. My name is Ramon. I'm in the fifth district. This is a this is an interesting sign. I like it. But I don't feel that this is an appropriate use of of funds for using taxpayer money. I know that we have already some office holding accounts that seems more appropriate, more of a freedom of speech thing, I think. However, I also notice that.
Speaker 7: I think the.
Speaker 2: Costs are significant to our city. I'm certainly willing to to undercut the price that this guy has done. I don't know how he's getting the contract. I'm certainly willing to do everything that this guy is going to do for $5,000 or less. So I don't know how are you going to beat this thing out, but I'd like to be part of that.
Speaker 7: And if it's necessary.
Speaker 2: I will certainly look for that. I'd like to work with my councilwoman or District six, and when those bids go out, I'd like to be part of that. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Are there public comment? Please come forward.
Speaker 2: Good afternoon. My name is Michael Baker. I'm a business owner here in Long Beach. I own a barbershop next to the AP records. I am a native here in Long Beach, and I can remember when we used to buy vinyl records and VIP records.
Speaker 5: Where we used to see.
Speaker 2: Different entertainers like jazz entertainers, country western entertainer. It was just a place where people could go buy music during the old days. We had a lot of record store here in L.A. County. And to have a VIP record here at Long Beach, where we were able to see different artists be able to buy vinyls every week, be able to buy tapes, CDs. Some of you guys probably don't know vinyl CDs, but we used to have those back in the days. And VIP records were always there to supply us. And if we didn't have the music there, they always was able to supply us with it. Whenever you think of Long Beach. Throughout the world, people know VIP records, people, travelers from all over the world just to look at VIP records, not only just for the different artists who came to be BRP records, but it's just like when you think of Long Beach, you think of VIP records and the guy earlier said it all. I'm just trying to piggyback a little bit of history on it. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir. Speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hello again, Cami Johnson from KABC on Bay City College. And I'm here to actually I'm is a fortunate day that we've come here because we've come here to celebrate diversity in our community and representation of different racial groups and different groups of cultural standing. Because today, you know, we're marking the day that we are standing on a culture icon and this is a worldwide cultural icon. And no disrespect to the AAPI community or the Latin American community or any other community, but they are highly, highly represented through a mola, through the Pacific Islander Museum. And this is just the first step beyond just a record store, but as actually a cultural significance to the African-American community. This is history we're making today. And so I'm just here to let you know that this is more than just a record store. This is more than just buying vinyl. This is more than just the history. This is more than anything you can possibly imagine. This is a worldwide phenomenon. We're sitting in our own community and there are people from all over the world, Germany, Japan, that I've seen specifically just coming to my website to just find out more about what's going on with VIP and Long Beach. When people come to California, they come to Long Beach, they say, okay, Queen Mary. But second to that is VIP records. And so therefore, I just want to let you know that this vote is important to our African-American community and all people of color in our community that need to be represented in such a phenomenal way. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thanks so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Hello, everyone. Mayor Garcia, the council members, I am indeed honored to be here today. First of all, I'd like to thank the mayor for embracing me and sitting down with me to discuss a lot of possibilities. Like to also thank in his absence the Andrew's and the mayor for getting us to this point that we are today . Special thanks. Go out to John Keisler, John Edmond and John's assistant, Isabella, who have been working above and beyond to support VIP in this movement. It's a may the mayor year a little over a year ago. I have packed it in. I felt like that I did all I could do in Long Beach. I just kind of felt kind of disconnected on love and what a different year and a few months make. Because today I feel optimistic. I feel included. I have a new relationship now with the city that I haven't had for many years. And, you know, it's just a great feeling and a great possibility for the future. I look back over the 38 years I've been a businessman in this city, you know, the love, the respect that I have been shown over the years of being here, the love that I have for this city and shown to this community. You know, I think back over the times, you know, when gang violence and stuff with at an all time high in the early nineties and I just felt that I had to do something to help the kids in the community. And that's what led me to open a record in a small recording studio in the back of my store. And as you are, many, you know, is that that is the launch pad for artists like Warren Snoop Ricky Harris, rest in peace and and others. And, you know, I got a chance to, uh, you know, save lives. I wish I was able to say even more. But, you know, with where we are today and moving forward, I feel that my work is not done in Long Beach. And I feel that there's a lot more that can be done to create opportunities for youth moving forward and in this community. And I just thank you for this opportunity and thank you for connecting with me. Youth. Many years ago, I had a great relationship with this city. I was looking through some of my accommodations, both city, state and government that I received in the years past. And it's a I feel today that I can have that new relationship in a new beginning. And I thank you all for this time.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good afternoon, Mayor Garcia and Councilmember City Attorney. I want to thank you, Mayor, honestly, for your amazing leadership and guidance. And Councilman Diaz and John Edmunds and Keisler, we're not taking steps today to restore a sign. We're taking the first step to preserve legacy. It's Long Beach legacy. It's Calvin Anderson's legacy, but it's also the legacy of black music. There was a time when slaves were banned from playing loud instruments or dancing. There was a time when greats like Sammy Davis Jr performed for thousands but could not use the same restroom. And today, we're taking the steps to make a sign that represents hope. Because the truth is, that sign built its name and its brand in a toughest area of Long Beach where we had the highest crime and unemployment. There was a beacon of hope outside of Hollywood or New York that you could just walk down the street and pick up the mic for the first time, or maybe play an instrument for the first time. And although we didn't think that that was or he didn't think that was going to save every life and everyone was going to be a rapper or a singer, it.
Speaker 1: Gave a platform.
Speaker 7: And what our hope is today is that this is not a District six project. This is stemming because of the faith of District six. But it's a citywide project. And we hope that we can work with all of the council members to really help restore this legacy, preserve it, and provide opportunities in different districts to further the education so that young people can touch and see the stars they dream of, and they're not so far away. And so we take the city's faith in us very seriously. We have mobilized the best of historic landmark experts, preservation experts, so that we can ensure that the sign is restored and that the integrity is held in place . And together we will work with the city, follow the city's lead, and at times are going to have to follow our lead. And together I think we're going to really create something amazing for Long Beach. So thank you. And we hope that you will support us today. And just one more thing. I thought I would use this moment to market our new line of clothing in honor of Mr. Richardson's new baby. So this will be the smallest VIP clothing line ever. Mr. RICHARDSON So we just wanted to thank you guys. Sorry for the PR plug.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you so much. And I think this is our final comment, Mr. Good here, and then we'll go back to the Council for discussion. Very good here. This city is fortunate to have no shortage of members of the African-American community there. It's a city can take, proud of and do outstanding jobs and have a wide range of a wide spectrum of.
Speaker 2: Events and undertakings in this city. Unfortunately, I think.
Speaker 0: The stigma associated with this for the individual that one police in the article that you've seen a few times.
Speaker 2: Refer to as Long Beach is number one thug.
Speaker 0: The degenerate snoop dog overshadows that.
Speaker 2: So I think the best place to hang that, quite frankly. That sign and keep it.
Speaker 0: Is in the top floor of.
Speaker 2: The Long Beach City Jail, period. Well, given the amount of blood that Snoop Dogg was responsible for spilling on the sidewalks, in the.
Speaker 0: Streets of.
Speaker 2: This city and his treatment of women. Thank you. Okay.
Speaker 0: Coming back to the city council, Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So I've had an opportunity to speak with Councilman Andrews and his team. And so I want to applaud the mayor, the council member, the community for coming back in fairly prompt, short period of time with a plan to restore this. There's no question to me or to to others on the city council that this is not, you know, that this isn't anything else but a symbol and an emblem of our own cultural tapestry and our history. And it says that, you know, we as a city take seriously art and culture and historic preservation of all of our all of our our communities here in Long Beach. And they all have specific value. And there's no question how much value has been brought to Long Beach by the activity that took place have taken place historically within the VIP record. So I'm I'm happy to make this this motion. And I encourage the city council to support the most of this action tonight on behalf of Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilwoman Price for the second.
Speaker 3: Thank you. I'm happy to support this item as well. I will say as a point of clarification, because we did receive some emails today that this is a project that's being led by Councilman Andrews. It's a it's a project that he has worked in collaboration with the mayor and others in our community to bring forth and to fund. He is using his discretionary money to do it. And I think when we think about projects that enhance a community, sometimes there are projects that aren't quantifiable but mean a great deal to the people and the community where the improvement is being made. And so I wholeheartedly support his his decision to to support the community and anything that he wants to do in regards to this this particular request, I wholeheartedly support and I think thank his team for working with the community on it. Thanks.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 8: Yeah. I want to thank everybody that's worked really hard to educate the council and staff about the importance of the sign. But I really want to say that in the last couple of years, Vice Mayor and myself have really, along with everyone on this council, talked about equity and preserving the sign. While it's something that Councilmember Andrews has decided to do out of his direct funds, I think that preserving the history of the artist that performed there, that sold their albums there and the people that go into VIP records is so important to Long Beach. I'm from Texas, from Houston, Texas, and VIP records was something I grew up with. And so being able to move here and to see that we are a city that's going to preserve that history, not knowing what that next step is is really important to me. And so I wholeheartedly support this. And I want to applaud you guys for making sure that we've found a way to preserve the history and to be able to tell the stories of that struggle and how we come out of that and make our lives what we need them to be. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 5: Thank you. And also like to just, Lynn, my support and say that I will enthusiastically support this this item. I want to congratulate Mayor Garcia and of course, sixth District Council member Diane Andrews for for reaching a resolution that I think is going to be one that the community will appreciate that that hip hop, hip hop artist and enthusiasts throughout the country will appreciate it is a a symbol, an iconic landmark for for our city. Any time that somebody visits from out of town, it's a it's a destination point for me to show off our city. Much like in Hollywood, there's Capitol Records and the Hollywood Sign VIP records. That symbol in the Central District or central area of our community is is is a symbol of of of something that many of us grew up on. I know it's important to my generation. And so I'm happy. And I was rooting on us to get to a solution, a resolution here. This is one of those issues where, you know, you take the lead of the the councilmember in that district. And I'm proud of the that the Andrews was able to make this happen. So I'm happy to support. And congratulations, Mr. Anderson.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And before we get to a vote, I just want to just first that Mr. Anderson, thank you for being a small business owner in Long Beach for almost 40 years. And I think that is. You know, over over those over those many decades, you provided a lot of jobs. You provided a lot of opportunity for youth. You opened your store when there was a lot of gang violence and challenges within the central Long Beach and across the city. And so I just want to just take us for a moment beyond just voting for this project. I just wanted to honor you as well for your incredible commitment to the community and to Long Beach, because I think that it's hard to be a small business owner, you know that. But to do it and to open a business and to remain committed to the legacy of a VIP and to the location and your your effort in this process is really commendable. So I just want to start by by thanking you for for that. I just also want to add that talked to a few folks as well. The truth is that VIP records is is the most famous hip hop records brand in the country, if not the world. And so when people think about famous record stores across the country and famous places that sold music and music developed within within the hip hop community and that type of music, VIP records is incredibly well known across the world. And in fact, I can't you know, oftentimes folks will will tag you or send you photos of places they are in Long Beach. And I constantly get pictures of people that take photos over by the VIP sign. I'm on PCH. And so I think that this is about certainly preserving their VIP legacy, but it's also about the history of Long Beach. And I think we have to honor all of our history and our history in the city has there's a lot of great things about our history, whether it's the Navy, whether it's the arrival of the Queen Mary. Whether it's the development of hip hop music and West Coast rap that developed in Long Beach, whether it's a variety of other parts of our history, they're all a part of our city. And so and whenever we can preserve our history and this is part of our history, I think is really important regardless of the type of music or the location or all of that. And so I'm really happy that we're at this place today. And the last thing I'll say is, not only is VIP records an important part of the history of Long Beach and the development of music, it's also an important part of black history. And I think that it's important to recognize that within our African-American community in the city and the development of that community within Long Beach, this is also an important part of that history within the community. And I've heard that consistently from numerous members of our African-American community within the city of Long Beach. And so for all for those reasons and others, I want to thank Councilman Andrews for taking the lead on this issue. He wanted to be here, couldn't. But I told him that I would kind of speak in his stead. I know I speak for both of us when I when I when I give these remarks. And I want to thank the council for supporting this and look forward to a strong partnership in the future. So contemplate, please cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Great. Congratulations. Okay. We are. And just to make it just also sure announce it. We're going to be doing the we have a hearing and then after the hearing, we're going to be moving up item 19 to the front of the agenda. And then we'll go will be we'll be going on to the rest of the agenda as well. And we also have we also have public comment, which we'll do right after the hearing. Okay. And so with that, we'll begin the hearing and turn it over to the clerk to begin that pass. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to approve the use of the Sixth Council District's one-time infrastructure funds transferred from the Capital Projects Fund (CP) in the Public Works Department (PW) into the Economic and Property Development (EP) in the amount of $80,000 to support the preservation of a historical and cultural asset at the top of the building located at 1030 Pacific Coast Highway;
Authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute the necessary documents with World Famous VIP Records LLC, a private organization located in the City of Long Beach, in an amount of $80,000 to be used for the removal, restoration, historical landmark designation, and temporary storage of the iconic World Famous VIP Records sign, until a permanent location can be determined within the City of Long Beach; and
Increase appropriations in the General Fund (GF) in the Economic and Property Development Department (EP) budget by $80,000. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05092017_17-0338 | Speaker 7: Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Thank you. So we'll move on to hearing number two. And I believe an oath is required on this hearing. Clerk Would you mind introduce an item.
Speaker 1: Report from financial management recommendation? Receive supporting documentation into the record. Conclude the hearing and approve the hearing officer's recommendation and Planning Commission Determination to revoke business licenses issued to Mico Sports Lounge, located at 710 West Willow Street and approve the hearing officer's recommendation to allow the commercial industrial business license issued to Mark Ronald and Colleen Mackey property owners to remain and be modified by adding a condition to the business license, requiring the property owners not operate or lease the premises, and to any tenant engaging in the sale of alcohol for the property located at 710 to 714 West Willow Street, District seven.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Let's go ahead and do the minutes of the oath.
Speaker 9: There is an oath required, and anyone that intends to testify this evening should stand and take the oath when the clerk reads it.
Speaker 1: You and each of you. Do you solemnly state that the testimony you may give in the cause now and pending before this body shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God.
Speaker 4: And I.
Speaker 2: Thank you. So let's go ahead with staff's presentation. Mr. Modica. Thank you, Vice Mayor. We do have a staff report for this. It will be led by Sandy Palmer, our purchasing and business services manager, and supported by Deputy City Attorney Arturo Sanchez.
Speaker 1: Good evening, honorable mayor and members of the city council. Tonight, you have before you a recommendation to uphold the hearing officer's determination to revoke the business licenses issued to the way incorporated doing business as MidCoast Sports Lounge, located at 710 West Willow Street and to allow the property owners business license issued to Mark Ronald and Colleen Mackey to remain and be modified by adding a condition to the license requiring that the licensee may not operate or lease the premises to any tenants. Engaging in the sale of alcohol for the property located at 710 to 714 West Willow Street in Council District seven. For some background on this item, in June of 2016, the Development Services Department, as well as the police department, recommended the revocation of the conditional use permit or cuppy and the business licenses associated with this property. The basis for the rectification excuse me revocation was the continued violations of both the conditional use permit and the business licenses . Some of the nuisance activity stemming from the operation of the bar included noise, public urination, intimidation from the bar patrons towards neighboring residents, parking issues, a shooting of a patron coming from the bar, a stabbing outside the bar. Approximately 250 calls for service that are attributable to the bar from January 2014 to May 2016. Citations for UNpermitted Entertainment and a Citation for Health and Safety Issues related to operation of the Bar. On August 9th, 2016, City Council referred to the Planning Commission, the Consolidated Public Revocation Hearing of the of the Cup and the business licenses . On November 3rd, 2016, the Planning Commission voted to revoke the conditional use permit and the business licenses issued to both the property owners and the business owner. After an eight hour long public hearing on November 10th and 11th, 2016, both the business owner and the property owner respectively appealed the revocation of the business licenses. It is important to note that neither party appealed the revocation of the CFP, which allowed the land use of the property to be a bar that appealed, time lapsed and the conditional use permit revocation decision is now final. With the conditional use permit no longer in place, the bar is no longer allowed to operate at the subject property. On December 20th, the City Council 2016 City Council referred the appeal the business license revocations for both the business owner and the property owner to the hearing officer. The six hour long appeal hearing was held on March 15th, 2017, and on April 4th, 2017, the hearing officer submitted his written report outlining his factual determinations, conclusions of law and recommendations. That report is included in the staff report and is marked as Exhibit A staff respectfully request that the City Council uphold the hearing officer's recommendations, which are again to revoke the business licenses issued in its way. Incorporated Doing Business Mico Sports Lounge, located at 710 West Willow Street, and to allow the property owners business license issued to Mark Ronald and Colleen Mackey to remain and be modified by adding a condition to the license requiring that the licensee may not operate or lease the premises to any tenant engaging in the sale of alcohol for the property located at 710 to 714 West Willow Street. And with that, I would like to turn over the staff report to Art Sanchez from the city attorney's office.
Speaker 4: Mr. Sanchez.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Ms.. Farmer. Council. I am the deputy city attorney that was assigned to this matter. I handle code enforcement and nuisance abatement matters for the city. And I handled both both hearings. And based on the events and the evidence and facts that are presented at each of those hearings, I thought it was important that Council view a video that was prepared by the residents and kind of spliced together different scenes of the type of activity that they had had to endure since the bar opened back in 2014. And I wanted to give you just a little background before I show the video of, you know, this particular location so that counsel has an idea of the area and the proximity of the bar to the residence. So if I may, real quick and the PowerPoint presentation can be put up, please. So obviously this isn't the the front entrance to maker's bar located 710 West Willow Street. This is an aerial shot of the location of the bar. It's flanked to the let's see where we the north by Oregon Avenue and to the south by Main Avenue. And let's go next here. This is a view looking oh, sorry, east west. And then I'm kind of backwards here. So this looks like it's viewed from the north going south. There we go. So this is a view from obviously above Willow Street, towards the back alley or back parking lot of Migos, where it's designated a little drop pin. And the location of the home adjacent to that alley is the one that where the video was taken from. And this is another angle looking now. Here we go again. So west to east. I think I think I've got that one right. Again, of the parking lot area, which is that there's a parked car parked car in that middle lane. I think there's eight designated spots and that's the parking lot directly behind me goes. And then there's the little alleyway and then that home right adjacent to the alleyway. And this is kind of a ground shot of the same alleyway and parking lot. And this is if you go in looking now, you go again west, east, to west. And again, that the property adjacent to the alley and adjacent to the back parking lot of. A little bit closer view the this is the back door to me goes in the parking lot adjacent to it. Another picture and then this is looking from the driveway exiting that alley in the parking lot, looking to go east or north on Main Avenue. And then this is looking from the alleyway south on Main Avenue. And then this is looking west on Willow Street, where the entrance to me is from the corner of Main Avenue and Willow Street. And then looking south from the corner of Willow Street and Main Avenue towards the the alleyway and the driveway that I previously were previously shown. I'm sorry. The reason I wanted to give you a little bit of a background of the location is because the residents were having trouble when they called the police because of the nature of the calls that were mostly noise violations and also parking violations as well as other nuisance related activities. But because the low priority of the calls, police were arriving and not seeing anything, and there were some discrepancies about whether or not the residents were making a founded calls or legitimate calls. And so what the residents did was they banded together and bought a camera system that was set up in that adjacent home. I think it's 25, 69 Main Avenue. It was the home of resident Ricky or Payson, and they started taking video footage of themselves back in May of 2015, I believe is when they purchased it. And so what the council was going to see now is a compilation that they came together and produced themselves and then took it to someone to have prepared of. I think it's 15 separate days where activity was occurring. So with that, I think you can play the video, please. Oh, and before I put it on anything, I just want to advise that there is some profanity that's going to be used in this video and there is some public urination that is depicted. So I just wanted to warn anyone that that's going to be too cold of the scene. So with that, you could play the video, please.
Speaker 6: I. Around. What? Oh. Right. So why? We hope. After left feeling. Where we are right now. All we. Can't talk about shit that I'm talking about. No violence. Are you hear how? So.
Speaker 2: City manager. I think we get the gist. If it's okay, if we cut the video a little bit early, that is fine. Yeah. Pissed off idiots. Thank you. So if you want to continue your staff report.
Speaker 0: So and I just wanted to point out and that the time of of night that and the date we're actually depicted on the video and the TV cameras are positioned obviously facing the back parking area of Nico's and also to the front from 2569 Main Avenue. And that video is presented at evidence at both the Planning Commission hearing and the hearing in front of the hearing officer on the appeal. So and in conclusion, it's the video is played and I know it's some for some it's hard to watch that. It's clearly depicts the type of activities that the residents were having to go through in relation to the operation of Mico Sportsline. So with that, I would request that the Council approve the recommendations of the hearing officer. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. So there is a very specific format we have to follow here. We have two appellants. Each appellant is given 15 minutes. And so if the clerk could queue up 15 minutes, I'd like to have appellant Mackey come forth first and and for their comments. Is appellant Mackey here? Okay. How about appellant, Nancy? So we'll start with appellant. Nancy, if appellant Mackey isn't here, then we'll surrender those 15 minutes before we go to the public comment.
Speaker 9: Vice Mayor. As Miss Yancey is coming down, I would like to point out there's no specific requirement that Mr. Machias representative be here. But I would point out that Mr. Mackey was represented by an attorney both at the Planning Commission hearing and at the hearing in front of the hearing on the appointed hearing. OFFICER.
Speaker 2: Thank you. So they have been represented. And just before we begin, is Mr. Mackey's representative here? Okay. And they weren't sure since they're listed that we do call them out.
Speaker 9: That's correct. And they were provided written notice of tonight's hearing.
Speaker 2: Fantastic. So we'll begin with appellant, Nancy, and we have 15 minutes. And you don't you don't have to use all 15 minutes. It's not the minimum. 50 minutes is the maximum. And you can defer your time to other speakers if you like. So feel free to proceed.
Speaker 7: Will there be public comment?
Speaker 2: Yes, ma'am. After after your comments, then we will have a public comment.
Speaker 7: Period started back up.
Speaker 2: And we'll I don't see the clock. Let's start the clock back exactly 15 and then we'll get started.
Speaker 7: Okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think you're good. Go ahead. Oh.
Speaker 7: My name is David Yancey. I am the owner of Michaels Sports Lounge. I, I did have a hearing, um, upon coming to the hearing, we had the planning commission hearing. We were not prepared for the hearing. We never received the video that you received that you saw. My lawyer and asked for a continuance because we never got discovery. So we never was able to act on that video that was cut and sliced many different ways. If you looked at the video, you could hear a young man yelling at who he was, yelling at the neighbor that was talking to him. That guy had never come in my bar. You can not into my bar. What I had on like that and dressed like how he was if I was some regular neighborhood guy but the guy, Ricky would be outside, literally intimidating people walking up the street. We're going to shut you down. We're going to get you shut down. You don't belong here. He actually did that to me while I was outside, but I was helping my security. You need better security. You're paid. None of this is. Well, you're disturbing. I hear he's out there starting things. We actually have one guy to say. The neighbor said, I do look up in his yard. So he picked it up and brought it in the bar. I said, you do that. He said, I did not. He was the intimidating person then to put up a camera on the back of his house with a high speaker on it, because it's just amazing how you looking at the pictures. Everybody's car window was rolled up. You couldn't hear my security guard. My I know my security would not allow people to play music loud while he's standing out there directing them out of the parking spaces. I gave you guys a booklet in the back of the booklet as my security log by each time they met with the neighbors, but each time they met with the police department, each time there was communication with neighbors, police, or they had to kick somebody out of the bar. The majority of the time when someone was kicked out of the bar, they didn't leave. And I couldn't I didn't have control of a main street. I was told to control the front of the bar, the middle of the bar, the inside and the back parking lot. I looked into some things like on second and how they have the police police in the neighborhood. I went and checked downtown Long Beach. I watched the bars on downtown Long Beach and I noticed the police police in the neighborhood there. The police only come to me because one is called upon by the neighbors. I got a call on Saturday, just Saturday. Five people are standing outside. They literally just outside smoking. So it's like now we're getting cited because they're outside smoking where they're supposed to smoke on the inside. I actually literally told the police, you guys are too loud. You need to leave before the neighbors call the police on you. Because I didn't have anybody in my bar. Once I got once I got put up for revocation by the city. I went through the the the the revocation, I guess recommendations. It read that they met with me through two and a half years in regards to the instances going on at the bar. They did not I never met with Mr. Urunga. I never met with his sidekick. Whatever. She is slain. I called Yolanda. And I'm sorry I called you right in 2015 November and asked for a conversation with him. They said I couldn't have one because I was under investigation. I had no idea what investigation I was under after the recommendation. I've been labeled as a bad person. I've been labeled as a person that doesn't want to communicate with the people on the block. I've actually given you guys letters from people that's on the block. I brought a guy with me that actually lives on the block, on the new neighbor that lives behind the bar where Mr. Ricky used to live. He gave a letter that was in the packet that I gave you guys after I was revoked. I had a appeal. So in doing my appeal rights, they told me I could remain open throughout the whole time of the bullying tactics of the neighbors and the city. I was told by Mr. Mackey. That I appealed my appeal incorrectly and now I have to close. So I told Mr. Mackie, No, you pale George incorrectly. He said No. I appealed to correctly, but he kept telling me I had to close, but he didn't know why. When it boiled down to it, he finally said, Well, they told me not to appeal my conditional use permit, so I didn't appeal my conditional use permit. Now you have to get out. Now you have to close. But that was bullying by the city that made Mr. Mackey go ahead and not appeal. So he is still able to keep is able to rent out his business without a liquor license. I continue to stay open. I'm actually I'm still open now. Well, not now, but I've been operating without a conditional use permit. The city has been coming in every week and giving Mr. Mackey a citation. Because it's not. My citation is Mr. Mackey's. But I still remain open and I haven't had any problems. But the neighbors are still calling the police. We had a bunch of neighbors walk by not too long ago. There were a bunch of eggs at everybody's car that was parked in a fight. We had neighbors yelling at us just because I guess they wanted to. In every which way we always stay is not a black thing. But when I turn them into look against me, for me it was not a black thing. I don't know what else it could be is the first time a black person has been over there. I notice I was hit last week. Mordaunt came in here and told you they were being interrupted by the police. They didn't want those people coming over. It was actually black people. But Muldoon's and Daleys both both operate without a entertainment permit, and they both have deejays and bands. I got a ticket and had to go to a criminal court because I operated without a deejay. If I go to a criminal court, I will no longer have my job. If I'm so, I got to take it. February 22nd, the prosecutor's office sent me a letter, March like March the 17th, telling me I had to go to a criminal court for a crime I committed for having a deejay without a permit. I never got a citation January 7th issue to me. I figured if I did something wrong when they came into the facility based on a side of me, then none of my bartenders got a citation. I didn't get a citation, but I went to court and I pled guilty off a ticket that I thought I had. That's not what I even went to court for. That's another plot by the city. Six other bar owners told me they got the police came and told them they could not have a deejay. All they did was turn the deejay. They just deejay just left. But I get a ticket and I have to go to court to get criminally prosecuted and be on probation for a year, all because of a deejay, but nobody other. Mr. Austin, you don't have no entertainment permits in your area. Neither do you. Mr. Richardson And I don't see any of those people going to criminal court for a deejay, and that's just the most obscene thing I could ever hear of my life. The next we have in the hearings, our main witness says he had to sell his house for 20 to $50000 less because the buyer was a nuisance. So he had to hurry up and get out of there like I told him last time I seen him. Nice time you sell your house. Why don't you buy one pass? Because he wasn't even on the property. But you testify under oath that I had to move. I had to move because the boy was. He's quiet and everything. So you get the whole sympathy thing put on. He's crying, telling a lie. The next man next to him says, I could attest to that because I do real estate. And yes, he did lose between 20 to $50000. That's this man right here and that man going in right then. But liars, there's just too much liars. Then when asked by the city attorney, did you know anything about this video? Yes, we did. We put the video together, in his words. Well, why didn't the other side get it? We wanted to surprise them. Whatever happened to Discovery don't should not be privy of all the information that I'm going to be accused of so I could be able to fight for myself. During this whole process, I have not been able to fight, put myself. Because the bullying city and the bully counsels that don't listen and nobody and you bully and neighbors just want me out of there is worse things happen at other bars then that's going on at my bar. You mentioned last week Rock Sands is wonderful. They had a shooting at blocks and you mention it when you said how wonderful it was at a shooting at my bar. It was it as noted in the hearing paperwork. It's that I had a murder in my bar. That's incorrect. They're writing things. And those are not the things that matter inside the bar. No. And a suicide attempt. How? How will I know when somebody leave their girlfriend, break up with them, they walk out and commit suicide? That's like you watching TV and you Macca's not not coming on no more because she did. So you just can't kill yourself. That's how I see it. How can I. How can my security if I had security, my security, what? I knew this man was going to kill herself. As a matter of fact, there was not even a trace of blood in front of my bar or in the back of my bar. So I believe he was at the 710 mark. The man didn't even speak English. Then another incident. Somebody got stabbed inside the bar. No, they did not get stabbed inside the bar. Somebody got stabbed. A guy got stabbed because he was flirting with a black guy across the street at a laundromat. The black guy proceeded to chase him. The guy hit him with a hammer. So the black guys, that guy ran in the bar. So because he had one beer in there earlier, that's my.
Speaker 2: Fault.
Speaker 7: That that that can't. All this stuff is has. You have to be actually embarrassed. But put me up by some foolishness like this where we had told us that was Oprah for 50,000 years that had 50 murders in tow bar was outside of tables and around tables. Tell us, in the service district just last week they had was just a knock out brawl. Police sitting out in the front door watching. I can't even continue on YouTube this year because that north side is something that you have to understand. I'm the only black lady bar owner in Long Beach. Yeah, I do cater to black people. Not all, but some. It's a group of black people that need a place to go because they're not going to go to tables and they're not going to go to tailgate. We don't want to go to rock bands because they don't want us in rock band. They're going to go to dailies because my bartender like getting shot at in front of the window. I told you guys last week, that's where you go because you play pool. I have a poorly that's here. They're not there to represent me. They're not going to give me a trophy this year, but they do represent me. I have a group of older guys that play dominoes. My bar is just not about that. I've changed my whole structure of the bar, but the council, Mr. Turanga, is so taken this so personal, he doesn't even want to speak to me to see what changes I've done or how I've done things to make things better. My whole thing is just changed. Then for the man in the paperwork to say None of my witnesses were credible. You got a whole group here. Just why you even have this group, this one lady sitting right there testify that those people those people. What are those people? Those black folks? Literally those black folks. I knew they were from her bar because they were those black folks. So some homeless people that's out there. And she said, the lady defecated in the broad daylight. It's two black homeless ladies that's on that street at Young One and an older one. I let some women in the bar sometimes use the bathroom not all the time, because they clean up in the toilet. But it helped the homeless and then we wouldn't really have a problem. We have homeless people drinking in the back. All of that is not what is cut out to be those days that was on the air. Sure, those things was happening, but it's not happening now. And that's when I first open. When you first open a business, sure. You're going to have problems. You can't you can't just open a business and everything go hunky dory. Everything's not going to be perfect. When you first open, you got to have problems, but you have to work on them. If you don't work on them, then just quit. I would have quit if I did everything these people said I did. If I did every single thing they said I did, I would have just said, You're right, I quit. But right now I didn't put my life savings in this business as seven employees that need this job because they are over the hill, they can't get a job nowhere else. So I'm. I need that. I need to have my business.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Miss Yancey.
Speaker 7: You are quite welcome.
Speaker 2: So. So we'll move on with the. With the hearing. So at this point, we will accept public comment. Any members of the public that would like to speak on this, on this hearing. Now would be the time. So please come forward. Give us your name, where you live. You're allocated 3 minutes. You don't have to spend all the 3 minutes. You. But 3 minutes is the maximum, not the minimum. Sir. Give us your name and go ahead and proceed. Thank you. My name is David Kirkpatrick. I think of many more achievements. Okay. Given accommodation. I think they address misconception to my problem of the heart outside of this council. And I have a disease called spinal cerebellum attacked and that only happens to by one or two people. I've heard a lot, about 400,000. And I was lucky enough to inherit this from my family. So that's how I can get more time. But then you see what happened to me. I've been suffering with that news, this noise from the sport lounge for three years. And now on the weekends, the bar patrons walking up and down the sidewalk and street with a loud outburst of noise, shouting and screaming. What caused me to wake up multiple times and I. 10 p.m. due to be 2 a.m., sometimes 3 a.m., and sometimes I'm not able to sleep at all. So I don't sleep at all. Motorcycles and cars blaring music down the alleyway and then the parking light behind the bar would also wake me up in the middle of the night. The dogs across the alley would would constantly be barking long after 10 p.m. when. When they would hear that patrons from burnout even have taken medication. And I know I better get a taste then. No, wait. I, I, I want to enjoy peace in my home and not have to hear the nightclub activity and the patient out of the bar, hanging out in front of my house, talking loud and playing their cars at at high volumes in the middle of the night. Numerous times I have. Had to ask the beach at the bar, not to park, not to bike my driveway. One time being away, getting in the middle of the night, I asked the folk to leave my house if they could lower their level, their tyranny. The phone, one that might bring her head, was broken. So I think I don't know what happened, but I talked to them, upset them. My grandkids don't want to be at my house on the weekends because of the nuisance activity. They would they would hear the language and and that no one should hear no air to air. And an ambulance would be awake and out of their sleep because of the noise. One time I was awake at 2 a.m. hearing the bar patron scream my neighbor recognition name out loud, and there at the time, music from the outside the bar was over a car. And then when it was shaking my windows because of the loud noise. The first six months the bar was open. Then they had a fight to get them to lower the music. After 10 p.m. we have to appeal to the City Council already to try to make this happen during the daytime. Our worst there is there is the problem, but then it gets past 10 p.m. The noise becomes a big problem. I've been dealing with this situation since 2007, starting with the local bar, then the sand bar, and now Spartan Lounge. Something has to be is something has to be done to eliminate the unacceptable noise after 10 p.m. and throughout the rather than one hour worse the parking provide. The parking provided for the bar is wholly inadequate and the park system at the top of the bar too loud to the neighborhood. We're just. We're just. No. Really quite. Is it this is total the attempt or do we have to deal with this stuff? You guys stopped the deal. You guys didn't see the. The. A good portion of that video. Um, there's hours and hours of footage in and of things of loud outburst of noise in the area. So thank you for letting me speak to you guys. I really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your time. Next speaker, please. And let's reset the clock back to 3 minutes, please. Thank you. Just give us your name. Thank you. My name is Rick. You represent our house. Was the house 2569. Right behind the bar. One of the most effective neighbors of it. You know, I've been in front of you guys already for some time, and it was very, very upsetting to not only that, you you're the victim and you've been offended and you've been victimized and threatened. And not only myself and my family, you know, most of my neighbors can tell can tell you that they were awakened during the night. I can tell you, we were not able to sleep throughout the night on weekends. We had to leave the house, go somewhere else. I stand before in front of all of you and invited you guys to come over to my house and experience that. This is we've been doing this for three years. You know, I learned about condition, hell condition. Even though my gassy things that I'm acting, I'm not. So but I make this little story, you know, simple. You guys need to put a stop to this. She cannot keep blaming everybody else but her. She's not innocent. She's not. She's not nice person that wants you to believe she is not. She's not. She turned patrons against me. That person that you heard, the profanity that that patron that you hear, that's never around my house. It was a guy that was ready to beat the heck out of me. I was inside a call. The police. The police came. They couldn't find the guy. The guy came out of the bar where whatever were, she says. There's lots of footage that we have in a hard drive. There were give it to different department. We were not able to played all of them here because we were only given a few minutes. Bottom line is this. Now she's accusing me of being a liar. And it's very upsetting. Very upsetting. But I hope is does he really own her house? Because I'm going after it. She is going to find out her real damages and losses I did on the house pay the mortgage for 16 years. 16 years. Well, she would like me to take. I pay my rent either way. It's not relevant. But she wants to make an issue. She wants to make a lighter. Me, a liar. Now she needs to pay for it. You know, I strongly advise you guys. I strongly. Please, I'm asking your pleading you guys. If you let her keep her license, even though she's going to operate on a different location, you're just going to transfer the problems to another community. She has no business being an operator. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Iraq.
Speaker 7: Good evening, council members.
Speaker 1: My name is Kerry Sanders. I'm a resident of the 2500 block.
Speaker 3: Of Main Avenue.
Speaker 7: I bought my home two years ago this month. This was a dream that I realized on my own through hard work and discipline. I'm proud beyond words that being a single mom, I could do this. In the first year of my residence on Main Avenue, I was stressed beyond imagination. Most impactful was the Christmas holiday shooting. I was woken up by my daughter shouting.
Speaker 3: Mom, I heard gunshots.
Speaker 7: I had guests staying for the first Christmas in my dream home. We ran out of bed to see chaos in front of our home. People running from the direction of the bar, screaming and crying. I thought to myself, What if those bullets had gone through my daughter's window? Where have I moved to? I have lived in Long Beach for more than 20 years in various diverse neighborhoods. I've never experienced this kind of fear. I live with my daughter and another young roommate. Since we've moved here, we've experienced confrontations over loud music parking and sexually harassment comments coming from people in front parked in front of our house. There has been public drunkenness, drunken arguments in the street. These are not homeless people. Even now, every loud noise or screeching car still sends.
Speaker 3: Me into Mika's mode, thinking, What now?
Speaker 7: I could go.
Speaker 1: On, but there's no time.
Speaker 7: Through social media, there has been promotions for large events and parties at Nico's supposedly a neighborhood bar. Some of the invites have over 1000 guests. One promoter calls the bar the hottest throwback Thursday.
Speaker 3: In L.A. County.
Speaker 7: Another promoter invites guests to an ongoing laugh out loud Friday.
Speaker 3: On comedy nights.
Speaker 7: Council members. This bar sits in a residential area. I find these promotions grossly irresponsible, where he buys for 1000 party cars, for 1000 partygoers Bach or even 50, for that matter, who will see to it these customers disperse responsibly. The video shown gives the answer to that question. Nobody. I am pro women in business, especially minority women. I myself am of Hispanic origin. But I think the owner of Nico's should have sought out a site zoned for a nightclub, given the large entertainment events she's held over the years. We need peace in our homes. I work very hard and wake before the sun comes up for work. My job is in patient care and I and my neighbors need a stress free place to rest and enjoy our families. I am here to ask you to not reinstate Michael's business license. Even if the bar moves somewhere else, it will put another neighborhood in peril. Thank you. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hello. My name is Augusta.
Speaker 3: Williams and I live on the.
Speaker 7: 2500 block of Main. A few houses down from the bar. I must say, Councilman. Richardson. I'm sorry that you stopped the video. It cost a lot of money for us to make it and a lot of time. And it seems like it's our only defense. What happened on the video? What you saw is what I have experienced.
Speaker 3: It's hard to explain in 3 minutes.
Speaker 7: How the nuisance fire has impacted my life for the last three years. There's the actual loud and upsetting disturbances, along with anxiety caused by a nuisance business that can flare up any time. After the shooting, I became concerned about my own safety and the safety of friends and family who visited me. I avoided planning my event, any events at night or on.
Speaker 3: Weekends at my house.
Speaker 7: Over concerns my visitors.
Speaker 3: Might see.
Speaker 7: Something like a part of my patron relieving themselves in public or a heated argument. And by the way, I witnessed the lady who defecated on my neighbor's yard and she was well dressed. She was not a homeless person, and she was coming from the bar. As my family became more aware of what was happening. They became concerned for my safety. And one suggested I might consider moving. The noise, especially Friday, Saturday and into Sunday mornings were unpredictable.
Speaker 3: Intermittent and.
Speaker 7: Stressful. Eventually, to ensure an uninterrupted night's sleep. I chose to go to bed after the bar closed and all customers left. The area. Going to bed at 3 a.m. and trying to get enough sleep was difficult and distress disrupted my natural sleeping pattern. My home is my American dream and legally everyone has a right to enjoy their homes in peace and quiet. The nuisance forces and violent bar incidents have interfered with the right. With that right and no longer do I feel safe in my home or my neighborhood. I will no longer walk past the bar or walk my dog at night. The notion and this has been going around, the notion that the shooting and stabbing had nothing to do with the bar is misleading and contradicted by the police reports. According to one report, the stabbing victim victim was drinking in the bar before he got stabbed outside. We're here tonight because four oh, as I understand, Miss Yancy wants her license back to in part to prove she can be.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your time. Thank you.
Speaker 7: I have a disability, so I'm going to ask for a little bit more time.
Speaker 2: What is the disability?
Speaker 7: Rheumatoid arthritis.
Speaker 2: Mr. City Attorney. Don't work like this.
Speaker 7: They gave me extra time last time.
Speaker 2: Should we accommodate?
Speaker 3: I've got one sentence.
Speaker 2: Okay. Sure. Attorney says we should. Sure. Thank you.
Speaker 9: Short extension.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Just one sentence here. As I understand it, Ms.. Mance, Ms.. Yancy wants your license back in part to prove she can be trusted as a responsible business owner who can follow city.
Speaker 3: Laws and ordinance.
Speaker 7: Yet her bar.
Speaker 3: Is and has.
Speaker 7: Been breaking the law by serving alcohol without a conditional use permit for several months. We are here tonight because for nearly three years, Ms.. Yancy has refused to take responsibility for the problems her bar and customers have caused and has consistently claimed. We neighbors are making everything up. How can you correct something, Ms.. Yancy, you claim never happened. If you can't recognize your mistakes, you're bound to repeat them. Please vote in support of the Planning Commission and hearing officer's decision to revoke the business license.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please. So as a point of as a point of order, we're going to maintain the 3 minutes in almost every circumstance unless there is some, you know, some reason reasonable accommodation requested. And we're going to begin the 3 minutes as soon as someone approaches the podium. We're not going to take breaks for applause and things like that. This is a we will respect everyone's time and get through this so we can get to a decision. Thank you. Please proceed.
Speaker 7: My name is Tony Karamazov on the 2500 block of Main Avenue, right around the corner from the Nuisance Bar. When I moved into my home 30 years ago, the bar around the corner was called the Club Club a small little hole in the wall bar tucked in the corner, quietly into a residential community that I moved into . The peaceful enjoyment of my home has been taken from me in many ways since Nichols opened it. Being from the cars, the car alarms, loud people walking to and from the bar in front of my home. When the rear door to the wall would open, the music would blast into my neighborhood, patrons gathering on the corner at Willow and main screaming helmet, having a good time, music blaring from their car, radios parked on the corner. All of this and more working for me from my sleep constantly. That's not a neighborhood bar. My sleeping habits began to change, and on Thursday nights, because of the disturbances, my stomach would start to churn in anticipation of the weekends because of the disturbances. When my neighbors and I reached out to Miss Yancy in February of 2014 and asked her, Could we find something, some solution together regarding the disturbances? She told us to call the police if her patrons disturbed our peace. When the police met with her months later regarding the ongoing disturbances, she told them, and I quote, she would take care of her patrons inside the bar and the police could take care of her patrons outside the bar. The video you saw barely was a small example of the absolute hell. That is my experience because of Nico's. Of course, Nico's customers are not all bad people. No one is saying that, but some of them are. I've seen police reports in which an undercover detective reports that he recognized the main gang members and drug dealers in the bar. When the shooting happened in December of 2015. It was a turning point for me. I never was afraid of any of the businesses on Willow until Michaels moved in. This is about a nuisance bar. Nothing more, nothing less. Please do not reward bad behavior. Please put an end to this process and deny the appeal.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next picture, please.
Speaker 7: My name is Christy Cain, and I live on the 2600 block of Main Avenue across Willow from Nico Sports Lounge. I'm speaking today to urge the council to approve the repeal of the business license for macOS in December of 2015. My husband and I witnessed the immediate aftermath of the shooting that had its origins in the bar just feet from our front door. Although time has passed, the emotional shock of that night, the agony I saw and heard, the victim experience and the steady, low lying dread I've lived with since since has changed the way I view my neighborhood and even the city which I've called my home for almost 20 years. I'm under no illusions that Wrigley is a perfect neighborhood with no crime. But gun violence practically at my doorstep is a clear and stark manifestation of the problems Nico's has brought to our community. As you've heard from my neighbors, they've had to consistently deal with less momentous but no less stressful conditions daily. I've been asking myself what's worse for over a year now, and I honestly don't know the answer. To add insult to injury, Miz Yancy has never taken responsibility for any of it. She has no interest in what happens outside the door of the bar. She's made that perfectly clear in these chambers and outside. She's made a bad situation. So much more frustrating to the neighbors and I would argue to the city, please hear us. The hearing officer and the Planning Commission and approve the recommendation to revoke the business license from Ecos. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hi. My name is Edward Kane. I live on the 2600 block of Main Avenue across the street from the bar. I am also speaking to support the recommendation to revoke the business license. The shooting happened in the early morning hours of the 27th of December, so the extension of the night after Christmas , we had gone home late. My dog needed to go for a walk. They have a way of let you know when they need to do that. So I went to the door, opened it up, and I was immediately confronted with the sight of a body lying in the street that had been shot in front of my house . There was a melee of people that had poured out from the bar and were basically creating a to do in the street. Obviously I did not take my dog for a walk. I went inside, I locked the door and I called 911. There were further violent incidents, the stabbing that increased the sense that this is a volatile place and it was making my community and the street I live on unsafe. And about the shooting, i read the police report. One of the things about me, he does not want to accept any responsibility. She wants to gaslight us and let us think that these things that we've seen even tonight on the video, she wants to pretend that those things didn't happen. We've seen this on the video. She says it didn't happen. She wants to say that it's other people in the neighborhood. It's not the bar. She wants a scapegoat. People. The police report makes it clear that patrons and management and also what management, anyway, employees and patrons of the bar recognized the the shooter as having been in the bar, recognized the intended target as regular of the bar , the shooting. They were both in there that night. It was an event that started in the bar and it ended in my in front of my house. So to say that the bar's problem is is ludicrous and it's disrespectful to the neighborhood. She had opportunities to work constructively with the neighborhood. She chose to scapegoat and to alibi and to deny reality. And for those reasons, she should not be allowed to keep her business license. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Hi. My name is Bill Alvis and I live on the corner of Cedar and BURNETT, which is nearby the area. But I patronize MCUs on a regular basis. I want to mention that.
Speaker 2: Regarding.
Speaker 5: Shootings, this is Wrigley and unfortunately I was almost shot in my own front yard. I had to duck over, shooting through my.
Speaker 2: Next door home.
Speaker 5: Over seven shots. People were shot next to my home.
Speaker 2: Two people in my.
Speaker 5: Landlord save someone's life. That had nothing to do with this bar. This is Wrigley. Now, the police, unfortunately, are trying to work together to make this better. But as a victim, I've not had help from the police.
Speaker 2: Someone broke into my home.
Speaker 5: And did not help me at all. So the other just trespassing. They didn't get a breaking and entering ticket. They got a ticket for saying for trespassing instead of breaking. Entering. Anyway, today, I'm just frustrated with this meeting because of that gentleman's comment about Snoop Dog and putting that sign on the top floor of the police department . It's hard to get by that kind of racism. I understand the issues with the neighborhood and the noise that people have seen.
Speaker 2: However, had I known I was on camera and my voice.
Speaker 5: Was being recorded outside that bar, I would have never hugged my gay partner. And that makes me very angry that I was not.
Speaker 2: Notified that I am being.
Speaker 5: Videotaped and my voice is being recorded. That's very upsetting to me. Regarding the homeless issue, well-dressed homeless people are in Wrigley and they're especially over in that neighborhood. Those people have strange clothes and they come from the riverbed. I know one person who dresses impeccably.
Speaker 2: She's homeless.
Speaker 5: But she doesn't cause problems in the back of the bar. Regarding disabilities, I am also disabled, so there is no excuse for that type of behavior too. I understand where these people are coming from, but I want you to know that I have seen Deedee squash issues. Those videos you look at one is January 1st. So that's New Year's Eve was to be expected.
Speaker 2: You bought a home by a bar.
Speaker 5: And I'm just wanting you to think outside the box or you rented a home outside of a bar. People should have done their due diligence before moving in there and buying homes right next to a bar. It's a shame that Deedee is going to lose a lot of money and her employees will no longer have jobs because they didn't plan in advance. Maybe club was an issue. Deedee has changed that and I've never gone to the bar club before because I did not feel comfortable in that bar. But ever since Deedee took over, well, within the.
Speaker 2: Last two.
Speaker 5: Years, I've been comfortable, I've been welcomed, have never seen arguments, have seen some noise in the back immediately. So she has secured in front of possibly she should get security in the back. But that's all I have to say, really. I just can't believe what I've heard tonight. But everyone is entitled to their opinion.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you for your time. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hi. Good evening. My name is Sabrina David. I am a Long Beach native. I grew up in a six day strike. I do recall riding my bicycle as a teenager to VIP records to get a record to get the vinyl, as he mentioned. But I also grew up with Deedee Yancey. I grew up by Kings Park. That was one of the areas that I patronized. Since then, I've grown up, I've made a career, had a career, made a life for myself and kind of distance myself from Long Beach. When I found out that Dee Dee was opening up a sports bar, I have not since then, since the day she opened, I have been.
Speaker 3: A patron.
Speaker 7: Of her bar. I'm not a hoodlum. I never was a hoodlum. But yes, I grew up in Long Beach, so I absolutely know drug dealers, I absolutely know murderers. I absolutely know gang bangers. As a matter of fact, I'm related to a few in my family has been a victim of gang violence. That is not a bar problem. That is your problem. That is the city's problem. If the city took a long time to get to the police, to report or to witness the things that were occurring outside of her bar, they shame on them because no, she is not the police. No, she should not govern and police the area outside of that bar. Now, I'm afraid of being killed. I'm not going to a bar where I think people are going to beat me up and be killed. I'm absolutely not a product of that particular environment. So when you hold her responsible for what happens outside of the bar, I find that to be ludicrous. The neighbors, Rikki, in particular, has bothered me when I parked in front of his house. I've since then stopped parking in front of his house, but I have a beautiful car and it's clean and it didn't bother his. As a matter of fact, it enhanced the neighborhood. To be quite frank with you. I didn't use loud. I don't play my music loud. And if I did, most likely it's classical. So I don't I'm not sure how I am a nuisance to the community, but I'm also a homeowner, so I am sympathetic to that. And maybe that didn't occur with other people who patrons patronize the bar. But I can absolutely tell you with certainty, because I've worked with Didi to try to mitigate this. Our entire problem. She has done everything she can within her powers to try to make sure that no one parks on that on Main Street, to make sure that there's no music, that that's played loud. We haven't had a DJ. And furthermore, I've had many, many fundraisers there. I've had one for breast cancer, I've had one for the class of 1985, probably. Jack Jackrabbits for our 30 year reunion assisted my.
Speaker 8: Friend with her class.
Speaker 7: Of 86 reunion fundraiser there, and those monies went to notable organizations either within our community or nationwide, i.e. breast cancer. Did we have a bunch of people there? Yes, we did. I'm 50 years, though. We have 5050 year old women that were doing a paint and sip. Not sure how that disrupted the community. I'm pretty sure they were upset about all of our BMW, them Mercedes and Porsches and all the other things that they drive parked in front of their house. And I like this car backfiring. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your time next week, please.
Speaker 7: Hello. My name is Kelly Melton and I am a patron of Michael's Sports Bar. And I just want to kind of touch up on a couple of things here because.
Speaker 0: I really.
Speaker 7: Hate that it's gotten to this point. Back in November of last year at the meeting when this at the council meeting, when this issue first came up, I do remember that there was a takeaway basically from that meeting directly from the mayor asking you, Ranga and Councilman Andrews, to try and work with the community and Deedee to try to get a resolution to this issue. So we wouldn't have to get to this point.
Speaker 2: At that time.
Speaker 7: A few of us did meet with Didi. We had some meetings on trying to brainstorm on things that we can do. And I myself personally took the challenge to reach out to Councilman Andrews. And you, Ranga.
Speaker 2: Called both offices.
Speaker 7: And to no avail, no response from them. So I'm just kind of appalled and and all that. The city's not taking a different stance on this to see what they can do to try and help this business owner, but also help the community. You know, I'm not going to deny what happened on that video because it's there. But I'm sure there's more to the video. I don't page I don't patronize the bar that late, so I can't tell you what happens after 10:00. But I know for me, 50 year old woman, professional.
Speaker 2: I've lived in the big.
Speaker 7: Screen knows community. I lived in the Wrigley and in the central area. Things happen everywhere and we can't control the things that happen outside of the bar. I really feel that she can't. I think that she's made a change. There's been a drastic change to the bar, and I think that the community's not willing to open their eyes to see that the changes that she's made and those changes have come basically from her seeing this video and the things that were going on. I think that all this red tape that the city is putting her through is personally a waste of my tax dollars because we see and hear about the same things that happened in other bars and other communities. And so how I look at it as we have a a bar in place with the African-American bar owner that we can say 80% of her customers are African-American, yet you all are doing everything you can to shut her down and not try and work with her. So for me, I just have an issue with that. Again, I accept you, Ranga. You take some time and meet with her. If not, have your staff person at least return some phone calls? Because I know I personally reached out to you to try and mitigate this issue based on what the mayor recommended. So I have to say thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your time. My speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening. My name is Carol Bolton. I'm a homeowner in the Wrigley area, 3171 Eucalyptus. My in-laws are at 3274 main and I didn't go to the bar when it first opened. But the last three years I do it, go to the bar, and sometimes I even ride my bike down there because I'm retired and there's not a thousand people in there at every time I go in. That is you can say it's 20 people in there. I don't know what someone said. A thousand people that can't hold a thousand people. So I just want to ask you guys to give Deedee her license back. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your time next week, please. Good evening. I just wanted to say that for me. You start with your name, sir. Can I remain nameless? Is that fine or. I don't think so. My name as a hearing. We're going to have Joe Taylor. Thank you. And I just want to say that for an average Joe like me, I'm a working man. I work every day. I've made it through all this rough neighborhood. That's all. That neighborhood ain't rough basketball for what they're talking about, in my opinion. But through all this, I've not heard one time where there has been any arrests made directly because of somebody doing something at the bar, that murder. They want to talk about that stab and all this stuff. We're not directly linked to the bar. So in order of fairness, we talk about American dreams here. We are given $80,000 for VIP records, which I'm all with that. But we're taking this lady's livelihood and other people's livelihood. This is a serious situation. And I understand I'm a homeowner also. I understand that it could be things that could be a nuisance, but I just think that we should be able to come to some kind of medium to where because we're are the police. If if, if, if all this problem is, why haven't there been any arrest in that neighborhood directly connected to Meeko Sports Lounge? He has a video where we have who knows what, how he got it or how he doctored that up. But why haven't the police arrested whoever he was yelling at, whoever if that guy was committing the crime? But last time I heard yelling, it's really not a crime. So I'm just here, like I say, rather than Average Joe as a safe place for me to go and to have a cocktail after drink and on the weekends, whatever, catch my own or whatever, I feel safe there. I'm pretty sure the people that go there feel safe there. And I've heard about no property damage. I mean, they have a couple of cops don't punish everybody for a few people's bad actions after a few bad experiences. The shooting two years ago was I have to do it now. Once they all say rectify the situation, we're not hearing about anything that was current. I haven't heard about anything. A 2017 The last thing I think they said on a record with something like April or some 2016, that's still over a year ago. So I'm just saying try to if you think about it, try to give her at least. A way to rectify the situation. And I know council, you guys have all kind of other stuff on your agenda. It might not be important to you, but for an average Joe, that's important to me. Just like where these people are, if they are guilty for that. Just like for those people, then to prove it. That's not prove, though. Just some video, some guy made up. And then they didn't even give her a chance to defend herself against that video. So if we Americans let's be fair, let's give her at least the opportunity to defend herself and have all the evidence that's being brought against her in her bar so she can take it to her counsel. And because that video come on, look, that that that was kind of doctored up. I mean, anybody can tell that, but I don't know how it works. But I'm just saying, like I said, I'm representing Average Joe. My time has come in and I just think that you should give her a fair chance. We are Americans. Let's be American. Get ready for a fair chance. Thank you. Thank you. Next big, please.
Speaker 7: Hello. My name is Monisha Israel and I am a bartender at Mika's Sports Lounge. First of all. I have butterflies in my stomach. I'm so. This means a.
Speaker 2: Lot.
Speaker 7: So, I mean, this is my only job. I have been there. On May 7th, seventh, I celebrate my three year anniversary. And because I was there during the debate, the initial beginning. And from then to now is a completely different place. And I think that you should go by what it is now, not what happened two and a half years ago, because it's not like that anymore. All of that you saw on the tape, it's not like that. We don't have the time. We're closing early. I mean, I work there and it's not people it's not a lot of people that go there. We have our regular people that come and they've been coming and they want to continue to come and I want to continue to work. So with that being said, please vote for us to give Jessie her license. Right.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. My name is Race. Esther is president.
Speaker 5: Of the National Association for Equal Justice America, a national civil rights organization. We're very concerned about the allegations by Michael's sports analogies. One of the things that we're very concerned about is a defamation of her character under the 14th Amendment. She did not get due process or equal protection.
Speaker 2: Of the law like most businesses do. Number four, she did not get probation.
Speaker 5: In order to correct.
Speaker 2: The problems. Five Ms.. Fiancee's witnesses was not credible, but witnesses that the city used was all credible. Credible. That doesn't sound.
Speaker 5: Right to me as a national civil rights president.
Speaker 2: ABC came by 16 times and.
Speaker 5: Found nothing wrong. Results of this The city took her business license. She has a right to make a living. It's not a privilege. In America, we feel that it's a human rights violation as a civil rights group and a lot of people know me as a national authorized president, we wouldn't be here. She's a member of organization, and we wouldn't be here if she didn't get due process protection of the law. One of the things that that we were concerned about is, is. We should all try to get along this lady. That's money in her business. And she has a right to make a living, have a right to have shelter. And it's not a privilege. Is it national civil rights? The defamation of a character is something that we look at, a civil rights group. One of the things that we did in Culver City, we had a big problem with the police department and we brought. People down there, too. But there are hiring practices where I think what we're doing, we're trying her on her priors and not what's happening currently and the person that no laws. We're very concerned about that. She has a right to own a business in America. I'm not saying it's racism, but I'm saying that it's something that we need.
Speaker 2: To look at.
Speaker 5: And everyone deserves due process.
Speaker 2: Equal protection of the law.
Speaker 5: As a national civil rights group. I don't care what color you are. We have a moral nature. If you miss that, our members will come after you. Thanks a lot.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your time. Next week, a police. Excuse me. Good afternoon, counsel. My name is Jonathan Taylor. I'm a justice advocate with the National Association for Equal Justice of America, along with Mr. Esters, who is the president of the organization. I am as he is, we're new to this issue with Ms.. Yancey Bar and all that were due to this particular incident. We're not new to issues of unfairness, of an injustice, I would say, to the fine neighbors that surround that bar. It's unfortunate that the disagreement seems to have become so personal against Ms.. Yancey I would say this when I was able to visit the location of that bar last week, what stuck out in my mind is that 500 feet south of Mrs. Yancey, there's a building there that has a large sign open all over it, saying they're getting ready to open a bar called a parlor or lap. 500 feet west of here, there's a liquor store that stays open, 24 hour closes at 2:00. It just seems to me it just seems to me that and from what I've heard here today, that there's been a bar, that location for the last 30 years, it seems to me that the city believes that that location is an appropriate place for a bar. That street is terribly, terribly busy. And if indeed that street and that location is not suitable for a bar, then maybe the city may need to consider rezoning that portion of that street so no one can open a bar there. Not necessarily just Ms.. Yancey, it just has with those things that just has the appearance of unfairness. This this city has a rich history. It markets itself as an international city. And when you're an international city, you've been very important to the development of the American society. The Navy was based here during World War Two, and our country took on the shape of being the power that it is from World War Two. You have a woman, a black woman, the only woman in this city. She's fortunate enough to own a bar. I'm not going to call these fine neighbors races at all. I'm not going to call you racist at all. But it is a fact of life that in our society, certain people aren't welcome, certain places. That's just a fact of life. But I would also say to the neighbors, I myself am used to living in places that aren't tenable. I would simply suggest to you in the matter of Ms.. Yancey, try something different. Postpone the revocation of her license for 90 days. Allow her to form a a sit down relationship with some members of the police department, some members of this neighborhood council, and certainly under the guidance of the police department and with considering the question of the neighbors, certainly some kind of and minimal operating formula can be considered. And I would suggest that there's always the opportunity to closer, but at least provide 90 more days and allow that kind of coalition to take place. Thank you for your time. Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Hi. My name is Bobby Richardson, Jr. I want to start off by saying I love you, Dee Dee. We're here because I want to believe it's a misunderstanding, because the people who are talking bad about Deedee and saying all these things that she's not owning up to.
Speaker 8: Kind of.
Speaker 2: But we continue, sir.
Speaker 5: She just do me. I it. I just think that they. They, like I said before when I was here, that if everybody gets a chance to sit down and understand one another instead of passing judgment because of someone else's ignorance. Any bar that you go to in that area or any area you go to, whether it's Orange County or Long Beach, you're going to have some ignorant people while they're drinking that don't necessarily mean it's her fault. And when these people are talking about her, they're they're speaking so personal about her as if they know her. And she's completely the opposite person. Just like Bill got up here and said he feels uncomfortable. He's he's a gay man. He feels uncomfortable the way that the neighbors are treating him when he comes to our bar. And I live in Paris, California. I'm a longshoreman. I've been on her 20 years. When I get off work. I like to go there, too. That 91 traffic died down. And then I get on the freeway and go home and then door going out. That time is when I built the relationship with Didi and it's crazy because my dad worked for Boeing and he used to go buy tables. That was his spot to sit at to go let the traffic die down. So he asked me one day, where you go? I said, I go buy me goes. He said, lets me go. I said, Did he ever see all that? And he got scratching his head. He said, yes. He said, I know our dad. So remember Didi when I came in, actually. That to me was like, okay, damn, I'm. I'm sorry. Walking in my pop's footsteps were like, he retired from from bowling, which is Donald Douglas. And I'm gonna retire from the longshoreman. But we doing the same things, and I'll never even know it. But he chose that bar, and I'm choosing her bar. And like I told you guys before, if you all took the time to come in there and get to know the people that's in there, not the people, that's the ignorant people that's outside the bar. When it's almost 2:00 in, the bar is closing and everybody's drunk. Those are the people that are singing and those are not the people that's in there every day. We know each other on a first name basis, first name, but it's like, cheers, a TV show. I'm sure all y'all on and watched. All y'all don't watch. That's how we are, amigos. Don't judge us like that.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. I give a few more minutes because you got interrupted. But thank you for your time. I'm good. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, counsel. My name is Jermaine. I was born and raised here in Long Beach.
Speaker 5: I'm a photojournalist for a Long Beach Times newspaper and.
Speaker 2: Also a Freemason. It's just strange to me how when a person owns a.
Speaker 5: Business, how they could be blamed for something that's.
Speaker 2: That happens outside of their business. And they they put the blame on her. When you have mass shootings at schools, are the schools responsible for the shootings that happened there or the mass shootings that happen at the post office? Was the post office responsible for that shooting? Should they be accountable? I think not. The problem here, your own counsel, is the problem of a person trying to own a business or trying to have a livelihood. When I was young businesses, black businesses were all throughout Long Beach. So the questions used to be asked to me, What do you want to be when you grow up? I used to say a fireman, police officer or a business owner. The question never came to me a president because I never seen a president. Now, 2017, the questions asked to children. What do you want to be when you grow up? They say a policeman, fireman or a president, not a business owner. So something right there is wrong to me. Here in Long Beach, I'm a business owner, but I had to move my business outside of Long Beach. Just have a successful business. I'm born. Raised here in Long Beach. Ex-gang member, ex-drug dealer, ex-convict. But I chose to choose life up to better myself, making sports bars a place where we can all go and enjoy ourselves. A lot of ex-gang members do go here. A lot of ex-drug dealers do go there. But one thing that we do have is family, a community, a family that we used to have here in Long Beach. We have a lot of places we can go to the Hutch Grant or grant, a Grand Central Station. We had Lucy's go to Saint Lucy's on the West Side. We even had Melody's dance hall in Pacific. But we have nothing to go to nowadays. Absolutely nothing. So what is a community to do when they have nothing to do? They turn to violence, drug sales or anything like that. It's a pattern. It's a fact. It's not something that somebody made up in a storybook or nothing like that. All you have to do is look at the numbers and facts. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening. My name is Susan Redfield and I live with my husband in the 2500 block of Main Avenue down the block from the bar. I'm representing my husband who is handicapped and bedridden. I am in favor of keeping the license from the bar owner. I do not take this revocation request lightly, but my life and the others in my neighborhood have been in turmoil on too many occasions. And after three years of following the rules, this is the last resort from when Mika's first opened. There were problems on the weekends when we were awakened regularly by loud screaming. After midnight, cars raced down the block with music blaring and other unfriendly and frightening elements of disregard to this quiet family neighborhood. So in 2015, I began noting the dates when I was awakened. I kept a little log in the drawer next to my bed. I have a list of the dates. There are 23 of them between February and November. Then there was the Christmas shooting, of which you've heard too much. So I won't go into that. What you didn't see in the video that was shown was the vomiting in our bushes, the urinating and defecating on our lawns, drunk people falling down in the middle of the street and having to be carried away. Then there was the stabbing. I am now often faced. At night in my own home, I've been participating with the neighbors in a attempt to improve this situation. We've met with city leaders, the police at various homes, including my own. We've met at the police station. We've followed all the rules and regulations required in order to make our complaints known to the bar owner. To give her proper notice. To give notice to the bar. The building owner. Sorry, I'm a little nervous due to the building owner and notice to the police in the city. It's been three years. It's come to this point not in a whimsy, but after nearly three years of requesting, begging, pleading that the noise, the violence, the other illegal activities and outlandish behaviors stop. They violate the CFP and they violate my peaceful life. I should mention that that Councilman Wrangham and many neighbors met after the 2015 incident, and there was significant discussion about the financial cost to the city of Long Beach that this bar and its problems have caused. The number of police that have been times the police have been called had to come and check out the situation, meet with neighbors, attend hearings. The Planning Commission hearing was 10 hours long. The eviction hearing had a 17 page report. This is not how a should a city should have to manage its business affairs. I want to close by saying that this neighborhood, my neighborhood is relatively reflective of all that makes Long Beach great. It's a mix of young and old families and singles, diverse in all ways. That's what I love about it. My issue is with makos and it's total disregard for our well-being, and it's unreasonable interference with my family's peace and safety.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Susan. Next, Peter, please.
Speaker 5: Hello again. I'm Dana Dedmon. I live across the street from Michael's. This is the sixth time I've either spoken publicly or testified on this matter. And my third time in front of you, the first time I was at this podium was on March 17th, 2015. I urge you to deny me IQOS a permanent entertainment permit because the window rattling music from the bar was keeping me awake at night because of overwhelmingly negative comments by me and others. You voted to deny the permit. The second time I spoke to you was on August 9th, 2016. I asked that you approve the Long Beach Police Department's recommendation to revoke the bar's business license. You voted to send the matter to the Planning Commission. Next, I spoke at the nine hour City Planning Commission hearing on November 3rd and fourth, 2016. I testified about the bar's negative impact on neighboring property values. This was evidenced by the under market value sale price of the house directly behind the bar. Your planning commission found the bar to be a nuisance and voted to revoke the business license and conditional use permit. On March 15th, 2017. I testified before the special hearing officer who was appointed to hear the bar's bar owners appeal. During that hearing, I was cross-examined by lawyers for the bar owner and the building owner. The hearing officer found the evidence credible and upheld the revocation of the licenses. My latest testimony was April 5th, 2017, at the Superior Court regarding an unlawful detainer action against Migos. The court found that, quote, Nichols has been operated in a manner that makes it a public nuisance, unquote. The building owner was awarded his property back to summarize. You voted to deny the bar a permanent entertainment license. You voted to let the Planning Commission decide if the business license should be revoked. The Planning Commission determined the bar was a nuisance and revoked its business license and conditional use permit. The hearing officer ruled, quote, The operation of Michael's at the property is a public nuisance within the meaning of the Long Beach municipal code, unquote. He upheld the decision to revoke Michael's licenses. And finally, Judge Douglas Stern of the Superior Court evicted me. Cos now I stand before you. Two years and two months later, to remind you that my neighbors and I and many city departments have devoted thousands of hours to this effort. We want assurance of peaceful enjoyment of our homes. We do not want to go through this again. Michael's can no longer occupy 710 West Willow, but your constituents in other parts of the city should not have to go through what we have gone through. Do the right thing. Deny this appeal.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And I see Larry is there. If there are any other speakers, please line up. But gentlemen, the blue jacket is the final speaker. Thank you. Proceed. Okay. My name is Michael Anthony Harp. I am a resident of Long Beach. First of all, I'm really upset and appalled by number one. Susan is right next door to me. She is my neighbor. We still speak on a daily basis. To one another. Even though she sees different from what I see. Two. Didi is a new business owner. She should have the right to. Of course, it's going to be a minute before she gets her feet on the ground. That's with any any pert, any establishment. There's all kind of stubbornness up below, back and forth, down the way, up the way. You're not picking on them. Whoever is doing the picking, you're not picking on them. I don't see what the problem is. And for these people to have all these. Outrageous. Criticisms about Michael's. I don't see it. I don't get it. I understand. My cousin Stephen. Because he he he's going through what he's going through. I can understand that about him being in bed at 10:00 or whatever. Okay. But. I've walked. Down the street at ten. After ten, 11, 12 went to the liquor store. There are a lot of homeless people not to blame homeless people because they're pretty good people, too. As far as I'm concerned. But they go down the alleys. Loud music, sleeping in the alleyways. There's a whole lot of stuff going on with them as well. So. Oh, boy, boy, oh, boy, boy, boy, boy. I don't even know where to begin with this, though, because it don't make no sense. I don't understand why we can't get along as one come to some type of conclusion or an agreement and make things happen. We shouldn't have to be fighting and wanting to close down makos. They don't make no sense to me. It just don't make no sense. The Andrews. I'm his godson. He knows me, and he knows me as well. I don't. I'm just going to cut it down. But I say my vote is to keep Michael's open. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Larry could never have been in his place. But seven words, this does not pass the smell test. Thank you. Next speaker, please. My name is Roman.
Speaker 7: It seems to me.
Speaker 2: Nobody is talking. They've got. They've given up. It's what it looks like. The residents and the the bar owner there, everybody's talking on different levels. And I know that from my talks with Elizabeth Griffin, who's the most for the police, that the city is short staffed, a lot of police. And I noticed that there's also we're having meetings regarding density that's taking place. And it just appears that when you have housing right on top of a bar, that really is going to create problems. I mean, just generically and I know you've had a property bar.
Speaker 0: There for 30 years prior is what it.
Speaker 2: Seems like. But in this occasion it appears that they are the bar owner has got a lot of a lot more people that are coming in to her bar. And so, I mean, I realize that there's also been some violations of what appears entertainment stuff. And I don't know a lot of the details, but I have looked at the video and I know a lot of people are saying, wow, that's bad.
Speaker 7: But I actually can't tell that much what's taking place.
Speaker 2: Maybe my eyes are got to clean my glasses or whatever, but I don't I don't see a lot. But I just know that the residents are so angry at the noise. And I can completely understand that if you have that much noise, you're just trying to sleep or relax or do something with your kids. It's insane. But at the same time, I think there's some kind of a lesson that can be learned long term from the city, by the way, that it's planning and what it's doing. We have a lot of density, a lot of parking issues, a lot of problems there that maybe could have been solved had we planned the area better. And that's all I'm saying. As far as the permitting goes, I would like to see it a due process for everyone. And I don't mean this just for because someone is of the certain race, but I think everybody should be presented a all the information that's against them and they should be able to to address each and every one. And and although I know that the residents don't want to have an appeal, I do think that there is some kind of an appeal that should be done just so they can address some of those issues in a formal.
Speaker 7: Way, each.
Speaker 2: One, one by one. Because I understand things like there was a shooting, but it wasn't at the bar, was across the street. That's where it was generated. I mean, little things like that, little nuances may need to be addressed. I mean, I'm just putting that out there. That's what I'm thinking and that's where I'm going to stay. Thank you. So that concludes public comment. We are going to close the hearing and move it the discussion back behind the rail. Before I go to Councilmember Durango, I want to just address the video that's brought up. So the purpose of this hearing is very specific and very narrow, is to determine if the recommended action by the Planning Commission is appropriate. I stopped the video because the language that was in the video, I thought, you know, we got the message and it was a bit inappropriate. And for the viewers to hear some of that language and I do understand and sensitive to the residents may have dealt with that themselves, but it was my prerogative, the chair, to say , I think we've heard enough when we heard certain language being used, language that I don't allow in my home. So so that's why I stopped that. And one question for staff before I go to Councilmember Urunga, did we follow all appropriate noticing thresholds and requirements before arriving to today? Yes. Okay. Councilmember Durango. Thank you. Vice Mayor Richardson, this hearing is part of a lengthy process. It wasn't easy, and it's one of the most difficult decisions that city council has to address are issues like this. It's never easy to hear testimony on both sides regarding the validity or not of a proprietor running a business and how they run that business. The process was complaints filed, sent to the nuisance abatement people. Our department monitored noise, police department involvement, police calls, visits by vice, visits by poor planning department. And then it goes to the planning. It goes to the city council. We refer it to the Planning Commission. The Planning Commission heard all the testimony of everybody on both sides. It made its recommendation. There is appeal. It is sent to a ALJ, which is a reminder of the Chief Administrative Law Judge Legal and administrative law judge. The Administrative Law Judge hears again what the Commission heard, reviews all the material, receives all the testimony the same that that the Planning Commission made. And it's an independent ALJ like a judge. He makes his recommendation, and now we're here through the hearing. So having said all that, I just want to ask the city attorney and and Vice Mayor Richardson alluded to it. Has due process been followed? Have we done everything we possibly can up to this point to where we are now with this hearing?
Speaker 9: Councilman Urunga, I would in my estimation, I would say definitely yes. Not only was the process followed that you just described, but prior to that process, there was much interaction by various city departments in attempt to resolve the situation short of a revocation. As you know, and as you mentioned, a revocation is a fairly drastic measure that the city does not like to engage in. They like to short stop it by trying to get things to work out regardless of what the type of businesses that may be causing a nuisance in the neighborhood. There was outreach not only by the city prosecutor's office, the city attorney's office, the health department, the building department, the planning, the building and planning department, most certainly the police department, health department, all in an effort to get this into compliance so that they there would not be a necessity to take the next step, which was the revocation and many meetings, not only with the neighbors, but certainly with the property owner. The property owner, his wife attempts to meet with Mrs. Yancey. Ms.. Miss Yancey, numerous correspondences written to Ms.. Yancey, notifying her of the situation that it was existing out at the bar. So I don't remember if it was eight, nine or ten, our planning commission hearing a six hour hearing in front of the hearing officer and then tonight. So yes, due process was followed. Our process was followed.
Speaker 2: Are we talking about this situation here? But were there other legal issues concerning this location as well, that there was a case that went to a superior court? I think it was, or.
Speaker 9: So that that item is not technically part of tonight. But one of the speakers alluded to it because he testified apparently as a witness in that case. What he was referring to is that the property owner, Mr. Mackey, filed an unlawful detainer action in the Superior Court to have Mrs. Yancey removed from the premises. And the judge, who's a Superior Court judge at the courthouse next door, issued a lengthy opinion, which we've read and reviewed and did make a finding that a nuisance activity for chronic nuisance activity existed at that location to the extent that Mr. Mackey had the right to evict Ms.. Yancey from the premises, and the judge did order that. As far as I know, she's still there. There's another process that would be followed before she was locked out, so to speak. But there was a judgment entered against Ms.. Yancey for eviction.
Speaker 2: Now that we're talking about that. Can you clarify what the meaning is when you have a cup revocation? What's what's the consequences of a cup revocation? And what is a c, u p?
Speaker 9: So a copy is a conditional use permit and the city routinely requires a cup for those types of uses in the city that are more intensive type uses, the type that need a little bit more regulation. We have coupes with bars, bars and restaurants that have alcohol. Other facilities that serve alcohol are the ones that come before you more most often with the ups. We have check cashing that has sirups and other uses type that such as that type those types. So that's what a copy is. In this particular case, there was a copy that was issued to the property owner way back when, which allowed him to operate a bar at that location. The the the hearing before the Planning Commission involved both the revocation of the business license and the C up. I have no idea what the motivation was, but neither. Of the two parties, Miss Yancey, or the business owner chose to, or the property owner chose to appeal. The revocation of the CPD only appealed the revocation of the business license. So legally now no bar can be operated at that location. And I believe one of the witnesses testified, or maybe even since he testified, that the property owner is currently receiving citations from the city or has in the recent past received citations regarding operation without a copy. Maybe there is a strategic reason why the property owner chose not to appeal the CPA. I don't know.
Speaker 2: Okay. So Mr. Yancey made an application that she is still open. So is there a date certain when this up takes effect? Is it in effect now? She she claimed that she was allowed to continue to operate the business during this whole process, that.
Speaker 9: We didn't go to court to shut her down. But technically, the minute that the appeal period lapsed after the CFP was revoked, anybody that operated a bar out there was doing so illegally. And that continues through today.
Speaker 2: All right. Thank you. Well, we are here tonight tasked with whether to revoke the business license for the establishment due to numerous violations, including police calls for service noise violations, health department violations, illegal construction opening without a business license and hosting special events without an occasional event permit, among other allegations, including inadequate security and parking as required by the CFP. When Ms. Yancy applied for an entertainment permit from the City Council. At that hearing, I advised her to sit down with the neighbors and establish a working relationship and then come back and apply for another entertainment permit. To this day, after two years, Ms.. Yancy still refuses to meet with the neighbors under oath at the revocation hearing. Ms.. Yancy described the need to meet with neighbors as outside of her responsibility as a business owner. I met with Ms.. Yancy. Yes, I did. We met in my office with planning people, with the police department. And we talked about the need for her to reach out into the community, into her neighbors, to try to mitigate some of the issues that they were having and some of the disagreements, obviously, that they were having. She also communicated with my staff, which she indicates she did not. My staff is not my my check girl. Whatever. She she's my chief of staff. My staff reiterated the same suggestions that were brought up to her at our original meeting, which were to work on mitigating the concerns raised by the neighbors. And this included some basic suggestions, including keeping the back door closed, lower the volume of the music, and connect her video camera with the lounge police department to establish a line of communication with the neighbors and to establish a line of communication with the neighbors to this date. None of those suggestions were implemented. I want to touch on the video as well. I saw this video for the first time today as well. I hadn't seen it prior to today. I was amazed that that. Situation to agitate police and that these neighbors had to tolerate everything that was taking place there. I had the same emotion as Vice Mayor Richardson. However, it's fact and it's what you saw is what happened. The video was but a brief snapshot. Into what it was like for the neighbors on Maine Avenue and in the surrounding area. Sadly, this is what was occurring at the bar, and yet the business owner refused to meet with the neighbors to try to mitigate these conditions. I firmly believe that if we had reached a point of mitigation, we wouldn't be here tonight. And if the proprietor was willing to work with the city and the neighbors to find solutions on the ongoing issues, we wouldn't be here. This, in addition to this and finally this establish establishment is incompatible with the neighborhood, given its numerous calls for service and other violations. And I asked my colleagues to please support the motion on the floor. Thank you. And it's seconded by Councilwoman Gonzalez. Would you like to speak to your motion, your second? No. Okay. Thank you. Seeing no further council comment and we've already had a public comment. We will go ahead and cast our vote.
Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 2: Thank you. So now we have time for our public comment. I'm sorry. Go for it. I just like to say that the staff has some suggestions for Miss Yancey. It's not the end of the world in terms of getting a business license. You can apply for a new license after a year. If I'm not mistaken, can staff provide some additional recommendations as to what can happen from here on out? Yes. Thank you, Councilmember. And we would like to offer that, Ms.. Yancey, have the availability to sit down with our economic and property development department to see if there is assistance and have been through our business outreach efforts that we can provide. And we would be happy to make that connection and sit down and talk about what the city can do to help her with future small business endeavors . Thank you. Are you satisfied? Councilmember? Yes. Thank you. So at this point, we'll move forward with our public comment on non agenda items. We have Larry Goodhew, Mia Salas, Anthony Novella, Elayne Hutchinson. So with Larry Goodhue come forward, followed by Maria and then Anthony. | Public Hearing | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the hearing and approve the Hearing Officer’s recommendation and Planning Commission determination to revoke Business Licenses Nos. BU21338610, BU21338620, and BU21338630, issued to Enaid’s Way, Inc., dba Miko’s Sports Lounge, located at 710 West Willow Street; and
Approve the Hearing Officer’s recommendation to allow the commercial/industrial Business License No. BU90057720, issued to the Mark, Ronald, and Colleen Mackey (Property Owners), to remain and be modified by adding a condition to the Business License requiring the Property Owners not operate or lease the premises to any tenant engaging in the sale of alcohol for the property located at 710-714 West Willow Street. (District 7) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05092017_17-0351 | Speaker 1: Moshe Karis.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And we'll move right along to item number 18.
Speaker 1: Report from Long Beach Gas and Oil Recommendation to adopt the resolution authorizing the city manager to execute customer natural gas transportation service agreements between the city and utility customers that procure their natural gas supply from third party marketers.
Speaker 7: Citywide.
Speaker 2: Thank you. A brief staff report. Yes, we have a brief staff report from general manager Tony Foster.
Speaker 5: All right. Good evening, Vice Mayor and City Council. This item seeks your approval for adoption and resolution authorizing the city manager or designee to reenter into a natural gas transportation service agreement between the city and several utility customers that purchased their gas supply from third party suppliers. LP Go along with other gas utilities. Allow certain large consumption customers to purchase their natural gas supply from third party marketers and utilize city's pipeline system to transport this gas to end user facilities. These customers must be either compressed natural gas or rate five customers, electric generation or rate seven customers or transportation rate nine customers. These customers are not charged for the gas commodity, but rather only the gas transmission rates that apply to their requests. These transportation customers were approved were last approved for the Transportation Service Agreement in June on June 12th, 2012. The customers are thumbs. National Gypsum. Long Beach. Memorial Hospital. Toyota Asphalt Products. American Textile Community Hospital. Saint Mary's Hospital. Bloom Energy. California State University. Long Beach and Home Depot. The current contract expires on June 31st, 2017, and new agreements must be executed to ensure continued services to these customers. The agreements will be for an initial five year period, after which the agreements will automatically renew for a one year period. Any party may terminate upon 30 days notice. Revenue generated through these agreements is estimated to be one point million, one point million dollars annually. But this varies based on the actual demand. This concludes my report, and I'm happy to answer any questions.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Mr. Foster. Is there any public comment on this item? Seeing nonmembers, please cast your vote.
Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 2: Thank you. We're going to take a couple out of order here. The next one is 19. That was the first one to be requested to move up the stairs. Take take that one now. Mr.. We'll take a moment. | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolution authorizing City Manager, or designee, to execute Customer Natural Gas Transportation/Service Agreements and all necessary amendments between the City of Long Beach and utility customers that procure their natural gas supply from third-party marketers, for a period of five years, with automatic one-year renewal options, at the discretion of the City Manager. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05092017_17-0354 | Speaker 2: Thank you. We're going to take a couple out of order here. The next one is 19. That was the first one to be requested to move up the stairs. Take take that one now. Mr.. We'll take a moment.
Speaker 3: Mr. Vice Mayor, I'll be recusing myself from. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you for allowing me to invite you to to do that. That's fine. Thank you. So we'll take a moment to allow Councilmember Price to exit the room and we'll move forward.
Speaker 1: Report from Public Works. Recommendation to award a contract to Sally Miller Contracting Company for improvement of the Sixth Street Bicycle Boulevard Project for a total contract amount not to exceed 903,100. District two and three.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilmember Pearce. Okay. Can we have a brief staff report, please? We can have a brief staff report by Public Works director Craig Beck, who has been working on this for a few years.
Speaker 4: Okay, it's.
Speaker 0: Not quite a few years, but I'm getting closer. Vice mayor, member, members of the council this evening, we're pleased to bring before you another evolution in our ever growing master bicycle plan for the city. This is another bike boulevard similar to some that we've implemented on Pacific and Vista. This is on Sixth Street. We believe it's an important East-West connection linking a number of different neighborhoods. We're excited to have this before you this evening and are available to answer any questions.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 8: Yes, I did ask for a staff report. Card staff has been working really hard on this and the community members around this bike boulevard are really excited about it. So I want to thank you guys for all the work and I urge my colleagues to support this vote tonight.
Speaker 2: Well done. Thank you, Councilman Austin. I support. Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item? Please come forward and you have 3 minutes.
Speaker 7: Good evening. Know Neal Belmont Heights. I have a question about. Originally this project was proposed as a application for a funding federal fund. Safe routes to school, I believe, was the initial application by Sumi Gant way back in 2011. So my question is, has that grant been granted? I think it was $500,000 initially. Is this contract being paid for partially by that grant or is this going to be city money? So who's paying for the Bike Boulevard? AS My first question and second question is, does this $821,000 cover the complete two and a half miles of the Bike Boulevard from Junipero to Bellflower? And if not, what portions does the $821,000 contract cover? And then my third question is. To date, there has not been any public notifications.
Speaker 3: To six Street Boulevard.
Speaker 7: Residents regarding the Bike Boulevard itself. What it's going to look like, how it's going to affect their parking, how it's going to affect their passing through the neighborhood and so forth and so on. And so my question is what sort of public mailings will be issued, public notices about the construction that is apparently, at least under this agenda item going to start in July, which is just very. It's in a couple of months. So I'm a sixth Street resident and I would like to know what the plans are.
Speaker 3: And will we have will the residents on Sixth Street for.
Speaker 7: That two and a half miles have public notice of the construction and information that they can be educated and contacts that they can reach if there's any questions? That was it.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your time. And I know that there's quite a few questions there. Some are outlined in the memo. And Councilman Pearce, do you want to just.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I was just going to ask Steph, if you could just clarify, one, the funding and to the community engagement process?
Speaker 0: Yes, certainly, this has been a process that's been evolving. There have been multiple community meetings to talk about the Sixth Street Bike Boulevard. We are prepared to move forward, as you mentioned, in July. So we're roughly 45 days out before we we see a notice to proceed. And all of the funding is from transportation grants. There is no general fund involved with this particular project. And I'm happy to after this item, I can talk to you about specifics and give you my card and you can address any questions you have my way.
Speaker 2: Banking Council among them.
Speaker 7: And then just a point of clarification, I appreciate when our city management staff talk about grant funds. They're all tax dollars in one way or another. The difference is also with these types of tax dollars, if we don't apply it, another city would get them. So it's not as though we want to use money on things that we don't need. That's never the goal. But they are grant funds that are specific for a purpose. And so they have to be used within that purpose. And I know that that can often be confusing on some of the other projects we've worked on. When people ask about that variance, I just wanted to make that clear. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Seeing no further comment or public comment or council comment members, please cast your vote. | Contract | Recommendation to adopt Plans and Specifications No. R-7026 for Improvements of the 6th Street Bicycle Boulevard Project; award the contract to Sully-Miller Contracting Company, of Brea, CA, in the amount of $821,000, and authorize a 10 percent contingency in the amount of $82,100, for a total contract amount not to exceed $903,100; authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to enter into the contract, including any necessary amendments; and
Accept Categorical Exemption No. CE-57-09. (Districts 2,3) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05092017_17-0359 | Speaker 7: Thank you. Motion carries.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Item 21 Please.
Speaker 7: Report from water.
Speaker 1: Recommendation to declare ordinance approving a resolution of the Long Beach Board of Water Commissioners. Establishing the rates and charges to be charged for water and sewer services to all customers. Read for the first time and laid over to the next regular meeting of the City Council for Final Reading Citywide.
Speaker 2: Is there a brief staff report? Chris Garner with a brief staff report. Thank you. Very briefly, as part of Proposition 218, we have to do a cost analysis study. We've spent the past year doing that with an expert analyst with us, and the result is what you have before you tonight. Well, what we do is we take our costs, we allocate them fairly to our customers among not only the customer classifications, but among the tiers. And for our residents, more than half of the customers will see no change or even lower monthly water and sewer bills under the new rates and structure when compared with the current rates . These customers are those that tend to use less water than the average customer, such as multi-family and duplex customers, as well as single family homes that use water efficiently. For those few residential customers that use much more water than the average resident. They will see higher monthly bills. This new rate structure will send the proper price signals to our customers to encourage the continued efficient use of our water supply. The new rates were approved by our Board of Water Commissioners. Interpretations of the proposed rate changes were made to each of our 90,000 customers. A public property rating hearing was held by the Water.
Speaker 5: Commission last Wednesday night to allow our customers an opportunity to voice their opinions.
Speaker 2: In regards to the rate changes. Prior to the hearing, the work program.
Speaker 5: Received six written letters of opposition. At the actual hearing, two customers attended, of which only one spoke in opposition.
Speaker 2: So before each night's request approved the resolution that the City of Long Beach Water Commissioners adjusting both the water and sewer rates and structures. Thank you. Thank you. And it's been moved and seconded. Any public comment on this item saying numbers, please cast your vote. | Ordinance | Recommendation to declare ordinance approving Resolution
No. WD-1369, a resolution of the City of Long Beach Board of Water Commissioners establishing the rates and charges to be charged for water and sewer service to all customers, read and adopted as read. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05022017_17-0324 | Speaker 1: Item 17. Item 17 is a report from Development Services. Recommendation to receive and file the proposed 2017 report on regulators and incentives for the production of Affordable and Workforce Housing Citywide.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. I'm going to I'm going to turn this over to our our department services staff will be giving a report, just to recap also. So a few things. So I just want to again, some of you are probably or most of you were at the actual study session where we went over kind of a lot of the details about the recommendations. I think we spent probably about four or 5 hours going over those details, which I think was very good information. A lot of questions were asked by the city council. And so today we're going to focus more, I believe, on some of the recommendations that are going to be that are going to be brought forward by staff. And I also just want to just take the moment to thank everyone that participated in any of the three roundtables or citywide conversations, the folks that participated in the Affordable Housing Task Force, as well as the numerous meetings, whether it was with affordable housing developers or private sector developers or other advocates that we're all involved in, in the recommendations that are before us today. And so with that, I'm going to turn this over to anybody, our development services director.
Speaker 9: Mr. Mayor, members of the city council, thank you very much. And to go along with that, you've probably heard enough of me over the years related to affordable housing and some of the goals that we've been trying to accomplish with affordable housing, particularly related to our housing element. I think we have gone a step further than expected with our our views on on where we should be with affordable housing. And with that, I'm going to ask Patrick Geary, our housing development officer, to give the staff report. He is our premier expert within the city on the production and preservation of affordable housing. He has worked on every single major affordable housing development project in the last ten years, and we're very fortunate to have such an expert on staff. So with that, I'm going to ask Patrick to give you this update. Thank you.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Amy. Good evening, Mayor and members of the City Council. In February 2016, Mayor Garcia assembled a group of area housing leaders and advocates to form the Affordable and Workforce Housing Study Group. The Study Group worked with staff to prepare a report on the revenue tools and incentives for the production of affordable and workforce housing. The goal of the housing report is to recommend policies that may increase the production of affordable housing. The report was developed through a collaborative process that includes research input from the study group, community meetings with stakeholders and industry experts and public study sessions. Between February 2016 and February 2017, the study group held 15 meetings. In addition, Mayor Garcia, the Study Group and staff held a roundtable with housing advocates on September 19th, 2016. A roundtable I am sorry, a Housing Resource Fair and Community Forum on September 24th, 2016, and a roundtable with housing developers on October 14th, 2016. There were over 200 attendees at these community meetings. On February. On. On February 21st, 2017, the city council held a study session, and during the study session, staff presented Amy presented a rather lengthy report on revenue tools and incentives for the production of affordable housing, which included data on housing issues, housing accomplishments, best practices, and a list of policy considerations presented by the Housing Study Group. The Study Group spoke. The City Council shared comments and asked questions, and both the Study Group and the City Council asked staff to conduct additional research on a number of items for anyone who missed that City Council study session, I just want to take a moment to summarize some of the city's affordable housing accomplishments over the years and over the past ten years, over 2000 units of at risk housing have been preserved. And most of those occurred within the last four years. 1737 affordable housing units have been developed in the past ten years, including 342 units that are under construction now. The total amount of funding invested in affordable housing over that ten year period is $560 million, which includes about $136 million in city funds and $414 million in funding leveraged from the developers. We've helped rehabilitate 367 existing housing units and helped 335/1 time homebuyers purchase their first home. In addition to 342 units that are under construction, we're working with developers on five new projects with a total of 275 units. This slide provides a list of items that the staff conducted additional research on. The additional data is included in Chapter X of the final report, which you have in your pockets. Staff also conducted research on rental rates, but found that the data was conflicting and in some cases not current. The section on rents has been removed from the housing report and is included in a draft rent report that was forwarded to the City Council separately. The draft rent report is a work in progress in order to address the concerns over the accuracy of the rental rates and data presented. Staff will contract with a firm that provides professional real estate data to provide current and accurate rental and vacancy rates. The final housing report includes recommendations that are a synthesis of research, best practices and input from the study group, the City Council and the public. Those recommendations are presented in three sections Section one. Policies to implement immediately. Section two. Existing Legislative Requirements and pending initiatives. And Section three. New Initiatives for development and implementation. Policies to implement immediately. This section includes policies that are already in use or that can be implemented without additional City Council action. And these policies include the following 1.1 Encourage the preservation of existing affordable housing. One point to encourage project based vouchers in new, affordable developments. 1.3 Continue to waive developer impact fees for new affordable housing. 1.4 Promote the city's density bonus program. 1.5 Continue to partner with, partner with developers and other community stakeholders in the pursuit of funding. 1.6 explore the potential development of student housing. 1.7 tracked federal and state legislative activities and support legislation that increases funding for affordable housing. 1.8 Support. Seek a reform that encourages the production of affordable and workforce housing. 1.9 Create and maintain a database of public, publicly held properties for potential housing development. Section two includes existing legislative requirements and pending initiatives that are in process. This section includes new state requirements and initiatives that staff is already working on that will be that will be presented to the Planning Commission and City Council in the near future. 2.1 is the first item under this section, which includes the adoption of an ordinance that supports the development of accessory dwelling units. The section, this item is actually something that staffs are already working on and will be presented to the City Planning Commission in the near future. 2.2 implement state law that reduces parking requirements for affordable housing near transit. 2.3 conduct a financial analysis and Nexus study to update the coastal zone in Lee and Lucy program. 2.4 Review and update the Condominium Conversion Ordinance. A study on the update updating the coastal zone in Lee and Lucy program and the condominium conversion ordinance is already underway and it will be presented to the City Council in the near future. Section three includes new initiatives for development and implementation. 3.1 began exploring a local bond measure to capitalize the housing trust fund. 3.2 immediately began the development of an inclusionary housing policy. I'd like to point out that current law allows the implementation of an inclusionary inclusionary policy for ownership units. But the legality of implementing an inclusionary zoning policy for rental units is in question. We plan to move forward with the preparation of a study and an ordinance that includes a policy for both ownership and rental housing, with the hope that current legal issues are addressed. 3.3 investigate the possibility of establishing a local document recording fee to fund affordable housing. And 3.4 investigate the possibility of dedicating city resources for the housing for housing during the annual budget process. 3.5 Modify the Housing Trust Fund Ordinance. 3.6 modify the moderate income debt definition from 80 to 120% of AMD to 80 to 150% of AMI 3.7. Encourage the adoption of specific plans with programing hours. 3.8. Consider expanding one for one replacement of lower income units. 3.9 develop and offer first time homebuyer programs. 3.10 Encourage regulations to incentivize the use of shipping container construction for housing. 3.11. Develop a plan to include micro units as a method for encouraging housing production. 3.12. Study the potential for short term rental regulations, as are vacation rentals. 3.3. Ensure that sufficient resources remain available to implement the city's proactive rental housing inspection programs. 3.4 explore the feasibility and mechanics of using new structures such as the Enhanced Infrastructure Financing District Tool to capitalize the Housing Trust Fund. 3.15 explore the and propose an Article 34 referendum. 3.16 Provide staffing resources to manage the growth of affordable housing production contemplated by these policy recommendations and recommendations through the annual budgeting processes. As resources allow. And then for next steps staff is recommending the adoption of these policies. If the council chooses to adopt them tonight, staff will take the necessary steps to implement them, including drafting or revising portions of the Long Beach Municipal Code for Future City Council consideration. And before I conclude, I would like to thank Andrew Chang on my staff, who has put a tremendous amount of work into this report and collecting data. So thank you, Andrea. And that does conclude my presentation. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. And let me let me say a few comments. I may turn over to the council and of course, we'll have public comment as well. Let me first just begin by thanking the staff. I know that there's been a lot of community conversation, but the team has worked really, really hard on this report and the multiple community meetings and the multiple conversations. So if we can just give staff a round of applause, I just want to thank you guys for for your real hard work on this. And and I wanted to share what why I'm supportive of these recommendations. And a couple of questions have been asked and then turn it over to the council. The first thing, just to be clear for for the council that has the presentations, I wanted to make sure that you all were able to see, well, there are 30 recommendations or I think 2930 recommendations. There's a few of them that have an asterisk on those that you saw that you have in your report. So those are the recommendations that were added either by staff or by a council member at the study session that was asked to be included. And so if you had a question about that, I just wanted to point that out. And the rest, of course, were brought forward by the by the Housing Study Group. In addition to that, I just want to point out that what what this report and this process has been focused on is how we build more workforce housing , how we build more affordable housing for low income families, how we provide access for families that are here to get into homeownership and provide a long term, hopefully solution to building more affordable housing. There are a couple of items that I want to just point out, which I think are really important and I think are in particular these are what we have in front of us are some substantial changes and moving forward on this discussion in this policy. I want to point out some of the areas that I think are really important. I am particularly supportive of beginning and moving forward on on developing a policy that is that for inclusionary housing within the city of Long Beach hopefully was clarified that the intention of course, is to do a policy that includes all units. But of course we have to also wait and see what's going on with state law when it comes to the conflicts currently around around the rental piece. And so that will be studied as part of this whole this whole process. I'm very supportive of looking at trying to build additional student housing with our Long Beach City College and Cal State Long Beach Partners. And they are as well, I think, promoting the city's density bonus to all multifamily developers I am very supportive of, I think is exciting. The fact that we're talking about building micro units, which I do believe there's an opportunity to build in the appropriate areas, denser units at a lower cost. If we look at our code and what we allow as far as the size of units to be built. I also believe that and I support the idea of developing a first time homebuyer programs for not just city employees, but for those across the city to provide them access to buying their first home. And I also want to just point out here that I think that all of these items, a vast majority, came from the study group and the explore, whether it's the exploration of a bond measure, whether it's looking at changes to the current code, the way we do some of our fees, I think it's all been, I think, properly vetted. And so I just want to thank staff and I think there's some really good stuff in here too to move the conversation over to the next step. I also want to turn this over and note that I this is a there is a lot of policy in here. So I do expect that council members will have some questions and have some conversation about certain parts of this policy. There are 30 separate additional recommendations in here. So I expect that as well. And so with that, I'm going to turn this over to the council and then we'll go to public comment. Councilmember Pearce. The public comment first. Okay. Well, we can do we can go ahead to do. Councilman Gonzales, your final public comment first. Okay. So we'll do public comment first. So please come forward.
Speaker 2: Good evening, Mayor City Council. My name is Robert Fox and I'm the executive director of the Council of Neighborhood Organizations. We have resurrected ourselves. Yeah. So we're here to participate in the city council, to give recommendation and advice and to share our problems and our concerns with you. Frankly, I was not prepared to be so joyful this evening. The staff listened to our data that we presented, incorporated it into this new proposal, and I couldn't be more pleased. I didn't think it would be that successful. And I'm shocked and amazed. And I supported 100%, except for one little thing. Of course, you knew how to be one. There is a question at the end of the Affordable Housing Report regarding conversions, condominium conversions. I want to clarify that with the City Council so that we in the staff can review that. If it's talking about converting apartments to condominiums, I can understand the point. Alamitos Beach, which is that most high density neighborhood in the city of Long Beach, has owner owns. We're probably the only city in California that has so many own your own associations. These are not condominiums and we are converting them. We started converting them when Bonilla was head of the zoning department here. I helped write that law for the city. And what that does is it converts an on your own into a condo. The reason this is important to the affordable housing plan is because the only way you get to buy and own your own is by cash. So even if they're lower priced at 150,000 or 200,000, it sort of leaves that out of the ballpark of anybody who's low income. You'd have to have a lot. You have to have a lot of money. If we convert them to condominiums, then the standard practice of having a 20% down or a 10% down to buy the condominium makes that a very affordable product. And since we have such an amount of that kind of housing, I would beg that the council reconsider a moratorium on conversions or specify it to leave on your own out of it, because I think that would do more harm than good for the low income population. Certainly, I started out with an own child. So, you know, I know how difficult those things are. So I would hope that we would take into consideration that issue. And I also support the idea of really looking at formulating a lot size and unit size for the granny flat issue. We've submitted some documentation to you all and it's high time we get that done as quickly as possible so that we can move forward in construction in the neighborhoods in a compatible way. And again, thank you so much and thank the staff so much for listening and being so cooperative and incorporating our concerns in the final report . Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening, mayor and council members. I represent a group of landlords and landlady here in Long Beach and we're very much interested in affordable housing. We provide housing to the working population of Long Beach, and our housing is very affordable. Long Beach is has the most affordable housing between about the beach cities of Los Angeles or Orange County. And the distinction of Long Beach is that I don't know the exact number, but probably half of our housing is older housing, you know, built in the forties, fifties and sixties. So that means that we have to spend the rent that we take in for maintenance and for upgrading our properties so that we can compete with the newer properties, such as what you have here on Broadway, across the street from us, and also in downtown Long Beach. Not much housing is being built in the other areas of Long Beach. So we have to maintain the housing stock that we have, which is very desirable to our to our tenants. And I want to say we've just gone through a very long, extensive recession period. And so rents have really not gone up very much. So now the recession is over, they tell us, and costs are rising. Property taxes are rising, which go towards providing the services that we have here in Long Beach. The minimum wage is going up, that which we use to pay our employees. So costs are going up and rents. Modest increase in rents will be going towards maintaining our property and upgrading our property so that we can compete with the newer properties. And again, as I said, Long Beach has the most affordable properties. Rents in and of all the beach cities. So I'm saying this to say that we are against rent control. We want to be able to maintain and upgrade our properties and to keep Long Beach a desirable area for our working population. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Daniel James. Home ownership is one of the primary considerations when it comes.
Speaker 9: To.
Speaker 7: Having a safe and wonderful city. And so I strongly encourage anything that you can do to have on your own. I'm the gentleman Mr. Fox just mentioned something about on your own. I think that needs to be strongly taken in consideration of how you can encourage people instead of renting to own their own homes. I mean, that contributes to the good of the entire city. And I would like to bring back a something that you just passed maybe a month ago regarding the property on Norwalk. It would have been a perfect property to create condos or on your own. You could have had a much more dense property there, and it was near transit. It would have been perfect for the East Side to contribute to the to creating more affordable housing. And yet this council chose to make it either one and a very expensive housing at that. So what I'm seeing is you're saying one thing and doing another. So, I mean, what you're saying here in this report I think is great, but what you're doing is something very different. So please be an integrity in congruent do do in your actions what you're saying. So thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening, Mr. Mayor.
Speaker 4: Members of the City Council. My name is Sunil Cheng. I'm executive vice president of Link Housing. We are a nonprofit, affordable housing developer based here in Long Beach. And I want to say thank you and commend you, Mr. Mayor, and the Council for this study that has been fabulous. And the approach and the process of getting all the stakeholders involved has been great. So thank you for that. I think this group knows affordable housing benefits everyone. It benefits the people who live in the housing. It benefits our local employers because they have a local workforce that they can hire from. It benefits our businesses because it means that our people are spending less on rent and therefore have more money to spend locally. It's this great flywheel that helps entire communities. And I think one of the things I'd like to do tonight is to offer you the practitioner's perspective. As someone who does develop affordable housing, I think a lot of the recommendations are really great and including the focus on density, on things that we can do to expedite the process. I'm particularly heartened by the revenue tools that are recommended in the in the program and would encourage.
Speaker 7: That for this study to.
Speaker 4: Have the greatest impact and for these recommendations to have the greatest impact that we really do look at ways of funding that affordable housing trust fund. We're in a very fortunate time right now and that there's a lot.
Speaker 7: Of political will to build affordable housing.
Speaker 4: Because we recognize the great need. We also happen to have a county that is funding those initiatives and a state that's also looking at those resources. But at the end of the day, all of those funding sources rely on local funding. They want to see that the local jurisdictions are participating. And so that's where really making sure that those revenue tools that are being proposed, which include a housing bond, they include looking at recording.
Speaker 7: Fees, include looking at in lieu fees that those are.
Speaker 4: Really considered and carried forward. I think that's important in order for units to be.
Speaker 7: Produced, affordable units to.
Speaker 4: Be produced, and for this to really have impact. We as a city pride ourselves on being a diverse city. And it's really important for us to remember that economic diversity is an important part of that. Every community needs to have its child care workers and its.
Speaker 7: Clerks.
Speaker 4: And its baristas. And so that's an important part of making sure that everybody can be housed. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Thanks, Peter, please.
Speaker 3: Hi. My name's Matt Houston. So and I just the thing that stood out to me and also some of the things that the other speakers have touched on already. But but the main thing that stuck that stuck out to me initially was there was a Section two point something I can remember that was it was something about parking and incentives or or to me, it felt like it was kind of pushing the parking off, whether there's, you know, some sort of a discount or whatever it might be in some way for this parking. But there's already in downtown Long Beach there, I don't know if y'all have noticed, but there's already kind of a little bit of a some parking difficulty there. And so I was thinking it might be good to kind of build in like some requirements instead of having, you know, an option to offset the parking some other way because it's still going to add, you know, parking needs to the to the to the pool and the and I was thinking, you know, then there's a funding issue and all this kind of thing. And just to throw it out there, it might be something that could be done, like have a, you know, to facilitate something like a credit unions and this sort of thing so that, you know, we can get tax breaks and people can reinvest and they can do things like the home ownership and also have a pool, too, you know, and and Inglewood, I was thinking having like a L.A. Rams and a Chargers credit union and working it out, the cards, everybody would like to have the cards and that could help to kind of offset gentrification and that sort of thing possibly . And then have like some diversity type things built in as well, which I think is really good. But you know, building, building parking structures might be good. I think the main reason that I think that's an issue is, you know, as Ben Carson says with urban development, that it's kind of you have to look at the whole the whole person. And if a person and me as as someone who was, you know, lost a little bit of my freedom and had to kind of start over as a software developer and with a lot of skills that I've developed over the years without without a car. A lot of the people who have those jobs that that I'm seeking that I'd really like to have, are kind of nested away in places where they're kind of tucked away from public transit. It's almost as though some of those businesses are actually trying to hide from people who rely on public transit, transit. And so that's that's something that's that can be become like a class separation. Mechanism. If people don't have access to vehicles and employers are kind of tucking their businesses in places where it's very difficult to get to through public transit, then it makes it an unfair situation. And so the breach that remains a barrister, if the breeze there wants to be a breeze, so that's great. But you know, the opportunities for other things should also be there as well. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Thank you for having us. My name is Trevor Griffith. I am a lecturer in labor studies at UCLA. I also work part time as an organizer with the California Faculty Association at CSU Long Beach. And I'm a member of Democratic Socialists of America. I'm here with two brief requests. The first is that going forward with your rent study that you'll be sure to pay attention to the years between 2015 and 2017, which is absent from the current draft report entirely, and b, that you pay attention to neighborhood level level data by using Zillow and publicly available data that Zillow makes available. I was able to identify that over the past two years we've seen the price of a studio apartment go up 38%, the price of a one bedroom apartment go up 31%, and the price of a two bedroom apartment go up 25%. It's true what landlords are saying about rent staying flat during the 2010 to 2015 period. But the last two years have been different, and especially if you pay attention to Southwest Long Beach, you'll see that that's where really these rent increases are taking place the most. So that's point one. The second point is I'd like to request that you take proposal 3.6 to modify the moderate income definition from 80% to one 20% all the way up to one 50% of area median income. And you separate it out from the proposals and vote on it separately. And the reason is because and you may or may not already be aware of this area, median income, median income, excuse me, is determined based on a metropolitan region that includes Los Angeles and Glendale. Long Beach is a city that is poorer than those two other cities. And as a result, the area median income determined by that proposition is much higher than actual median income in the city of Long Beach. So in 2015, the median income for households in Long Beach was $52,783. But according to HUD's median family income for the L.A. Long Beach area, it's 63,000 per year. So that's a 20% difference. And what difference that makes is Long Beach. The city of Long Beach uses that HUD data, that metropolitan region data to determine its affordability settings. And so when you're talking about raising what is currently 120% of median income at roughly $75,000 a year to 150, you're talking about subsidizing households that make between 75, 75,000 and 100,000 a year. But we already know that at least in 2015, 150% of median income in the city of Long Beach was already $75,000. So you don't need to benefit the top, you know, 33%. We need to focus our resources on those who need it most. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Good grade data, by the way. We're going to and I know that there's some questions about the the AMA, which I think staff is going to address during the during the council comment. So next week.
Speaker 3: Staff members and so second district resident and also coming as a member of Democratic Socialists of America Long Beach Branch, I would just like to say that the proposals that are being put forth are all very interesting and very show that broad range of experiences that are going to be going into developing this new plan. However, I would say that they're a little bit more stilted towards the issue of the adequate housing supply, which of course is a very serious issue. Instead, I would also I would request that you look further into legal avenues in order to strengthen the basically the the demand issue or the costs that are going to be associated directly with the individual individuals seeking housing in the city of Long Beach without adequate statutory protection for rent control, adequate statutory protection for folks being displaced for any particular reasons, including those that might even be that violate the 14th Amendment. It's really imperative that that Long Beach get ahead of this. Landlords have, especially in this particular city, lacking rent control, have a host of particular areas to be able to or avenues to displace residents and very limited resources on the on the actual for the individual residents to be able to combat this in any particular legal manner . The city of Long Beach right now in Legal Aid, I believe, only has one full time housing attorney. You can go go down and go to the across the street, to the county courthouse any day of the week. And you'll see that an increasing number of evictions are happening every single day. And those people lack any legal representation for the most part to be able to combat them. So it really again, it really falls on the city, therefore, to increase its own its own statutory protections for, again, their own residents. At the end of the day, the city must be serving its residents. Over the individual landlords you're going to be looking at. You know, when I worked in the 14th floor, a lot of the landlords calling for complaints. We're we're calling with 714 area code phone numbers compared to the residents who are again, find themselves displaced at a record rate because of the rising prices between 2015, 2017. Thank you and have a good day. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Good evening. City Council members and Mayor Garcia. We are Cal State language masters in social work students working on our capstone.
Speaker 7: Project for graduation. My name is Rebecca Gomez. I am one of the four students.
Speaker 5: That will be speaking to you today. To finalize our Capstone project, we decided to present our findings with city council members to bring attention on some important issues that many Long Beach residents are faced with, and to support the policy recommendation to allocate resources to prep. As part of our project, we were tasked with going out in the community to assess the needs of our chosen ZIP Code 90813, which is District one represented by Lena Gonzalez. During our needs assessment, we interviewed community members, community service providers and business owners. We attended a city council meeting, the mayor's roundtable with Housing Advocates, the Homeless Study and Community Forum and Resource Fair. We encountered that the main concern for many residents is housing, such as affordable housing, unjust evictions and substandard living conditions. Since our group's academic concentration in integrated health, we decided to focus on substandard living conditions after hearing residents testimonies and how this has affected both their physical and mental health. This became the main focus of our capstone project and we created a survey to capture the extent of these concerns. We went back to the community, door to door and in public facilities such as laundromats and parks.
Speaker 7: To speak with.
Speaker 5: The residents about their experiences. After this, we decided to gather another perspective on how substandard living conditions are addressed.
Speaker 7: In the community by the Department of Code Enforcement. We interviewed a code enforcement officer bureau and.
Speaker 5: The effort to come in as a neutral party. Another component of our project was to speak to political representatives. We were successful in meeting with the chief of staff from Roberto Franco's office. My fellow group member, they were present. Our summary of our findings. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Great work, students. All of that. Yes. Copy.
Speaker 7: Good evening.
Speaker 4: City Council members and Mayor Garcia. A name is Lacey Salinas and I'm a member of the group project and I will be presenting on the findings of three of our interviews with residents in the Code Enforcement Bureau. First, it is my duty to.
Speaker 7: Provide a depiction of the stories of the residents of the ZIP Code.
Speaker 4: 90813, which is in District one. We have learned that overcrowding is apparent in multifamily apartments. For example, one resident mentioned having eight people.
Speaker 7: In a one bedroom apartment. Imagine that. I know it would be impossible to to understand them and to understand what this family.
Speaker 4: May be experiencing.
Speaker 7: Most rapid concerns are related to not.
Speaker 4: Having healthy and affordable housing, which is pertinent to today's agenda item. Nearly 30% of residents are unaware of code enforcement and what they can do for them, and only about three mentioned having a positive experience with them. Those who were unaware of code enforcement share that. They were fearful.
Speaker 7: Of reporting their concerns because.
Speaker 4: Of retaliation and unaware of their tenants rights.
Speaker 7: When asked the miracle question of what they want from their landlords and their city, the majority said that they want renter.
Speaker 4: Protection against rent increases and.
Speaker 7: Evictions. Which we have.
Speaker 4: Noticed is not part of the policy recommendation. To our understanding and speaking to the housing organizations. Renters protection is part of preserving affordable housing.
Speaker 7: We also explore how these substandard conditions might be affecting their mental health. One fourth of the residents stated that they had persistent worry become easily annoyed or irritable, feeling depressed or hopeless and trouble sleeping or staying asleep, which we have learned are symptoms linked to anxiety and depression, mental health disorders. Second, our interview with Code Enforcement Bureau Kurt J. Kinane played a key role in identifying some of the barriers that.
Speaker 4: Code enforcement officers may face.
Speaker 7: And the experiences of our residents. We learned a lot about how the code enforcement division is structured and how the procedures are carried out. Kerr further explains the process of the violations and the time.
Speaker 4: Span of handling these concerns.
Speaker 7: What we learned from our interview is that code enforcement programs such as Prep is not able to protect tenants against retaliatory harassment or allow code inspectors to enter their dwelling. So why would your resident speak up if the odds were against were already against their against them? Therefore, if additional resources are allocated to prep, then we hope that some of these.
Speaker 4: Resources can be used to protect these actions. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Good evening, city council members and Mayor Garcia. My name is Daniella Ruiz and I am also a master's of social work student from Cal State Long Beach. I am also a new Long Beach resident and district too. I moved to Long Beach a few months ago because I had heard and experienced many of the great things that Long Beach has to offer. As many of us know, Long Beach is known for being diverse, welcoming, friendly, protective and inclusive. And in many ways, living here has allowed me to feel welcomed and included. However, during this project, I had the opportunity to meet people who have not been protected by the city in terms of housing and adequate living conditions. These people have shared stories about the rodents and other critters that invaded their homes and families. They have spoken about how their voices have not been heard when they have attempted to take action. And some have even shared stories about being evicted when they have attempted to take action. They also shared how they feel anxious, worried and fearful of being evicted. So instead, many of them choose to live in the apartments that they can afford, even though they pose a threat to their health. It's disheartening to learn that a city which appears to be so welcoming and friendly is allowing such an injustice to occur by not protecting its own residents, by not ensuring that their homes are habitable, by not creating affordable housing for the most in need. Additionally, as part of our project, we were tasked with connecting with political representatives. This was the most difficult part of the project since we were experienced many barriers when attempting to connect with elected officials. Despite our various efforts and avenues, we were only able to set up two interviews. This speaks volumes about the barriers that residents must experience when attempting to make their voices heard. If, as master level social work students, I found it difficult to engage my own city government. I can only imagine how isolated and disconnected other folks must feel.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, city council members. My name is going to go in and I'm a resident of Long Beach, currently residing in District seven. Information Project has enlighten us as to the tremendous need of the community.
Speaker 7: It is our hope that you, the City Council, will continue to find.
Speaker 4: Solutions for some of the following concerns.
Speaker 7: First is education. If additional resources are allocated.
Speaker 4: For prep, we need to continue.
Speaker 7: To educate our.
Speaker 5: Residents on how the program functions and education around complaint based code enforcement.
Speaker 7: From our interview, it was alluded that outreach.
Speaker 4: Was already taking place, but.
Speaker 7: The residents we talked to had not been reached and let alone know how to report it. Second is protection. If the residents are not protected, it is very likely that they will not report at all for.
Speaker 4: Fear of retaliation and most importantly.
Speaker 7: The fear of eviction. Even through the prep program, there's no guarantee renters will not be.
Speaker 4: Retaliated.
Speaker 7: Against if they allow.
Speaker 4: An inspector to enter their unit.
Speaker 7: Third is more safe, healthy and affordable housing. As you will note, the 90813.
Speaker 4: Area is the most impoverished area in Long Beach and therefore the most in need.
Speaker 7: And we notice from this policy recommendation the need of these minimum wage earning, working class people of color will not be addressed. As a resident of Long Beach for 25 years, a single working mom and a student from Cal State, Long Beach, I am looking to you, my city council, to ensure that those most in need live in safe, healthy and affordable housing.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 7: The women I come from in birth. My name is Angelina Ramirez. I live in District six. I'm a community organizer for obvious reasons. And power in general or recommendations needs to have stronger commitments and timelines. We support more funding for affordable housing, such as increasing coastal zone and new phase, a bond measure for funding more affordable housing . We need to preserve whatever affordable units we have, and we support expanding one for one replacement for affordable units, a way we support dedicating more resources for HIV. We need to make sure our city is able to keep our homes safety safe and healthy. We strongly oppose changing the moderate income definition to 150%. And am I? We cannot support the city subsidizing how simple people making more than 100,000 a year. The city is already focused on moderate income housing and we need housing for the working class families of Long Beach. Inclusionary housing for home ownership units only. We need to have inclusionary housing for rental units and for working class families. A prime environmental impact report. We oppose this type of EIA are in the downtown plan because of the impact the has this has in the surrounding community and the community to be able to have input on what is being developed in our communities and by having a program are our voices will be silenced. In addition, when we are talking about preserving affordable housing, we need to include renters protection in the discussion. They are not two separate items. When the protection helped keep people like me in their homes and help keeps the rent affordable for families. You cannot say the rental protections are not part of the affordable housing discussion. There are related. We hope to see that these recommendations are not equitable. The city wants to move toward more equity and these recommendations will not do anything for those in it and focus development on the higher income level, not for families like me. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hi. Good evening. My name is Lilia Ocampo and I am a Liberal member. And today I come to speak for the people that does not make the low income, for the low income people, the very low income people, and also the extremely low income people which I belong to. Suddenly I look, I realize that the affordable housing plan is for the work force. What I don't belong. Where I don't belong to yet. I belong to the work class. And we are not included and are planned. And I want to ask Mario Garcia to first include us, the people who serve. The people who work. The people who.
Speaker 6: Sorry.
Speaker 7: But the people who make the economy, who spend the money and the city who work for the city, for the service, for the service and also for for low income families. We have a children's that if we're not included in the plan, we're going to end homeless because we're not going to be able to afford to pay for the rent of an apartment. We're not going to have a house to live in because we're we're not going to. We're not making enough money to be a condo plant. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: When I stayed with Senor Alcala, they miembros they'll consiglio me nombre de recalcitrants eb en el distrito or no estoy aqui representan como miembro they leave it para todos or you part they they. Barriers or so partly various organizations are guilty that they long.
Speaker 5: Good afternoon, mayor and councilman. My name is Ricardo Cervantes. I live in District one. I am here as a member of labor. I am also part of various other organizations in this city.
Speaker 7: Killed in a year and in battle. Aqui Bible in the city that they long be central mi familia e miss e hos i order minutos e i i erin travel aqui in thumb them your free una they last mother scare is is tavern a stand luciano opera la luna una bartender beneficios para la comunidad durante el plan the fandango may even look good in is toluca pork then they entonces sat service members then can be OC event account that is they plan.
Speaker 5: I have always rented in the city of Long Beach. I raise my family, my daughters and now my grandchildren in the area of downtown. I was one of the mothers who was fighting for the benefit package for the community during the downtown plan. I was involved in the fight in this fight since then because I knew that it would cost a this plan would cause a change.
Speaker 7: I order estamos pray S.A. aqui for all seen estamos ah Rolando they be vendors. I said see Willie says bueno de la seu that is they considerando mas puntos para this model year of bbn thus SLC release apple yandel i the intent c is the intention.
Speaker 5: And now we're here present because we are now talking about affordable housing. It is good that the city is now considering more funds to develop affordable housing and we support this recommendation.
Speaker 7: Better look in those people. But ask estamos recommend recommendations. No, but reflect on the necessity that is been struck on monetary trouble. Mi familia no esta representan though esto recommendation this is aim for the estate is too little Barack here removes applejack construction is the baby and thus para la familia scape gunmen must they sing went out me do you need those L.A. esto no representa mi familia.
Speaker 5: What concerns us is that this recommendations do not reflect the needs of our community, community of workers. My family is not being represented in this recommendations. The focus of this study seems to support the construction of affordable housing for those who make over $55,000 a year. And that does not represent my family.
Speaker 7: Ah, they must get in most cambios la the fee, the FEC, the law lower and lower us more. They are not Barack Incluyen familiar square gardening classic sing sing me Lola is esto no incluyen amy familia in Oakland como neither others no opinion eso recommendation.
Speaker 5: And now we're here trying to change the definition of moderate income for families who make over $100,000 a year. That does not include for my family, does not include my community, and I do not support this recommendation.
Speaker 7: Necessity must aim for calmness in Los Trabajadores. Okay, gaman in minimal loss they there say to add that incluyendo losing capacity. Does he get any meaning rational feel if I mean.
Speaker 5: I mean we need to focus on workers who make minimum wage family, the elderly, the disabled, those who have a fixed income and families like my.
Speaker 7: Las Comunidades Estamos preoccupy those poor. Keller's recommendation is no. Some considerable. I see no one. Moussa Kiwanuka yeah those sick say it Amos or Luciano opera mask Bebe Anderson says civil espera but familia como como la mia? Gracias.
Speaker 5: We, the community are so narrow.
Speaker 0: Spencer indicated that instead of the OC.
Speaker 5: Thank you with the community our concern about the recommendations that do not consider do not consider us and we will not stay quiet. We will continue to fight for affordable housing. That includes families like mine. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. I just want to clarify something and I wanted to ask Patrick, I think it's important to the recommendations are for all levels of low income and very low income housing. However, I think the piece that's being pointed out, which I think is an important point of conversation, is the the change to the AMA on the moderate side on the higher end. And so I think there's going to be some questions about that and why the staff recommended it. But I've had a couple of people say that the low income housing or very low income is not included. That's that's that that's not correct. So that is all a part of this project. This is for all levels of low income housing, affordable housing. And we will talk about the ambit piece at the council discussion in just a few minutes. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you for that clarification. Karen Rhys side. I'm a resident of.
Speaker 9: The First District.
Speaker 7: In one of the low income affordable housing units on seventh and Pacific. And I want to thank everybody that participated in the process because this is kind of really the most open dialog. And thank you, Mayor, for leading this effort and this very, very serious issue. Tonight, I'm going to speak on behalf of the Gray Panthers. And we have sent everybody our position paper dealing with affordable housing. And we're also not in support of raising.
Speaker 4: The AMI until we hear additional information.
Speaker 7: There's a couple of things missing from the proposal, and one, we would really like to have cohousing consideration considered as a part of the proposal. Actually, Maggie KUHN, who was one of the founder who was.
Speaker 4: The founder of the lot of the Gray.
Speaker 7: Panthers, was one of the first advocates for co-housing in the US, and co-housing consists of placing elders with college students. It's a very successful program economically, very supportive and creates great understandings and support for both of those age generations. There's no mention of multi-generational housing. We would like to see that included as part of the process. The other thing that we feel is missing and maybe it's not appropriate to put it in this particular report, but our tenant protections and we all know our city is experiencing incredible rent increases. In my day job, I am at the senior center on Fourth Street. I listen to the stories and they are increasing every day the heartbreaking stories of our seniors who have received rent increases that they cannot afford. They come in crying because they don't know what they're going to do. It is just heartbreaking. So we really want you to consider renter protections. I live in an affordable building. I looked for section two or two HUD, because they're more protected. My building, if they sell the building, there's no protections for me.
Speaker 4: In this plan.
Speaker 7: It's going to be too little, too late. So please consider those things.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening. My name is Margaret Hennessy and I'm a retired master's level social worker. When you are on your way to being old, an elder, a senior, you are very busy living, working, solving problems and raising children. When you realize you are eligible for senior housing, senior transit passes and free lunch, it's almost surreal. But it happens to all of us. The dictionary definition of a displaced person. It's a person who is forced to leave their home because of war, persecution or natural disaster. A refugee when someone is evicted from their home due to rapid inflation of rental cost, that is also a displacement. We older adults have been told by the city that there is commitment to Long Beach senior citizens. But as I look at the gentrification process, we senior citizens who have reached this stage of life where we are no longer able to compete and generate new increased income, we older adults are becoming increase. Distinctly vulnerable to displacement. Starting over does not come easy to many older adults. And choosing to move away from a place that they considered their home, their roots because they are no longer able to afford inflated rent is heartbreaking and humiliating. Surely there is a way to work this out without driving seniors into homelessness or storing them in shipping containers just to get them out of the way of progress. We older adults know you need money for social programs. Developers have money. Let them know if they want to develop in Long Beach. They will need to do so with the moral compass in this beautiful, developing, diverse city on our beautiful coastline. We want to remind the city that we seniors are part of this rainbow. In fact, most of us work very hard to get us this far. We challenge this council, both individually and collectively, to legislate senior rent protections like just cause and rent control, especially since our income isn't going any higher. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, madam. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: My name is Liana Noble. I live downtown and part of the North Pine neighborhood. District one. And I also want to thank the mayor for your initiative in convening the study.
Speaker 4: Group and that.
Speaker 7: We've got this kind of a comprehensive document in front of us, because I think we all the one thing we can agree on is we have a hell of a housing problem here in our great city. I have got four concerns, and my concerns are from a neighborhood perspective. I'm lucky. I am in the process of buying a loft.
Speaker 4: Whether I'll pay it off before I die or not is another question.
Speaker 7: But I am officially a homeowner. But most of my life I was a renter. And the majority of the residents in my neighborhood are. We have more than 60% renters in the North Pine neighborhood, which is our citywide average. We are up around 75 and 80%. So what happens to renters happened to me in my neighborhood, and that is my motivation. My concerns are that these are not recommendations that are specific to the very general. I understand the challenge of coming up with specific recommendations. But I think we are at a crisis and we need something that we can measure and evaluate. Secondly, as other people have raised, there is nothing. Even though there was a lot of discussion in the public comment from the 200 plus people that took this seriously and participated. There's nothing in here about renter protections. And I know from my neighbors that unless there are renter protections, we are not going to solve our housing crisis. There's a lot of talk in the report about homeownership. Obviously, I think homeownership is great, but we are not going to become majority homeowners in Long Beach. That is not the economy that we live in. It isn't the reality of this country nor of our city and our city's history. We've got to address the needs of affordable rental housing. And as people have already said, with an emphasis on the low, the extremely low, everything that's below moderate, that the renters that live in my neighborhood up above seventh and up to Anaheim. That's what we need to address. My final concern is that when we talk about workforce, I sure they hope that we are going to define that, to include my neighbors who keep the restaurants open, who work in the hotels, who work in retail and have minimum wage jobs. That is our workforce.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much, speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Good evening, mayor and members of the city council. My name is Neal Richmond.
Speaker 6: I live in the third.
Speaker 2: District and I'm the I was the director of Community Corporation of Santa monica, community based nonprofit.
Speaker 6: Housing developer in that city. And for nearly 20 years, I taught affordable housing finance.
Speaker 2: At the UCLA.
Speaker 6: Department of Urban Planning.
Speaker 2: First, there were some very good policies that have.
Speaker 6: Been proposed, like a bond measure, to create a local source of funding for affordable housing production.
Speaker 2: However, there's a lack of emphasis on the.
Speaker 6: Preservation of affordable housing. The central problem in Long Beach is an overreliance on the model of housing filtering.
Speaker 2: That leads to what critics.
Speaker 6: Call trickle down housing policy. This is the assumption that the production of higher income housing.
Speaker 2: Helps those at the bottom of the market. I recommend that elected leaders and staff read.
Speaker 6: The May 2016 report of the Institute of Governmental Studies, California's oldest public.
Speaker 2: Policy research Institute. The filtering process takes generations measuring that, meaning that units may not filter the rate that meets the needs of the market's peak, and the properties may deteriorate too much to be habitable. Further, in many strong market cities, changes in housing preference has increased the desirability of older, architecturally.
Speaker 6: Significant property, essentially disrupting the filtering process. Typically, my neighbors in Belmont Shores are not moving to new and.
Speaker 2: Shiny developments in Santa Clarita.
Speaker 6: Or for that matter, often near Ocean Avenue and relinquishing their old and used homes to.
Speaker 2: Deterioration and occupancy by lower.
Speaker 6: Income households. Homes are not cars where most.
Speaker 2: Buyers do prefer new.
Speaker 6: Over old. The institute did argue in favor of the production of more subsidized housing.
Speaker 2: We are losing out on getting private capital investment through the.
Speaker 6: Low income housing tax credit program because of a.
Speaker 2: Strong, dedicated source of housing funding that is required to package projects. Federal funding has declined, and, of course, redevelopment money has evaporated. What can the city do? Well, here are three ideas. First, commit to at least 20% of boomerang funds going directly into a.
Speaker 6: Housing trust fund.
Speaker 2: As you know, these were once tax increment funds that that were used by the city for those purposes. We'd like to see them dedicated again to producing affordable. Housing. Second, we'd like to see follow the lead of the city of Los Angeles and commit to both commercial and residential linkage programs. It's important to just respond to the housing market. From from new real estate production in Long Beach should begin immediately to make a strong commitment to a Nexus study. Thank you for this opportunity to speak and we hope the Council will strengthen the proposal before it.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: My name is Georgiana Charles. Linda. I live at 327 West Sixth Street. I just gave some pictures to you and the conditions I'm living in because I'm low income housing. I'm also here with liberal because we need low income housing and it all sounds good and the mental health thing is great, but it's like you guys keep waiting and dragging. What is a senior at my age going to do? Buying a home? I don't have a chance. You know, I live on sort of security. I just saw some pictures up there of that's the condition of my house I live in right now because I'm low income. They treat us less than I cut 14 mice and less than seven days. I'm afraid to go to sleep because they got in my bed and scratched my face. And that's how we get treated because we're low income and now our building has sold. I was here before because the building I was in before sold and they gave us a 60 day notice. Now, that same owner, Donald Me, is buying up all the properties. An apartment that I paid three, seven and 54 now is 1195, and all they did was put in a new floor. There's got to be something that you can do. Your city hall, you guys have the owners phone numbers. You guys have luncheons for everything else. Why not invite some owners and have them, you know, have a discussion about letting people in? They're still handing out vouchers at Section eight. There's no housing. No housing. We don't make two or three times the amount of rent, so they won't even look at us. I have perfect rental history, but because I'm low income, I don't have a chance. So I know there's something you guys can do. If not, you'll see me every week and I'll just come up here and complain. You see the pictures? I'm afraid to sleep in my apartment at night. And the owners will not do nothing. They will not even buy me traps. By the time I pay my rent and buy food, I can't afford traps. People are buying them for me because they know the condition. I called the Health Department. Nobody are doing nothing. So we got to get some some code enforcement or somebody involved in this. I should not have to live like that.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And, ma'am, I'm not sure, obviously, where this apartment is, but you should just leave the address and we'll make sure that someone's up. Okay. We'll take we will take a look at that. Okay. Next speaker.
Speaker 2: My name is David Wagner. I'm a fairly recent resident of Long Beach here in downtown. I'm speaking in support of Libra, and I'm also a professor. Retired professor has written nine books on homelessness and poverty. First thing has to be said, obviously the focus is local, but you have to look, we're in the USA and this gentrification process has been going on now for about three decades. It's not news. Look at every city up and down the East Coast, every city on the West Coast. Fewer and fewer poor people and fewer and fewer working class people are remaining. This is not.
Speaker 3: Localized to Long Beach.
Speaker 2: So we ought to have some recognition of that. Anybody who talks about diversity and wants a city where everybody makes 100,000, well, it needs to be called out on that. What kind of diversity are you calling for? I've heard the mayor, I've heard the council. I've heard them say they want a diverse diversity where I mean, the barn door is already closed. I can't afford to live in downtown anymore. You need about $100,000 of income in your family to live downtown. You need probably close to 70 to live elsewhere. So this is really years and years and years after this problem emerged and it emerged in New York and it emerged in L.A. and emerged in Philadelphia. What we're doing is basically the European model, which is the rich, occupied the cities. The poor had to go out to the suburbs like you see outside of France, whether they're big projects in the suburbs. And that's what's happening in the United States. I think it's important to keep in mind for both people on both sides of this, this is not new. So I think any proposals that don't have rent or protection has several other people have said are doomed to failure. Check out all the other cities. And secondly, no protection for eviction. I understand there is no just cause language in this state. You could be evicted for any reason whatsoever, and that's got to be remedied. And finally, a couple of people have spoken about this, the 3.6 change in the median. Am I I'm not even sure you could do this, really. But it would essentially, as several people have said, raise the so-called affordable housing to 90,000 a year. And this is something that really once again takes us to the new diversity issue. What kind of city do you want? I mean, is this Malibu then? It's after what you want. Fine. And I'll leave with it. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir. Thanks so much, Max.
Speaker 7: Good evening. My name is Suzanne Brown. I'm a senior attorney with the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles. We want to thank the city for its continued efforts to look for housing solutions that are right for Long Beach. And we're happy to have this dialog with you tonight. I'd like to address four of the cities housing recommendations in my comments this evening. First, we support the creation of an inclusionary housing ordinance. However, the ordinance and any.
Speaker 5: Underlying economic studies should include.
Speaker 7: Rental developments. Assembly Member Assembly Bill 1505 by Blum is expected to become law and it will clarify any legal uncertainties regarding inclusionary housing for rental projects. Second, while we agree with the recommendation to increase coastal zone in lieu fees, we are very concerned with the timeline. The city made a legally binding commitments in its most recent housing element to complete an economic study in 2015 and to increase coastal zone in lieu fees as part of the city's budget process in 2016 to 2017. The public has not seen any such economic study and these fees were not increased as part of last year's budget . We urge the city to share this study if it exists, and to set a clear timeline for increasing these fees right away to be in compliance with law. Third, we do not support changing the definition of moderate income to 150% of area median income. This is contrary to longstanding definitions set by the federal government at HUD and the California State.
Speaker 4: Department of Housing and Community Development.
Speaker 7: It's also contrary to Long Beach's affordable housing arena numbers. SAG has told Long Beach it needs to reduce. 4009 affordable units by 2021 to meet the existing affordable housing needs of residents earning 120% or less of Mary area median income. In light of this, the city should not change its definition of moderate income to 150% of am-I. Fourth, we encourage Long Beach to adopt an affordable housing linkage fee for new residential and commercial development to maximize local revenues for affordable housing. This very important recommendation was not included in the city's report, but it is a critical.
Speaker 4: Tool for housing development.
Speaker 7: The City of Los Angeles is currently in the process of adopting such a fee. Finally, I shared a legal memo with you earlier from land use experts at the Public Interest Law Project about inclusionary housing impact fees and access studies. One really important point from that memo is that nexus studies are not required for and low fees of any kind, albeit coastal zone in lieu fees or inclusionary housing and low fees. Nexus studies, which are more complicated and expensive, are only required for linkage fees and impact fees. Please utilize this memo from experts.
Speaker 5: In Sacramento.
Speaker 7: As you make policy.
Speaker 5: Decisions tonight.
Speaker 7: And in the coming months.
Speaker 5: As it sheds critical light on how to best craft much needed.
Speaker 7: Affordable housing policies without creating unnecessary burdens on the city. Thank you for your time and dedication this evening.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker.
Speaker 2: Yes. My name is Holly Stewart and I live at Fourth and Pine. And I'm fairly active in my community. And I thank the mayor and all the council and especially my councilwoman, Nina Gonzalez, for your concern about these issues. And I'd better be talking about a bit different than many. My concern is, as I walk through the neighborhood now, I'm retired, by the way, so I spend a lot of time out walking around. I see children and families where they're in stressful situations of worrying about things like eviction or how are they? Are they going to have a decent house? How are they going to have that house taken care of? And I think the effect of this on the children is very, very bad, just as it is for seniors who are facing things like eviction. And I think part of our part of our goal has to be to, again, as everybody has been saying, protect affordable housing and try to make sure we even have more of that so that, in fact, we get stable neighborhoods where children grow up looking ahead to their school from one year to the next and for even for a whole semester. And I know our mayor here as an educator also, and I worked in education for almost 30 years, that kind of primacy among the children ends up also making a difference all the way through education of whether young people are successful and get on to college and learn the skills they need to have a different kind of life. And I think that is one of the crucial things about this, is that we don't end up also seeing a situation where if we don't maintain affordable housing over a broad area now I'm until about land area. What happens then? We end up with a different kind of segregation. It's not like the old things have Latin groups or black groups, or there's that being the victim of segregation that ends up being segregation by income, and that has just disastrous effects. I was poor and white. My family were. And I know that I went through some trials and errors. I saw my mother fall through the wood, the feet on the floor of a house because we couldn't afford to live in a better place. And I know that later when we got more permanency and in our family and we were still not high income or even moderate median income, but the fact that we had permanency from one school to the next and from one school year to the next, gave me the courage to keep on going in school and then go on to university and graduate school and things like that. But there was times when I wondered, Why am I in school? But I think this is what all of us, this job, all of us back here, all of you at the table is to try and get these neighborhoods. So we keep people of all incomes and all creeds and races and ethnic groups able to live together and build that future for our children. I really believe this is something that we can do and we need to do it. And so thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. And quiet before you go up, I want to make sure I have for that speaking. So I have the gentleman in the back because my last speaker. Right. And because I'm closing the speaker's list. And so and so looks like there's another speaker behind him. She's the last speaker. I'm closing my speaker's list. And the speaker's list is closed. Okay, no more. And we're going to take everyone that's in line right now. Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. City council members who are here, Rivero with Libra and my compadres motors, they already went before me and spoke of where we stand in both support and opposition, of what revisions need to be made and what still needs to be addressed as part of this discussion around affordable housing. From the very beginning of this process, from the formation of the Study Group to the other community workshops, renter protections has always been part of the community's conversation. Yet here we are considering recommendations and not a single form of such policies is being considered. Mr. Mayor, I hear you and several others say that this is about affordable housing and not renter protections. You speak of them as though they are two separate and distinct things. Renter protected protections is directly tied to the preservation of what is affordable for families right now. Are you limiting your definition of preservation to just covenanted or project based units? Because that's not what we mean when we are speaking of affordability. We want to keep the homes that are affordable to us now. And that means having conversations about resident retention policies, which include renter protection excuse me, renter protections. We cannot have an intelligent conversation about preserving affordable housing without this, and we will continue to invite this into the discussion. Now I want to turn my discussion to the idea of equity. It hasn't been long since you all voted to establish the Office of Equity and even less time since it has been operational. This office was supposed to be the guiding light, steering us into a more equitable city and to understand its true meaning. We were even shown a cartoon graphic that. Showed everybody given the same opportunity.
Speaker 2: I invite you to seriously think.
Speaker 3: About the intention behind this office, which you all unanimously had put into place. It was to symbolize a new path for the city. So I invite you to honestly ask yourself, do these recommendations.
Speaker 2: Speak to that idea of equity?
Speaker 3: Do these recommendations provide for the most in need? Do the any of these recommendations.
Speaker 2: Give everyone.
Speaker 3: The same opportunity? Because if you believe that they do, then I have to sincerely.
Speaker 2: Question that.
Speaker 3: Which guides you. However, if you don't believe it is equitable, as if you don't believe as I do, then I implore you to seek the counsel of your conscience and vote to make it so. Equity is not changing the moderate income definition. Equity is not focusing development on moderate and above moderate income levels. Equity is a citywide inclusionary housing policy, including rental units. Equity is resident retention and renter protection policies. Equity is funding affordable housing developments for the lower income levels. That is what equity looks like and that is what you should all be striving for. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Mayor. City Council City Staff Brian D'Andrea, senior vice president with Century Housing. As you know, Century is the nonprofit steward of the villages that Cabrini West Long Beach. We're home to 1300 formerly homeless residents on any given night. We work very closely with the city and all our partners to restore a sense of help, health and hope in the lives of our residents. I'm also here this evening as a member of the Mayors Study Group, chaired by Bonnie Lowenthal. And first, thank you to the mayor for convening this group and lifting up this issue of housing affordability. Tonight's a really proud evening for all of us on the group. I also want to acknowledge the efforts of city staff that work diligently to prepare a really incredible report, including Patrick Geary, Andrew Chang and Amy Burdick and their entire team. All of us know this is an issue that acutely affects and impacts households across the income spectrum here in Long Beach, and one that's putting real strains on our communities. This evening, we encourage City Council to not only receive and filed this report, but to keep it handy. City staff has done a great job outlining a set of really compelling and progressive recommendations that can form the backbone of all of your policymaking efforts here in the weeks and months and years to come. It's clear that the Council has many policy tools at its disposal, tools that will invariably require choices. But we think these choices can ultimately spur housing development, generate economic activity, promote homeownership, and alleviate the affordability burdens facing our city and our residents. In closing, just like to say thank you on behalf of century and that we look forward to continuing our work with the city.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. We look forward to your new projects that you're building right now. So thank you. Please. Next Speaker.
Speaker 5: Good afternoon.
Speaker 7: Good afternoon, Mayor. My name is Cheryl Cole Rowley of 327 West six, apartment two. And I live in Ms. basic apartment and the condition is very bad there and I don't know what's going on. She sold the property, not telling anyone what I have to deal with. The rats and the roaches. This doesn't make no sense. I'm a senior citizen and I don't complain. I don't call the health department. I don't call a code inspector. It just don't make no sense. I can't even sleep at night. Dealing with the mouse is running all across my floor and I. I contact the manager and she told me that you do it yourself. It should be up to date about this. And when I can't tell a complaint, I call everyone out. I just sweep it up on the rug. Ms.. Beasley, I sold a property. But they didn't want our money on time. I'm a senior citizen. I shouldn't have to live like this. I'm stressing out every night because the roaches and all this stuff, I don't have the money. I don't I don't have the money to buy all this stuff. But she does. So the problem is basically it. And the manager tell me, write a letter. Write a letter, this part. So all of this. I wrote a letter and I went to the health department. I don't call it a code inspector. This should be studied about this, sir. I mean, this doesn't make any sense. I'm a nervous wreck. I got to wake up every night and think the rat gonna jump in my bed. This is terrible. Oh 327 Beasley I never miss Beasley. And it's just terrible there. I shouldn't have lived like this. And I just want to thank you guys. But if I had to keep coming out here, I will come. And it doesn't make any sense. But then management to rent on time. But they don't do the condition there. What do I do for this? I don't call the health department. I don't call the code inspector. Miss Beasley, I sold the property and I'm still doing the same stuff over and over. I don't have the money to keep bad dog stuff and a mouse and all that. I'm on a fixed income. I live upstairs. I live on. It's just terrible there. I'm not sure I should live like this. I'm a senior citizen. And if I could go somewhere else, my rent might be too high. I can't afford it. I'm on a fixed income. I just want to thank you guys and just hear me out. My name is Coleman, Sherlock Holmes.
Speaker 0: And if you can leave the address with the clerk and we're going to we're going to send someone out. Okay.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. You, too. Mr. Mayor and city council members, thank you for addressing these very important issues. My name is Steve Askin. I am both a homeowner and a rental property owner in the second district where my wife and I have raised four children. Now, this hearing has focused mostly on a report that deals with long term development. But I am here to ask that the Council also take action on some of the immediate rental crisis issues which are threatening our city's diversity, as we've heard from some of the witnesses tonight. I only need to look down my block in Rose Park to see how rapidly rising rents are moving. Some of my fellow landlords, I'm sorry to say, to chase out good tenants so that they can bring in wealthier tenants. We just heard an elderly woman tonight who experienced just that. The common problem of being pushed out on 60 days notice and a feeble excuse. Now, to preserve our diverse neighborhoods, the neighborhood where I'm so happy that my children have had a chance to grow up. We need to protect the tenants, the tenants who helped us landlords prosper specifically. And I was it's not part of this report, but it is part of the overall housing mandate. I urge this Council to address the immediate crisis by reasonably restricting the landlords right to throw out tenants without just cause and by considering putting some restraint on the excessive rent increases which we've seen in this city. I'm speaking as someone with 32 years as a rental property owner and based on that experience. I also have to ask all of you to ignore the claims that we've sometimes heard that protecting tenants is unfair to landlords. The truth is, our tenants need protection far more.
Speaker 3: Than us landlords. The truth is also.
Speaker 2: That anybody who's bought rental property in Long Beach over the last ten, 15, 20 years almost certainly has seen both their property value and their rent revenue soar to highly profitable levels. We landlords, quite honestly, though some will tell you differently, do not need unlimited rent increases just to maintain our properties. My fellow landlords know that they're earning more than they ever dreamed possible. While many of our tenants suffer for the good of our city's tenant majority and for our entire city, I urge all of you to support fair rental practices and ignore the shrill voices that we've sometimes heard from a few self-serving landlords.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: My name is Amy.
Speaker 4: York, and I'm currently a renter in the seventh District.
Speaker 7: And I spoke at one of the forums before.
Speaker 4: On the need for renter.
Speaker 7: Protections. And I, too, like many people here, was really surprised when I looked through the report and the saw no discussion of renter protections. And anyway, I did want to address one section of the report.
Speaker 4: Which is letter D on eviction.
Speaker 7: And displacement, because it was unclear to me why this was the only thing that was addressed on eviction. And basically what what the report says is further investigation needed to be done into the number.
Speaker 4: Of unlawful detainers that had been filed.
Speaker 7: And apparently the goal of that is to get a better understanding of displacement. Yet there were first of all, the the term displacement.
Speaker 4: Isn't really defined here.
Speaker 7: Number one. And number two, there are other forms of quote unquote, displacement that aren't addressed at all, such as gentrification and rising rents, that type of thing. So I wasn't sure why those issues weren't discussed as well.
Speaker 4: And there was also a.
Speaker 7: A distinction between.
Speaker 4: Unlawful detainers and 60 day and 30 day notices.
Speaker 7: Almost as if 60 and 30 day notices are legitimate.
Speaker 4: And not a form.
Speaker 7: Of eviction. They are, in fact, evictions.
Speaker 4: And yet those aren't being investigated. Only the unlawful detainers. Anyway, I wanted to go back and talk a little bit about my experience.
Speaker 7: When I spoke at the forum, I explained that I'm a victim of a retaliatory eviction. This was when I was living in District two.
Speaker 4: And after months of dealing with an issue with.
Speaker 7: Management that they refused to remedy, I emailed the owner to discuss the issue, which I had a legal right to do, and four days later I received a 60 day notice.
Speaker 4: To vacate.
Speaker 7: No reason was given because under the law they don't have to give a reason. But what they didn't anticipate was that if I could show retaliation, I may be able to recoup some of my expenses which which I did in small claims court. And I was awarded my expenses, but nowhere near.
Speaker 4: What it cost me in terms of time and stress.
Speaker 0: And thank you, ma'am. Time's time.
Speaker 7: Okay.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Please. Oh, good evening. My name is Libra, a United States Navy vet and.
Speaker 6: Resident of Long Beach. I came here.
Speaker 3: To speak on behalf of some of my fellow vets that was put out on the street because the city of Long Beach gave them affordable housing vouchers, and the new developers that came in and bought the buildings that they lived in forced them right back out on the street. I had a friend that he was in the hospital getting the heart operation and he had to come out of the hospital and go right to a homeless shelter. You know, I understand we got these New York real.
Speaker 6: Estate developers or Michael Bloomberg who funded the housing.
Speaker 3: Developers or whatever. But I don't feel that New York is the city that we should be modeled after, you know, to take care of our people. I believe City of Long Beach has always taken care of the homeless. L.A. County has always taken care of the homeless. So I feel we need to represent as a city and where we always have been.
Speaker 6: Instead of, you know, letting some people from a model city like New York that doesn't.
Speaker 3: Never take care of the homeless. In my book.
Speaker 6: I visit the city several times. I was raised in the West from California. And, you know, I feel that we need to take care of our own.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Josh Butler with housing Long Beach. I want to thank the mayor for having me. Maybe a part of the study group and for the council for taking up these recommendations, as well as the many members of the public who gave countless comments to us to help guide where we're at today. And there.
Speaker 2: Is a situation which we have waitlists for.
Speaker 3: Affordable housing, which are anywhere from 3 to 8 years long. We have 19,000 people that signed up for the Section eight waiting list. We have 1000 vouchers that are currently out and cannot be used. We have vacancy rates that are dipping as low as 2%, and we have rents that have risen anywhere from 20 to 30% over the last three years. So does with that backdrop that we were asked to put together these recommendations and start to build for the future. And I think we've done a very good job of doing that. Unfortunately, I feel like we have left the city council a great deal of heavy lifting to do because we have not addressed the immediate need as some of the folks here have mentioned. They may pass away while they're waiting for an affordable housing development opening to come through for them. These are seniors who are living on fixed incomes who, when they move, are being asked to verify that they make three times the rent when they're one on a fixed income. That's not possible to do. So where are they to go? When landlords speak of 1400 dollar rents, I often wonder if they would let me borrow their landlord time machine so I could go back into the past and warn people about the impending disaster that will be facing us in the future. And that would be if we would have passed inclusionary housing ten years ago. How many units would we have on the table if we would have included affordable housing in the downtown plan? How many units of housing would we have had? And maybe the urgency with what you are faced in terms of dealing with this plan would not be as great.
Speaker 2: But it is.
Speaker 3: And so housing Long Beach, while we were part of this group and we certainly support these recommendations, we'll ask the council to go one step further, as we have for the last year, and that is to enact a just cause eviction protection ordinance for the city of Long Beach. If you're paying your rent on time, you're following the rules of the lease. You should not be kicked out of house and home. I think that's a basic standard that we should be able to meet. We are the largest city on the West Coast without any form of renter protections beyond what the state provides. That's simply not enough. And every day housing Long Beach, we see the victims of that policy coming through our office. This report does not focus on the displacement that has occurred in our city. The data is readily available and we've been working on trying to get that data and we look forward as this process moves forward and working with working with city staff to help better identify where we are seeing short fallings. I think looking at Edison Shutoffs as something that we could also take a look at, we've seen an increasing number of shutoffs there. So the health of the community is not fully reflected in this report. I think this report tries to make very poor situation look very good. I'm not sure why we did that. We have a lot of work to do and I don't know why we would need to reframe our current housing stock as having gone anywhere needing the need of which our residents are facing right now. So I would employ the Council to take a deeper look at some of the challenges that we're facing right now and take a look at coming up with a stronger solutions possible to build upon the work that we have done. And thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please. And just just also one thing that I had brought up a few times. So I know that multiple council members have asked and requested staff to provide rental information. As far as some of the numbers and some of the some of the data points that were brought up today and certainly some of the data points that both the some of the housing advocates, as well as some of the property owners have asked to be included. So staff is right now working on a lot of this data collection. I know that they're reaching out to some of the groups. It's kind of it's taking place currently. I think there was a draft of an initial data that has been collected. I think that is an ongoing process that's going to happen over the next few months. It's been asked, I know, by multiple council members for that information. And so just for for folks that are here, I know that staff is working on that and they'll be reaching out to everyone to ensure that the data that is being actually collected and shared is reflective of what's actually happening. And so that's I think it's important for everyone to have correct data on all of the rent, all of the rental issues that are happening across the city, and to hear from all all sides and hopefully bring folks together as well. So I know and I think that Josh was just up here. I'm not sure he went. He's up there. So those I that's something that you've asked for as well, Josh And that's that data is is being collected.
Speaker 2: Next speaker My name is John Kendrick. I'm a vice chair of the Long Beach Gray Panthers and a member of Labor Day. And I've been in Long Beach since the eighties. And I want to hit on four things. One, renters protection. The first time I got evicted, it was illegal because I reported my.
Speaker 3: Landlord.
Speaker 2: To the city. It was during El Nino year and we have a.
Speaker 3: Mold in our apartment. My landlord took documents for somebody else. Why did it out? Did a sloppy job.
Speaker 2: And then said, He served me, but I never got served. And then I got a three day notice to vacate. Now, when I went to court because I found out I can get documents and I found out and I saw on here where he used documents.
Speaker 3: For something else, which I've been told, you can't.
Speaker 2: Do that on any kind of legal documents. Use Wite-Out and you can see what he messed up and this and that. And I never got served. When I took it to the court, the judge left it off. There was no protection at all. Second time, I got legally evicted. I look on the website. And I brought up my landlord. I got evicted. Single parent of three kids going to college. One child in special needs. I ended up in Curbelo Village for two years because the people there, the director, the staff was taking money from the people. And doing things they shouldn't have been doing. It took us almost two years to get enough information to report them. Well, they did a surprise visit. The director and her husband and staff all got fired. So even the people to supposed to be helping us, we down at the lowest we can be. They're not helping us and there's no protection. It costs me years to go from obviously to college with a two year degree to not be able to go to Cal State Long Beach, because I couldn't afford the debt to go farther with that. And my children suffered during that time. Also, do you talk about the homeless camp? It's off because.
Speaker 3: Anybody being homeless, they know.
Speaker 2: We're out and moving around at 3:00 in the morning. When you start that survey, the signs up. Everybody's all over the place and this people just aren't even counted in a survey. When I looked at it and then I took part in your talks that was going on.
Speaker 3: And there was things that.
Speaker 2: Were brought up. Like one district one, two and three, they're in prime areas.
Speaker 6: For sea level rise.
Speaker 2: As it's growing. When those areas go underwater.
Speaker 3: Which they will, we don't find a way.
Speaker 2: That means other areas that's considered not prime real estate will become prime real estate and.
Speaker 3: Those people will get pushed out even.
Speaker 0: Faster. Thank you. Here we.
Speaker 2: Go. One of the things where we are, we got to we got to get you would never talk about artificial intelligence. We're losing jobs real fast. So they.
Speaker 0: Could think.
Speaker 2: How can I afford a house?
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. And also, I know I mentioned earlier, but I think Ms.. Where is the last speaker we did that? We close the speaker's list. So you're the last. She's the last speaker. Sorry, sir. Okay. I think you really spoke, I believe already, sir. So she's the last speaker? Yeah. No, it's okay. Not. Not not a problem.
Speaker 3: Next speaker. I'm Kevin Yeager. I'm a resident of District two and a member of the Long Beach Democratic Socialists of America. My mother, my sister and I were all living independently and searching for housing in Long Beach, and we ended up moving in together with a fourth roommate in a three bedroom in Alamitos Beach. My father, my mother is a Long Beach librarian, and she's choosing to live with her kids just so that she can afford her community. My sister is a CSU Long Beach student, as well as a full time worker, and we've already heard hopefully about the homelessness crisis that's facing our students. And so this is not a hip, new millennial trend of living with your parents. It's an economic coping mechanism. We don't need homeownership encouragement. We need you to recognize that our workers incomes have been stagnant and or declining for the past few decades and implement real renters protections. I hope we can all agree that we want our students and librarians to live here rather than commuting in from the Inland Empire where they can afford it. In particular, the protections and preservation recommendations by the Affordable Working Housing Study Group put forward. They were woefully inadequate. I don't understand how an affordable housing study could fail to recommend that it failed to recommend rent control and just cause eviction protections. We can certainly do more than analyze, contemplate and enact policies to address Airbnb or consider a policy to limit condo conversions. Also extremely problematic is raising the moderate income definition to 150% of AMI. And I don't understand why the study group would recommend this other than as an immediate concession to the developers to allow them to build closer to market rates. Housing, market rate, housing. Excuse me. But the truth is, there are real alternatives that we can consider, like rent control, like just cause evictions, like community land trusts. And we need a city government willing to stand up to the speculative real estate industry. We need a city government that stops talking about housing as a financial commodity, as a market demand to be fulfilled, and starts treating housing as a human right. Until we do this, our city is letting the real estate industry profit while we pay the price. And these protections we are asking for are not politically impossible because unlike the developers, we, the renters, make up the majority of your constituents. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Mayor and Council. I'm Brock Howard from downtown Long Beach Alliance. Good to be with you again on behalf of the commercial and residential stakeholders of downtown. I want to thank the Mayor for convening the study group and for council for having this conference. A conversation tonight on a very important topic. We also want to thank the study group and the city staff for the amount of work, the hard work they put in on this and for all of the community meetings they also took part in and hosted. The recommendations. The deal has already started to look at these recommendations and prioritize them, and we look forward to having to be part of any conversation involving policy and implementation in the future and look forward to hearing back from you as to the direction on those those recommendations and the implementation of the recommendations. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. Thank you, Mayor, and the members of the city council. My name is Johanna Cunningham, executive director for the Apartment Association, California Southern Cities. Tonight, I would like to thank the city staff, Patrick, Amy, as well as Andrew for including us in this study and asking our advice. HCC was present at many of the meetings and we wish to express our availability as the City of Long Beach continues to further define and address the issue of housing. I would like, however, to address one particular topic this evening, and that is of course the rent rental housing industry. While I appreciate the work of city staff conducted to try and better serve this issue, I want to.
Speaker 7: Address the disconnect between what.
Speaker 4: Is being reported online and the reality of real rents. I'm going to use one example, real life example that I have encountered just recently. It is in the zip code of 90802 and concerns a group of rent rolls that I was examining. The average rent there was $851. Once again.
Speaker 9: Far below.
Speaker 4: All the reported agencies that are online. American Community survey as you stated reports 994 apartments dot com reported an average of 1450 dollars. Craigslist was reporting $800.
Speaker 7: There are a few additional factors that I'd like to.
Speaker 4: Note.
Speaker 7: Here. The rents listed.
Speaker 4: Online represent really only about 20% of what's being advertised, and that many of these rentals are not listed online, so they are far above what is actually being represented. Most rentals are either self-managed or they have management companies and they don't use the online forums. Owners hang out signs outside the building and you'll see those all over the city. Those rents are usually anywhere between 20 to 30% below what is being advertised online. Long Beach has a great number of long term residents who have been in their units for five, ten, 15 and even more than 20 years.
Speaker 7: The rents cited are newer builds fully monetized.
Speaker 4: Recently renovated or newly.
Speaker 7: Purchased properties that still need to be renovated. All of these factors will change the data and.
Speaker 4: Collection and the outcome.
Speaker 7: A CSC is working on compiling data that is not online from our members.
Speaker 4: To help report a more accurate reflection of rents.
Speaker 7: In Long Beach. Other questions that we would like to be considered are the age of the building.
Speaker 4: How long have residents been in place? What improvements have been need to be or are planned to be made within the future? What amenities are available? At what.
Speaker 7: Point does the rent rate affect the amenities.
Speaker 4: Being offered? Thank you for your time. And we look forward once again to continuing.
Speaker 7: Our discussion with the city.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. And let me just add also, Joanna and and obviously, we look forward to continuing working with you and obviously all the other groups as we try to make sure that we're getting accurate data. And I think no one should ever be afraid of data and of getting good data and being able to make decisions based on real data that we can that we can agree to what the right and correct factual data sets are. And so I think that's something that we're going to have to work ourselves out in the next, you know, in the in the weeks and months ahead. But that's something that's really important. So thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Excuse me. Good evening. Members of the council. Mary Garcia, I want to thank you for addressing this issue and for enduring an hour of our comments. Some of you looked like you're suffering and you're suffering. And when I was up there, I'd be suffering with you. I mean, this is way beyond my attention span. What I want to address briefly is something John Kindred said, who is the go spoke 3 to 3 guys before me and he didn't sit it tonight. He told it to me 17 years ago when I took over managing the El Capitan condominium complex on 33rd and Santa Fe . He said, Andy, if you can fix this place, you can do anything. And the complex was in disarray. We were averaging two calls for police service a day. It was on the brink of financial collapse. And if it had collapsed, that is 150 entry level homeownership opportunities, homeownership units that would have been lost to the city of Long Beach. And so I was able to bring it out because I have the time. I'm in the real housing business. I know how to fix things like this. But when you are addressing these policies and you mentioned this tonight of increasing homeownership opportunities, that really means. Minimums. And what I want you to do when you're formulating your policies is to think about how things might affect how those complexes are run, because most of them.
Speaker 2: Are lucky to have a real estate professional.
Speaker 3: Running for them. It's people.
Speaker 2: Ordinary.
Speaker 3: People generally, who are not really sophisticated with real estate, who are have the responsibility of running their community for things. For example, I traveled to one Atlantic Avenue in your district, Mr. Austin. We have a fine complex run by a great board, but they're lucky they have someone who is a real estate management professional running that organization . But she won't be there forever. So we need to craft policies that will not make it difficult for those complexes to get rid of the bad actors when they get in, because it can be very difficult to get rid of them. And I know that, for instance, there's some talk of just cause eviction. Why? To bring that, it makes it much more difficult to get rid of these people. When I was trying to get rid of the gang members and the drug dealers, I didn't send out fines to the owners because once a drug dealers, oh, he had the music to out things that really wouldn't be you know evict able under a just cause the eviction scenario. So I just want you to imagine it when you're crafting your policies. How is an unjust, sophisticated board going to deal with a situation where they have bad actors in the community who are more violent and more threatening , better funded that they are. So thank you very much for your time. Have a good evening.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. And although our speaker, please.
Speaker 7: The council. Mayor, I want to thank you. I want to thank you, Amy, because you took some time. Patrick, you took time to meet with better housing for Long Beach, and we gave some.
Speaker 5: Input and some of that input was implemented.
Speaker 7: And I really appreciate it. I wanted to just address a couple of things that were said tonight, because I was getting a little concerned that you might get just one side of a story and there's always two sides to every story. So there was one gal that spoke about being a great tenant, and I don't want to call her name out, but I know that particular story because one of those tenants was given a relocation fee and has two evictions on the record. So sometimes we don't always hear the truth up here. We hear people coming up here telling stories that aren't always really accurate. I'm a property owner. I manage quite a few units. All my units are my own and I take good care of the units. And I welcome good, you know, good renters. But there are times where most of road and issues are caused, 90% are caused by the renter. So, yes, that's not accurate because I deal with it every day. So when you want to target and attack a property owner, you got to look at the whole picture because there are two pictures in this. There are two stories. So there's a couple other things I wanted to address. You know, when you tell a lie long enough, people start to believe it. And so I want to say that there's a lot of misinformation that comes up here. And, you know, one gentleman mentioned Legal Aid and Suzanne Brown and I, I just I just talked to someone about legal aid. I don't know if you guys know David Clement. You gave him an award, Jeanine. You gave him an award and he let the tenant live there for one year. And then legal aid took up a case and now is suing him for free. So but I don't know if Legal Aid knows that David gave that tenant a year to live there for free. So these are stories you guys don't hear because we landlords don't come up here and tell you all the good things we do for the renters. And yes, we do do a lot of good things for renters. And so I think it's important that, you know, when when, when to thinking about things like, you know, implementing Prep, you guys implemented Prep. There is a class action suit going on in L.A. right now where the renters, the property owners are getting together and suing the city because they don't like intrusion in their units. I have talked to almost every one of my tenants about these forced inspections, and they're not a fan of them, especially undocumented tenants. They don't want that kind of intrusion in their units. So the people that are pushing force inspections need to think about the unintended consequences that can come along with it. So there's a lot of issues that we need to really address. And I think that, you know, when when people talk about housing, taking information from people that are giving housing, not people that are talking about trying to put housing providers out of business, because if you lose the housing providers, you're not going to have housing and it's a difficult process. So thank you, guys, and thank you. Thank you for letting me share. Bye bye.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Okay. We're we're going to go ahead and take this back to the back to the city council. And thank you, everyone, that had a chance to comment here and at all the other various sessions. So I just want to ask one question and I think Customer Pearce was up first. Will, I'm sure have some questions too. But Miss Bodak. On there. Obviously, there's 30 recommendations on on here. The one that has had some of the most questions was 3.6, which is about Amy. And so I know that currently and please correct me if I'm wrong. The current moderate income definition that we have at the city is 80 to 120. Is that right?
Speaker 9: Yes, sir, that's correct.
Speaker 0: And so the the proposed recommendation here and just to be clear, the the the proposed items on here. 80%, 90% of these are recommendations that came from the study group. There are also recommendations in here that came from staff or the consultant. Staff consultant. So this is one of those. So I wanted to ask where the recommendation came from. I just want to be clear that something that staff brought to the table as a recommendation. So I just wanted you to explain, Ms.. Burdick, the reasoning. Because I also want to just also be honest. It's my understanding that even if the AMA was raised, there's no real funding for this. I mean, the truth is that the state and federal funding right now, is it funding this level of moderate income housing anyway? Is that correct, too?
Speaker 9: That's correct. Mayor and members of the City Council, RMI and the definitions of extremely low, very low, low income and moderate income bring forth a lot of confusion and discussion. Currently there are there is no funding opportunity for any type of housing production or housing preservation or affordable loans or first time homebuyer mortgage programs that address any moderate income category. And right now, moderate income as defined by HUD is 100% to 120% of AMI. And yes, we do use Los Angeles County AMI. That is a requirement of our HUD documents. We do have to comply with those as well. If we were to, I would just want to give you this perspective. As the implementers of first time homebuyer programs in particular, a two person family of moderate income makes up to $62,000. They would be able to afford a mortgage of $230,343. That is infeasible in this city where our average median is 550,000 and excuse me, our median is 550,000 and our average is 630,000. If we increase the the range for moderate income, we would actually capture folks who can two person family who would earn up to $77,750. But as you said, Mayor, we do not have any funding sources available. The idea is that if there were an unencumbered funding source that we were able to achieve through one of these recommendations, whether it's a bond issue or an A in lieu fee or a recording fee, that we could allocate some of that money, that it does not have restrictions on it to the moderate income category without cannibalizing any of our other funding sources for the other categories, which we already have. So that's the rationale for why staff was interested in increasing it to 150%. We used to have first time homebuyer mortgage programs. We had to discontinue those programs because we were not able to provide a big enough subsidy for the mortgage for a first time homebuyer because we were only able to qualify them under the low income, very low income or extremely low income categories. So because of that, we no longer have a first time homebuyer mortgage program and we no longer offer silent second mortgages like we used to as well. Having said all that, I understand there's an emotional reaction to this idea that we would only be focusing on moderate income. And if that is a concern to the city council, we can certainly discuss these issues further and, you know, look to define that definition more at a later date. Hopefully that answers your question, sir.
Speaker 0: Okay. Because currently it's 80 to 20 on the median on the idea. That's where we currently are today, correct?
Speaker 9: Correct. Okay.
Speaker 0: Thank you. So we'll we'll let the council ask questions and go from there. So thanks for some of that clarification, Councilman Pearce.
Speaker 5: Okay. I want to thank everybody that came out and spoke tonight and everybody that's sticking around for items later. I know that this is an important issue to a lot of folks, and I definitely want to thank the mayor for all the hard work that he's done over the last year, year and a half, to bring together the issues and bring together experts in this field to talk about how do we generate income, how do we generate dollars to build more affordable housing? And that's what the discussion is about today. And I know that there are some of us on the council that want to talk about the important issues of renter protections. As I've said many times, I myself am a renter. But today we're talking about at this moment, this critical issue about getting enough income to build are enough resources to build affordable housing. And I want to say one thing that I think is really important. There's a dear friend of mine, Bob Smith, from the painters, and he says, you've got to have three things in life to be successful and to contribute back to our community. And it's education. It's a good job and it's housing. And I think Long Beach in a long time has come a long way on education and jobs. And I'm really proud that today we're starting to have that deep conversation around housing. So I have a couple of questions. I'm going to try not to be as lengthy as my 25 pages of notes that my staff prepared for me to go to the Army. Question me 1/2. I wanted to ask you mentioned that HUD defines it as 100 to 120 as at the OECD as well. What is their definition for moderate income?
Speaker 9: It's the same.
Speaker 5: Okay. And how many other cities in California have changed their definition to moderate income?
Speaker 9: I don't have that info on my.
Speaker 7: Okay.
Speaker 5: And what's the maximum income level a person within the above moderate category can earn? Do we have.
Speaker 9: A single person?
Speaker 5: Yes, a single person.
Speaker 9: $68,050.
Speaker 5: Okay. Okay. Thank you for that. I want to just say on this issue, I think, you know, you guys were really clear that it was a concern. And I think we have to be really important that we're not creating trickle down housing. Right. We know that whenever we create one of these market rate housing, it takes several years, three decades to be exact, before somebody can afford one of those units. And so while we're creating a lot of opportunity to build other housing, I think that on this item, you know, I have a real challenge supporting this one item . I would support being able to come back and look at maybe how our funding options are working every single year. I want to hear the rest of what my council colleagues have to say. But on this one issue, it's the one that we have to ask ourselves who are we trying to develop housing for? And when we look at the last several years, we've been developing market rate housing. It's been happening. We've done a great job with the downtown plan to help generate that, and our market is meeting those needs. So on that issue, I think it's really important. Number two, I want to I want to thank you guys for including the rental issue when we're talking about inclusionary housing to ensure that the consultant study looks at both ownership and rental housing. Thank you for that clarification. I definitely appreciate it. And look forward to should the state change their policy as being able to implement that here in Long Beach. I would like to ask on one other item. I know that we have done a great job on the 30 something policies on here. I would like to ask staff to report back to council in 90 days on Long Beach's developer impact fees and comparison to other cities in which cities have impact fees and inclusionary housing. If there's cities that don't do both are cities that have both so that we can have that full picture moving forward.
Speaker 9: If I may. Two weeks ago you authorized a contract for a developer environment assessment contract, and that work will be actually included in that contract. Thank you. So I don't know if it will be concluded within 90 days, but that that specific task and line item is a requirement of this study.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much, Amy. I really appreciate it. I'll wait to hear the rest of my colleagues comments. But again, I want to thank the council and the mayor for bringing this stuff forward and everybody that's that's stepping up to discuss these issues. Appreciate it.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 4: Yes, thank you. This was a very comprehensive report. I know we had a lot of our input already put in to this report. And so I have basically three items I'd like to discuss. So I would like to touch on the multigenerational housing. I was actually researching that a bit, so I have another component to that. So specifically with 3.11, that recommendation, it does look at micro units, but I would also like us if we can expand that to look at Co-Living. As mentioned before by I believe it was Karen who maybe herself. Okay, great. An example that I found was common space in Syracuse, New York. I believe it's multigenerational, but it focuses on students as well. But I'm looking and I'm liking that we're exploring more of that, especially joint use agreements between our the city and our educational institutions to provide more of that, those housing elements and then the inclusionary housing. I'm looking forward to seeing that come about and seeing what the court rulings decide for us. And then I have a question on the income restricted rental units. Can you define that specifically? I know it's state and federal mandated units. So what would that look like exactly?
Speaker 9: Do you can you refer to a specific policy? What are.
Speaker 4: You. Well, it's income restricted rental units in here. It's in the. In the hope.
Speaker 9: So. So income restricted rental units, that is our technical term for covenants. So all of the units that we develop for affordable housing based on various income levels, whether they're extremely low, very low or low income, we place covenants on those units for either 45 years or 55 years, and they are restricted at that income level. So if it was developed as an extremely low income, affordable housing project, all of the tenants must be, you know, income qualified when they sign their lease and when units turn over, the next tenant that comes in must also be that same income qualified level.
Speaker 4: Okay. Great. And in terms of density, the density bonus program, the projects that we have. So I'm looking at the data on both the income restricted and density bonus. And it seems I mean, we have a lot of those types of projects in specific areas of the city and it seems like they're more so in some areas than others. So I guess my question globally would be how are we influencing these types of projects to be citywide? And I know it addresses that sum somehow in this this report. But, you know, for instance, 1700 units of income, restricted housing is in the first district and we have about 250 of density bonus affordable units in the district, which is great, but how do we get those types of projects in different areas so that people can see and have opportunities elsewhere?
Speaker 9: The short answer to that is your upcoming general plan. The land use element is the guiding document that establishes where height and density and residential development will be occurring in the city. And so it is up to ultimately the city council to determine where that height and density will go. But we are pushing certainly and the state is pushing height and density along transit corridors and they define transit corridors, not just as light rail or fixed rail. They do define transit corridors as those that have bus stops with very frequent headways of bus service. So our land use element, which we'll be presenting to you in a study session next month, is going to show you where we think there's opportunity for height and density to be developed over the next 20 years within the city. That is your opportunity to spread density throughout the city. With density comes opportunity for additional housing development.
Speaker 4: Okay, great. Thank you. And then the final I appreciate that. And we'll we'll look into that certainly a bit more. And then the final item is the report on rental rates. So what is the timeline that we expect that to come back fully and comprehensively back to the council?
Speaker 9: I'm sorry, which one was that?
Speaker 4: The report on rental rates.
Speaker 9: Their report on rental rates. We're working with our economic and property development department to establish the the a consistent data source. And so I suspect that the goal would be to evolve that into a consistent reporting mechanism that we can present to you on a semiannual basis so that you have an understanding of of trends.
Speaker 4: Okay. And when do we expect that? Do we expect that in six months? Is it looking like we'll get that data in?
Speaker 9: I don't have a timeline for you right now given the other 29 recommendations as well. We'll be balancing that.
Speaker 4: Okay. Well, I.
Speaker 0: I can. I can.
Speaker 4: Like. Yeah, I would like a more firm answer.
Speaker 0: Yeah. I mean, listen, I want to just. Just jump on there, too. I know it's being right now. I think Mr. Chrysler is kind of driving that part of that process. So just in some casual conversations, I expect that over the course of the next couple of months, next month or two, I think a lot of that data is being collected and there's some discussions happening in the community. So I don't expect it to be six months expected to be over the course that. Mr.. Mr.. WEST over the course of the next 60 days. You think we'll have that data?
Speaker 8: Yes, 60 days we'll at least give you status reports along the way.
Speaker 4: Okay. And that's going to be between development services in the economic development department?
Speaker 9: That's correct.
Speaker 4: Okay. So I would just like for us, as it's being developed, to just include a few things for consideration because I think we should include them. And we've heard this and I certainly would be remiss if I didn't include this or didn't talk about this now and have it included in the report. So what I'd like to just kind of have us wrap our heads around is just displacement and what that definition is and what that looks like in that report. Also identifying demographics affected right now. I think we just have information as to cost burden, which I think we already know and have, but we also have median rent information. But that demographic information would be good. And then how do we I know we've been working with housing Long Beach and Apartment Association, but how do we and I mean, maybe this is a bigger question, but how do we come together to be able to maybe create a list of resident retention programs? And I don't know what that looks like, whether it's education, I'm not sure. But I think there needs to be some sort of clause in this rental report that includes kind of that what that looks like. So just something to keep in mind. Other than that, I think this is a great report. I'm looking forward to hearing more and we'll see where it goes from there. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And first, I want to thank all the speakers for for coming out. This has been educational beyond my expectation on this evening. I also want to thank staff for this very, very comprehensive look at the report on a very, very complex issue. I think there are some creative recommendations here. And the recommendations, I think, do take into account the input from most, if not all, of the stakeholders who participated in the process. Getting to this point, I think we need to obviously take a realistic approach. And so that's why I will be supporting the recommendations here tonight. I think I'll be supporting staff's recommendations, not because, you know, everybody necessarily agrees with everything, but it represents, I think, a step forward as moving the bar. And I think a lot of many of the recommendations actually address much of the challenges that we face here with housing in the city. It's been said that we have a housing crisis in the city of Long Beach. We have a housing crisis in the county. We have a housing crisis in the state. We also have a jobs crisis. I want to respectfully disagree with one of my colleagues who said that we've addressed that issue and we're doing great in terms of jobs. We're doing great in terms of our unemployment, but we're not doing great in terms of good jobs. We have an empty factory right next to the airport. They used to employ thousands and thousands of people on a daily basis and those good jobs were lost. We still need to get back to that now will continue to to be on that program, because I think there is a nexus between the jobs that we have in this city and the housing that we in the housing crisis that we have. The issue of affordability particularly I also heard from a number of residents here just this evening that I think validate the need for prep. Right. We we hear that we have a quality issue as well with some of our housing and prep does exactly address that. And no matter where you are on that issue, you know, if you look at the data here, our inspection rates have gone up significantly. And I think we're going to get good data and sounds like there's there's results happening as a result of prep. And so I'm glad that this council has moved forward to. To support that, and I hope we'll continue to do that as well. I did have a question regarding 3.5, and I would love for this border if you could read that policy and explain exactly what we are seeking to do with that.
Speaker 9: Certainly.
Speaker 7: So there is an ordinance.
Speaker 9: On the books called the Housing Trust Fund Ordinance, and it was to be the repository of matching funds at the time for a program that was run by the state OECD. So you would qualify for matching funds if you had a housing trust fund ordinance in place? We established a housing trust fund ordinance, but the ordinance was written so that it only the funds that would put were put into it would only be eligible to be used by extremely low income and above moderate income purposes. The Housing Trust Fund Ordinance, as it was defined, was not funded on a regular basis and it did get very limited capital in it.
Speaker 7: However, the.
Speaker 9: City has a restricted housing assets fund that all of the funds that are in the restricted housing asset fund total approximately $35 million. And that is really what we use for the production and preservation of affordable housing. So the idea of modifying the Housing Trust Fund ordinance is to expand it, to allow all of the sources of money that we have in our housing asset fund and to be able to spend those moneys on all of the income levels and not just the two that are currently defined in the ordinance as it currently stands.
Speaker 6: Okay. So in terms of diversifying and promoting economic diversity, it would expand.
Speaker 9: It would allow us to say that we have a housing trust fund ordinance that has $35 million in it, as opposed to a $175,000, $35 million in it, excuse me, as opposed to 150,000. It would allow us to spend that money in the way that we spend all of our housing asset funds as well for extremely low , very low, low and moderate income.
Speaker 6: And so they're moving forward to the next point, 3.6. Is there a nexus to modifying the moderate income definition from 80% to 120 in the area, median income to 80 to 150?
Speaker 7: Well, yes and.
Speaker 9: No. If you chose not to modify the moderate income definition up to 150%, it would still be at 120%. And we could still utilize any funding sources that are unrestricted for moderate income.
Speaker 6: Okay. Well, thank you for for that clarification. And I guess my next question, maybe you've answered it, but I had a question prepared is why are we changing the HUD standard? And I just would make clear on that.
Speaker 7: It's in there with the idea that if we.
Speaker 9: Receive locally available, unrestricted dollars, that we would be able to help more folks in a income strata that we cannot currently reach. And our focus really is on homeownership. And as you probably remember from the rental report, we are are our homeownership opportunities are decreasing even from five years ago. So we are becoming a a more intense renter city as opposed to a homeownership city. The idea, again, that staff was supporting was if we increased it to 150%, we might be able to work on some homeownership opportunities for that that income strata.
Speaker 6: Well, I'm looking at the data provided here, and I don't know what page it's on, but it shows homeownership versus renters here in Long Beach. Yes. Nationally that that number doesn't seem to have moved much over the last 50 years.
Speaker 7: In the seventies.
Speaker 9: I think we are at about 70% renter and 30% homeownership. That is very different from the from the nationwide average. We did decrease over time five years ago. We were at, I think, 57, 58%. We now think we're up 58, 59%. So we are creeping back up. I believe the the average for the United States is 30% renter. Is that correct? Patrick? Page 37 of the report.
Speaker 3: It's a.
Speaker 9: 55%.
Speaker 2: Right. Okay. Well, thank.
Speaker 6: You. And I don't know if that matters much to somebody who is at risk of, you know, losing their home or or or who who can't afford to rent today. I do get that. But I think these numbers tell a story that they need to be looked at more, more clearly. And bottom line, in my opinion, this is like I said, I'll be supporting staff recommendations. But the real issue, I believe, again, goes to the the shortage or the available of existing housing stock. I think we have to build and we have to build at all levels to to accommodate, you know, the demands of our constituents citywide . And and we need to address the quality of the housing stock. I think our proactive rental housing inspection program is helping in that regard. And obviously, I think we need to deal with the affordability of the existing housing stock at some point as well. And so I will be supporting this. I think staff has done a great job. I think and I think in reality, I just want to be realistic. I don't think we're going to be able to implement all of these recommendations in time enough to solve our crisis. But like I said, I think tonight if we we make this vote, we will be taking a huge leap forward and in addressing an issue that has it's a growing issue here in the city. So thank you very much for your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman. Councilmember Arango.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mayor. I do want to commend everybody who came out tonight. Your voice is very important and it's a compliment to the city of Long Beach and to you as residents who come out here and get involved in the decision making so that we make it here in the city. And your civic engagement is certainly welcome because we need to hear what you think about what decisions that come before us and the studies that we have to deal with in.
Speaker 3: Regards to the council.
Speaker 2: Comments that have come thus far. I want to commend Council members from the first and second Gonzalez and Pierce for the issues that they brought up. It's very insightful in terms of what they see as important issues. I'm not sure that I can recommend adoption of all these recommendations because there are some that I have a question on. But more specifically, I have one that I think should basically be removed, that I don't see any benefit or aspect to it. And that would be item 1.8, which is dealing with the sequel, supports equal reform to the city's legislative actions with that encourages the production of affordable and workforce housing. It's just a statement that's put out there with no explanation whatsoever as to why it was put there or any explanation as to what.
Speaker 3: Would be the benefit.
Speaker 2: Revisiting Sequel. My interpretation of it at this point is that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Leave it alone. Why is it there in the first place without any explanation? From my conversations with individuals in the building trades. They're fine with Sequa as it is right now. And if we're looking at affordable housing and the development of affordable housing, Revisiting Square would basically change some rules that may be actually detrimental to what we want to accomplish here. So I would I would suggest that we either reevaluate that recommendation with an eye on removing it or if it needs to stay there. Tell us why. I mean, why do we need to reevaluate that item and come back with with with the more clear, more clear explanation as to why needs to be there and what do we want to accomplish with that other and that I think the other comments that have been made regarding the the income levels and the whole aspects of rental properties and inclusive housing has been is right along the lines where I'm at and I. So I'm looking forward to moving forward with this. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to first just thank the audience for for bearing with this discussion and excuse me not to step in the back for a little while, not feeling that great, working on a few hours of sleep, got a newborn. So excuse me for that. And I'm up on caffeine. So if I come a little jittery, it's. It's the caffeine. Thank you. So I want to acknowledge just the mayor, the city council, everyone. This has been a really well put together process. Everyone has had ample opportunity to come to the table. Speak, and we're still at the beginning of this. And so that that really says a lot about our sincerity as a city council, our mayor, sincere sincerity to really do something meaningful around affordable housing. I want to thank the task force and staff for their hard work. And I just want to say that it is not easy. It's very difficult to develop affordable housing. From identifying the site to entitlements to identifying financing, going through the tax credit process and then 18 months of construction. You're talking about five years from, you know, the idea to actually opening, opening up a building and then there's there's the lease up period as well. So you're talking about five years. So so, you know, we should all there's going to be plenty of opportunity over the course of this time to really evaluate, reevaluate, check ourselves and make adjustments as we go. But as we move along, I tend to agree that, you know, with the recommendations being up all night gives me an opportunity to really review the the city council agenda. There's a lot of good stuff in here. And we could go we could go stronger. There's things that we can improve. But I'm going to support this tonight. And I have some thoughts and some areas where I think we should some considerations moving forward as we continue this process, so on. So I want to say congratulations and thank you to both the the task force and to city staff on these recommendations. I can tell that these are things that you think we really can make, you know, that we can implement. So on inclusionary housing I support it is becoming standard in in major cities. I, I the angel is always in the details obviously. So as these ordinances are developed and you know, I want to keep a close eye on those. I do believe they should apply to ownership and when we figure out the legal circumstances and to rental housing as well. So I do support both of those and I'll continue to watch that to better understand the legal circumstances. In terms of revenue, we still don't have a replacement for the 20% set aside from redevelopment. We don't have that. That was our major our major source of revenue. So I do support a revenue, a bond, something that is dedicated to to housing because we need a local source. So we're at these other table, these other regional tables like SAG and other cities are dealing with the same thing. The state the feds do not provide a dedicated source for us to really develop this. We have to, you know, for a foreseeable future, we have to think and protect ourselves and think about a local source. So I do support that on the armory discussion. So I'll follow it that the 120 versus the the 150. And I have a quick question in and some thoughts on that. So and I know that this is this has come up, but one more time for a family of four and 120 versus 150. What are we talking about for a family of four in terms of the the income?
Speaker 9: So for a family of four, let's see, under the current definition, it would be a family of four with an income of 77,750. They would be able to afford a mortgage of 282,875.
Speaker 3: That's current. That's current 77 total. Yes. So you're talking 35, less than 40. Okay. So for 14 floor, that's you know, when I started working up here, there was the field field deputies or two city council members. They got married. They may be able to afford and possibly afford a house. And I got to tell you that I'm.
Speaker 4: Already married, Rex.
Speaker 3: So, so so, you know, I could see I can understand why we want to justify going to 150 a 150%, if that means, you know, to teachers or, you know, to field deputies on the 14th floor are able to buy a place. I don't think that's unreasonable for a family of four. And but again, the angels in the detail. So I followed the portion. We said we don't have rent resources, as many resources to help lower moderate income ownership. Now, when I was purchasing my my home, we didn't have down payment assistance in some cities, had it in some cities didn't. And that impacted my decision on where to go. And luckily I was able to get here in Long Beach. We didn't have we didn't have that tool. So tools like that do make sense. But my concern is, are there tools, are there resources that could be going to, you know, extremely low income that will be some somehow taken away and given to the moderate income owners? From my original understanding, there really weren't because there aren't resources available. But. I'd like to understand for the sake of tracking and evaluation, if we could like as we move forward track by, by category, what resources were actually utilized. So our density bonus is only being utilized by a certain subsection. Is it just the moderate or is it just extremely low using using density bonuses or whatever incentives come out? So so my question for staff here is how can we evaluate this on a regular basis, six months, a year to see are there certain categories that are absolutely not using incentives? And how can we throw some incentives at them? Because I believe this is a both and situation. Not a not a no. But it's a it's a both. And so so how could we or what is the cadence we anticipate on reporting back and can we report back by category?
Speaker 9: We absolutely can report back by category. We can tell you exactly how many units are covenanted for extremely low, very low and low income. And we can tell you how many are covenanted for moderate, which are pretty much almost. Well, you.
Speaker 3: Know, I mean, like moving forward, like are we building in these categories?
Speaker 9: We are building in all those categories because we're required to do so under post redevelopment dissolution law. So we have very, very defined categories that we can spend money on. And Patrick, I don't know if you know them off the top of your head, but they're very prescriptive.
Speaker 6: Yes, Amy. So we can't use any of our existing funds to serve moderate income households. A minimum of 30% of our funds have to serve extremely low income households. A maximum of 20% of our funds can serve low income households earning up to 80%, ami the remaining 50% have to serve households under 60%. AM I?
Speaker 3: Thank you. So I get that what I'm really interested in is a year from now when we look back or a year from when we implemented certain changes, could we look back and say over the course of last year, the last year, this category use this many density bonuses or this much of an incentive, this category did not. So we can understand if certain categories need additional help, we can. Absolutely, we can do that. Okay. Fantastic. That's what that's what I would like to see. And then finally, I think we have some opportunities. You know, we have a lot of motel motels that are being misused. And and frankly and I know that, you know, we've had conversations, but, you know, just once they are in the open, I think we should try to, you know, free two birds, one key and, you know, clean up nuisances with these motel motels and create housing opportunities for people who need it. And so that that's something I think we should make a priority and set a premium on because we can literally help the quality life of people who are already being I mean, you probably heard was a terrible incident at a motel, motel, and they happen all the time and that's housing opportunity. So we should figure out how to hold these folks accountable and update those uses to be something that we actually meet. But overall, I just want to say, I know I've spoken a lot, but I want to I just want to say thank you to everyone I think is a good first step and I look forward to tracking the progress.
Speaker 0: Great. Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 5: Yes, thank you. I appreciate the discussion. I wanted to ask one more time. I know the Army is the topic of fun today. And for a family of four.
Speaker 7: What is the the.
Speaker 5: Moderate income maximum and and minimum sorry.
Speaker 9: The maximum is 77,750.
Speaker 5: So I have I'm looking at a graph that tells me that's the minimum and that the maximum is 97.
Speaker 9: 97,000 would be if we increased it to 150%.
Speaker 7: Okay.
Speaker 5: So I'd like to go ahead and go and make a motion to approve the study. But leaving out the recommendation for Am I in hope that we could come back at another time and do what Vice Mayor has suggested, which is kind of look at where people are using our resources and also look at other first time buyer incentives where when we look at the bond measures and everything else that we're talking about doing so I'd like to make that motion.
Speaker 0: Is there is the second Councilman Gonzales or do you ever to have a second or is there a second?
Speaker 4: Yes, but although I would just I guess to kind of feed off of that, I would like to see what other cities are doing relative to AMI and making that. I think we we've we've kind of talked about this quite a bit. And I think it's it's very important that we address this. So if there's some sort of information we can receive before we move forward with that piece. So that would be great.
Speaker 0: And so I think I think that the motions to receive and file and adopt the recommendations but remove 3.6 because the current AMA is already what it is. So that just wouldn't the status quo wouldn't change as far as what it currently is. So it would just be to remove 3.6 and just do some further study and some further information about what other cities are doing around around. Am I? I believe that's the motion. Okay. Councilman Gonzalez, is that the second?
Speaker 4: Yes. Correct.
Speaker 0: Okay. Councilmember Andrews.
Speaker 2: Thank you. C'mere. For those of you who are not keeping up with the time, we have 21 more items to go, and I. We might as well wake up now, because I just want to, first of all, thank everyone who was a part.
Speaker 3: Of this, you know, bargaining for this document to come forward. And a lot of this is because I think the development and service and, you know, the numerous.
Speaker 2: Sarkodie's who came out and took time to be a part of this study group and people have a body the input, you know, this.
Speaker 3: Housing is a very sensitive issue. And when we mention affordable housing becomes, you know, an urgent.
Speaker 2: Matter.
Speaker 3: That faces us in California. But what I really like to say is I think that with individuals.
Speaker 2: Like our Mrs. Amy Bodak and her group and a lot of work that you all of you guys have come to gather and you're very study groups. I'm sure that we're going to be able to come to something here.
Speaker 3: Where we can all be, you.
Speaker 2: Know, satisfied with. So thank you again very much for sticking around tonight because we're going to be here for a while.
Speaker 0: And in the can you just keep getting longer? So we will.
Speaker 6: Councilman Austin So I'll be sort of following up on Councilmember Andrews's comment, recognizing that we do have a big agenda ahead of us. But I do want to didn't they want to just just point out something that one of the some of this data here that that I think is pretty compelling. The 2010 Census had our population at 400,060 462,000 residents. Today, the Department of Finance estimates our population to be 484,000, almost 885,000 residents. That means I've heard a lot about people leaving Long Beach, but the numbers show that people are actually coming to Long Beach and this is creating a serious housing crisis for us. And so I think the I mean, the numbers don't lie. I mean, that we have a population growth that we're dealing with as a result, we have a housing challenge as well. So just wanted to make that point.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Orengo.
Speaker 2: Thank you. To my previous comments regarding seek work with the makers of Motion. Consider including the removal of item 1.1.8.
Speaker 7: I would.
Speaker 2: It. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. And I'm fine with that. But this is also a reminder of, I think the reason why staff put that in was because it's part of your guys's legislative agenda on the city council that you pass through the state legislative agenda that Councilman Austin chairs. So I think that's why it was put in there. So I think that if you remove it, you guys have to revisit the legislative agenda that you have as a state budget committee as well. I don't know if Councilman Austin has a comment on that or not.
Speaker 6: I do have a comment on that, I think. I think as we discussed, there's a housing crisis throughout the state and cities are looking at ways to to be able to build and address their housing crisis in a in a manner that can be expedited. You all know, we've we've said it. This is a crisis. If this is a crisis, do we want to have roadblocks? This council approved a housing development in my district a little over two years ago. Right. And that process was delayed significantly because there was it was challenged. It was challenged. And there was no merit to the challenge. But it could be challenged through the existing school process. And so and not to disparage those who had a difference of different opinion on that. But if we are truly serious about addressing our housing crisis, we, I think, have to look at modifying that that that that legislation and to to to be able to effectively address our issues.
Speaker 0: Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I just want to speak to the speak to the motion and directly to Councilwoman Pierce for a moment. So I just want to direct just directly to Councilwoman Pierce for a moment. So the the 122 150, I think and correct me if I'm wrong, I want to have a back here quickly. Is there is the hope that resources are not pulled into a higher category, higher income level that somehow is taken away from where we need extremely low and low income?
Speaker 5: That is the expectation is that we don't take resources away from that level. Okay. And the fact that the market right now is already creating housing at that level and we're not creating housing further down.
Speaker 3: Okay. And so would it be would it make sense to then say, you know, we want to evaluate that. We want to study that additional one 2150, not stop whatever incentives we're going to try to prepare, but craft it in a way that it does not limit whatever we have dedicated or whatever resources we have dedicated to . But you know, up to 120 level the traditional because I think we have to just think not. No but but yes. And even if it's a we have hesitation on the one 2150, we should still continue to evaluate it, craft some programs and see how we can try to meet those needs. I can tell you, I grew up, lived a renter, understand completely. And at one point I did make the transition and it was hard to transition as a, you know, single guy wasn't making a lot of money. But transitional homeownership and having local resources to help achieve that is essential. It is essential to just building wealth, generational wealth, like getting into that. And I don't want to I don't want to limit it because we don't understand it.
Speaker 7: Right.
Speaker 5: And that's why I think it's good to to study it, bring it back. I think the flag for me was the comment that if there's money that that has no strings tied to it, that it would go directly to this this area. And I want to make sure if we have funds that will have strings tied to it, it goes to where it's the most need. Sure.
Speaker 3: So I think. Well, same page. I think what I would ask then, if you could just amend emotion then and just say, you know, about, you know, continue to evaluate and study the one 2150 but bring any programs that are going to, you know, any funding, any programs that would bring it back to council, all of it together so we can understand. So the 120, you know, that's going to have to come the council anyway. Right. But that marginal stuff, we want to see it all together. Yeah. And give clear direction account to staff that we want to building mechanisms to ensure we're tracking and ensuring that we're not you know, stealing from, you know , robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Speaker 5: Right. Right. And I would I would want to see, as we discussed, having that be a continual report. Absolutely. An annual report back.
Speaker 3: So you're going to put that in your mode, just some reporting tracking and continue to evaluate this. We're not necessarily saying no, but we're.
Speaker 5: Yeah. Yeah. All I'm in my motion to include that fantastic things.
Speaker 0: Okay, then the motion has been amended. Councilmember Supernova.
Speaker 3: Thank you. I'd like to thank staff and all the speakers here tonight for spending their time with us in particular. Andy Whalen, I'd like to thank you for your moment of comic relief. We desperately needed it. You know, we've discussed the sequel issue, but I would just like to give staff an opportunity to weigh in on it . Okay. You have 10 seconds. That's a joke. Go ahead.
Speaker 9: We support 1.8.
Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. And thank you for that brief response. That's all I have.
Speaker 0: Councilman Price.
Speaker 4: Okay. Well, I think any of just a little bit more direction than that. How would your recommendation be impacted if the motion were approved now with the friendly in regards to the sequel issue?
Speaker 9: So in regards to the sequel issue sequel, it can be a extremely expensive undertaking for an affordable housing developer. And there are some discussions at the state level that would impact their ability to do projects. We would like to be able to be going through the state and federal pledge. Well, the State Lodge Committee to support sequel reforms specifically for affordable and workforce housing, making it simpler for them, therefore less expensive for the housing developer, the affordable housing developer to proceed.
Speaker 2: And if I can add for the implementation, the way we would do this is you'd be giving us direction tonight to start thinking of some of those ideas, too.
Speaker 3: On how to make that process a little bit easier for affordable housing developers.
Speaker 2: And then we would be bringing you through your legislative committee, some specific wording to give staff the direction to work on. So that would be the implementation. You would see that again.
Speaker 4: Okay. So I guess the question I have for Charlie is how does the friendly regarding secure change staff's proposal?
Speaker 8: If I understand, I need some clarification after the last discussion here between Vice Mayor and Council Member Pearce. But as to 1.8, the way I have the motion reading currently is the it is a motion to adopt staff recommendation without 3.6 changes and to remove section 1.8 entirely.
Speaker 4: Well, if I can just chime in, I would be supportive. First of all, thank you to the staff. You've done a really great job. I would be supportive of moving forward with a receiving file on the staff rapport with all of the friendlies that have already been made. Absent the the secure, friendly. So if there's a if there's a recommendation, a friendly and it's been accepted, which I'm not totally clear on, then I might want to make an amendment. So I'll just wait to hear some more and then I'll chime in. Okay.
Speaker 0: I want to actually show that Councilman Pearce is going to go back to the motion to make a comment and I'm going to ask Miranda.
Speaker 5: Yes. So understanding that if we left that in today, it would still need to go through different committees and still come back to council and go through that whole process. I would I'm okay with keeping it in today. So I'd like just so we can have a more public conversation around it, I don't think any of us have had a detailed enough conversation to leave it off the table. Yeah. So I think. Roberto, you. Councilman Miranda.
Speaker 0: Go ahead. Customary lingo.
Speaker 2: Okay. But my my purpose for bringing this up, obviously, is because there already is and state ledge. It's just misplaced. I don't think it belongs here in this and on this item here, because we are going to be addressing school reform through our state pledge committee. So, you know, I would just turn to this issue for this today. You know, if it's if it's going to help anything, then I would draw my friendly as long as we know that it's a state led issue in that on this 1%.
Speaker 5: Thank you, councilmember appreciate that.
Speaker 0: It's it's on the state ledge book. So. Okay. So we have a motion and a second and I'm going to repeat it. Mr. City Attorney So the city attorney is supposed to adopt all of the recommendations and to move on item. Gosh, which one was that one? And in relation to item 3.6, did you want to repeat repeat it. Vice Mayor tried it on I believe it was to move forward with with reviewing all items of all images and to actually review all of them. But to bring back to council a report on what actually changing 80 to 150 would actually mean.
Speaker 3: That margin.
Speaker 0: That margin.
Speaker 3: 20 to 150.
Speaker 0: And how that would impact.
Speaker 3: Other other available things. We can do that. Yeah. Okay. And the report. Right. Report periodic and the report report by category. Yeah.
Speaker 0: Okay. There's a motion. Any second members, Pisco and Castro votes.
Speaker 5: First.
Speaker 6: It is.
Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Great. Congratulations, everybody. Very nice. I have an announcement. If there's someone actually left their keys on the podium. If anyone found a set of keys when they went up to the podium to speak and maybe just grabbed them thinking they were theirs there. Someone's actually missing a set of keys. If you can just return them to the clerk. If you have them, that would be great. So if you have a set of keys or found a set of keys, please bring them to the city clerk. Thank you. We're just going to take a just 30, 32nd, one minute recess and they're going to start the council agenda in a minute. We're going to go and call the meeting back to order.
Speaker 6: If it was called the Great Depression, you know, I would talk about that. All right.
Speaker 10: You know, it's not like you were saying, oh.
Speaker 0: Okay, I'm calling to order. If you're chattering to go outside, please. So maybe mean called to order. If you're chatting, including our staff, you guys can go outside. She. Thank you. Welcome.
Speaker 1: Councilman Gonzalez. Councilmember Pearce. Councilwoman Price. Councilmember Sabino. Councilwoman Stacey Mongo. Councilman Andrew's. Councilmember Younger. Councilman Alston. Vice Mayor Richardson. And Mira Garcia.
Speaker 0: I'm here. Thank you. I have a I'm going to do open public comment right now. And we'll get back to the items in just a minute. I have one, two, three people here, I think, for all the same item.
Speaker 2: Can I have Dale Dixon? Sergio Gutierrez. Victoria Osuna.
Speaker 0: They're all here for the Rainbow Harbor kiosk issue. Is that right? Okay. Please come forward.
Speaker 2: Is that is of Velcro also?
Speaker 0: And Fanny Martinez. The is that a different issue? It's all the same issue. Okay. So then let me let me do it over. So then Dale Dixon, Fannie Martinez, Gutierrez. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to receive and file the proposed 2017 Report on Revenue Tools and Incentives for the Production of Affordable and Workforce Housing, adopt recommendations, and direct City Manager to work with the appropriate departments to take necessary steps to implement recommendations. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05022017_17-0316 | Speaker 0: So we have to move that one up and we're going to hear the item 14, which is the marijuana penalty item. So can we go back to the consent calendar? And here the one item that got pulled up? Item eight.
Speaker 1: Item eight is a report from Development Services Recommendation to Adobe resolution approving the acceptance of grant funds from this gag in the amount of 250,000. A District 89.
Speaker 0: Based on the Richardson Desert Motion.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to I want to pull this off just to just to highlight this. So, you know, when I took office a few years ago and even before that, when I served as chief a staffer for Councilmember Neill, we always talked about needing a better plan to update some of the our data land use in North Long Beach. We're talking about, you know, motels that have been there since before the freeways were built. We're talking about over proliferation, proliferation of liquor stores. We've talked with staff. We've beat our, you know, heads against the pavement looking for resources. And it's all been conceptual until now. You know, we so, you know, this is an opportunity for us to just say thank you, to skate for acknowledging that there is a need in North Long Beach to take a better look at the plan. We haven't been able to do so, but now we have the resources to start this conversation. And so I want to I just wanted to chime in and say, you know, this is this is big. This is big news. This is an opportunity for us to really look at some of these, you know, outdated, long standing issues have plagued North Lambie's far too long and really set a new vision for a specific vision for the North Long Beach community that ties together and integrates all the work that's already happening from open space work that's happened, corridor work on Artesia Boulevard, have a new development in Atlantic and you know, all tied these things together to look at one cohesive document. So I want to acknowledge staff and I want to I want to say now that this is real and, you know, we're moving forward, I really look forward to working with Councilman Austin to look at some of the you know, we share North Long Beach, look at some of the things we can work together on and really achieve some some real policy change that's lasting for the future in North Long Beach. So that's that's my motion.
Speaker 0: In the second of the Council of Pearson a public comment on the side of oh.
Speaker 3: And I want I want to quick staff report sorry.
Speaker 0: Okay. Quick staff report. Mr. West.
Speaker 8: Amy. Barack.
Speaker 9: Mr. Mayor, it's me again. So about the Army issue.
Speaker 3: It's too soon.
Speaker 7: Too soon, too soon. All right, so.
Speaker 9: We're here to ask you to accept the grant funds and adopt the resolution to move forward with Skog. We've had a great relationship with SAG in other areas of town. This used to be called the Compass Blueprint Program. And through that program, we were able to get a couple of grants from them to focus on Long Beach Boulevard Corridor and Atlantic Avenue. And that actually led to the development of the Midtown specific plan, which you all adopted last year. So we're looking forward to the opportunity to to really utilize this this study to kind of jump jump forward with some of the land use discussions we've been having in North Long Beach, particularly as it relates to obsolete uses, corridors that need to be revitalized and allowing new uses on those corridors. So with that, we would like your support on this and moving forward. We will be working with both District eight and nine to to push these items forward.
Speaker 3: Thank you. And one more thing I'd like to say. We applied for a lot more money and we got just a little bit. So I'm pretty confident with our continuing relationships and engagement with SAG and, you know, hopefully some love from our president of the of the COG here. We can I'm pretty confident we can identify the resources to to to complete the plan. So by no means is this enough money to finish it. This is just allowing us to get the get the process started.
Speaker 0: Good luck with all that car money that's there. I'm sorry. Next up is item on the motion. In a second, please cast your vote.
Speaker 6: Public comment.
Speaker 1: Public.
Speaker 0: Cohen did not ask for public comment.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 0: Okay. What's next? Item 14, is it? Third item of the night. | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolution approving the acceptance of grant funds from the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) in the amount of $250,000;
Authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all necessary documents with SCAG relating to the grant awarded to the Development Services Department for professional planning services to study land use regulations for North Long Beach in the context of the City’s proposed updated General Plan; and
Increase appropriations in the Development Services Fund (EF 337) in the Development Services Department (DV) by $28,000 to provide matching funds. (Districts 8,9) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05022017_17-0321 | Speaker 1: Item 14 is communication from Councilwoman Praise. Councilmember Pierce. Councilmember Urunga. Recommendation to request the city attorney to report back within 30 days with a draft ordinance allowing the city to apply penalties on property owners and to shut off utility services to unlicensed and illegally operating marijuana business.
Speaker 0: That's one price.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Just a few comments on this. As I know, we've been here a long time. So as we all know, medical marijuana will be returning to Long Beach due to the passage of Measure M. And with that, there's an opportunity for us as a council to make sure that patients, businesses and impacted communities are protected from unlicensed and illegally operating marijuana businesses. The measure and businesses will have a series of regulatory policies to ensure safe access for patients and quality of life safeguards for communities. Illegal businesses also cost the city money as they pursue inspections, follow up, legal action, prosecution and ultimately shutting down of those businesses all while the business is able to sometimes defer action and or delay while still making money without being permitted, licensed or paying any taxes. That the toll that these businesses take across go across many city departments, including the police department, code enforcement and the city prosecutor's office. This item seeks to apply penalties that will reduce the city costs associated associated with addressing unlicensed illegal businesses by applying penalties to property owners who lease or rent to unlicensed medical marijuana businesses rather than just the business themselves, which would encourage the property owners to work to resolve these issues or be preventative and vetting out their future tenants. This also looks at shutting off utilities to unlicensed marijuana businesses in order to further enforce their need to be properly permitted, licensed and compliant. We want to be able to reallocate any resources that would be otherwise used for these efforts to the community at large. We all know as a council that this council and many other cities in the region have had problems with illegal dispensaries that have really drained the city of millions of dollars, cities of millions of dollars. We've experienced that ourselves in Long Beach, and we recently had an issue before council that dealt with millions of dollars spent trying to regulate actually trying to enforce laws against an illegal operation. We need enforceable tools as a city that reduce the likelihood of having illegal marijuana operations. Adoption of this ordinance is necessary to limit the number of illegal businesses that would drain or limit our city resources. Now, I understand that this is a report asking for the city attorney to come back with a draft ordinance that includes financial penalties and utility disruptions. But of course, if there are best practices that have been utilized by other cities and the city attorney wants to include those. The intent behind this item is to make it more efficient for the city to be able to tackle the illegal dispensaries in order to make sure that we continue to protect patients, communities and, of course, businesses that are operating within the legal realm. It's only fair to businesses that go through that, jump through the hoops, do what they're supposed to do, that they have protection and partnership from the city when illegal competitive operations show up. And so I want to make sure that we're we're really being aggressive with illegal operations. Some people have said to me, well, this should apply to all illegal businesses. I absolutely agree with that. And that's probably a conversation we can have another day. But it doesn't cost the city millions of dollars to shut down other illegal businesses. There's something about the nature of these types of businesses. I was talking with a good friend of mine who is a city attorney for the city of Santa Ana. She specializes in these cases. And, you know, the problems that they have, even when they go to try to shut down utilities, is there's generators in place. The business is operating within a few minutes or even the next day after the police were there. So I think being able to go after the commercial property owner is huge because that's an area and I think those fines should be significant. Like in the thousands of dollars. I don't think we should be applying $150 fine to people who are illegally renting the location. So I would ask that this item look at what other cities have done. The city of L.A. will be doing this with their passage of measure. M, Riverside and Anaheim have also used similar concepts in their cities. So I look to the city attorney to incorporate some of the best practices and give us, in my opinion, the most aggressive enforcement tool that we can have as a city to go after illegal operations. And I asked my colleagues for their support. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilwoman Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 5: Yes. I want to thank my colleague, Councilmember Price for bringing this item up. I know that you've worked with a lot of stakeholders to make sure that we're drafting and looking at the right issues. I think highlighting the dispensaries that will get licenses and all the things that they have opted to do, which include everything from security , making sure that, you know, they have the properly trained employees. But I think also that there's a community point person for each one of those dispensaries or businesses it's going. Be out in the community, going to neighborhood associations really says that there is a legal operation where people are trying to do the right thing and going above and beyond to be good neighbors. And I think that's been the biggest issue with dispensaries in the past, is what kind of neighbors are they for our communities? And so I wholeheartedly support this item and I look forward to seeing what options our staff brings back for us to ensure that illegal operations aren't impacting our neighborhoods. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Councilwoman Price, have you ever heard a councilmember come up with a really good idea, so good that it makes you a little mad and jealous? You didn't come up with the First Avenue. It just happened to me right now, this is this is a no brainer.
Speaker 4: Ideas. Oh, it's our collective idea. It's not my idea.
Speaker 3: Oh, come on. Come on, now. This is. No, seriously, this is this is a no brainer. I'm happy I'm happy to support it. I remember, you know, being around for the last round when there were so many illegal operations and seeing the challenges that folks had dealt with from just impacts on neighborhoods and all that, we need every tool we can absolutely get to, you know, to to make sure we, you know, protect quality of life, our neighborhoods. The the other thing is it's just not fair. You know, folks are living through, you know, leaps and bounds to go through and and sort of play by the rules. And people are opening up shops right now. Just, you know, forget the rules. We just got to open it up. So I think you're spot on and you have my support completely and I'm looking forward to seeing the results.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any public comment?
Speaker 7: Good evening. I'm Sylvia Contreras from District eight. And I just would like to add to Mr. Price's comments. A few years ago, I was a high. Was in the role of a private investigator for a marijuana Grow It event. Evidently, it was a cartel girl. So what I see here, it was a major, major grow. What I saw here is that the owner. Rented this area on the outskirts of town and the tenants were coming into town to pay him the rent. He normally would go up and collect and they said, No, no, no, we will come down to you. And he thought, Great, save me a trip. After about a year and a half, he ends up in jail because the owners were growing marijuana. What I would not like to see is that on a smaller scale that if the commercial brokers or the owners of these properties, if they have no idea that something like that is going on, something maybe to educate them. You know what? Since you had this kind of business. Make make some sort of a plan that those particular landlords don't get caught up in that. That owner. He got in jail. And the ones that actually did, the girl, they never got caught. And I say that because I was investigated for that for that for that particular case. So what made me think about a long time ago, we had those barber shops with the with the trolley things. This is a crazy idea. But those those particular businesses like that are going to be opened. Something to tell the public that that is a legal facility. I go through all these places in Long Beach. I never ask their business license. I know it's a little green certificate like that, but I don't walk in. Let me see your license. I wouldn't do that for marijuana either, but something to identify. I don't know. A red a red window or red or something to say. This is illegal from city of Long Beach. It's just my that's my only comment. As a scarlet letter clause.
Speaker 4: Mr. City attorney, can you include that in there?
Speaker 7: Although the window of the business is red.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Next week, please. Hello. My name is Elliot Lewis. I'm a dispensary owner in the city of Long Beach, or soon to be dispensary owner in the city of Long Beach. I wanted to touch on a almost we're almost almost got approval about to start the buildout. I just want to thank Councilwoman Price for bringing this issue up. I think it's a very important issue and the rest of the council who supported it. I just want to put a color on a few of the issues and then maybe throw in a couple of extra suggestions. You know, number one, the way I see it, it's a public safety issue. And there's a lot of bad actors that are still out there that are cultivating marijuana that has betrayed is powdery mildew, pesticides, etc.. These dispensaries are not required to do any testing, and the clientele that walk in there are ingesting all these different possible chemicals, mildew, things that are harmful. You know, we're going through all the right steps to make sure that our patients have safe access. Also, when it comes to edibles and different things, people don't know what they're getting. They don't know the dosage. You know, that's that's a major issue. Also, the city is losing large amounts of tax revenue by allowing these places to exist. It's estimated in the city of Santa Ana. I know they're trying to throw out trying to throw them under the bus, but I know they're trying to do some working on it now. But there's been some reports done. I've heard anywhere from 5000 to 12000 patients daily are getting their medication at illegal dispensaries. This is costing the city tens of thousands and tens of thousands of dollars. And the other thing I want to touch on, what we're trying to bring to Long Beach is good paying jobs. They're union jobs. They're jobs with benefits. And by allowing in illegal dispensaries, these guys aren't paying taxes. They're not hiring union jobs. They're paying, you know, slave wages. And they could sell their product at less than we can because they're unregulated it. So I just wanted to touch on a couple of things. I know of another jurisdiction. I can't remember the city by name, but what they started doing is when they made a this is all the money thing. These guys, the owners are playing a cat and mouse game. If it's in their interest to take the higher rent and they can game it out with assist the city and it's monetarily beneficial, they're going to continue to do it. So I think this is price is right on with, you know, trying to hit them in the pocketbook and in other jurisdiction. What they're doing is they're picking the guys up. They aren't charging them with any severe crimes, but they're setting the bail amounts really high. So if three or four of your guys get picked up, it's $10,000 a bail. You know, per guy, you start to see after two or three busts, it's not worth it to keep open. And the last thing I wanted to touch on and, you know, I'm not sure exactly, you know, how this gets addresses today and they continue to be there is delivery service. There's a lot of illegal delivery services. They're here right now. I'm sure they're here to stay. So something to think about when we're addressing the measure. But all in all, you know, the LBC, everybody I know that's a legal operator really supports this. I'm really, really glad you guys are tackling this issue. I want to say thank you.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Very good. You clerk as the addressed upfront, I view any any pot dispensary. Operator or a landlord. The rents just a slight step above. Sex trafficking. Period. What needs to be done? And I know there's rumors about one going down in Belmont Shore. That ain't going to happen. Period. The douchebag publisher of that paper. Hopefully we can get deported. That individual, those individuals have essentially for the past year been operating a sanctuary. For two members of an insidious criminal syndicate. One of which threatened to kill. Threatened to kill. A store owner less than two block and a half away because she reported the use of their use of crack cocaine. The female. Is equally dangerous. Threatened to kill people, kicked and stomp people that thought. And she thought they had taken up their panhandling space that it had been down to them by a certain element within the police department. They champion they champion these people that spit at the Long Beach librarian because they had for their conduct been banned from the library. Period. So you go back to you look at the record of the landlord. And in this particular case, the building that the grunion is in and where the poster line is the same people they could have a year ago undertaken a very simple step. What the responsible person, they're all in this Polly restaurant that is put up a simple gate across that, an attractive black black gate. They could have put it up in a in a 2 hours period. But for over a year, over a year, they've been catering to this criminal syndicate. That's an irresponsible landlord. And anybody like that should not be given a permit that's separate and distinct from the fact that the area itself, Second Street, is a de facto adjunct to playgrounds for K through 12 kids, period. It's something that cannot and will not happen. I know the. Councilperson is operating a good faith, but I would come down much, much stronger and absolutely none of them in Second Street area and the correlative areas of any district like that.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Q Next speaker, please. Good evening, counsel. My name is Matt Bell. I'm executive vice president of U of CW Local 324. We represent cannabis workers in Orange County and throughout L.A. But one of the things in L.A. County as well. One of the things that we'd like to bring up.
Speaker 2: With some of the other speakers mentioned is workers that are affected by this underground economy. When there's these.
Speaker 3: Rogue shops throughout cities, they're not paying insurance, they're not paying wages. Everything's under the table. And these workers are exposed to all kinds of different abuses. And it's imperative that not only when these cannabis businesses come in the medical cannabis, that it's not just unfair to the owners that they have to compete against the black market. It really exposes the workforce to abuse. And I know the council members have brought up. We want to bring good jobs to Long Beach. And it's imperative that we put a stop to these rogue shops and whatever methods that we can use to stop them. We're in full support of Councilmember Price's agenda item, and we look forward to getting workers good wages, good benefits in this industry, not only in Long Beach, but throughout California. And to bring this black market and these out of the shadows and and regulate this business and make it what we know it can be to bring medicine to people that desperately need it and to also to supply good jobs. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 7: Diana alleging advocates for disability rights. First of all, I agree with everything that everyone has said before me. My concerns are a number. First of all, I. It shouldn't. What I really don't appreciate is the medical marijuana being targeted. If it included all businesses, I wouldn't have a problem with it at all. Any illegal businesses? But it seems to me that. Whenever there's an opportunity, Miss Price targets marijuana, demonizes it. We've got it. It's they're horrible, horrible businesses. Or we have to educate people about marijuana. But forgetting and I did, by the way, put in a an article from the county Register basically saying that 82% rise in deaths and abuse of drugs and alcohol had nothing to do with marijuana. So everything is targeted towards marijuana. It's not a bad thing. It is medical. There is goodness in it. So to keep targeting it now, I do support this particular issue. But at the same time, I don't like the idea that it's been targeted just for the marijuana businesses. It should be any illegal business and I hope that you will put protections in that will protect owners. Some days maybe somebody rents to someone they don't know what they're going to be doing there, or they go in, they live, whatever. So I just don't want to see someone. And also I have been getting some phone calls from patients who are concerned because this police department has been known very, very well known to abuse their power. And I can see something like this, them abusing it and using it as a way to target the patients, people who are growing their own. So these things, I mean, the patients need to be separated from this. Let's see if there is anything else. And last but not least, demonizing marijuana only makes it only serves to whet appetites. So you can keep on demonizing it all you want. But it's all it does is increase the use. And that's exactly what has happened. So with those changes, if you can make them, I do support the idea of it and I think the legitimate dispensary owners will be responsible. They've certainly gone through enough to get here. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Nick Speaker.
Speaker 2: Good evening, Honorable Mayor City Council.
Speaker 3: My name is Adam Hijazi. I'm on the board of directors for the Long Beach Collective Association. First off, I want to thank Councilmember Pearce Pryce Pearce, very close to Councilmember Pryce and Councilmember Pearce and Councilmember Rangel for bringing this item forward. I don't want take too much of your time. It has been a lengthy night, but it is it is really important to be able to differentiate between the legal the sanctioned operators versus the unsanctioned operators. In the past, I think that was one of the biggest issues that happened in the city that we were not able to differentiate. And what ends up happening is the community gets confused and then they see the actions of a unsanctioned operator versus the actions of a sanctioned operator, and then they get to mix them all up. So we've been working really hard on bringing forward best practices, self-policing and security systems to be able to bring the best that we can to the city of Long Beach. So we're definitely in favor of this, and we thank you very much for bringing this item forward. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Stephanie Dawson Solo. Second District Resident Grassroots Governance Strategies. I just want to thank again council members, price and peers for working on this particular issue. I never thought I'd be coming up endorsing a particular agenda item for Councilwoman Pryce, but I'm very glad to do so. In this particular case, I would call it in the the the reason that this particular measure against property owners is so necessary is frankly, just because of the economics of the black market cannabis world. One of my first cases as an attorney in this business was representing a security guard who was caught in a well-intentioned action by the Long Beach Police Department against an illegal operator. The security guard in this particular case had no idea that he was working for an illegal dispensary, but he was essentially caught holding the metaphorical, metaphorical criminal bag of charges while the landlord was, you know, nowhere to be seen. Again, I don't want to be harping on commercial landlords too much, but, you know, when you're when you're asking for six or $10,000 a month for rent for a otherwise empty warehouse in northern Long Beach, you know, it's somewhat to say that you probably had a pretty good idea about what's going on, what sort of activity is going on in that particular area. I will say that in terms of looking at the different areas that the different jurisdictions for inspiration on good policy, Anaheim is not one that has a particularly great reputation within the cannabis field, but that's purely because they don't allow access for any sort of commercial activity, unlike here in Long Beach , thus going for the utility shut down practice model that they have there I think is a good idea, along with the developments for Measure M in Los Angeles. I will say, though, the two one jurisdiction I would completely avoid in terms of trying to model your legislation up over the city of Whittier, for whatever reason that council there is decided that they're going to be going after personal cultivation, which makes no sense, not just from a public policy standpoint. I mean, why go after somebody who's trying to grow six plants in their backyard orchard from a police, from a utilization of resources standpoint? That's a bad idea. But frankly, the bigger issue that the city of Whittier kind of ignored in going after personal cultivation was the fact that there's a plethora of case law supporting kind of the ability to personally cultivate as a patient as well as, you know, the Prop 64 statutory allowance of six plants per person. If we have police going after people for their backyard, for the backyard grows, it's a really just counterproductive and extremely expensive litigation invitation for litigation by slightly unethical marijuana lawyers. You're going to be going after that. So I would just say focus again on the commercial activities. You now have a supply chain that you're able to differentiate that sort of thing. So putting some sort of arbitrary plant count on what differentiates that versus the actual intent and the profits that are going to that are going to be a lot. You're going to be able to focus your investigations on, frankly, the people who matter most on that particular issue that you'll have a good day.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And our last speaker.
Speaker 3: Hello. My name is Matthew Houston. I actually have a medical marijuana card, and. And I found that it's. It's a little bit hard to figure out, you know, what what exactly? I think the I guess the government's a little bit schizophrenic on the issue. It's kind of on both sides. At the same time. It makes it very difficult for someone to figure out exactly, you know, what is what is the best way to go about things. And I think and maybe it's because on the federal level, it's still considered illegal. And so something that would normally be in place to to kind of fine tune how the production is going on is something like the FDA, which of course, can't get involved. So, I mean, that's that's just something that's that's missing. And someone like me who doesn't really care one way or another whether I'm using medical marijuana or not, is, you know, it's I'd I'd love to see some results, but where do I look? You know, where it seems like, you know, it would be like, for example, I'm I'm planning to run across the country and so I'm I'm utilizing a as clean a, you know, medical marijuana product as I can. And I'm noticing that. And and this is all just from my own evidence is that my back injury, the vertebrae in my back are slowly straightening out. Now, I have no one to report this to because the medical community can't you know, the medical community can't endorse it. So then you can't research it. So then you can have evidence so that, you know, it's it's a circle of just ridiculousness that doesn't make sense to me. And yeah. So I'm planning to run 1600 miles, if I can, to, um, Galveston, Texas, maybe from Long Beach to crowdsource a reconciliation flag after the Civil War. And and I was thinking, I don't know, what do I do when I get there, you know, going across state lines and then you have it just seems like a perfect opportunity. I mean, if there is something with the back thing that I think, you know, and then I would be going to a state with a guy who that had a tree fall on his back. I mean, and they're considering I don't know, it just. I'd like to see more research done. And I don't know how to do it because it's like like I say, the government is kind of schizophrenic on the issue. It's like. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. There's been a motion in a second. And Councilman Austin.
Speaker 6: Just really quick back to the subject. I wanted to just just tell Councilmember Pryce that this is a brilliant idea. I think this is if we had this tool maybe four years ago, how many millions of dollars would have been saved? I think, you know, this this is an issue that has been evolving over several years. It seems like we're getting smarter as a as a body here. But also the actions of the state and the voters have actually helped us become smarter on this issue. And so either the groundwork has been laid, you know, lessons have been learned. I think this is an excellent item and I'm happy to support it.
Speaker 0: Great. Thank you very much. See no other public comment. Members, please cast your votes.
Speaker 4: I just want to clarify one thing. The intent behind this item and just so I don't think there'll be any objection from anyone on the council, but we have no interest in going after people who are growing things in their backyard. I mean, that's the last thing we have time to be worried about right now. What I'm worried about is the stuff that's going to cost us millions of dollars to go after. So, you know, I just want to make sure that the city attorney's office doesn't waste too much time on the six plants. I'm more concerned about the million dollar operations that disrupt our neighborhoods. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. There's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Version carries.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next item, please. I believe it's 16 is going to be tabled to another.
Speaker 2: Day, I believe. Right?
Speaker 0: Mr. Olsson. Okay. 20. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Attorney to report back within 30 days with a draft ordinance allowing the City to apply penalties on property owners and to shut off utility services to unlicensed and illegally operating marijuana businesses. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05022017_17-0328 | Speaker 1: Item 20 is a report from police department.
Speaker 6: No comment.
Speaker 1: Recommendation to receive the application of Crown nine sports bar Long Beach for an original ABC license at 1740. Is Artesia Boulevard determined that the application does not serve the public convenience and this is a necessity and submit a public notice a protest to ABC on the basis of high crime in the reporting district and residences within 100 feet of the establishment.
Speaker 0: District nine is a second on this motion first. Okay. Vice Mayor.
Speaker 3: Thank you. So I want to hear from staff first, and I wanna hear from the public before I get my comments. Thank you. Commander LeBaron. Honorable Mayor and City Council. Item number 20 is an application for an original Onsale Beer ABC license. This location is currently.
Speaker 2: Closed, resulting from the suspension of a previous.
Speaker 3: ABC license. The police department has conducted our investigation and.
Speaker 2: Based on the high crime formula for the reporting district, as well as the proximity to residences within 100 feet of the location, the Long Beach Police Department believes this application does not serve the public convenience and necessity and recommend a public notice of protest be submitted to ABC. That concludes my report and I am available for any questions. If you might have.
Speaker 0: Any public comment on this, please come forward.
Speaker 7: Yeah. I'm here. My name is Debbie Flynn. I'm representing Grant Neighborhood Association. We are also I'm the one that denied the claim to ABC and talked to our detective, our Zoller, on this. I've been in the neighborhood for 24 years.
Speaker 4: We have seen a lot of fights come out of that bar. We've seen prostitution. We have seen.
Speaker 7: Drunk drivers come out of that establishment.
Speaker 4: Hit parked cars in the middle of the night, two, 3:00 in the morning. We have seen used.
Speaker 7: Condoms, children walking to school, finding use condoms on the sidewalk. The trash is atrocious. I have no idea why they can't pick it up, but they need to be responsible if they're going to stay in the neighborhood and be responsible for what they do and what their patrons do. I don't see any reason why they should have their liquor license.
Speaker 4: Especially when they're using it for underage drinking.
Speaker 7: And it's been proven from a detective.
Speaker 4: Marcella has told me from her report. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speakers.
Speaker 3: Hello. My name is Patrick Conlon. On the internet, the insulin. I was told I'm not actually here to speak on cloud nine. I was told to speak during this time just because you ran out of general comment. And actually, is that.
Speaker 0: Now this has to this has to be on this issue.
Speaker 3: Has to be on this issue. Yes. Sorry. One of your staff told me to wait for the end of the meeting. You can speaking. It's expected.
Speaker 0: There's a there's a second public coming here at the end of the meeting. All right.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Councilman. My name's Brett Johnson. I live on Rose, which is. The bar is off artesian Rose. I grew up.
Speaker 6: There. I've been there for.
Speaker 3: Over 24 years. My mom, my father. Now I'm raising my. My my daughter there and my my wife. I've known this bar for a long time growing up there. And I've seen when it was Dutch Mill to players, to all these different bars. And I saw it was an opportunity for my family to actually own something in our neighborhood and take advantage of of something of what we want to call it, a dream. I think everyone wants to be their own owner and take advantage of raising their kids in their neighborhood. And I saw this chance for me to take advantage of it. With that being said, I talked to my best friend and my uncle. We actually walked the bar, already talked to a North Division commander who mostly told him that we want to change things in the neighborhood. We want to be on track with him and be on the same page. Well, when the vice came around and talked to us, we told them that we're signing on with the cameras. We're all for everything that we need to do to make the neighborhood better. Me growing up there, I want the bar to be back high. It was when I grew up. There were no problems, no friction, no fighting, no none of that. Like I said, I'm raising my daughter on the street, so I'm asking for you guys to give us a shot. We invested a lot. We didn't know that we were going to have this many issues because we didn't know that the bar was hated so much. We had to find it out later on down the road. It almost made us feel like we made a huge mistake. But I know we can change things around and it's going to be for the good for the neighborhood. One of the things that we want to do is going to continue to go out to the meetings we wanted to link up with Ground Association. I have heard of Great Association, but everything snowballed on us so fast that we weren't able to meet with her and we were trying to meet with you are still there. We talked to Jessica and Chris, so they told us certain things that we would have to do and the timing was just bad right now. Well, good for you. Congratulations. But it was just bad for us. So just. We're just asking for you guys to give us a chance. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Nick Speaker.
Speaker 3: Honorable Mayor. Councilwoman, my name is Shaun Addison. I am the new owner that is requesting this license. 4:00 at night. I was raised in Long Beach. Got my high school education here. My college education. And I'm proud to say that I am from Long Beach or I was a I guess you could say made a man here . When I was presented with the opportunity to own a business in the city. I jumped at it. My best friend, as anybody would like, he said, is something that we've always dreamed of from the from the jump. It was just it was a great idea. You know, we were all for it. And then slowly but surely, we started to hear all this negative stuff about the previous owner and a lot of things that have been brought up about the previous owner. But that's not us. And I haven't had a chance to meet with the Grant Association. But like he said, we're all for being a part of the community. A lot of the things that she brought to to our attention just right now, some things that we haven't heard of cleaning up or making sure that things that may be a nuisance in the neighborhood are are taken care of by the new owners of the bar. Like you said, we met with the North Commander, Division COMISAR We had a good discussion with him, Jose Gonzalez, which is the plan that the community's community association policemen. We met with Detective Barzola and we've heard a lot of things that, like I said before, the previous owner did and he took advantage of a lot of things. But that's not what we want to do. Like we said, we want to get the bar back to what it was and we're hoping that we're afforded the opportunity and a chance to do that so we can be a part of the community and something that they can be proud of is not looked on as a nuisance, but just as a reputable business in the neighborhood. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And our last speaker.
Speaker 3: Good evening. My name is Dan Forsberg. I'm the president of the DeForest Neighborhood Association in support of the Ground Association. I do have experience with that bar, in particular, not with the new owners, but over the last three owners between urinating underage girls, running in and out of there, busts going on close to that area. And I mean, it's unfortunate for these folks that they're they're coming in and being blindsided. However, we have an overconcentration of bars, liquor stores in problematic areas, including motels on Long Beach Boulevard, etc.. It's time that we honor the residents of North Long Beach. I've been there for 35 years. It's time we honor them with a little bit of an upswing to honor that renaissance that Rex is always talking about and move on. So I support Debbie and what she's doing. I'm hoping that these folks will meet with the Grant Association. They meet the first Thursday of the second Thursday of every month. You know, I don't know when the purchase has gone on, but I've also seen many, many, many times where there's a quick sale and it's grandfathered and all kinds of other things go on. It's time we stopped doing those types of things and just respect and honor the neighborhood.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So. So with this circumstances, you know, it's a bit unfortunate that, you know, this is the this is the you know, the first time I heard from this property owner was, you know, a week or two ago because, you know, there was I'd probably received about 50 communications from residents within the last month . And when I say it's unfortunate, it's not particularly the new owners fault, but I think we need to be more clear in the direction when people apply. As soon as were notified that these things happen, we should have some sort of a process to, you know, go work with these people to modernize and update their users. We can say no tonight. But the reality is those bars aren't going anywhere. The last commander, when when when did this liquor license get shut down? The the previous liquor license. Mike, the previous liquor license was.
Speaker 2: Suspended in August of 2016.
Speaker 3: August 2016. And when was the last violation? It was at that same time. So it's been it was close is 2016. And just last year, I took my staff on a tour of all the bars after it was closed down. And it was why it was open and it was selling alcohol. We went to two tours to every single one of them, and that's just the history of this. There's a lot of history of these establishments. So the question for me isn't necessarily how do we continue to shut down bars on Artesia? The question is how do we pivot and create a new standard for bars on Artesia? You can have a dove bar. You can have something high quality. Muldoon's is an example. Rock Sands is an example. All the bars on on Second Street, these are great examples. But the standard for Artesia is it's just frankly too low. And we have to build more congruence and confidence with our residents and our neighbors because there's no way there's no way that this was going to. I mean, it's easy job for me because staff has already recommended a protest. So I'm going to uphold staff's protest. And I'm going to ask that. With this and I've talked with city staff already, and this is not a part of the motion. This is I just think it's appropriate for me to state this. I want to meet with our economic development folks and and whoever else is appropriate code enforcement, whoever, to develop a real strategy for the bars, the six bars on Artesia Boulevard. We've already done we've seen some great examples of what can happen. The last gentlemen's club in Long Beach was on Artesia Boulevard, and we leverage for them to give up their entertainment license in exchange for alcohol becoming a sit down restaurant. Now, their Uptown Bar Grill. Neighborhood associations actually meet there. You know, Pistons, a historic bar on Artesia Boulevard has been closed for years now. A new a new owner, Michael Barber, who has Falcons and others making an investment. How can we have a strategy on Artesia Boulevard to where property owners, if they want to invest and they want to be a good player, someone who wants to make an investment, increase the standard, raise a standard for the area. They have a path to do so. And it's not just we come to city council and they continue to get shut down. So my motion is to uphold staff's recommendation. But I do I would like to sit down with the property owners now that we've you know, we've met them, I'd love to sit down with them with our economic development folks and figure out a better strategy and agenda for this bar and all the bars in Artesia. So that's my motion. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay, there's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Maximum item. I think it's 15. | ABC License | Recommendation to receive the application of Cloud 9 Sports Bar L.B, LLC, dba Cloud 9 Sports Bar Long Beach, for an original Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) License, at 1740 East Artesia Boulevard, determine that the application does not serve the public convenience and necessity, and submit a Public Notice of Protest to ABC on the bases of high crime in the reporting district and residences within 100 feet of the establishment. (District 9) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_05022017_17-0322 | Speaker 0: Maximum item. I think it's 15.
Speaker 1: I am 15 is communications from Councilmember Ranga Councilmember Super nine Councilwoman Mango recommendation to cancel the City Council of August 1st 27 due to national night out.
Speaker 0: A councilmember pierce. I'm just going off the motion because of the motion here.
Speaker 6: No.
Speaker 3: No, no. That much. But yes, this item is for National Night out. I think we have some business. If we could convene for some business earlier that night and take off early, that would be great.
Speaker 0: I think this is a request to cancel the whole meeting, which would be great. I'm fine with that.
Speaker 3: Oh, okay. Well, the mayor says.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So let's discuss it. All right. So if there's not a critical issue that night, we'll cancel the whole meeting. We'll go to a national night out.
Speaker 0: I think the motion is right to cancel the whole meeting.
Speaker 3: I thought I was going to get a lot of pushback on that. I'm sorry.
Speaker 6: Okay.
Speaker 0: Would you want to throw some word in there?
Speaker 3: Well, considering it's after 10 p.m., I'm going to go with a flow here, so. All right. The motion stands as written. Right.
Speaker 0: Great. Is there a second?
Speaker 2: Their motion.
Speaker 1: Is Herman.
Speaker 6: Cain.
Speaker 0: His motion are second the cancel August 1st. Be happy to take any friendlies to throw in some more meetings.
Speaker 2: Really? I'm sorry.
Speaker 0: And throw some more out. How about just kidding, I think. Public comment. Okay, please cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Councilmember Richardson. Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 0: Okay. Next item, which is we did 16 oh 16, which is the Reversion Amounts Conservancy report we're going to table it most of the table that. Councilman when Price and Gonzales any public comment signaled and tabled. But without objection, Max is 19. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to suspend Council rule contained in Long Beach Municipal Code Section 2.03.020 (B) relating to the meeting schedule of the City Council in order to cancel the meeting of August 1, 2017, due to National Night Out. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0305 | Speaker 1: The first one up is Councilman Pearce. On renter's day, if we can get that item read, I believe it's item number 26. 26, madam, quick.
Speaker 2: Item 26 is a communication from Councilmember Pierce, Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilmember Durango recommendation to request a resolution in support of Long Beach, proclaiming April 19, 2017 and every Wednesday in April as renter's day.
Speaker 1: Councilwoman.
Speaker 10: Yes, thank you so much. I want to thank everybody for coming today in support of Long Beach renters. I know that many of you hear this a lot, but it deserves repeating. 60% of Long Beach residents are renters compared to 35% nationwide. That means that over 270,000 people in Long Beach alone rent. And I'm one of those people as well. With such a large number, it comes to no surprise that renters are a huge asset for our city. They add value to Long Beach workers as Long Beach workers, youth, students, seniors, business owners and entrepreneurs. Too often we talk about renters rights, renters issues, and we think of it in a vacuum. And so today is really about honoring individuals that contribute to our community, that are diverse, that live as renters. And we want to just use today as an opportunity to recognize their contributions, as well as using as an opportunity to talk about issues or challenges that they might face as renters in our city, so that we can begin to have a citywide discussion about the importance of renters in our city. We know that in our city alone, we've had over 40% increase in rents for one bedroom apartments just in the last five years with the highest cost in my district. And I know we have some new development that's happened that could contribute to some of those numbers. But as a renter myself, I know that those numbers are happening on my street every single day. And so I want to thank everybody for coming today. I want to ask my colleagues to support Renters Day as an opportunity to celebrate those that contribute to our community. So thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 9: Yes, I want to also acknowledge and thank council member Pierce for bringing this forward. I think it's really important that we do recognize a day solely for renters, especially as most of our residents here in the city are renters. I, too, also am a renter, and I'm okay to say that. And I care about my city just as much as somebody who owns here in this city as well. And so I hope that we can broaden the discussion and look for more opportunities to kind of bring everyone together under this umbrella. So thank you so much, Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 1: Thank you. We'll take public comment now if there's public comment on the renters day item. Now is the time. Please line at the podium and we'll go to this. Please come to the podium. Ready to get.
Speaker 8: Back to work. What an exceptional opportunity. I want to applaud the Council for this. Before I was a homeowner in this city, I was a renter. And I realized one day when you when you write your taxes or you're paying your taxes, you don't have a write off on a lot of things because you're a renter. When I started working for the homeless in writing up a syllabus in order to help people come off the street, we came up with an idea that that possibly the council might want to look at giving landlords some sort of tax break when they give renters maybe one year off if they pay their rent consecutively on time . Add something more to this that would give landlords an incentive to acknowledge the fact that renters are paying their mortgages. But I wanted to just applaud the council on this.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Very good, Hugh Quirke, as he does. I think the concept is a ditsy concept, unless it's accompanied by also a landlord's day, because without the landlord you don't have the apartments to rent, period. That's what seems to escape so many people. And we in the city do have. There's no question there's a housing shortage. No, it's no answer. That's not always will be. And one of the things I'm suggesting this city council do is be honest with the community and print out the articles that have been posted and many times and other newspapers that are very posted once or twice here by sister organizations that we have some of the highest rentals in the country. And the realities are probably 85% of the people that are looking for. Retro space will not find it in this city. And in my view, the first priority of that, of course, is our Long Beach residents. Born in Long Beach or migrated here or migrated here legally. Who are senior citizens. Beyond that, then the city needs to certainly look at what needs to be done. But I think it's to thumb your nose at the owners of the property. It's stupid. Period. And it manifests a lack of mature understanding of what the crisis really is. So if you want to have a day set aside, have it for renters and landlords, or come up with a word that would combine those two. Thank you. Or phrase. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Here I.
Speaker 4: Am. Hello. Good evening, Mr. Mayor. City Council. Before I start, I'd like to thank the mayor personally for introducing me to Steel Craft. I saw him on television last Sunday and spent a very pleasant day out. There have been great food and craft beer, so thank you very much for that. And now. My name's John Donahue. I live at 3713 East 15th Street in District four. I've lived there for about 32 years.
Speaker 5: I want you to imagine a headline.
Speaker 4: Absentee Millionaire Landlord Threatens to evict 92 year old disabled World War Two veteran and 54 year old daughter. I've been living in Long Beach since 1952, and I came here. I rented a furnished apartment with a garage for $50 a month. And today I'm paying 1370 $5. How did this happen? I understand that not all property owners are greedy and only care about profits. However, in January, my landlord notified us that our rent was increasing $150.
Speaker 5: And threatened to.
Speaker 4: Evict us if we didn't pay. I consider this extortion. I receive Social Security and a veteran's pension. My rent is now 5050 7% of my income. I'm sure you can clearly see something is absolutely wrong with this picture.
Speaker 5: And there is a solution for us renters.
Speaker 4: As renters, we contribute much to this city.
Speaker 5: And we should look at ways to protect and you should.
Speaker 4: Look at ways to protect us and keep us in our homes because this is my home and I should not be forced out. So I'm here spending standing with Libra and all renters.
Speaker 5: Thank you for helping.
Speaker 4: Us by declaring renters day in.
Speaker 5: Long Beach. I'm looking forward to working with you to find better solutions to keep people like me in our homes. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: But as Angelina Ramirez, we have Latin and Espanyol guys and a number of people. And in English my name is said, I really never mirrors changes. Today I will speak in Spanish because my head is not very clear. It was it's like I keep up. I here is the recommendation. E Paquette then got went to apparently cuatro anos. I'm here to support this recommendation also because I have been a renter for over 24 years primeiramente this movie. And then lastly Dona Vivienne, then a distrito safe. First I lived in District one, now I live in District six. EPS is important that I consider the contribution gas and the person that's been in especially that and I feel that it is important to recognize the can how the people who live in this community contribute to it . It can be important. I can also know Somos llanos. They will not gas that the most estamos para and the poor will never be in there. And also, just because we are not home owners, we are paying to live in a home paren. So pardon me is important because I reckon Oscar at all those to him think if they appoint an economist commits this type of person rent that and that's a reason why it is very important to me that we recognize people who are out there paying month after month for their rent. Yes, important también. Guess who we are? Like contribution. Gael Sassine It is also very important that we can recognize and see the contributions that they make in which of the nostrils cabanas, Castano, Rita Yellow never see the eyes themselves and the yes is then, you know like us. I mean necesitan rent that many of our young ones who are going to the universities and are about to complete their schooling and are about to go out there and rent as well. Parens up body. So let's be the I guess that point is the recommendation and that is the reason why I'm asking you today to to vote for this recommendation. You're not welcome, Professor, if we have been given that says. But I mean, they also they are only apparently so inclined. I'm not going to be able to purchase a home, so I will have to continue renting. So it is important that we have a day like this for us renters. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor. My name is David Root. I live in District eight. I am a third generation Long Beach resident, second generation Long Beach renter. I am also a Desert Storm combat veteran and a cancer survivor migrant. Since 2014 of my original move in date has been raised $290. I rent to garages. The rent on the garages is also increased $80. The reason for this rent increase, according to my landlord, is to bring everything up to current market value. As it stands, my rent will be over 1700 dollars a month. Neighbors in my building who were also served with an increase a month after my original increase came. Got a maximum of $125. When I question my landlord about the reasoning for this, she said that like it was just because of the owner wants to bring everything up to current market standard. The reasoning in my mind is I require a service dog due to my cancer. It has been discovered that. Certain animals. Dogs can sense diseases in humans. My wife, who also has a service dog, suffers from chronic migraines and she passes out due to the migraines and the dog alerts her to an onset of a migraine. When we were when we first moved in, we notified them about my dog and under the current. I'm sorry. Under the previous management company, they were fine with that. We paid a $300 deposit, which by the ADA was unlawful, went on with it. Everything was fine. Once my second dog came along, we had him registered, certified everything legal, submitted the paperwork to the landlord. The landlord said, We'll keep this under between us because the new owner will charge you a $2,000 deposit for the dog. When I told them that this was illegal, they said, Well, we'll just keep it to ourselves. To make a long story short, the reason for this. Increase of such a high amount is because they cannot charge me for having a service dog. They cannot request such a very large deposit. And when I brought that up to her, we went back and forth about it and they said, Well, you're going to have to either pay the rent increase or you're going to have to move out. I attended Liberty City College, graduated with an auto body degree intended to start a business in Long Beach. But now with this happening, my hands are being forced to where I'm going to have to move out of Long Beach, which is the city I was born and raised in and I love and I don't want that to happen.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And, sir, thank you for your service to our country. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Good evening, city council members and Mayor Garcia. My name is willing to go AM. I'm currently residing in District seven. I have been a resident of Long Beach for 25 years. Here today, San Juan live in all renters to show my full support of proclaiming renter state Long Beach. And even though the credit reform for rental applications was taken out of the agenda, I still came prepared to kind of talk about how this affects me and my family. The first item that I will be will be referring to is the credit reform for rental applications. Long Beach is currently in a housing crisis. As a tenant, I don't feel stable when it comes to my housing needs. I will be graduating next month from Cal State, Long Beach, and I will join many other families looking for a new place to rent for me and my children as a single mother. My focus right now is having enough money to pay for a security deposit, which can be as much as twice the rent. In addition to having to pay for the first month's rent, paying an application fee every time for an apartment, that's a financial burden to already the high costs of first month's fees. It is very likely that I will have to apply to.
Speaker 6: Multiple places having to play for an.
Speaker 2: Application fee each time I apply. This is beyond my means and makes it more difficult for me to provide for my nine year old daughter and my six year old son. In addition, it is not certain that I will qualify for an apartment after I have paid my fees. Another problem is the unintended consequences of submitting different applications.
Speaker 6: And having my credit check in a short amount of time and the damage that this can cost to my credit score.
Speaker 2: This just adds another barrier to my housing need. Reforming the credit check and reporting process will make it more affordable for families like my own. In addition to releasing some of the burden already associated with the first month's fees, the second agenda item is about celebrating the contributions of renters by proclaiming Renters Day Long Beach. As a renter, I give to my community in so many ways as a consumer, as a student, as a voter, and as a volunteer. Not only am I a renter by my parents, my grandparents and my siblings all reside in Long Beach. We're all renters and we all contribute economically, socially and culturally. Today, over half of the residents in Long Beach are renting, and we have made Long Beach the attractive place that it is today. Given the current housing crisis and the unmet needs of renters, it is time that we acknowledge, honor and celebrate the contributions of all of them on beach.
Speaker 6: Why?
Speaker 2: Jordy and I'm in full support of proclaiming renters day Long Beach.
Speaker 8: Thank you for your time.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hi. She was good. Hard to follow. Good evening, Mayor.
Speaker 4: And City Council.
Speaker 7: My name is Wayne Murchison and I live temporarily at 2035 East Broadway in District two.
Speaker 4: I've lived in Long Beach for over ten years and I've been.
Speaker 7: Had been renting in the past here in Long Beach. I'm a very active member of my community, social justice, and although I can't vote, I give counsel to others in their voting. So I'm a graduate of Neighborhood Leadership Program as well as Long Beach Rising, and I'm also on the advisory board for Long, Long Beach residents and powered myself as well as everybody else here is here.
Speaker 11: For it to speak for those who can't be.
Speaker 7: Here. I've been essentially homeless for a little over five years now, and in that time I have seen many of my friends who have gotten rent increases, forcing them out of their home to.
Speaker 4: Seek something affordable. However, by the term affordable, the amount they were.
Speaker 7: Paying was closer to 50% of their take home wage.
Speaker 11: That doesn't even include their utilities, food.
Speaker 7: Transportation, health care costs, let alone any emergencies that may come up for myself while at the VA. Years ago, I talked to a social worker about Section eight and was told there was a five year wait. It seems it is.
Speaker 11: The same these.
Speaker 7: Days and on top of that, only.
Speaker 4: Good for six.
Speaker 7: Months if one was not able to find a place that would accept Section eight. That opportunity is lost and one goes back to the end of the line again. Seems there are a lot of rental entities who do not want to rent to section eight applicants for some reason.
Speaker 11: It would be nice if we had resident.
Speaker 7: Resident retention policies policies so people are not displaced at alarming rates. And since there's new development happening, there needs to be more affordable housing created.
Speaker 4: I was at the Forum Forum.
Speaker 7: Of Housing Developers.
Speaker 4: And feel the.
Speaker 7: City needs to dedicate permanent source of funding for production of affordable housing. It would also.
Speaker 11: Seem the city needs to.
Speaker 4: Give developers.
Speaker 7: More time and land for production of these units and on top, and adopt inclusionary zoning policies.
Speaker 4: That will help.
Speaker 7: With building more affordable housing. As the city adopts policies for affordable housing production, our city must produce them for the people who are most in need from extremely low to low income families, not just moderate and.
Speaker 11: Or.
Speaker 7: Workforce families. Otherwise, this results in a problem where there's not enough rental units available for low and extremely low income households.
Speaker 4: Even without.
Speaker 7: Section eight.
Speaker 11: I would be very disappointed.
Speaker 4: If Long Beach.
Speaker 7: Is creating an atmosphere as expungement for those who can't live here anymore. It has always in the past, it has always been known as a very diverse population.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Civic time's all up. I got to keep going. Thank you, sir. Time is up. Oh, thank you so much. Your next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Mr. Mayor and City Council. My name is Davi Merkle. I live at 1450 Coronado Avenue. Number nine, District four. I've lived in my apartment for over a little two years. And in Long Beach for about 17 years, I'm civically engaged and actually voted for you, Mr. Mayor. I've also voted for you, Mr. Soprano.
Speaker 8: I'm here today to stand for. Renters in the.
Speaker 6: Sorry. I'm here to stand with renters and with really bringing in solidarity as we acknowledge and celebrate the contributors. Renters make in Long Beach. My building was sold late last year and was under management by Borba Investment Realty starting in October 2016. Prior to that, I was the onsite manager for two years and was responsible for renting the units in property maintenance. So I have a clear understanding of what is required by property management as far as maintenance and repairs. Personally, I reported these issues to my unit back in September 2016, which involved a bathtub that moved while I used it. I notified them that it might be the flooring, of course, as it is common practice, the property management they just put sunken in. Call it a day.
Speaker 8: After getting the.
Speaker 2: Runaround from the management, along with Mickey.
Speaker 6: Mouse repairs, I finally called code enforcement in January of this year. I was unsatisfied by the servicing and reporting of the corner inspector that finally had to go up the chain to the Deputy Director. After getting through the higher ups involved in demanding quality repairs, it was finally shown that my term actually a 1923 cast iron clawfoot tub, which is sinking down. I have to cast. I have to. Cast. I have. Sorry. This makes me very nervous because of the fact that right now, because the two claws are floating midair without support and framing. It's been over 80 days, and I'm still waiting for completion of repairs. So as I use the shower, I may fall through.
Speaker 8: To a 2.5 15.
Speaker 6: Drop into the cross base. Borba has given and has been given an extension while my safety is at risk. I know that time is running out. So basically what I'm saying is that I have been retaliated against with a 60 day notice to vacate and I'm constantly being harassed and have not had peaceful enjoyment of my apartments ever since. I'm on a fixed income and I am permanently disabled.
Speaker 8: 62% of my income goes to rent alone, not including utilities.
Speaker 6: Thank you for your time. Thank you very much. And please make this a renters day. Please help us out. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. And before I do the next speaker, just real quick as an announcement, I may have missed it, but item 16, which was the item around the credit check item that was pulled off the agenda. So that will not be heard tonight. I think most people know that. But just the city attorney wanted me to announce that one more time. So that item is not going to be heard tonight. And I'm going to be closing the speaker's list here, unless there's anyone else that's speaking on this item. And this gentleman here will be the last speaker, and then we're going to take a vote. So, sir, you're the last speaker in the back speaker list is closed. Yes, sir.
Speaker 5: Good evening, city council and mayor. I'm Robert fox live at 2815 east broadway. About six months before Nancy also had passed away, who was one of my dearest friends. She had suggested that we have a renter's day in Long Beach to acknowledge and to celebrate our population. She was one of my dearest friends, and I totally support this idea of having a renter's day here in the city of Long Beach. Bizarre. How, Janine? The reason was I came to this city many, many years ago, decades ago, and I was a renter. I lived at 125 Cherry Avenue, right on Bixby Park. And this city opened its arms to me. I was a renter for 25 years. So I totally understand and acknowledge that being a renter doesn't mean that you don't participate. I found it. Alameda Speech Neighborhood Association from 125 Cherry Avenue, and then I moved to another apartment at 1828 Second Street, and I still was involved. I founded the Broadway Business Corridor Association. I don't want to give you all the things that I did, but the idea was that a renter, 60% of our population here, are contributing people to this city in very, very important ways. And we move on. We do other things. And I think I'd love to acknowledge everyone. The thing that's bothering me of late is there seems to be such a wish for division in the city. And I'm it makes me sad. I've lived here most of my life. And I love the people of Long Beach. Currently, I'm executive director of the Council of Neighborhood Organizations. I know every neighborhood in every district of the city, and we have great people here. Whether they're owners of land or whether there's leasehold estate, we all have estates and land and there should be absolutely no difference about how we are treated. Everyone should have respect and grace, and I think the idea of celebrating our diversity is an absolutely brilliant idea. So I support this motion by Janine and Lena, and I am willing to participate in it. I'll bake a cake if that's what it needs, you know. So thank you for bringing this up to just share it. Cherish a part of our community, which I have been a part of for many, many years. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Robert. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Hi. Good evening. My name is Lillian Couple and I live in and Arthur's district. I'm a renter for 28 years now, and I'm here to support the rent Thursday. So we as renters, we contribute with our economy of our city because of course, we pay our rent and we spend our money here. We work here. So we we want to be recognized because I think we deserve it. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. City Council. My name is Walker Rivera, program director of Libra. And I just wanted to thank the city council members and the authors for bringing forward this recommendation for Renters Day Long Beach. Personally, I've been living in Long Beach for over 20 years. At some point during the during the real estate boom, I owned a home for the majority of my time here. I've been renting and I've contributed quite a bit. I'm actually a product as as well as Wayne is of the Neighborhood Leadership Program of the City of Long Beach. So you all have yourselves, yourselves to thank for me being up here and constantly being in front of you. This is what you created. So. So you should celebrate it because now is now I'm here as an advocate and and as a representative of the community and all the other renters in Long Beach, which is 60% of the city. The majority of the city. And you can imagine that we contribute in so many ways, as some people have already noted, economically, socially, culturally, and even our families live here. We we make the city a lot of what it already is. And as we've been saying, sort of in in our in our lead up to today is we we help make the city of Long Beach work. And so we really appreciate the opportunity for the city to work for for us. And I know that we are here to to talk about the council item that was pulled. But we we want this to be a a sort of a benchmark and something that we can constantly revisit on an annual basis so that you're constantly reminded that we are here that were present and that we're and that we're a majority and that we're constantly going to be advocating so that we're protected just as much as the other population is protected, so that we are seen just as much as the other population is seen, and that we are heard just as much as the homeowners and the property owners and the property management companies and the real estate agents and everybody else is heard. I think that we deserve just as much as as they do. I think that we contribute just as much as they do. And so we we really appreciate that this day is going to be here and set forth on an annual basis to celebrate our presence, to celebrate what we contribute, and to celebrate all that we bring to this city. Again, we we help make the city work. And so we really hope that Long Beach starts to work for us as well. So thank you very much for for doing this, for bringing forth the recommendation. And we hope and moving forward that we can figure out some ways in helping some of these renters save a little money, especially in this time of crisis, through the credit check rental application reform process. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Hi. First you got mayor and city councilman. My name is Latoya Marshall. This is not my first time up here. I come back with questions. Last year, at the end of the year, I had an issue with the Housing Authority. I was told by the city council members. Okay, Latoya, we're going to check into these issues about this. Never once have I got any call back. I have reached out to the multipurpose center Shallowater and have not gotten anywhere. When she said, Oh, Marsha, we will talk on your behalf to the Housing Authority. Allison King No one has reached out to Allison King or my we have about the housing authority appeal. In my case, getting my voucher back, getting me from being homeless. I have two kids, a 14 year old and a child that's going to be two years old, made first. I'm still displaced out of my house. It's been almost eight months. I come back clean to you guys again. City Council members, the Andrews. I don't know what's going on now when I call the housing authority is like Latoya, who like I don't even exist. Like I was not offered, you know, some type of motel voucher to get this matter cleared up. Like, I wasn't told that someone would reach out for the housing authority to get my voucher back for me and my kids could be back in on here it is eight months later and I'm still pleading with you guys, asking you guys for help. Please reach out to the Housing Authority as Alison King. Reach out to the multipurpose center. They gave out $600 million to the homeless. And never once did Latoya Marshall get called and got help that I asked for eight months ago. I'm not trying to be a difficult person. I come up here faithfully with faith, humbly in myself, begging and pleading on the mercy of each and every one of you council members to please stand by. We all say that, y'all, we help the homeless. This is a single black woman trying to get off the streets. I don't been harassed. I don't been assaulted. I you know, I constantly get into it with the police department where I'm getting tickets. This is not a normal thing that a citizen had to go through. If I'm homeless and I'm disgraced and I ask for help in our reach out to the city council members, please show some type of faith or hopefully you guys of some type of humanity. Please. I'm a homeless woman asking for you guys help again. Please reach out to Shannon Crowder, to Alison King for the Housing Authority. Thank you. Have a good night.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. And our last two speakers next speaker.
Speaker 8: Thank you very much. My name is Zoe Nicholson. I'm a renter in Rose Park. I bring you a letter from the Human Relations Committee. Dear Mr. Mayor and council members in commission, I meant to say I'm not used to it yet. In recent months, the Long Beach Press Telegram has reported on various aspects related to the state of housing in Long Beach. The housing issues identified include significant increases in the cost of rent, an exceptionally low vacancy rate, homelessness and a shortage of subsidized units. The housing crisis in Lombard seems to be reflective of a national trend that is complex and multifaceted. Over the last several months, the Human Relations Commission has heard from community leaders about issues related to housing, homelessness and potential municipal policies and actions that may help to mitigate this issue. The Human Relations Commission has largely bases its perspective on this issue under the principles of equity, human rights and dignity. Additionally, our Commission is particularly concerned with the disproportionate impact of housing on homelessness and among vulnerable and or disenfranchized communities, including individuals affected by intimate partner violence and people of color. The Human Relations Commission works to develop and recommend programs and plans to the City Council designed to promote full acceptance of our citizens and community and in all respects of community life, and submits recommendations concerning matters relating to prejudice or discrimination. Inequality in equal opportunity in employment, public accommodations, housing, education because of race, religion, national origin, age, gender, sexual orientation, or mental or physical disability. In this light, the Human Relations Commission strongly supports the city's effort to explore. The feasibility of housing programs and policies such as a standard rental application and credit check process that help to mitigate barriers for individuals seeking to secure and maintain stable housing. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And our last speaker on this item. Hi, my name is Bill. Survived Council District three. I've sent a letter to my council member, Susie Price and to Vice Mayor Ross Richardson.
Speaker 5: Last week.
Speaker 1: To support this endeavor for Renters Day. I have personal friends that are affected by this, and one thing I'd like to add by this whole situation for the, you know, bringing apartments or homes that people are renting as well up to market rate is that if someone has to leave their apartment or home.
Speaker 8: And they.
Speaker 1: Cannot find housing here in Long Beach, we're shedding are good people, good people that are contributing to our city economically through work, through purchasing their groceries or something like that. I recently met a lady who is forced to leave because she's renting a home in Council District three. The homeowner passed away. The children are selling that home now and now she's in a panic because she's trying to look for a place to afford. It's going to have a small ripple effect because that homeowner who owned her home that she was renting owns five other homes. So all those homes are being sold. So I feel for her. I directed her to the resources I can, but it's just that we're shedding the population that, you know, it's human capital and human resources that we're also shedding that people are going out of our city for. So I definitely support ask the council to support this endeavor. The renters definitely contribute in many, many multiple ways that are too many.
Speaker 5: Too numerous.
Speaker 1: To name. Thank you. Thank you so much, Councilmember U. Ringa.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Mayor. I want to thank Councilmember Pearce for bringing me to this item. I think it's a worthy one. We hear a lot of compelling stories. We've heard compelling stories tonight of some of the endeavors and and the the issues that are facing renters. I was once a renter and before becoming a homeowner, many of us are renters, first of all. And it's an issue that it's not an issue. It's a fact of life, that when we want to continue our lives and eventually end up being into home ownership, there is a process and that process includes renting. And so we all hope for a great experience. I've had a great experience, but not all of us do. So bringing this forward as as one day out of the year to recognize and acknowledge that renters are contributing members of our community, that they are important, that we want them here, that we want to have a great experience in Long Beach. I think it's important for us. So I want to thank Councilmember Pierson, Councilmember Gonzalez, for joining me in this effort. And I look forward to working with you in the future. There are some other items and discussions that have to take place as we move along in this endeavor together. And I'm looking forward to more discussions on this. So thank you very much for being here this evening. Thank you for your civic engagement in being here tonight.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And I just wanted to also just say, I wanted to I thank you all for coming. I know that there was, I believe, an event even before the council meeting started where you guys, I think, rallied and had a conversation outside city hall. And so just thank you all for being here. Probably, I imagine like like most or all of us on this up here, we've all been renters or are renters. And one, just appreciate everyone's contribution and your and your advocacy including those that came out and support from all sides of the general issue and whether it's property owners and particularly, of course, all the renters that came out. And so thank you. We're going to go and take a vote. And as we do that, I want to thank all of you for coming out tonight and being a part of this renters day agenda item. So, members, cast your vote.
Speaker 2: Councilwoman Longo. Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you guys for being here. I really, really appreciate you guys coming out tonight. Thank you. Okay. And again, item 16 with Paul that I want to make sure I mention that again. So we've got a couple more items that were asked to be moved to the moved to the start of the agenda. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request resolution in support of Long Beach proclaiming April 19, 2017 and every third Wednesday in April henceforth, as Renters Day. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0269 | Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you guys for being here. I really, really appreciate you guys coming out tonight. Thank you. Okay. And again, item 16 with Paul that I want to make sure I mention that again. So we've got a couple more items that were asked to be moved to the moved to the start of the agenda. So we're going to do item 24 next and then item 18, we'll try to get to these items here and they do the public comment as well. Madam Court. Can we read them 24, please?
Speaker 2: Item 24 is a communication from city attorney. Recommendation to declare ordinance amending the Long Beach Manager Code relating to office holder accounts read and adopted as read City Y.
Speaker 1: Okay, I know this is the second reading of the ordinance that was in front of us before is actually your public comment. Is there any public comment on this item? Please come forward. And then we'll go to Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 7: My name is Steven Downing and I live in Melbourne.
Speaker 5: Sure.
Speaker 7: I have commented in writing to my council representative.
Speaker 5: And all I want to say is, is that.
Speaker 7: There has been zero.
Speaker 0: Transparency.
Speaker 7: On this issue. The memo issued by the.
Speaker 5: City attorney's office.
Speaker 7: Today, it was used by this council has not been made. A part of the package is probably about violation of the Brown Act if you consider it. The last time I was here.
Speaker 1: My only complaint was.
Speaker 5: There's no.
Speaker 7: Transparency. So I would recommend to the Council that this item be returned.
Speaker 5: To committee and the committee produced.
Speaker 7: Reports. There is nothing on the.
Speaker 5: Website that tells us any kind of discussion.
Speaker 7: Of this matter. It is merely a.
Speaker 5: Move to undo a.
Speaker 0: Reform movement.
Speaker 7: In the late nineties. So I recommend that the Council take this back to committee.
Speaker 4: And treat this matter.
Speaker 7: With the transparency that a democracy in Long Beach.
Speaker 4: Deserves.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, American Council members. My name is Dan O'Leary. I live in Beaumont, Shaw and Susie's district. I had to come up to speed on this item quickly, but basically I'm urging you to vote no if you do vote. I suggest that Steve is suggesting that we don't do that tonight. I see really no reason to it. What I was able to read, find, and then I did read the deputy city attorney's letter on this was that we're trying to align with.
Speaker 5: The.
Speaker 4: State government rules on this, but it's not clear why. And there's some some buzz about there being a constitutional right to be able to transfer money as free speech. That all sounds like it needs a.
Speaker 5: Lot more vetting. To me.
Speaker 4: It generally sounds bad if if there is going to be a vote on this and it passes, or is there going to be limits to the amount of money that can be transferred? I think there's a limit to the amount of money you can accumulate in your individual funds from.
Speaker 5: An individual contributor.
Speaker 4: There should be some sort of modest limitation on the money that can be transferred.
Speaker 5: To other candidates. So please.
Speaker 4: Consider tabling this and.
Speaker 5: Not doing this tonight. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir. And I'm going to close the speakers list. The lady there is the last speaker. Next speaker, please. I shall make Mr. Goodhue the last speaker. He's the last speaker? Yes.
Speaker 6: Good evening. My name is Glenn Stoltz, and I've sent many of you letters regarding this. And my question to all of you in the beginning was, in what way does this benefit the residents of Long Beach? And I received no answers back on that question. The only councilperson who returned an email to me was Gerald Supernova, which I appreciate. A couple of you responded online and but still I didn't get an answer to that question. Additionally, I think that if you were to adopt this sort of ordinance or change this ordinance, that transparency, fair elections and the ability for newcomers to enter into elected offices is diminished, which I don't think is a good thing for the residents of the city. Also, I would also say that the fact that the last meeting was agenda ized as a study or a feasibility for this issue and suddenly turned into a an ordinance change, a rewrite of the ordinance. So there were there was talk of Brown Violation Act in the I think it was the press telegram, but which I think should be considered. Also, Janine Pearce, who introduced this, said that she and her colleagues have been talking about this for a year now. And for that to be true and for nobody here to be able to or willing to write back and express how this benefits the city, I think is pretty outrageous. So, Ivo, I mean, if I were to vote, I would ask you to vote no on this item and put it away. So thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Madam Speaker, please come forward.
Speaker 5: Hi. My. My name is running. I'm in the fifth district. I'm against this measure. I mean, let's call it what it is. This does no benefit to the cities, the residents of this city. It only benefits the people here, the elected officials, nobody else. This is like a Kabbalah activity. That's all it is to it. This these funds were specifically put in place to not do this. And you guys are doing this. We have a situation where the mayor has got Lena Gonzalez and and Jimmy Pierce, who were on her election committee. Now they're now they're suddenly they're they're chair people have an election oversight committee and that only the mayor can appoint. And suddenly this thing pops up. There's no no visibility at all of what's taking place. We don't have any any study of what's taking place. So this thing was deliberately trying to be sneaked through through this. I'm I'm just going to say what it is through an obvious way to try to make the residents be sleepy and not know what's taking place. I praise Darrell Super now for speaking up and at least saying, Hey, look, what is this for? Because had he not done that, the residents of Long Beach would not have even known that this thing existed. This is just trying to sneak through. Let's also be honest with this thing that the we want to make things. The state law is a joke. This is just a narrative that's being used by the elected officials to try to take money that is not theirs, that they did not deserve it. They did not even earn it and are going to use it for their own political purposes. That's what it's there for. This is not going to help even people who.
Speaker 8: Are trying to compete with.
Speaker 5: The incumbents and do things on their, you know, on their own. And so all I'm saying is we need to get a safe playing field. We need to be honest. And we need to also ask ourselves, why do we bring things in front of the city council when it doesn't do anything whatsoever to benefit the residents? Why is it there? You're only doing this for yourselves. It's a selfish thing to do, and I'm just going to say it straight out. This is what it is and you guys all know it. There's no secret behind it. And the people that know it know that some of these people are going to be reelected. And believe me, you're walking off a plank. Once this thing starts getting known to the public, you all know it. We all know what you did, and we all know who's orchestrating it too.
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please. So thank.
Speaker 11: You, Mr. Mayor.
Speaker 4: City council members. City staff. You know, I didn't know much about this issue just until recently, and I feel that it won't decrease transparency or increase transparency, but what it will do is just increase distrust. There is nobody that you've heard so far saying, oh, what a great idea. It's wonderful you're doing this. This is not good. You know, we all see that. We know that. And it feels like it's being rushed through. You don't let the public know about about it. No, I'm not saying receive and file, but I am saying it returned to committee. Let's discuss this. Let the public know more about this. It this looks like a conflict of interest because this will benefit you. It won't benefit us as a person who has contributed to campaigns.
Speaker 5: In the past. It really makes me not want.
Speaker 4: To contribute to campaigns. And that's not what you want. You don't want your campaigns by by contributors solely by unions or special interest groups or other characters like that. You want the public to contribute to your campaign. You you want a dollar from every one of us in this city. And that way we all have a part of what's going on. You really don't want this. This is a conflict of interest for you. And what you need to do is put it back. If you want to continue to discuss it, let's all of us discuss it and make it more public. As far as getting in line with the state of California, that's not a reason to do this. It's not a reason at all. Please do what's best for the city of Long Beach and its residents. And Daryl, thank you for your position.
Speaker 5: And Stacey, happy birthday.
Speaker 1: We're going to a birthday thing for Stacie at the end of the meeting. So you want to stick around next week?
Speaker 8: Katonah is that August 7th district. Over 20 years ago, the city council did. Not look like it does today. Previously, there were no district elections. Very few women and people of color were on the council. The council did not look like the city that I lived in over 25 years ago. The city went to district elections for city council and school board. In 94 we redistricted and had our first Latina serve on the council. That same year, the Long Beach campaigning for measure was passed and all was. It was all in an effort to level the playing field so that we could have representation that looks like the city. Well, I think we did some of that. And now our city council more and more reflects its population. Today we have a measure that is over 23 years old. Updating some of the terms of the officeholder account. To be in line with the FEC guidelines is appropriate. The city has a leadership role in the region, like the other 80 cities in the county, by allowing us to utilize age accounts as permitted by law. We can support candidates and officers that have the vision and support policies that help our city and our residents. We have a disadvantage because we are in the minority. And now that majority of cities have a more lax or no campaign contribution limits. Many have rules that allow FCC allowable activities in regards to age accounts, and many have no term limits. And the members that there are some members that have been there for over 20 years on the council in many cases. Long Beach is a leader in the region, but we are at a disadvantage unless we update our rules to adhere to the PCC guidelines. We're also at a disadvantage and should look at limiting our city council terms to three terms like L.A. Most cities around us have no term limits. This hurts us on a regional boards and commissions. We are lucky that our mayor in his first term could get on the MTA and that Ortega was able to get on Coastal Commission in his first term. The environment, transportation issues of clean air and prayer are a priority for a city. But unless we are at the table, we sometimes miss out. Last time we had someone on a committee was over 11 years ago when I was elected to the governing board. It's not a coincidence that the Ports Clean Air Act and plan for early and Long Beach was prioritized because L.A. had a mandatory seat and Long Beach had a seat. Was was elected to a seat. Updating our campaign finance reform is important. And because it makes us more relevant, it makes updating our office so it makes us compliant with the law and it does protect our city from lawsuits. Updating our terms of office is also important. You're all, for all intents and purposes, a part time council, but you get 25% pay. You should get at least 50% compensation. We are a growing city and one that is nearing half a million. Most cities that reach the mark start look that mark start looking at structure and making changes. Even Fresno have a full time council council. They start looking at a strong mayor form of government, start looking at revising campaign reform laws and are appropriate that are appropriate for large cities such as Long Beach. It's like a child that's growing. Sometimes the shoes don't fit anymore, so you have to change them. Or we start looking at clothes our kids can grow into. I support this idea because it protects the city. We need policies, regulations and structures for a growing city. One of the half a million changes needed in the city is growing. Let's promote a political infrastructure that we can grow into it. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Hello. My name is Carmen Huxley and I've been a resident in Council District Number three for.
Speaker 9: At least seven years now.
Speaker 2: I'm a happy resident. Hasn't always been easy for me and a victim of crime and high.
Speaker 9: And we're going to be prosecuting it soon because the statute of limitations.
Speaker 2: Is as long as I'm alive. But at any rate, I wanted to mention and remind the group here that.
Speaker 9: Our federal government has.
Speaker 2: Said that money is a form of communication. And if I give my money, I, I didn't do this.
Speaker 6: But let's just say I support the mayor.
Speaker 2: If I wanted to give him money for his upcoming reelection, which I hope that someone runs against him. But at any rate, yeah, it's not funny. Thank you. Thank you. And I'm going to sleep better tonight. But anyway, I just like to remind you that money, as far as the federal government is concerned, is a method of communication. So if I'm giving my money to Dr. Garcia, he shouldn't be able to turn around and give that money to Mr. Price. That's all. So please keep that in mind and table this issue. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, ma'am. And our final speaker, Mr. Good. Here, please come forward.
Speaker 5: Yes. Although the speaker two speakers ago essentially articulated what the councilman in your anger would have articulated a word for word. At least she was better looking. As I indicated last week, this clearly does not pass the smell test period. And those that doubt that need to understand the target that is on their back. The convening authorities at the federal level. Well, no, every time you change your jockey shorts. And that's why the stench that flowed from last week's council meeting. In many cases, it's probably not that often. I'm handing out to you something I picked up yesterday. I've had these out to people to help that if they have problems with it, with the stench to put on their nose. And I went out to Home Depot to pick them up and I walked in and I asked the greeter there where they find them. And he sort of laughed. He said, Well, gee, I haven't seen Kossmann since my mother did the laundry. And he said, Well, you might check over there. I found him, came back out, and as I was walking out, he asked, What are those for? And I asked him, first of all, what city do you live in? And he said, Long Beach. And I didn't ask him what district. Isaias explained what was being brought before the council tonight, as well as last night as his instant reaction was, No way. Not at all. Period. No ifs. No answer. No buts. It's corruption. Period. And indeed last week's. Tactic by the mayor to even try to usher it through a little faster by reverting to the Seinfeld. His Seinfeld method of using the Seinfeld's Kramer method of entering into leaving a room, jerking the agenda around, because maybe by that, if he didn't, Councilwoman Pryce would have been in there. And my hope in God is that she would have expressed the same view that I did. Although in more diplomatic terms, this stinks. Period. It will be your legacy. And it will undoubtedly. Lead to at least one, if not two. Joining the mayor is cell mates, period. As soon as we get the federal master in here, which I think is going to be about 120 days period, so bring it back if you want. But no way. And no matter how you launder it, it still comes up as corruption. Period.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Good. You. We're going to take this back to the city council now. We have a motion in a second. I'm going to go and turn this over to Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 10: Thank you. I wanted to thank everybody for your civic engagement, for staying attuned to what we're doing. It really means a lot that we have a civically engaged community, which is core of what I've tried to do on every single agenda item that I've brought forward. And this one is no different. I want to make it clear on a couple of items. One, to address transparency. It did go to committee and it's now at its last reading. And I want to thank our city attorney for bringing this to our attention. And really, the fact is that this is about eliminating a conflict that we have at the city. This is about nothing more than eliminating a conflict and protecting the city. And so with that being said, I want to say that this simply aligns our rules with the current case law as well, clarifying these issues in his memo today. I really want to ask my colleagues for their support. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilmember. And I just wanted to make sure, because I think it's it's worth it. Mr. City Attorney, I know you and I had a conversation as well. And I do appreciate, obviously, you kind of laying out the memo and what current state law says. But I want to also just talk about kind of there's two questions I know that I kind of asked you, and I want to just make sure we for the public's purpose that we that you couldn't tell them what you had told me. The recommendation that is in front of us today does approving the recommended change I know it's on its final reading eliminate the current conflict that exists in our code with state law?
Speaker 4: Mayor Members of the Council. Yes. The the action that we were directed to bring back on the amendment by the City Council to repeal that section will eliminate a potential conflict with state and federal law. Under the Citizens United case, which came out in 2010, and the SEIU versus Fair Political Practices Commission case out of the Ninth Circuit, which talks about the contribution spending restrictions on those findings are political speech, and they've been held to be protected by the First Amendment and that in order there has to be strict judicial scrutiny. And what the council what the ordinance currently reads as a complete ban at this time. So by the elimination of that complete ban, you are being consistent with state and federal law.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And also and to and through the attorney, I know I asked you this as well, and would you recommend that we approve the change tonight to eliminate this conflict?
Speaker 4: It would be in the city's interest to eliminate the conflict. At what time the council decides to do that is a policy decision.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. City Attorney. They are going to go in and go to a couple of council members, controversial panel.
Speaker 4: Thank you. We had some electronic problems up here, so I apologize for being out of my seat for a while. Let's see if I can regroup. First of all, I'd like to thank everyone for attending tonight and speaking, and I'd also like to thank all the online audience for their civic engagement over the last few days. And thank you all for even emailing me, contacting me, texting me. And for the 100 people that texted me, I know my voicemail is full, but it's been that kind of a weekend. What some of the online comments and I don't think I've ever seen an issue so polarizing. Until tonight, I had not heard anyone in favor of this. 100% of online comments were opposed to this. And one of the things that struck me, because I've been very close to this issue, I sit on the Elections Oversight Committee. So tonight will be my fourth vote on this issue more than any other council member. So I've been seeking answers since a little over a month ago. I think it was March Tuesday, March 14th, when our election oversight committee met. But what struck me about the comments was a couple that said they questioned our ethics and someone said, let's start an ethics class. And someone else responded, right, teach ethics to politicians. Okay. For those of you who don't know, we are required to take ethics training every two years. I served on a commission for seven years. I was also required in that capacity. So since 2007, I've taken the ethics exam every two years, so I'm sort of familiar with it. I think whichever side you are on this issue, this body fumbled the ball. And I'll go back to one of the parts of the the ethics training in involving public perception. He says public service ethics is not only about doing the right thing, but also about the public's confidence that indeed the right thing is being done. That's where I think we failed, because somehow someone got the message that we were just totally self-serving. And that's not our job. Our job is more than doing the right thing, as the training says, we have to communicate to that public. So on behalf of the Council, I apologize to everyone for us not doing that. Now at that. Meeting a little over a month ago. I question the deputy city attorney. She's not here tonight, but anyone could go back and watch the video. I was digging for answers. I asked multiple times, what is behind this? What is the rationale? And that's why I'm suspicious of a document that comes out today in the 11th hour. Why wasn't I told that a month ago that this was the motivation behind this? So for that reason, I will not be supporting this issue tonight. Further to Mr. Parkin's rationale that Citizens United took place in in 2010, and I should say about citizens, you know, you talk about public trust. I think the Bloomberg survey in September 2015 rated that. And I believe 78% of the general population wants Citizens United repealed. So if you wonder why the local folks aren't for this, there's a good rationale right there. But that date, Citizens United was in 2010, SEIU. You gave an earlier date. My question is, if it was a problem in 2010, why did we take the action in 2014? It wasn't an issue in 2014 after the fact. So for those reasons, I really can't support the measure tonight. But again, thank you for all your civic engagement.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilmember. Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 6: Thank you. I want to thank my colleague, Councilman Supernova. And this is really an issue that, you know, last week the vote happened within a few minutes after the start of the council meeting, which was the first council meeting. I think we have had in my time in office that started exactly of 5 p.m. and I got here at 520 and I missed the vote last week. That is important because I feel that it was one of those decisions that was well-intentioned. I read the memorandum from the city attorney's office today, I think, and I don't know if this is correct, but I believe that what the memorandum is trying to say is that our local ordinance was superseded by state law. Is that right?
Speaker 4: Councilmember Yes, I think what we're trying to say is that if our ordinance as written, we would if someone were to violate that provision of the ordinance, we would have a difficult time to enforce that restriction on the contributions.
Speaker 6: So basically the ordinance, as it's written, reflects the intent of those who put the ordinance into place in 1994. But it's not enforceable.
Speaker 4: This this provision was, I believe, adopted in 1999. But that's correct.
Speaker 6: Okay. And so I struggle with this because from a legal standpoint, I think there is definitely logic behind why we're doing this. But as those who have followed my thoughts on this issue know, I hate the idea that fundraising is such a big part of local politics. It's really impossible to get in to politics unless you're independently wealthy or unless you're able to raise a lot of money. And I shared that in 2014 when we talked about raising the limits for the officeholder account to begin with. So I have a struggle with the issue personally and morally, although I understand what the state law is. And from a legal standpoint, I understand that we're not in compliance with state law. But but I think it's an issue for me that's much, much bigger than the legal parameters. I do want to acknowledge Councilwoman Councilmember Pearce, because I think she's in a really difficult spot. She is chair of a committee that is in charge of a code that's outdated. And I think there have been efforts to try to update this code for years. So the timing of it is not ideal for her because there has been efforts to try to update this code for many years. So I don't think there's any ill intent behind the the item. I think it really is a clean up item. So with that, I want to thank Councilman Superhot and I, too, will be voting no on this item.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Members, please go ahead and cast your votes. Bitcoin cash revolts.
Speaker 2: But not. Voice. Vote for you, please. No. And what is your vote, Mr. Count? My mango.
Speaker 5: Phone numbers.
Speaker 10: All the.
Speaker 1: It's not working. Okay, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 0: Should I.
Speaker 6: Oh, okay. No, I'm fine.
Speaker 1: Okay. Motion carries. Thank you. Okay. We're moving on to the next item, please. Item 18. | Ordinance | Recommendation to declare ordinance amending the Long Beach Municipal Code by amending Section 2.01.380; and by repealing Section 2.01.390, all relating to officeholder accounts, read and adopted as read. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0304 | Speaker 2: Item 25 is communication from Councilwoman Gonzalez, Council Member Peers and Council Member Turanga. Recommendation to receive and file presentation by Green Education regarding local community efforts to comply with greenhouse gas reduction goals.
Speaker 1: Councilmember Gonzales.
Speaker 9: Yes, I would like to welcome up Estella, and I would like to thank Green Education Inc for putting together this presentation. It is essential that we have this dialog with the community to identify best practices to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, especially with the goals that Governor Brown and the legislative legislature have put in place. And before you leave, will have a beautiful presentation and certificate for you. Thank you all for your hard work. And I know we've worked together, but we'd like to hear the presentation and then we'll go forward from there.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Let me actually join me with Councilmember Pearce first or I will go back to sorry, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 10: Well, thank you. I want to thank my colleague for our agenda using this great presentation to for two of my neighbors who work really hard for all of Long Beach. We know that Sacramento has put forward some greenhouse gas reduction goals that we have to comply with. But as a coastal town, climate change and climate resiliency are things we have to take very seriously. So one of the reasons I ran for office was to make sure that my daughter and all the future generations have a clean and safe environment to call home. And so I really want to thank you guys for the presentation you're about to give in all the hard work that you do every single day, trying to get us to listen and do the right thing on small things and big things. So looking forward to it. Thank you.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Councilmember Gonzalez and Councilmember Pearce. Mayor and city council members and staff, we really appreciate this opportunity and to be able to share what we're trying to do to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions in our city and also in L.A. County. You know, you know, green education. As the founder and producer of the Green Praise Festival, that's our yearly Earth Day event. We've been doing this for approximately four years, five years, holding festivals throughout the community, and we are really appreciative of everyone's support. Everyone that has helped us to conduct a festival in their in their district, in their backyard. This festival is our homegrown effort to recognize and.
Speaker 4: Reward the leaders.
Speaker 8: In environmental, health and justice and sustainability and to engage and educate communities that typically might not have access to so many organizations and subject matter experts all in one place. And to have fun while learning about climate change, about reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and how to create a more sustainable city in the process. But our other efforts include engaging disadvantaged communities and connecting them to vital energy efficiency and renewable energy programs. Day in and day out, we're outreaching to small businesses to connect them to programs that will help them save energy, reduce their energy bills and, of course, reduce greenhouse gas emissions. We're conducting workshops, town halls, green block events to connect residents struggling to purchase a new home or to stay in their homes to programs that will help create healthy energy saving, high performing homes. Marcia, a.k.a. Pinky, has trained approximately 1200 realtors across California about energy efficiency mortgage program. And we believe this is a key component not only for future homeowners, but for our city's efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and address climate change via the Climate Action and Adaptation Plan. With that, I'm going to hand it over to Marcia. Hello, everybody. And thank you again for letting us present. So for those of you that are not familiar with the SB 350 goals, which is the Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act, it is law to reduce our greenhouse gas emission to 40% below the 1990 levels by 2030, and to the 80% to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050. Also to increase access to energy efficiency and weatherization projects for low income families and ensure that the 16 largest publicly owned utility companies meet their greenhouse gas emission target by 2050 while maintaining reasonable customer rates and reliable electric service. Some of the barriers for SB 350 is to access solar, solar panels, solar photovoltaic energy generation, access to renewable energy by low income families, access to energy efficiency and weatherization investments, including those in disadvantaged communities, as well as increase access to energy efficiency and weatherization projects. All homeowners, as well as homebuyers, including first time homebuyers, can access can can.
Speaker 2: Have access to find.
Speaker 8: Financial resources to help pay for energy efficient repairs and weatherization projects. I study that a case study that I did in Walnut, California, back in 2012, which was an investor flip. The purchase price back then was $340,000. Appraised value after repairs was 465,000. Energy efficient upgrade was spent. $21,000 in cosmetic repairs was $25,000. This was a home that was built in the seventies and no upgrades has been done to this home. It's sold in five days. And mind you, in 2012, market was not moving. It sold in 2012, in five days and it sold for 485,000. And the scope of work for that for for that energy efficiency repairs was an upgrade to the HVAC system. I. Three design added insulation, exterior wall insulation and high efficiency water heater. And if this home was to put four solar panels on that home, it would have been a net zero home. And this home keeps their their HVAC system at 70 degrees, 24 seven. And the homeowner or the homeowners utility bills or electric bill is $50 a month. Another case study that I did in Southgate Southgate, California, which was a purchase in 2015. The purchase price was 410,000. The appraised value after repair was 520,000. The allowable energy efficient amount was 26,000. And they received a rebate from that energy upgrade, California, of 85,000. So the equity from day one, because this was a purchase, was $110,000 in day one. And again, the house the home was built in 1970. Scope of work for energy efficiency repairs was an upgrade on each HVAC system duct redesign, adequate insulation, exterior wall insulation, high efficiency water heater and a pool pump. And again, the homeowner keeps their HVAC system at 70 degrees with a pool pump pumping 24 seven, and their electric bill is between 20 to $23 a month. So low income barriers there's a single family home that that I research that sold in Wilmington, California. It sold in March March 2015. And the selling price was 240,000. It was it was an investor flip and the investor put a little lipstick on the property and it sold six months later for $365,000.
Speaker 2: 600.
Speaker 8: 364,888, to be exact. And this is without energy efficiency improvements. So potential impact for energy efficiency repairs or the what the initiative that we're trying to move forward here is the number of homes sold between January 2016 to December 2016.
Speaker 2: In the county of L.A..
Speaker 8: Was 54,000 homes approximately. And in the city of Long Beach, there was 3000 homes sold approximately. So if we were to assume that 20% of these new homeowners achieved an overall.
Speaker 2: 25% energy efficiency.
Speaker 8: Improvements for each of those homes, and that the scope of work would include heating and or cooling system upgrade, ductwork, air sealing and insulation. That is approximately we would reach approximately 1.884 metric tons of CO2 emission reduction from the savings per home. And that's that's an equivalent of 20% of L.A. County wide would be 4300 passenger cars off the road for a year or an annual electric use of 3006 homes per year. And here in our city of Long Beach, it would be out.
Speaker 2: It would be.
Speaker 8: 1100 metric tons of reduce CO2 emission, which is an equivalent to 240 passenger cars off the road for a year, or at an annual electrical use of 119.
Speaker 2: Homes for our beautiful city of Long Beach.
Speaker 8: By improving energy efficiency for every building and home, we can achieve our 20, 30, 20, 40 and 2050 goals. Energy Efficiency Mortgage is a path for for an initiative such as this because homeowners.
Speaker 2: All homebuyers and homeowners interested in refinancing.
Speaker 8: Are automatically pre-approved for an additional 5 to 15% of their approved loan to do energy efficiency repairs without adding to their debt to income ratio benefits is Long Beach will meet greenhouse gas reduction goals. Energy use decreases, healthier homes, less illnesses, more jobs, green economy and a model and model neighborhoods. And we can.
Speaker 6: Be the poster city for.
Speaker 2: California.
Speaker 8: As well as the United States.
Speaker 2: So we believe that energy efficiency improvements and programs like energy efficiency mortgage program.
Speaker 8: Will help with the heavy lifting that.
Speaker 2: Comes with passing and achieving the goals of our Climate Action and Adaptation Plan. Not to mention that then additional benefits that we will.
Speaker 8: Experience, like keeping families in their homes, creating new green careers here in Long Beach. Thank you again.
Speaker 6: For letting us speak.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. I'm going to turn this over to is there any other public comment on this item casing? None, Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 5: You know, and all this PRESENTI forgot to mention your name. It's Stella. Sure. I want to thank you staff for putting this presentation together. I mean, we have had those green events at West Long Beach, which are very useful. And your encouragement to have homeowners improve their housing through making them more efficient is is wonderful. And it really sets the tone for us to keep green in mind at the forefront at any time, whether it's buying a vehicle or how we buy our water or how we recreate. So, I mean, I want to thank you for bringing this forward. I hope that this is able to expand into Long Beach and get more people to buy into buying to, I guess, buy into more higher efficiency products as we as we move forward and to recycle as well. As we move forward. Thank you very much for your presentation.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And of course, to Pinky and Estella, you guys are, of course, some of our biggest screen advocates in the city. And you guys do great work. So thank you for that presentation. And turn this over back to Councilwoman Gonzales. Anything else?
Speaker 9: I just want to say Marcia and Stella, again, thank you very much. I know it's been said again, but I cannot thank you for educating me personally on how much this could impact not only the county of California, but the city of Long Beach. You both do incredible work. You're going to have an amazing green press festival. I know Rex couldn't be here. He's having a baby, I think. But I know that he also was very excited to have the event. So thank you both again. And we have a few awards of recognition we'd love to give you for all your hard work.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And as we do that, we're going to take a voice vote and continue that tonight because there are some challenges with that voting system. So I'm going to start with Councilman Austin at the end. All those in favor, please just make sure you turn your mike on when you say it.
Speaker 4: I, i, i.
Speaker 0: All right.
Speaker 8: I.
Speaker 1: And I think the two councilwoman. But Isaac passes unanimous. Thank you very much. Let's give them a round of applause. Thank you. We're going to hear item 15, please. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to receive and file a presentation by Green Education, Inc. regarding local community efforts to comply with Green House Gas reduction goals. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0306 | Speaker 1: The last item that's been asked to be moved forward tonight, I know it's been a lot of them. Tonight is item 27. And then we'll start with the regular agenda. And Madam Clerk.
Speaker 2: Item 27 is a communication from Councilman Austin Councilmember Peers. Councilwoman Price Recommendation to support SB 687 regarding emergency rooms.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much. I think this this bill is SB six, eight, seven, I think is pretty cut and dry and self-explanatory. It would require nonprofit hospitals in California to obtain approval from the state attorney general before closing an emergency department or at least hold a one public hearing about planning codes closure. Currently, the Attorney General has regulatory authority over the state sale of state nonprofit hospitals, but not over the plant closures. This legislation is supported by emergency room nurses, as well as the California professional firefighters. This is a time sensitive matter as this legislation is about to be considered an important policy committee. I know there are few people here to speak on this, but I would ask for your support. I think this is something important to Long Beach because we do have some large nonprofit hospitals in the city of Long Beach.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 10: Yes, I wanted to thank my colleague, Councilmember Austin, for bringing this forward. I know that some of us are supporting statewide bills, that there's some urgency to those bills to make sure that we are putting our support in front of those. And obviously, any closing of emergency rooms or any access to health care that might impact our residents is something that's of high importance to us. And so thank you for bringing this forward. I know it's time sensitive and I would urge my colleagues to support it. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Any public comment on this? C No public seeing no public comment on this or someone please come forward.
Speaker 0: But good evening, Mayor and.
Speaker 4: Distinguished members of the Long Beach City Council and those present in the audience today. My name is Joe Celestin and I am a community member of SEIU U EASTVIEW and proud millennial I to support the SB 67 resolution. Because over the past few decades there have been too many emergency rooms closures in the state of health in California.
Speaker 0: Excuse me.
Speaker 4: California is the last in the country. In the country when it comes to emergency departments per capita, a 6.7 per 1 million people. These emergency rooms closures have resulted in overcrowding, longer waits and ambulances to have to drive further distance to get patients to the. You're seeing how nonprofit hospitals are heavily subsidized by taxpayers such as myself and all of you.
Speaker 0: They should have an obligation to.
Speaker 4: The communities they are surrounded by. If we don't do something now to stop breeding of air closures, then my generation will be worse off than previous generations. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Good evening, Mayor. City Council and Long Beach Community. My name is Edna Rivera and I'm a financial counselor at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, and I'm a proud member of SEIU United Health Care Workers. It's a statewide union that represents 90,000 members. I'm here to voice my support for the State Bill 687 resolution. This closing of the emergency rooms across the state of California can have a devastating effect on our communities, especially the communities that include Latinos, African-Americans, women, the uninsured, Medi-Cal beneficiaries, E.R. closures, forcing emergency responders to travel long distance to transport patients to an unavailable E.R., which may cause negative health impacts for patients in need of emergency treatment. SB 687 would require any nonprofit that operates are control of health facilities to write a notice to and obtain consent of the Attorney General prior to a reduction of eliminations of the level of emergencies emergency services. It also requires that public hearing be held to allow community members, like all of us, to voice how the closures would impact our community. In the end, this bill would help ensure that the hub.
Speaker 8: For.
Speaker 2: The harmful ripple effect of air closures are minimized or minimized in our communities. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilman Austin, any other words? Okay, we can do a voice vote starting on. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 5: I. I.
Speaker 0: I. I.
Speaker 1: Kate. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Moving on to the next item. We're actually we had one other request we're going to do item 14. So. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Council to support SB 687 regarding emergency rooms and request City Manager to communicate the City's support to the bill's author and our state legislative delegation. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0124 | Speaker 1: Kate. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Moving on to the next item. We're actually we had one other request we're going to do item 14. So.
Speaker 2: Item 14 is a report from Parks Recreation Submarine recommendation to receive and file information regarding restorations of the senior meal program at Cesar Chavez and Cerrado, Silverado Parks District one and seven.
Speaker 1: Okay, Councilman Gonzales.
Speaker 9: Yes, I'd like to see if there's a staff report. But while we're waiting for our staff member to get here, I just would like to first thank our senior advisory commission. And I know members of the Gray Panthers that are here as well that have expressed a lot of interest in bringing back the senior food program, both at Chavez and Silverado. I'm glad to hear that it is positively heading in that direction and it could be maybe staffed up very soon. So we'll hear more information very shortly as Marie comes down. And then I'll just sit here and talk and talk until she can come down. That's okay. But I also want to say thank you to Marie as well. She and I chatted. I know that she has worked with a senior advisory commission and I really appreciate your work as well. And here she is. Thank you, Marie.
Speaker 8: Good evening.
Speaker 6: My apologies. You know, trying to do a little business in the back.
Speaker 9: That's all right.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Good evening, Mayor. Members of the City Council. On February 21st, the staff was asked to report back to the city. At that time, the city council and outlining costs related to restoring the meal program at the current state and the current state of the transportation services provided by Long Beach Transit to the two sites at Cesar Chavez and Silverado Park. At that time, the council requested that staff look at other options to fund these two sites and solutions for transportation issues. So this is our status report and an update. In the past few months, staff has researched options for providing senior meals at these two sites. First, reaching back out to HSA to see if they were in a better financial position to return services to these two sites. And unfortunately, their funding has not increased. And as reported previously, the total cost to restore meals at both of these sites by using the HSA program would be over $100,000. Staff then reached out to organizations that may be in the area already providing meals and to through other programs, and contacted multiple community organizations including Empowered for Life, Food Finders, Workforce Development, Aging and Community Services in LA and Women in Action reaching out to ascertain if any of these organizations had either the capacity to add additional sites or if they knew other programs that could be in existence. After multiple conversations, we're excited to report that Women in Action Reaching Out. A local nonprofit organization has offered to provide meals to our seniors at Cesar Chavez and Silverado Parks. The meals will be served Monday through Friday, beginning on Monday, April 24th, from 12 p.m. to 1 p.m.. They will be served either hot or cold and come prepackaged to meet the USDA serving sizes and the organization will be requesting a suggested donation of $1 per meal. Although this will not be mandatory. Women in action. Reaching out has been serving various communities in Long Beach since 2012. They provide meals and snacks to seniors, teens and youth residing in the Carmelite housing area on a year round basis. In addition, they provide afterschool meals at a park in Compton. Meals are also provided to seniors who participate in activities at the Long Beach Expo Center, located in Bixby Knolls. Ms.. Mrs. King, the CEO of Women in Action, reaching out is a very passionate person about her services to the community and is dedicated to providing the best services ever and is very excited about serving our seniors at these two sites. Staff is currently working with the organization on the proper insurance, health permits and agreements, and we are excited to be starting that program next week. We will also continue to research and identify additional locations in these areas that may be providing senior meals, such as local churches and other services and other agencies in case there are other options available for our residents. Finally, we are also in conversation with Meals on Wheels Long Beach to explore the opportunity of enhancing the Meals program at these two sites. To also include meals to homebound seniors. With respect to transportation. In August of 2012, the Long Beach Transit discontinued their passport services to Chavez Park. It was replaced with Route 151, where standard fares apply. The passport service was, as you are aware, a free service. There were no major changes to Route 191 at the time, which stops in front of Silverado Park. The discontinuation of the passport service and the discontinuation of the two meal sites were within months of each other and likely one did not affect the other. Both agencies cited the discontinuation of service because of low participation. I have been in contact with Ken MacDonnell, the CEO of Long Beach Transit, and Mr. McDonald explained that the majority of the three passport services were discontinued several years ago, mainly due to the fact that a lot of their subsidy is based on the number of paid ridership. So the more free ridership.
Speaker 10: That they offered, they.
Speaker 6: Then would be hurt with reduced subsidy. So they only left one free passport service in place. That said, Mr. McDonald understands the issues and wants to be a part of the solution and he will be working with his team and ours to identify opportunities for discounted passes for our seniors to get to these locations, or possibly working together to locate community partners who are interested in funding free passes for our seniors. We hope to have some movement on this issue within the next month and be able to come back to the council to report on that. In addition, on March 23rd, 2017, Long Beach Transit also hosted a community meeting to discuss their systemwide transit analysis and reassessment initiative, which will take an in-depth look into Long Beach Transit's current transit operations, such as one time performance ridership, route efficiency, staffing, etc.. It will also set priorities that will carry Long Beach transit into the future. Two of our senior advisory commissioners in their roles as advocates for our seniors, attended the meeting and presented a proposal for the reinstatement of the passport program on a route to include Cesar Chavez Park. In addition, we have been researching other alternative transportation options for our seniors to utilize to get to these two sites. One option we found could be the immediate needs transportation program operated by L.A. Metro. Through this program, there is a possibility of receiving free bus tokens and passes and taxi vouchers to provide to our seniors who are participating in the Meals program. We have been informed that there is currently a waiting list for this program and we are submitting the necessary paperwork to be on that waiting list. We have also been working with the HSA regarding their Rider Relief Transportation Program, which also provides senior access to reduced cost monthly bus fares. A representative from this program will be visiting both meal sites next week to provide information to the seniors on how they can enroll in the program and receive coupons and vouchers for the discounts. Again, we will continue to look at the opportunities for transportation as we move forward, but we are very pleased that we will be able to reinstate the meals program at these two sites starting next week. That is the end of my report.
Speaker 9: Well, that was great. Thank you so much, Marie. I appreciate it. This was a very in-depth report. I'm glad. I'm very happy. That will be bringing back the meal program to both of these locations. Cesar Chavez Park. Jan Peyser, Community Center as well as Silverado. And I look forward to certainly passing this item here now, but also looking forward to seeing the report come back in a month. That will include additional information about transportation. And I know our senior advisory commission is here. I know they'll continue to work and bring better ideas and more ideas to that discussion. I know a few things that have been mentioned so far that I would just like for us to take into consideration. But I myself am also in communication with Ken McDonald. I've been in talks with you as well. I'm glad we're all on the same page here. In addition to looking at alternative transportation options, bringing back some routes, looking for either free bus passes or some discounted bus passes, I would also like us to kind of open up the question to Long Beach Transit as it really depends on them. You know, they have their own board, their own director, but really looking at also ways that we can add more more stops near build senior buildings. I think that some have been changed, have been moved around, and I think that just creates an additional barrier for them to get to and fro different areas. So I think that's just something for us to look at and then just creating more access in general for that. So again, thank you so very much. Thank you to everyone who's here and I look forward to hearing more.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Council member gearing up.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Mayor. Well, I commend the staff and in their research on getting the program back on line. I think that we still have a responsibility to our seniors that this program should be institutionalized within the city and not have to rely on philanthropic workers, organizations and their generosity to help us keep this program going. So I hope that in the future discussions, we can look at other ways to institutionalize it. So we're not having to go out and reach into the philanthropic community to sustain programs that we should be responsible for here. I also want to commend staff for their efforts in transportation. It's out of our control. However, I think that we need to also work with our partners in transportation, such as Long Beach Transit, to make transportation more affordable and more accommodating to our seniors so that they can get from point A to point B without having having it be a major effort and an all day endeavor for them to get to where they need to be. So I'm looking forward to next month's report. Hopefully it can be a very good one. But again, I want to see the city move forward with institutionalizing the food program for seniors. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 10: Yes, I just want I really think Marie Knight for a thorough report and for my colleagues for pushing the conversation forward. We know that our senior population is a growing population and we have a senior center in my district and it's a great place to visit and it is a place where we do have access to a lot of different meal programs there. And so making sure that this is something that other districts in areas have is really important to me. And I really appreciate you circling back with public transit. I know it's one of the things that we're trying to work on as well. And so I support everything that you guys are doing and I would continue to support trying to institutionalize, you know, ensure that these programs are reoccurring with some city support. And also just really a big thank you to the nonprofits and the community groups out there that step up to do this work because you're not required to do that. So thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 7: Thank you. And I also like to just agree with my colleagues. I want to thank Marie Knight and Parks and Recreation and Marine Four for their work and their efforts to improve services, in address services for our seniors all across the city, and particularly in the areas of senior meals and transit access. It was it was mentioned that by Councilmember Gonzalez that she'd like to see more access points. I think there is opportunity, particularly in terms of engaging, engaging Long Beach transit. They do have no more resources now as a result of Measure M and and SB one. And so we should, should encourage them to increase, improves transit services and use those resources to improve transit services to our seniors. I also want to commend women in action reaching out. I know I made the recommendation that when this issue came before us, that we look at that organization, organization as doing some amazing work out of the Carmen Leto's community. If you go there on a daily basis, you can see a team of volunteers, women in action, reaching out, preparing hundreds of meals and feeding hundreds of seniors in North Long Beach and now in Compton. I believe now they'll be volunteering their services for seniors on the West Side into two park locations, which I think is awesome. And it shows the capacity and amazing potential to integrate our senior communities throughout the city of Long Beach. And so but I will agree with our Councilmember Urunga, in terms of the sustainability, I'd like to see that program be sustainable in an organization like Women in actually reaching out. I think, you know, there should be a codified agreement in a contract at some point in the future to to make sure that those services are are sustainable and that there are the seniors cannot can depend on them moving forward in terms of their quality of life. And yeah, I'm just proud that that that we're having an impact and able to to touch the lives of hundreds of more seniors throughout the city. And so good luck and look forward to it coming back. I'll support this.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. There's a motion and a second, I think, with a public comment. Stepped away with that. Did we do public comment? No. Let's look. Set the way. I wasn't sure if that happened when I stepped away. So public comment, please come forward if you have public comment. I get a lot of time from guys tonight. I apologize if you get tired of hearing from me about anyway. Bill again from Council District three. Maureen, I want to thank you for bringing this attention for the meals program to these very important parks. There are some programs in Los Angeles County where the increase has needed and the demand has increased. In fact, there's now a waiting lists for some food programs in Los Angeles County. We don't want to hear this kind of thing. However, regarding transportation, I would like to see a collaboration between the City Hall, Language Transit and Uber and Lyft. Uber just released their financials. Last year, they had $6.5 billion in profits. I think they could afford a little reinvestment in our community, which they're participating in. And also, I'd like to say that last week at Cal State, Long Beach, I believe, Marie, you were there for the aging and reimagining aging. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend that event. I was in Los Angeles attending the first annual ever AARP first annual elder summit. Got a lot of great information. Metro was there. They're asking for our feedback. So I'd like to see and I know Mayor Garcia is on the Metro board now. So I'd like to see some kind of collaboration, if we can. Something that we can do there as well. We are more than glad to send to you via email to your office the presentation that was performed by Metro there on their long ago program for transportation. There was a lot of great knowledge there for seniors, so definitely I'd like to support this item. Marie, thank you for your support and I'll definitely be contacting you on other items on seniors. Thank you.
Speaker 8: Good evening.
Speaker 6: I'm Mary Alice. You? I'm the chairperson for the Senior Citizens Advisory Commission, and we have been working on this.
Speaker 8: Project for Meals.
Speaker 6: For.
Speaker 8: Seniors for one year. Exactly. So we have been very patient in waiting.
Speaker 6: It's taken a lot of organization and a lot of meetings.
Speaker 8: And so we are now finally coming to fruition.
Speaker 6: And I want to thank Marie and her staff for all the work that they did. And I also want to thank Lena Gonzalez for her patience and waiting. And so I'm happy to see that we're going to be able to have some nutrition for our seniors and hopefully.
Speaker 8: We can get Ken McDonald, the CEO.
Speaker 6: From Long Beach Transit, to hear our message in our voice and and do the proper things so that we can bring our seniors there. Thank you very much.
Speaker 8: Karen Reseda, resident of the first district and secretary for the Long Beach Gray Panthers. And thank you, Mary, for all your work in getting this program back. I am. These lunch programs are absolutely critical for low income senior population. A lot of them depend on these programs. It's often their only hot meal of the day. I know when I find myself going to many meetings, that's the only hot meal I get. I participate in the lunch program over at the Fourth Street Senior Center, and there's regularly over 100 people and usually 10 to 15 people that come in, get on the waitlist, and oftentimes they don't get served because there's not enough food, because the demand is so large. But even more critical in the food and the transportation is the socialization opportunities for many seniors. The senior center is the hub of their socialization experience. So thank you all for supporting this and thank you your anger, Mr. Erakat, for suggesting that it be institutionalized. It really does need to be used for the well-being of our seniors and our community and keeping them healthy and aging in homes and reducing our health care costs . I want to hitch a ride on her last statement. She said. The seniors are in homes.
Speaker 0: However.
Speaker 8: As your homeless count will bear when the record is finally posted on your website. It's taken in January, but it's not up yet. The homeless count. That a passenger, a large percentage of those people are homeless. So you have seniors who not only are not part of your social structure because they are homeless, many of them are scraping on their food stamp card, the general relief card. And they're not getting to those meals. In thing, seniors said service centers that you're now going to restore and because they're considered public outcry casts. Some of them might have to show up dirty. And because they know that if they showed up dirty, that they wouldn't be socially accepted. They're not going to make it. So as we're seeking to restore your meals. I want to remind us of a man who died on the side of the Bank of America building in District four. He was taken off the street a month before he died. But he sat there morning after morning. Some people would bring him food. But I wonder what would would have happened if he had been invited into the singer's center. Someone would have noticed, oh, he's homeless. So he instead of being taken off the street one month before he died, if he had been invited into the senior center for Meals, he might have been off the street earlier than one month before he died. We think, in terms of seniors who are in housing. But many of you seniors who are homeless, seniors who are homeless will not see even these meals. Now. I'm 56. We're all going to be singers one day. If some of us already are. In front of me and behind me. What is it going to take? To get the same news that you counted in January who are homeless. Into those centers where these meals are. What is it going to take us to do this? And when you go to sleep tonight, I hope that's on your mind. What? What can I do personally?
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. President. Would you like to speak on?
Speaker 4: Those of you who know me know that I rarely speak after public comment. I don't think it's right that we have the last word. But these comments tonight were so egregious that I have to respond. So I'm references a particular individual in the fourth District, Richard, was a success story. We got him off the street and into housing. So I just want to set the record straight there. Ask anyone in our health department. They'll tell you that this was a miracle, what we did. Also, just to set the record straight on the homeless count, I watched it for many, many years. I don't ever remember it being out before late April. So there's nothing new about that. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. This is Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 9: Yes. I just wanted to add one last thing, is that I think in when we brought this item forward some time ago, this was really done in honor of Ruth Ricker in terms of bringing the meal program back. And I know the senior advisory commission knows that, and I know that we're looking to possibly rename this after her. She was a fantastic person that really believed in bringing that back also for the socialization issue. But this will be a great memory for her. Thank you.
Speaker 5: Thank you very much. I see no more. We have no one more individual than the diocese. Okay, fine. We'll do a voice count. Please cast your vote. I. I. I.
Speaker 4: I. I. I. I.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: No, I'm fine. Thank you. Notamment. Yes. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to receive and file information regarding restoration of the senior meal program at Cesar E. Chavez and Silverado Parks. (Districts 1,7) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0289 | Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Okay, let's go back to number seven now.
Speaker 2: This year. Item seven is a report from Economic and Property Development recommendation to authorize city manager to execute an agreement with KPMG Corporate Finance to assist city in evaluation and selection process for the operator of the Grand Prix in an amount not to exceed 50,000. District two.
Speaker 10: Hi. Thank you. I wanted to thank everybody that's worked on this and ensuring that, you know, we are doing our best research to choose the best operator for this event. And I wanted to just clarify that this study will also include outreach to other cities and financial impacts that have been positive and or neutral or negative in those cities. Could you answer that for me, please?
Speaker 4: So we now have John Keisler, the director of Economic Development and property management.
Speaker 0: Honorable mayor and city councilmembers. So the consultant that's been selected for this study is KPMG. And what they will do with regard to outreach, to the references that were contained within their proposal, is that they'll both review those references and reach out to contacts familiar with the projects and other cities that are similar to the Grand Prix . They will structure.
Speaker 12: The review to get information to support the city in evaluation against the criteria noted in the RFQ and.
Speaker 0: Help the city identify other cities that are not included in the proposal. But the responses are still of relevance. And so essentially they will conduct outreach of of places that both the Formula One and the IndyCar race operators have have previously run races and work with those.
Speaker 12: Organizations to both review technically what what was accomplished there and ultimately what the financial impacts and results were of.
Speaker 0: Those those events.
Speaker 10: Great. Thank you. I just wanted to, you know, state that I think, you know, making sure that we're activating the space in downtown is so important. And the fact that we're taking the time out to really look at the best financial impact for the city is a great opportunity. And so I just wanted to make sure that this did include that research. So thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I have Councilmember Austin. Somebody rang. I'm sorry.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Yeah, I suppose. Support this, this motion. But I also want to keep in mind that we did get I'm wearing my other hat as a member of the Coastal Commission that we did get a four year permit for the current operator. So I hope that when the study is completed that that is taken into consideration as well.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember Austin.
Speaker 7: With that that actually thank you, Councilmember. That that actually begs another question that I guess should be studied here is in terms of any any other applicants to to to run this race. Would they have to go through other agencies for approval? And and what would that look like in terms of timeline? What will be in terms of the US looking at the study, what will be the and this is first of questions will be the and have we considered the financial impact to the applicants in terms of prolonging this this process? I'm a little concerned about that piece of it. And then lastly, I do appreciate staff and the opportunity to have this this conversation behind the rail. It was on consent college calendar. But just some clarification, Mr. City Manager, could you tell us what is the policy for for contracts? Because I think this this falls underneath the threshold.
Speaker 4: This was a sole source. So this would fall within the policy that we've had in the past.
Speaker 7: And the other questions. I'd be happy to entertain.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I was incorrect. I'm going to let John and I'm sorry.
Speaker 0: Council member. My apologies. I didn't jump on the button. Yes. So we did issue an RFP and received two proposals for the evaluation of the responses we got from the operators. What we have in terms of policy is that anything that is competitively bid and we receive, you know, three or more proposals under $200,000 we would not
Speaker 12: . Have to bring to City Council per the purchasing policy. However, there are two stages to this review. In the first stages, as it indicates in the staff letter, there was a $50,000 effort to help in the preparation.
Speaker 0: Of the original RFP, which was awarded to a separate consulting firm. Mr. Schaefer And then this $150,000 proposal, which took us to the $200,000 amount and triggered the need to come to council was the technical and financial review of the proposals that we received after the RFP had closed. So there were two phases.
Speaker 12: To this review and per conversations with the city attorney and with with purchasing, it was determined that was the same project.
Speaker 0: And so even though they're different operators, same project, we reached the amount that we should bring this before the city council.
Speaker 7: Okay. And then my other question was in terms of the financial impact to the bidders.
Speaker 0: Absolutely. And so so we're very cognizant of the the timeline, given that 2018 the Grand Prix is coming soon and the current operator has obligations as well as commitments from sponsors and others. So we've committed to the council and KPMG, the consultant here, has committed to returning this review within a 60 to 90 day period so that we have time to.
Speaker 12: To bring back the recommendations to council this summer, hopefully early this summer, and provide a sufficient timeline for the existing operator to.
Speaker 0: Make make plans and make those commitments.
Speaker 7: Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Do you count to membership or not?
Speaker 4: Thank you. I just want to follow up on that 60 to 90 day window. Believe me, I'm the last man in the world who wants to bring this up. But we had a study done by someone on the international terminal. That original timeframe just got expanded so much and we were criticized for that. Is there any type of just absolute number they can plug in here not to exceed? I'm thinking 60 days. And then after that fact, we don't take it to other commissions or whatnot, but it's a hard and fast time. Also, I don't want to speak for the current operator, but I'll just tell you my personal experience and anyone within the sound of my voice can go to Joe Joe's Facebook page. And what the association did was they loaned us a two seater street legal Indy car the week before the the race. We drove it over to Jojo and took a picture in front of that establishment. They put it on their Facebook page, and as of right now, it has 925 likes and 99 shares. That kind of energy, I think, is diminished as time goes on. I think you strike while the iron is hot, you reel in these sponsors and boy, if this drags out too long, I just think it it really destroys the energy from the race. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Is your public comment on this item? Please come forward.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor. Council members. Councilmember Suber, now thank you very much for your kind comments. My name is Mike Murchison. I'm here tonight on behalf of the Grand Prix Association of Long Beach. I think we all agree it was a successful event. It was a terrific opportunity for the city to be showcased. What we're asking for tonight is basically what Mr. Keisler referenced in Darryl, what you reference, which was basically a timeline to get this back a time certain we can ill afford as a city to have this extend out towards the end of the year. And if you looked at the staff letter that was written in the agenda item, it mentioned the third quarter of 17. It didn't say that there was going to be a vote at that time period. It just mentioned that the eye would come back from KPMG. My concern on behalf of the association is if you watched the city process, the city process would then take that back to management. Management would review it, put it on the closed session calendar, and you're now looking at towards the end of 17. That's a big concern for the sponsors of the Grand Prix. Those are existing, those that are considering. So we're asking much like what Councilman Super and I mentioned that you have a time certain of 60 days, then plenty of time. We've had this RFP sitting out there now. It was quiet from December to March. The RFP was out. The two teams responded. They were submitted back in November. It's time to move this forward so we can get forward with a great race for 18. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Any of the public comment, please come forward. CNN. And I think, obviously, Mr. West, I think what you're obviously hearing from from the Council on Folks is want to make sure that this is done. Obviously, we have to we have to go through the process, but that was done expeditiously and that we're not lag in this at all because I think clarity for, you know, for our our current partner and other possible folks who are interested I think is really important. And so I know that I and others will be kind of ensuring that we stay on track and get this done as soon as possible. Okay. There's a motion on a second. We're going to take a vote. Voice vote again. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 5: I. I.
Speaker 0: I.
Speaker 4: I.
Speaker 10: I.
Speaker 1: Okay. Unanimous again. Thank you. I just did the consent calendar and the item that was pulled off consent. We're going to go on with this yet, right. So let me do some some of the public comment that we didn't get to Summer Hanson, then Sherry Martinez than Dan O'Leary. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute an Agreement with KPMG Corporate Finance, LLC, to assist the City in the evaluation and selection process for the operator of the Grand Prix of Long Beach, in an amount not to exceed $150,000 over a one-year term. (District 2) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0275 | Speaker 1: Okay, thank you very much. Is the toilet Marshall here? Okay. That concludes the public comment and no agenda items. We're going to go back to the agenda item. Next item, please.
Speaker 2: Should we take the hearing.
Speaker 1: Out to the hearing?
Speaker 2: Hearing item one is a report from Development Services recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record. Conclude a public hearing and accept categorical exemption. C e de 17 Dash 053 Declare ordinance amending chapter 21.56 of the law between this barcode. Read the first time and lead over to the next regular meeting of the City Council for Final Reading and a resolution directing the Development Director of Development Services to submit a request to the California Coastal Commission to certify an amendment to the Certified Local Coastal Program Citywide.
Speaker 1: Okay, Mr. West.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The staff report for the hearing will be given by Linda Tatum, our planning bureau manager.
Speaker 8: Good evening, Mayor. A members of the City Council. I have a brief presentation on this item and I'd like to introduce the project team to work on this, which is Scott Kinsey, the project planner, and Meredith Elgin representing the Public Works Department. This item is a request for a zoning ordinance amendment, and the amendment will change the way of wireless telecommunication facilities in the public. Right of way are regulated. It was initiated by the director of Public Works and the city attorney's office and also working with the planning staff in response to a significant increase in the number of micro wireless telecommunication facilities in the right of way. The intent of this request is to provide enhanced esthetic standards for these wireless telecommunication facilities and also to streamline the permitting process. It would also add a greater clarity for the predictability for applicants who go through that process. It's also intended to be a short term fix because staff would like to, with the approval of this patch ordinance, staff would be working on a comprehensive ordinance to bring back to the City Council for consideration. And we anticipate such an ordinance being completed within six months. What I'd like to do is just give you a little bit of background in June of 2011. This Council adopted the current zoning regulations for wireless telecommunication facilities, and at that time, most of the type of wireless communication facilities that we were seeing or what we call the macro wireless facilities, and these are typically located on private property. And they come in three different types or three common types, but we call the monopoles. They're also designated by the rooftop roof mounted sites that are integrated into the building that you see in the center slide there. And they could also be mounted on electrical transmission towers, which you see on the the top figure at the right and. These types of of sites actually give a carrier more broad area coverage and they each independently make up a cell in a much larger network of cell sites. The regulations for these type of macro sites are not going to be changed, that they are currently regulated by the Planning Commission through a c you p process. So they those are not the subject of the the pact legislation we're considering tonight. In 2011, the ordinance that was adopted was for the that at the time of that legislation in 2011, the micro cell sites were we're kind of a new technology. So the 2011 regulations didn't really adequately address those that type of technology. And this new micro site, it's a much smaller size and it's typically located in the public right of way. It's most often located on existing infrastructure, such as light poles and sometimes utility poles. And they're referred to, as I mentioned earlier, as micro sites or small cells. And rather than providing the area wide coverage, like the larger macro cell sites do, they actually fill smaller gaps between the macro sites and they also provide increased capacity within the macro sites coverage area. So the regulations that we adopted in the city in 2011 represented the best practices at that time for that new technology. However, in the year since 2011, the city has received a significant increase in the number of these micro Apple Micro site applications and specifically beginning it in at the beginning of 2016, we've received approximately 80 applications for these type of sites. So I'd like to give you a couple of it, show you a couple of examples of the small cells that were recently constructed in Long Beach. These are two here, and these are under the current regulations, again, fairly unobtrusive. Now, I'd like to go to Slide six in order to better respond to the development environment and the strong market for these types of facilities. We find it necessary to revise the current regulations to provide greater esthetic standards and better what we call location standards. And also, as I mentioned earlier, to clarify the process, streamline the process and make it a more efficient process for applicants. And what we really want to do is to encourage are esthetic and appropriately sized on small cell facilities that are sensitive to the context of where they're being located and that do not create a visual impact or a negative visual impact on the city's corridors, either through their size, the scale or their location. And the patch ordinance would would critically, most critically address these particular issues. Okay. We talked about the fact that the city has invested heavily in the the esthetics of the right way to make them safe, to make them attractive. And the idea behind this is to increase those esthetic standards so that these facilities do not negatively impact the city's investment in its ride away quarters. But I'd like to show you here is the type of design that our design standards would encourage. As you can see here on the slide to the left, at the very top of the facility of that, that structure is the actual facility. And at the bottom, you can see and the detail on the right shows, the mechanical equipment that's associated for the the micro site at the top of that structure. What I'd like to share with you now are the generally other types of similar esthetically acceptable styles that our our ordinance would encourage. Again, very unobtrusive, not very easily visible. So you'd have to really look to know that a wireless or a micro cell is on those structures. Now I'd like to show you in what some of these facility, what some of these facilities look like in other communities that don't have the type of esthetic standards that we're proposing. And you can see how these are very unattractive. They don't respect the context of the street and the environment, and they just do not contribute anything to the character of the city or to the adjacent development. So these are the types of of standards that we would like to particularly prohibit in the city. Okay. The other is, as I mentioned earlier, the idea behind the ordinance is to update it, at least temporarily, until such time as staff can work through some of the issues. We would update some of the definitions. We would clarify the permitting requirements, remove some of the language in the ordinance that's vague or confusing, and would also prohibit these type of facilities being installed on wooden poles. And of course, one of the other requirements is that we would require a higher standard of evidence for the applicant who would like to install these when they indicate that they can't meet the city's preferred location standards. So that essentially concludes the presentation, the technical presentation. It just like to briefly talk about the next steps in this process. Following tonight's council action on the ordinance, the staff would continue to work as a team. We would work with the the public works department, the Planning Department. And I would just note that the Public Works Department brought in an outside legal counsel who specializes in the preparation of wireless ordinances. So we have the benefit of their their advice as well, having worked in other cities and worked on wireless communication cases in the courts. So staff would like to conclude this presentation by recommending that the City Council consider the recommendation on this item that was taken by the Planning Commission at its public hearing last month. They recommended that this item be adopted by the City Council. So staff. Our recommendation is that Council will adopt this ordinance and the resolution that would forward this action to the local to the Coastal Commission for for action. And with that, as I noted, we have our staff planner here as well as a public works representative, and we'd be happy to respond to any questions from the city council.
Speaker 1: And he comes after Pierce?
Speaker 10: No, just thank you for the staff report. Appreciate the work.
Speaker 1: Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 9: Likewise. Thank you so much. This is a very thorough staff report. I'm looking forward to seeing the changes and how they manifest in our city public comment.
Speaker 1: They see none that's going caps or votes. I think the clerk said that they have it working now. It was. Let's try it one more time. Nope. Okay. Nope. Not. Not. We're going back to the real county. It's not working. That's okay. Let's go find Austin.
Speaker 5: Hi. Hi. Hi.
Speaker 4: I.
Speaker 10: I i.
Speaker 1: Unanimous. Thank you very much. Back to the next item, please. | Ordinance | Recommendation to declare ordinance amending and restating Chapter 21.56, related to Wireless Telecommunications Facilities, read and adopted as read. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0288 | Speaker 2: Item 17 is a report from Development Services. Recommendation to receive and file report and presentation on the development of a comprehensive wayfinding signage program citywide.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. And I turn this over. Councilman Gonzales from the city staffers, the presentation. Okay. I know we have a important presentation on this, and I turn this over to Mr. West. Thank you, Mr. West.
Speaker 4: Mayor, council members, you might recall, I think, the first city retreat that we've had in over a decade at Long Beach City College. This subject was discussed by the new city council.
Speaker 1: It wasn't a decade.
Speaker 4: Since a retreat. Yes. I don't think we've had a retreat in over a decade.
Speaker 1: Oh, okay. I thought you said a decade ago I was like, wow.
Speaker 4: No, but we haven't we've not had a retreat in over a decade. It was the first retreat. And at that time, the new council.
Speaker 1: Does feel like a decade ago.
Speaker 0: I just. Okay.
Speaker 4: Well, it's been a lot of work and I'm just now it's over to the assistant city manager, Tom Modica, who's been working closely with the design team, Linda Tatum, Development Services. And I think what you're going to see tonight is going to fulfill all the talk and dreams, hopes and dreams that we had when this came up at the retreat. And take. Take it away, Tom. I think this is a very exciting report. Thank you, Mr. Manager. Mr. Mayor, members of the council. You will have a presentation. We will actually go over the actual gateway signage program and. And and show that to everybody. I do want to spend a little bit of time talking about how we got here. This is, as the manager mentioned, this has been a big priority for the mayor and the city council to really enhance what our gateways look like. It's been a long time since we've looked at our gateway signs. We did one back probably in the mid 2000s in throughout the city funded mostly the redevelopment. And then we also did some downtown back in the early 2000, just downtown specific. You received a briefing back in August to talk a little bit about what the public outreach was going to be, knowing that public outreach is really important. So we've done a significant amount of public outreach. We've talked to over 300 groups in 750 interview surveys that we receive back to help inform this design. So you're going to hear now from Melinda Tatum. We'll talk a little bit about kind of the history and and starting, you know, the kind of the overview of this. And then you'll hear from our design consultants, Albert Perkins, before we talk about next steps. So. Linda Tatum.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Mr. Modica. I'd like to start the presentation by just talking about how excited we are to be able to finally bring this to you. And what I'd like to do is to turn it over to our consultant. So Albert Perkins and Cliff Silbert will make a detailed presentation and staff will close out the presentation with comments regarding the next steps. But I'd also like to introduce our the planner who worked on this project, Gerard Coleman, who's sitting here at the dice with me. So, Cliff, if you could do the staff present the presentation on this item. Thank you.
Speaker 11: Thank you. Thank you, Linda. Thank you, Tom. Thank you, Gerard. And thank you to the honorable mayor and council. We really appreciate the opportunity to be able to present this exciting work to you. Just to get started. Everybody has a package in front of them. It looks like the goals of this project really to focus in on three different areas of the city as a starting point. One is to enhance the city's identity and update the entry monuments into the city. The second goal is to improve the parking signage and helping people to find parking. The third goal was to help people through a consistent wayfinding program, not to find a way around downtown into coastal areas, and ultimately to identify and eliminate problems with existing signs which might be inaccurate or confusing have information gaps are redundant, but probably most of all, there's a lot of clutter out there and a lot of sign clutter, so we want to clean all that up and reintroduce a new system that can enhance the city. We are the ultimate approach for the vehicular science system is to look at the city entries, parking and then access to the to the coast as well. As we just heard, we did an extensive public outreach program. I apologize for not having your names all on here. We interviewed over 300 people from different advocacy groups, including biking, aquatics, the Queen Mary, all kinds of different neighborhood groups, individuals, and certainly many of you on the city council as well. And I thank you for your participation in this process. We also put out a digital survey on your website and got approximately 750 responses, actually quite a few more than that at last count. And that included 92% residents, 6% commuters and a few tourists as well. And what we heard is very consistent group of words about what people love about Long Beach and what makes it unique. And they said it's diverse, it's creative, it's progressive, it's vibrant, inclusive, casual and relaxed and a great waterfront with unique, friendly, small time feel to all of its neighborhoods. And I think just I've attended a few city council meetings. It's pretty clear that's what this city's about. It's diverse, it's open, and people are very optimistic and progressive in this town. Some of the ideas also came up and said, Well, if you can do a city science system, maybe you should put a slogan on the city sign system. So the kinds of ideas people expressed were the international city, the gateway to the Pacific, unique neighborhoods, great city, aquatics, capital of America, where the going is easy, the bike friendly city. In other words, a lot of different ideas about what the city slogan could be. Our recommendation is to not put a city slogan on your signs. The reasons are multiple, but some of the key ones are. The signs will last for decades. City slogans tend to be part of ad campaigns, and they're better integrated with advertising, promotions, merchandise and visitor information. And they can really enhance the merchandise, the promotions, the advertising, the visitor information by constantly being updated and being kept up with the time city slogans can really be interpreted to to sell products, too. So we recommend that for those slogans are used and Long Beach is very diverse. We've heard that over and over again, and city slogans can be interpreted differently by different residents, visitors and nationalities. And frankly, I don't think you'll ever come to a consensus or agreement on a perfect city slogan that will last for the next two decades. So just a note about that. As we looked at the city, there are many existing gateways into the city, although I wonder how many of you would actually know when you've entered the city of Long Beach. We've heard it's one of the largest cities in California, but I've passed through it a thousand times and I still wonder why I'm in the city when I'm not in the city. So one of the the focuses is to look at the primary gateways into the city. It really announced and proudly make everybody understand when they've entered the city language, give it some awareness, give it a sense of place. Science can do a lot of things, but one of the things it does extremely well is it creates a great sense of place for people and they can be feeling part of that place. So we'll be looking at reprioritizing what you're seeing here as the yellow dots, but none of the locations are finalized at this point. We'll be working with internal groups, with the city and with yourselves to define the final locations. The existing conditions in this, frankly, makes it look pretty good. There are a lot of signs out there that are falling apart that are very. Poor condition are illegible. They're very dirty. They're not well maintained. And then as you look at city parking, it's a wide range of visual language out there. People get confused. They just have no idea where to park. In fact, you have quite a bit of parking available and nobody knows how to get to it. And then on the gateways are all different styles and different versions of it. Some you can't read at all. They're just too small to read, but mostly they're out of date. So we want to take a new look at how to enhance the entry experience and how do you find your way to parking into the coast. So as we look at Gateway signs there, the city has a very powerful and clear logo and identity. And we looked at introducing these elements at different types of gateways through the city, including a signature gateway, which would be large letters, vertical gateways, which have a number of vertical posts and a color palette that is part of the city brand and enhances and gives us a feeling of a beach community or an ocean community and also enhances itself with some spots of color to to represent some of that diversity. Also, smaller monuments as well can be placed around the city. So there's a wide range of small, medium and large types of gateways that we're proposing. And there are a few different places where these can be located. Maybe one of the most important spots, though, is really where could we put a signature gateway that moment as you enter the city, there are a few spots in the city that make this really a glorious idea. The first one is at the 710. As you enter into the city, there's plenty of space out there. The pretty dramatic Long Beach lettering that's about 15 feet tall and dramatically welcoming you into the city. You certainly know you've entered into Long Beach in a place that its community can be quite proud of what it sees. And then at night we could spotlight this so there wouldn't be a night sky issue, but we could also provide lighting that that would give it some fun colors could colors that would enhance events and different holidays as you choose. But a very simple Long Beach sign that reinforces the brand of the city and announces when you've arrived. There are other opportunities around the city that are currently kind of visually terrible, so we would like to enhance some of those moments too. And this is one option on an overpass that right now is is kind of in poor condition. And is it one of the entries on Studebaker and seventh? So enhancing these underdeveloped and underutilized areas as well is one part of the goal of vertical gateways are proposed in order to really take advantage of the small footprint that they can create, but also the dramatic impact that they can have from a car. We want to make sure anything we put in it is large enough to see it's legible and it certainly gives a positive image for the city. So here's how that might look in Artesia. And we're again still looking at the different locations. And certainly we want to enhance these with additional landscape around them whenever possible. But the intent is to always locate them places that are safe, that are clear view to it, and also provide some real enhancement visually for the gateways. At the small end. There are plenty of spots that we don't have a lot of space and there are fewer cars passing by so it can become smaller. So and we can look at the color palettes of these as well. So there are a lot of opportunities and a lot of options for how these pieces can be put together. This gives you another example of how a smaller sign might look in these locations. As you might imagine, we prefer the larger ones more because of legibility and awareness. But certainly there are many places where this is the appropriate size as well. And then at the smaller size, very simple signs that really reflect some of the existing post mounted signs that are out on the site. Probably the closest thing you have to a historic feeling sign. But the idea here is to integrate the color palette of the city again with simpler signs at certain locations where the space is extremely limited and also the visibility is very, very evident. Wayfinding signs will help people find their way to parking and to other destinations in the city. The proposed right now is a very simple sign. One of the things we really heard is people felt many of the signs in the city were overdesigned. There's too much going on to the point where they can't even read them. So and the other important aspect is people want to know how to get to. So the proposal prioritizes parking and makes the P very clear and then we can add destinations to each of the site. We're also recommending that no vehicle signs have more than three messages on them because, as has been shown through speed limits, this is the optimal number of messages people can read from their cars going at the speed limit. We also want to make a unique sign for coastal access to really encourage coastal access. So make it very clear how to get to the coast. We looked at a lot of different versions here in this one currently represents a very soft beach in a sense, and now big waves because I don't get the big surf waves here, but the quiet, calm beach and ocean side that we see here. And these signs could be mounted to existing infrastructure, to St Paul's around the city. So we're not proposing any new polls, but wherever there is an existing sign, we're proposing to take it down as well. So as you come in on Broadway, what you might begin to see on the right is the directional sign on the left , a banner on down the street. You can see other directional signs and other elements attached to the infrastructure of the city. And then coming into Long Beach, we would also like to add, wherever possible, the welcome to Long Beach sign. So people begin to get the message that this is a welcoming place. Might seem like a very simple idea, but it's that kind of step that could help people engage and become part of the city again. And then finally we want to get to parking. So there are a couple of ideas about parking. One is when you arrive at a parking place, it makes it very clear you're at a parking garage, tells you the street you're on at that garage, and then tells you how many spaces are still available in that garage. This is current technology available today and being installed throughout the country and throughout the world actually. So you're going to be seeing a bit more of it. Another idea is to, as a later phase, let people know how many parking spots are ahead of them on the next block at the next garage. So the sign on the right is a digital marker that will help people understand as they enter the city where to find parking. Very simple, very direct, but also designed in such a way that enhances the city and has a unified color material and lighting to it throughout the city. We also hope to enhance the system with a pedestrian time program. We're working with downtown Long Beach to develop this part of the program as well. And this means once you get out of your car, you have a map, and that map will help you understand a five minute, ten minute and 15 minute walk from your desk , from your location, and also give you context in the city. And we're starting to see maps like this around the world that are really enhancing pedestrian movement and reducing pollution because people are getting out of their car faster when they park and they're starting to walk around and use the city much, much more. So it enhances not just the walkability of the city, but also the economics of the city. Then we're also proposing a series of banners that are essentially set up as templates to identify different areas of the city, streets in the city and key locations in the city. We've also showing some placeholder ideas here for imagery, Civic Center, Pine Avenue. These are areas that we could begin to take a step further in defining the kinds of activities and uses that are on those streets. And then we want to have a vehicle and pedestrian system enhance the overall connections. How do we get from Pine Street down to to the to the waterfront right now? That's a rather scary walk to take. We want to help people know that it's an easy walk. It's just a few minutes and enhance that with elements that they can see in the distance to help guide their way and give them a sense of security and safety and identity that comes with with walking in Long Beach in this particular spine here, we'll be receiving other enhancements, building renovations and a new hotel. So it's also a critical spine for the city between the convention center and Pine Street. We really want to show the importance of this spine and enhance the walkability of it. At the same time. Also, there are a lot of opportunities to talk about not just bicycles and the bikeway system that's being installed now and enhancing that, but also looking at historic markers in each different area. So there are these are essentially preliminary designs or templates that people might consider as options for how to identify historic. Destinations, important destinations in their communities. And then as you enter these neighborhoods, we would like to enhance the identity of the neighborhoods and in the areas in commercial areas and residential areas, and setting up a series of opportunities for neighbors to establish their own neighborhood identity. And they can do it within the citywide system, which also would allow them to add their own pattern languages and their own other languages as they may see fit. And this would be an opportunity for the neighborhoods that would be funded separately from the main program. So these signs might include commercial IDs, signs of residential I.D. signs, neighborhood I.D. signs, and other types of neighborhood identity signs. And these could be enhanced with other colors and patterns as well. These are provided as a template for those communities. I just want to work with that template and easy enough to install it as in their different locations as needed. We've also been partnered as part of this with Dubé, and I'm going to pass it back to Linda to give you a little information about how they will be working with us. But what you're looking at here is a preliminary map of downtown and how the map is evolving. One of the things I'm sure will come up is, you know, what's digital about the system? To preempt that question, I'm just going to say we we suggest that the digital part of the system be in your phone. This is why we see around the world it's working much better than walking up and having touch screens work. So it works in tandem with digital systems and allows us easy updating and it also allows people to absolutely locate themselves. You cannot actually locate yourself with Google Maps walking around the city. They're just not that detailed. So we need a partnership with static elements. And static elements also provide something the phone can't do, and that is a great sense of place for people. So that's part of why the map is here. And we would hope that that map would appear on everybody's phone, on the website and on the site. So that will really begin to link everybody together as they use the city. So again, I'm going to pass this back to Linda to talk a little more about that.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Cliff, I'd like to just highlight this component of the project deal. Bay and their staff here in particular, Shawn Warner has been a key member of the city's project team, which included the development services staff as well as public works staff working with the LBA. And we're excited about their participation because they are concurrently with the city's efforts. They are undergoing working with Cliff to develop their own comprehensive sign program, which they will phase in over time, and they will take care of the funding of that effort, which will significantly complement the city's wayfinding program. And it will also be at a much finer level of detail regarding getting around within the downtown area. So we're really pleased to partner with the lobby on this effort. And as Cliff mentioned, this is a preliminary design. We are still working to refine this design. Audie LBA is still working to refine this design in coordination with staff. So I'd like to close out by talking about what our next steps are with the Council action on this item. Tonight, we will work with the consultant who will start preparing a much finer level of detail for these drawings coming close, preparing construction drawings, and we will work with them to identify specific locations for each type of sign that we've discussed and presented here. And we will also refine the cost estimates for these each one of the the various sign types of so that we can work to identify the phasing and recommended locations for each one of these signs being sensitive to the cost parameters. And what we are hoping is that if we continue on the pace that we're working on now, we anticipate having being able to see the actual installation of the first phase of the signing, which we anticipate to be the the signature gateway entry signs. We anticipate having those installed by early fall of 2017. So that concludes Steph's presentation, and we're available to answer any questions you might have.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. I'm just going to make some a couple of comments, Councilwoman, that you want me to go to you guys first. I would do public comment first. Okay. Why don't we why don't we go ahead and then just do public comment first and then we'll go to the council. So public comment on this, please come forward and and as as folks are lining up, I just want to say that I think this is I know this is something we've been talking about for a for a couple of years. We put it we put some initial money in the first in that first budget to get this thing funded. And I just want to thank staff. For their work. The same consultant that was hired by staff is was well known as one of the best sign consultants anywhere, you know, just singing your praises, sir. And so. I think we're we're grateful that we're with the processes at this point now are we can take some input and and take the next step. And so coming to public comment, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor and City Council. My name is Sean Warner. I'm with the downtown Long Beach Alliance. I just want to commend the city for bringing this project forward. This is an exciting project. We're excited also to be a part of the project. Appreciate the city recognizing the importance of wayfinding throughout the city. Not only helps get people around, including visitors, but it in turn generates economic activity in our downtown and throughout the whole city. So we're also pleased that it's a comprehensive approach. It's not looking at just one type of signage, but it's looking at vehicular pedestrian signage and gateway signage. I think that's very important. And the fact that it's a collaborative effort between the LBA, the city and other partners. We're excited about that and be able to contribute to the downtown portion as well. I also want to thank city staff for the outreach they've done over the past 12 months in doing online surveys, meeting with different community groups. They also met with our Public Realm Committee last summer. So it's it's really encouraging to get the outreach and see the the comments that we heard during that outreach realized in what what they're presenting tonight. And finally, I just want to say that we're excited to begin implementing this project over the course of the next few years as funding is identified. One last note I did want to make is that next Thursday at Studio 111 at 5 p.m., DLB will be hosting a meeting to update our stakeholders on the pedestrian portion of the project in a little more detail. So please pass that information along. We'll be sending more information about it as well. But thank you again. Thank staff and we look forward to moving forward.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Good evening.
Speaker 8: Mr. Mayor, and council members and staff appreciate this report on the presentation. However, one of the things that was missing on that list, I think on page four, stakeholders that you talked to was Aquatic Capital of America. And it's very disappointing to us that we were not heard. I only heard about any of this stuff through or any community outreach through one woman affiliated with McCormick divers who went to a meeting, I think back in November. And then she provided some information. And also I did take the survey as many of our board members also did. I'm here as a representative of the aquatic capital of America, as the vice president. And the survey basically talked a lot about what direction do you come in from to the city, from what areas do you use? How do you walk, do bike, do you drive? What kind of parking issues are there? But nothing specifically about what would be on the science. So I was very disappointed to see this on the agenda tonight.
Speaker 0: As being an item where you would see the designs for the first time and we've had no.
Speaker 8: Public input as we have had on.
Speaker 0: Other projects when the designs.
Speaker 8: Came out before it went to council. So we would like to see you know, I had asked each of you yesterday to pull this item so that we could have this kind of conversation and put this off until some point when this conversation has been held so that we can have our sign, our side heard as well
Speaker 0: . In our input specifically in terms of the gateway and not.
Speaker 8: Having a slogan. I think when we've got the slogans up there now that say International City, that goes back, I understand, to when we hosted the Miss Universe contest 40 years ago by Friendly City, there's many, many cities that would, you know, appreciate the efforts of Mr. West and everything he.
Speaker 0: Wants to do to.
Speaker 1: Make the city more.
Speaker 8: Bike friendly. But I think there's many cities in the country that would make the same claim.
Speaker 0: But there's no other city that we know of in this.
Speaker 8: Country that can claim aquatic capital of America. With our history, our beaches, the bay, the lagoon we're in stadium.
Speaker 0: The number of Olympic athletes.
Speaker 8: The types of activities that we take place here, we're clearly the aquatic capital of America. And one of the I think was on page maybe eight, the top right.
Speaker 0: Monument sign showed.
Speaker 8: Aquatic Capital of America. And it's a very nice cement.
Speaker 0: Very project.
Speaker 8: That would be a monument that would last for.
Speaker 0: Many, many years as Mr. Siebert, I believe. Sorry if I missed your name wrong.
Speaker 8: So I think we'd like to revisit that issue as well and have some opportunity before the council approves this and moves forward with that to have our voice heard as well. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Tom Troutman, founder of the Long Beach. Quite a couple of America. Could you put up the seal of City of Long Beach, please? Can you do that? Before collared seal.
Speaker 1: I don't know that we have just an image of that available, but that's what we have.
Speaker 0: I saw one in a corner of something or in a previous discussion, but what I'm trying to visualize here is when I form this.
Speaker 1: Organization here.
Speaker 0: It is. Perfect. Thank you. What we did, a group of people in Long Beach who are eager to see the.
Speaker 5: Energy of the.
Speaker 1: City being brought out and what we see as aquatics.
Speaker 0: If you look at Shell, what do you see? Water, ships, sailboats. This is what Long Beach is. What I'm seeing here in this presentation is.
Speaker 5: Very, very boring, frankly. Nobody ever contacted me or any part of our organization.
Speaker 0: I've been working on this for ten years. I can't believe this is what it is. I'm frankly very disappointed. And I think we have to get reconnect and get some of these people that I've.
Speaker 5: Put together over the last ten years who are eager.
Speaker 0: To showcase their city for what it is. We've got the Queen Mary. We've got the Port of Long Beach, all of these organizations, the largest marinas in the United States, sailing, swimming, all of this was here. This is showing up at presentation.
Speaker 1: Nothing.
Speaker 5: Oh.
Speaker 0: I'm just flabbergasted, frankly speaking. I love to talk with this group more about this.
Speaker 1: I think you should.
Speaker 0: Totally.
Speaker 1: And get more input from outside just the.
Speaker 0: Downtown area. We understand and we share things. That's okay. But the image when I go to every city in the country, I look at what is the logo? What's the slogan for the city?
Speaker 5: I travel the world. This is something that needs to be addressed. Now, before we go any further.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. The keynote speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Hello again, Sylvia Contreras. And thank you for the presentation. I really enjoyed it. Actually, it was a new item for me. So if we moved forward with it is I'm fine with it. On the other side, I do agree with the people that are just mentioned here. My suggestion would maybe add a little design, a seagull or a Queen Mary or something like that to emphasize Long Beach. But otherwise I'd say just move forward.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Taking us back to the city council. Oh, Mr. Goodhue, please come forward.
Speaker 5: I think overall, the the concept is good, but there certainly obviously is the previous two speakers referenced some areas that it can be improved improved upon to capture the attention. My personal life is one of the greatest things we have. And the greatest icon we have in the city is, of course, the Queen Mary period that's internationally known around the world, period. But the level that there's a whole subset and the aquatic capital is certainly something that should be front and center and is matter of fact, is as part of that coming forward in the next six weeks or it's through the requisite commissions, I'm going to suggest. In fact, I've sent an email out to the council person on this relative to the open channel instead of calling that the open channel. I'm going to suggest that we call it Runnymede, and that is rooted in the understanding of the EGIS of the grant deed, which is singularly unique and very, very important to that. And of course, everybody knows what hopefully what Runnymede is. And there is within the grant deed, the what I have always referred to is the Magna Carta, the Marine Stadium, and more details will be coming out on that. But certainly the Marine Stadium and the sailing and the area activities that take place there should be incorporated in some of the signage in some areas that may not make any difference due in some part of the cities. But to ignore it, I think, would be rather ill advised and short sighted. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I take it back to the council. Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 9: Yes. I'd like to thank our design team, as well as our Long Beach Development Services team, as well as the EPA for their partnership. I certainly you know, I've seen I'm seeing the vision here. I know that some things I would like to see a little bit, maybe more character in some of the items. And I guess I'm looking to see how that evolves as the process goes on. And I know it will and the colors might change. So this isn't certainly settled, but I know that there was a lot of work put into this. And so I want to thank the stakeholders who were involved. And so on that note, what are the next steps and are we kind of talked about it, but in terms of timeframe and additional input, what would be the next steps just to clarify that?
Speaker 4: So Councilmember, I'll start with that. Essentially, after going through that public process and trying to listen to everybody and talking to all the mayor and council as well as the three stakeholders, this is kind of what the design team has come up with. We are tonight kind of out there to make sure that you, as the governing body, has a chance to see that and give us input. And so we're listening. That said, we would then need to start moving forward with kind of a design where we would start getting into further level of detail, especially realizing that some of what has come up today, some are more appropriate for certain areas than others. We'd be talking after we kind of come up with the initial staff plan with all the council members as well as what are the the areas that are more, you know, where each one of these could go and how those treatments could be. It could be done. We need to do some further cost estimates as well and really determine, you know, what budget is available and also what types of things like lighting would be appropriate in certain areas. And then in some areas, you know, for example, some neighborhoods we wanted to provide an option for neighborhoods to have this types of signage. But we also realize that neighborhoods are different and neighborhoods, you know, they have their own unique quality and their unique, unique needs. And so we're not necessarily saying every single neighborhood would have to have a sign that looks just like this. So these are options. And if neighborhoods are interested in pursuing a different approach, we would certainly accommodate that.
Speaker 9: Okay, great. I just wanted to clarify that, and I thank you for the hard work, especially in terms of the parking. I think that's long overdue. We definitely need to consolidate the messaging. Definitely need to get up on our technology and. Making sure that people know exactly where to park in all sorts of areas of the city. So thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Alston.
Speaker 0: It's a great.
Speaker 7: Question because you actually took one off of my my list. Thank you, Councilmember. Regarding the neighborhood signs, I think the question I actually had well, first of all, great job. This is very inspiring. It's exciting. And I want to just say, the the the concept for the entryway signs are very impressive. And so great job there. I don't I wouldn't change much in terms of what I have seen there so thus far. But I want to go back to the goals that were mentioned in from the beginning the beginning of your presentation. Yeah. PAGE So how did we arrive at the goals?
Speaker 0: So the goals.
Speaker 4: We looked at three different things. One, that Mayor and council talked about really highlighting our gateways and making sure that our gateways were signified with something special and unique so that you knew when you arrived in Long Beach. Separately, we also looked in our parking impacted areas, especially where we have a significant amount of parking lots like in downtown and parking structures. We how to actually navigate to those. And and it also was complimentary with a grant that we've received from Metro to do a lot of that electronic signage that Councilmember Gonzalez just spoke about . And then the third came from a ability to direct people to the coast. It's something that we've been working on, on all of our Tidelands projects and as part of our ah permitting requirement with development services is how to make sure people are aware of our coastal activities and how to get to the coast. So those were the three primary goals that we looked at.
Speaker 7: Well, I don't I don't disagree with the goals in any way. I think they are laudable. We we want to make sure that, you know, we're maximizing our potential as a city. But my my comment regarding the goals in terms particularly with the wayfinding signage and I believe my comments when, when I was interviewed would be to include some of our other amenities in the cities as well, and not just, you know, focus on downtown in the coastal areas. We do have some great communities throughout the city. We have thriving business districts. We have business districts. We want to draw not only local residents from a pedestrian and bike standpoint, but we want to draw regional dollars into our city as well. And so I would just add that, that when we look at wayfinding, we we want to direct where we are, improve our economic development potential for for other areas of the city as well. So that that's just my comment on that.
Speaker 4: And then certainly and if I could just provide some input on that and part of this was because we have a funding partner. The downtown is really focused because they're funding it. We were designing this as a system that if your neighborhood would want to use these types of signs, that they could be used in other areas . So we certainly have a template and we can we can expand this project and contract as dollars and others become available. But that is the intent.
Speaker 7: Salute. Great job. Forward to it.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Mary. I want to commend our consultants and our staff, obviously, for putting this together. But, you know, when you have a young you also have a gang. We're talking entry level gateways. What about exit as you enter Long Beach? It's big limit sign. And how about when they exit? We're like, Thank you for shopping Long Beach or Thank you for visiting Long Beach or You're leaving Long Beach, something that tells them Thank you for being here. I've seen that in other cities. So just think about that in terms of when you have an entry, you also have an exit. So I'll think about that. Also, just a fun fact. Here are how many cities border the seventh district? Does anybody know? For Los Angeles? Carson, Signal, Hill and Lakewood. And that includes Dominguez, Dominguez, Rancho Dominguez. So we have a lot of entry points. You border a lot of cities. So you might want to consider that into play, especially when you're talking about the exit signs, where they're leaving, where they come from and where they're going. But other than that, I'm looking forward to this. I'm colorblind, so color doesn't make a whole lot of difference to me. But what does make a difference to me is like would say caricature. Sorry. Excuse me. You could put my emoji in there or my or my emoticon that all that. As you're entering the seventh District. Those are, you know, who get e-mails from, you know what my mole can looks like. But good job. I'm looking forward to seeing this the some some more of a finalized product so that we could discuss it a little more. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. We're going to go to councilman before we go to Councilmember Pearce, just one thing that you had mentioned about just before we leave that topic, Mr. Modica because it's my understanding that the reason why there's so much downtown in this is because they're paying for their portion. And so while I think that the intent, of course, would be that there would be equal signage across the city and the downtown, obviously, if they're going to pay for that piece, that'll be the deal, be a piece. But as far as our research resources are concerned, I would expect that all areas of the city are treated equally outside of the downtown, regardless of that investment. Now, if you know the Northtown group or if you know Cambodia town, if they invest in a portion of for themselves, I'm assuming that that would create more signage opportunity . Right. But I'm just want to make sure that's clear that this should be this should be equitable across the city. But, of course, focusing on the gateway areas.
Speaker 4: Absolutely. If you remember, there were three different sections and that to the to the goals and one really that the gateway signs is distributed completely equitably. So if you saw in the presentation, we showed four different areas. Those were just examples to show that where there'd be entrance to downtown, to the west side, to the north side and the east side as well. And then the downtown was really focused on from the pedestrian side. But absolutely, as we start to roll this program out, we will be investing throughout the entire city.
Speaker 1: And and the other thing because you mentioned it, because I think it's also important to note we actually have a lot of existing very nice neighborhood signage. And so whether you go to University Park Estates or you go to North Alamitos Beach or you're going to go to Bixby Knolls, I mean, there's obviously a lot of these neighborhoods already have signage that they worked very hard to to put up and they've invested in, and it's kind of tailored to that neighborhood. And so I just want to make sure we're clear that in no way are we coming in and asking anyone to replace their signage or to somehow remove that. Because I think we I mean, I think I like and think we like the fact that a lot of neighborhoods choose to have their own distinct character. This is more of a more kind of global approach to gateways. And as we're adding signs about Long Beach and if neighborhoods want to be a part of the program, then they could be. I just want to clarify that because we have a lot of nice signage across the city that are very different per neighborhood.
Speaker 4: That's absolutely correct. We're not looking to replace or change the neighborhood identity in any way. We do get requests from time to time about we want to put up a neighborhood sign and what could that look like? So what we wanted to provide here were some options to also help the neighborhood association reduce the cost. It would be pre-designed and say you can pick from some of these and add some of your own flavor. But if they wanted to go a different direction, we think that actually helps with the character of the neighborhood is that not every sign looks ever exactly the same. There are some cities that are master plan that way. That really isn't the Long Beach flavor, but this would provide some options.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. Thanks for the clarification on that, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 10: Yes, thank you so much to staff to the team that's worked on this. I think, you know, you've got some really great ideas. I really like the Gateway City ones. I did have one question and it's not my district, so forgive me, but four or five and 710 area, it seems like that is a major gateway and I'm not sure it looks like there was some existing signage there, but are we going to be replacing that? Signage.
Speaker 4: Which one in particular at the four or five in the 710.
Speaker 10: Yeah. There's a four or five, seven, ten. There's one that says existing location. Well that remain there or will it be replaced with something. I'm looking at page seven.
Speaker 4: So there is an existing one there. We would likely through this effort be replacing those and we would work to see what makes sense there. Would that be a larger gateway sign or a smaller monument sign?
Speaker 10: And then on the gateway signs, I see the the colors are those colors by light or is that painted that way. Sorry.
Speaker 8: So the question that is light on that, the signature gateway, those are ground mounted lights that shine on the sign and the colors of the lights are the change. The sign remains the same color light.
Speaker 10: So say it's, you know, Saint Patrick's Day. Could we change them all to green or are we got to stick with the same color all the time?
Speaker 11: The the signature gateway. The signature gateway is currently designed so it could change the color. Okay. The secondary gateways are not currently designed to change the color, but certainly evaluate that option.
Speaker 8: Okay. I like the.
Speaker 10: Idea of being able to change color flexibility. You know, I think that the logo is really streamlined and I think it looks really great. Just want to make sure that we're exploring any opportunities to be flexible. And so thank you for that. I also just want to say how much I really appreciate the historical markers. I think they really, you know, give some flair and some some neat design, you know, when we're using basic of color. So thank you so much for all the work, guys.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Well, I have to start by echoing the sentiments of some of the speakers that today I'm incredibly disappointed that the aquatics capital of America is not listed among the organizations that were talked to. And if they were talked to, I'm extremely disappointed that they weren't made more of a focus of this presentation. I know that when I spoke with the with the group about planning for this project, I repeatedly stressed the importance of the aquatics capital of America to the third district. We have aquatics capital of America signs throughout the third district. It's it's it's an entity and group that we respect and value and appreciate their mission for all the great things they do for our city and for our young athletes. And so the fact that they were not a major part of this discussion is disappointing to the representative of the of the district. That's the beneficiary of many of their efforts. And as a city, that's the beneficiary of many of their efforts. So I want to start with that. So I would like to hear a little bit more about that. I think the idea of taking a pause and allowing them to be more involved is reasonable. And I'm open to hearing what my colleagues think about that. Beyond that, I like the the idea and the concept that we can individually tailor the signs to suit the needs of our particular district. And the reason I make that point is that I know I have talked with Tom in the past regarding the aquatics capital of America designation. I was not here on council when that happened, but based on conversations that I've had with colleagues throughout the years, based on the dialog that I've heard behind the dais, I don't know if there would be a unanimous will on the part of this council to have a city wide slogan that was related to aquatics . I don't know. I could be wrong. Having said that, I think it's important that we continue to echo the priorities and the the campaigns and the iconic symbols that are important to our communities, in our districts and in our neighborhoods. And I intend to do that fully, regardless of what signs we adopt citywide, the aquatics capital of America will have signage and representation in at least the third District Council by the third District Council office. While I'm here, I understand the disappointment that they have, because even as I look at the images here, I know there's a lot of images all throughout the city and they're scattered. But this is a really important group. They raise a lot of money. They help so many athletes throughout this city. They recognize civic engagement. They work closely with all of us. And the fact that they're absent from this document is really upsetting to me. So I don't know what happened. I was actually my excitement for the signs was overshadowed by the omission of this group from the discussion. And so I'm. I think, you know, the signs are very simple and I like that. I think it's an updated look for the city and it's classic and it's timeless. And I think that's good. I think when you have too many pictures and images and things like that, the signage becomes stale very quickly. Within a five year, five or ten year period of time. Even the seal. I love the seal and I love that Tom pointed out the seal. But it's not an updated look in terms of if someone was visiting your city as a way for them to be able to identify with an image or a brand. It's more historical in context and conveys a deeper meaning to the city. But to the user in the city, it's not an updated look. So I appreciate that and I like the simplicity of these signs. I think they're going to look great. My biggest commitment and my my my biggest concern has always been community engagement in this process. And every process that we do, branding a city is a big, huge deal and we're attempting to do that. And I know it's not possible to include everyone, but this particular group, I mean, I think the team I met with is right here. I repeatedly said to them, you have the aquatics capital of America, the aquatics capital of America. And I see some of the organizations reflected here, although, frankly, I don't this cannot be an exclusive list or this can't be an exhaustive list, because I would wonder like, for example, Belmont Shore residents associations listed here, that's really great. They're not the leading organization for Belmont Shore any longer. They have a membership that's much more diminished now compared to another Belmont Shore resident group. And I'm wondering, where was that group even reached out to so perhaps someone could shed some light on to how were these groups selected and others not? And is there a more thorough list that's not available to us at this time that we could see?
Speaker 4: Certainly, council member I can answer a number of those questions. So yes, indeed, this is an illustrative list that was put here. It was to show the magnitude and some of the sampling of the 300 plus interviews that we did in addition to the 750 specific survey responses that we got back. And I can tell you that, you know, that was an oversight on our part, that we tried to list as many of the entities as we could. We can certainly provide additional information, but we, the aquatics Captain America, has probably been our most frequently talked to group throughout this entire process. Myself, I think I've spoken to Tom several times since the beginning of this process. So he is very been very active. And in letting us know that they are interested in being on the aquatics, the capital of America has been part of this slogan. The city manager has spoken to them as well, and we also have them as part of our groups. You know, that being said, you know, we are going to continue to talk about aquatics, capital of America that, you know, I think you heard it from the consultant, regardless of whether it's on assign, given the recommendation from them not to put it actually on the sign itself, that doesn't diminish the city's ability to be able to do marketing, to be able to talk about important things like the aquatics capital of America. So that very certainly can still happen and we can still be part of our advertising and marketing. So while it wasn't included here, we did have a number of of water groups and aquatics groups that were interviewed. They weren't listed, unfortunately, on on that slide. But again, that was illustrative. And we've had several conversations with the aquatics capital of America, and we apologize for oversight and not putting it in there, but that those conversations did occur.
Speaker 6: Okay. I want to move on to what I think is going to be the next phase. So I'm open to to more dialog and more conversations with them if there's still an opportunity for that as we move forward. So let me just say that and I hope there's some support from my council colleagues for that. Having said that, if we talked about this, I apologize for missing it. But what funding sources have we identified to get us started? Do we have any money?
Speaker 4: Yes. So the city council actually authorized about $400,000 if memory occurs to get us started, the consultant contract cost approximately 150,000 in that range. So we are still have significant resources to be able to, you know, to start and take the next phase and to get us into further refinement. We would also be looking through the budget process to look at funding this and starting to do these in phases. So we'd like to take a big jump forward in the next budget process so we can we can get a lot of this done. The coastal signs, for example, and the coastal wayfinding would be funded out of Tidelands. So that would be something that would be different. And then the parking downtown signage is actually funded out of some of the downtown parking meter money. We had looked at some of that as well as that one and a half million dollar, I believe, Metro Grant to be able to digitalize the signs and to really provide some of that parking in. Information digitally, which would also incorporate some of the signage. So we have a number of different funding sources available.
Speaker 6: Okay. Do we have any priority for which science would go where first?
Speaker 4: I think we would do that through our the next phase of our planning. So we really are in kind of the beginning part where we're talking about, you know, getting consensus on on the design so we can move forward and get that next level of schematic design and start getting into construction documents. We need to do a further survey of all the specific locations and really hone in on what goes where and what makes sense to go where. Once we have our design direction and we'd be talking to each of the council members about what's the appropriate fit, what what types of those gateway signs would go where, and to make sure that we're, you know, that we're in touch with the community needs.
Speaker 9: Okay. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Mongeau.
Speaker 6: I am very excited about this. In the fifth District, we have many, many entry points to other cities. Freeway on ramps. People come by not only vehicle and foot and transportation through public transportation, but also via air. So we have lots of different routes in which people are engaging and coming through the city.
Speaker 8: Just a quick.
Speaker 10: Second. I'm one of the.
Speaker 6: Individuals who really focuses on ensuring that these assets that we're spending a lot of money on can be maintained long term and what our plan is for that. Could you talk a little bit about the long term costs that we think might be necessary to mitigate potential damage? Certain types of things like this that I've seen in other cities can and do engage with wildlife and the community. And the heights of the fines and potential graffiti and things like that are really important to ensuring that these are at the forefront and always at a level that we are very proud of.
Speaker 4: Councilmember That's a great point. We want to make a lasting impression. We want these to look good for a while. And so that's part of the reason that we retain Sober Perkins. They are experts in that, and they really, as part of their design, look to see about durability and making sure that they look good. So for that, I asked Albert Perkins, Cliff, to give a little bit more information.
Speaker 11: Yes. The maintenance of the signs we design signs either be very easy to replace or very easy to clean and maintain. And I think our intent in this case is to make the panels easy to replace if it's hit by a car, but if it's merely vandalized any kind of paint, we would coat these signs in such a way that they could all be cleaned very easily. Probably the biggest maintenance item you could expect over the years would be lighting. Luckily, new LED lighting has made great advances, so most of the lights now last over 20000 hours. I think LAX is probably the best example we have of lights that have been in place for a little over ten years now, and they've been on about 12 hours a day. So lighting is really the biggest maintenance issue outside of people just banging into it with a car. So we want to make sure that we locate these in places people can't really get at too easily. And and those are the core issues there. We also it is possible to create an app for the city that locates every sign in the city that allows your maintenance department to locate any sign. So if it gets hit by a car, it sends a signal back to the city and says, what happened to it? So that is an advanced technology that could be incorporated. And certainly by the time these are built, that would be a pretty typical tech technology.
Speaker 8: It's interesting you mention that there is a monument.
Speaker 6: Sign that was hit by a car and.
Speaker 8: It took quite a while between the.
Speaker 6: Insured and the city and the community and everyone who tried to get it back put together.
Speaker 8: But when I look at page 31, I love the.
Speaker 6: Commercial I.D. sign. Do you have anything similar to this that has been around a long time? Because I do worry about the durability of letters.
Speaker 8: Falling off.
Speaker 6: And things that can happen.
Speaker 11: Sure, there are many examples around the L.A. area that we've developed similar signs. I'll use LAX again as an example. Every sign at LAX today has been installed since 2000 or 2001. So we have to build them out of durable materials and make sure they last. The other effects of climate out here, we've got the salt water. We've got a lot of wind, we've got a lot of just sunshine. So we have to fabricate these in such a way that they don't fade. And there are technologies available for us to do that as well.
Speaker 8: Well, I really appreciate the work that you did.
Speaker 6: I think that this is pretty comprehensive. I know that as I looked through the different pages and saw the many ways in which it could be spread throughout the city, whether it's through the banners and the others, I think that it really helps the business associations and the neighborhood associations. I know our business association spent some money this year putting up similar banners and had we had a template like this, I think it would have really added some continuity. And when you cross over from Los Alamitos into Long Beach or when you cross over from Lakewood into Long Beach, signs like this will really help. And I hope that we even get to a point. There are lots of areas around the edge of our city. When I talk to neighbors and they talk about the need for.
Speaker 8: Street repair and all of those things, they don't always know exactly.
Speaker 6: If they're in Long Beach or Lakewood or if they're in Los Alamitos or Long Beach and so on and so forth, or even unincorporated in Long Beach. And so I would even be interested in encouraging local businesses to take a sign somewhat like the the banner and change it into something that says like a proud Long Beach business for those broader businesses. So people can know there are a few key gas stations that we encourage Long Beach residents to use that live over on the borders that don't have as many accessible Long Beach sales tax, gas stations. And so I look forward to engaging with our business associations. I look forward to seeing these all throughout the city. And I think the more of them that do look exactly like this, the more identity we will build. I'm not encouraging us to take down any of the old ones. I too appreciate the uniqueness of our city, but as communities that don't have them yet want to add them. I think that this is an amazing resource and I'm excited that the council was able to come together in a unified. That idea. I'm right when we came together as a group almost three years ago to start something that really can have a lasting impact of identity. So I look forward to this and thank you for everyone's hard work on this.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman. Councilmember Superman.
Speaker 4: Thank you. I just wanted to reference a couple of points that were made here already. And also thank you to our consultant and all for the time you spent with my office. I don't remember everything I said. Just think kind of pearls of wisdom I dropped at that meeting. One was that Councilmember Arango referenced it with the multiple cities. I remember stating at our meeting that four of the council districts Border Signal Hill and we, according to this list, will only have one Long Beach sign. Boring Signal Hill I think that's on Atlantic and Spring. If you go if you want to Google it, it's 518 East Spring Street. You can go to Street View and there is a Long Beach sign. And I think to Tom Shane's point that for those of us who grew up here, it was always the nautical theme. And here we are in Atlantic and Spring, and it's a very over-the-top nautical theme for the sign. And I believe your colors do pick up somewhat of a nautical theme, but it's not as dramatic as as we've had in the past here. And I think of the old Queen Mary signs of international city. So there is a constant reference to the ocean. But back to the point on Signal Hill, if you want to go to the 1900 block of cherry, you're saying you don't know when you're in Long Beach where you can tell there because there's a signal hill sign. There is no language sign. So what I'm suggesting with our friends in Signal Hill, how we partner with them to get back to back signs, one sign says Long Beach or entering Long Beach. The other side says Enter in Signal Hill is a little economy there. And just overall, I just like to say that I think the design process, the creative process like this is give and take. Your first shot out of the box typically is not where we end up. So I look at this as a work in progress. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 5: Yes, thank you. I think a lot of this I think you guys did a great job. But I think it's a lot more to do because I hear about the aquatics situation. They talk about aquatics, you know, Long Beach. But, you know, I think if you come down to 17, I think if you take a left and come east, you can't, you know, overlook that little school they call, probably high school. And more NFL players came from that school in any other school in the nation. So you have to understand, somebody's got to find out where did these people go? Even that thug you talked about, Snoop Dog, he even went there. So I think there's something they should be remiss that we should see something when we come inner city, you know, I know downtown you they have the money, but we don't. So I think something should be really mentioned when we talk about saying things about the, you know, coming inside of Long Beach, not just down on the pipe and places like that and realize that the money that they have. But we want to know Long Beach. Long Beach is a very diverse city. I think when you when we have signage, I think those signage should be able to represent all of our diversity we have in the city. And I think you guys did a great job. But there are just some things I think that we really seriously need to be a little more noticeable about. And that's really when you come inside of the city of Long Beach. And then people know when you read various signs that there are places that I would like for you to come in and see, not just downtown, right? So keep up the good work. I think this is something coming out of the box. We're looking at it. It looks good, but we have some more work to do and thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I think we've concluded council comment but Councilman Price.
Speaker 6: I just have sorry so so to the city staff and going back to the aquatics capital of America, Tom, I'm hearing you say that there was outreach there, organizations saying there's not outreach. Can can we at least agree that moving forward will do some specific outreach as we develop these signs further with the groups specifically, maybe go to a board meeting or something like that?
Speaker 4: Sure, we'd be happy to go and talk to the group again. We can also look at some of the other things that are unique, especially down the coastal areas. Signage. If you saw we did have some signage up there, that was banner signs which are kind of designed for us to be able to highlight certain areas and thinking in particular down by the beach and tidelands there, there may be some more appropriate areas to really talk about, you know, some of the aquatics, the great aquatics work that we have down there. So we'd be happy to go and talk again and get some additional input.
Speaker 8: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. No counseling, no other council comments. I'm going to just briefly say two things. The first is one of the things I actually like, and it's amazing. You know, people, you know, obviously see different things in signage. But I, I actually got a very nautical feel from the signs myself. And so what I saw to me and in the signs I saw. Waves. I saw blues, I saw whites. Obviously more of a modern take. But I think that that to me at least maybe it was different for others. But I saw a both modern and kind of contemporary approach that was kind of timeless to the idea of of the coast, but that could be applied, you know, whether you were in the coast or whether you were in North Long Beach or whether you were in in Central, it could fit anywhere. But still had that coastal theme to me at least. I just want to point out a couple little things I think are really important. I've mentioned these already. One is, you know, that entrance to me and I know that Councilman Price agreed the entrance to me that the four or five where all the freeways converge coming on to Seventh Street is critical. And so I'm really hoping that as we develop this and obviously with Councilman Price's input and everyone else, and I think Councilman Pearce mentioned this too, to me, that's just an opportunity for like a like a homerun, you know, and I hope that we're able to really focus some resources into that that entrance way into the city. That's also the entrance from Orange County. Right. So it's that corner county entrance into the city as well, which is unique, I think among other cities, like like is the downtown entrance. The second thing and and again, I only support this if Councilmember Super now supports it, but I'd love to see something at the traffic circle just because I think it's to me, the traffic circle is like so well known in Long Beach. And like when you're in the traffic circle, you know, you're kind of in the center of the city and, you know, it kind of it's kind of the place where, you know, pick your own adventure. Like, where are you going? Are you going to the airport? Are you going to go to East Side? Are you going to go to to to downtown? And so I just would love to see something, of course, unless Councilman Super hates the idea, but I'd love to see something.
Speaker 0: Some.
Speaker 1: Focus on on the traffic circle because I think it would be great. And then the last thing I'll say is I do appreciate and please we should keep the identity of other other neighborhoods like Bixby Knolls that has a very distinct look like let's let them keep it a look and keep going. And that's it. Councilman Hooper, now.
Speaker 4: Well, do I pick your own adventure? You don't mean the high accident rate around. Okay. Well, now, also, in that case, that is a Caltrans property. So we'd have to get those folks involved, too. But, yeah, wide open to that. Let's let's do something creative there. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And Councilman Austin.
Speaker 7: So I think to your point about the traffic circle, if we're pointed to the east side, it could get really confusing right there. I'm thinking Councilmember Andrews.
Speaker 0: Would agree with that. Yes.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Got a motion in a second. And we're going to do some additional outreach of the aquatic capital of America board, hopefully here soon. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 1: Their machines work again. Excellent. Thank you. An excited, please. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to receive and file a report and presentation on the development of a comprehensive wayfinding signage program, including City gateway entry signs, directional signs for public parking, and coastal access signs. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0295 | Speaker 1: Mr. Charlie Parker. I'm sorry, Mr. City Attorney. It's late. 222 and 17 can be together separate.
Speaker 4: It's one item with two separate actions. And we'll need a staff report on this pursuant to the armistice.
Speaker 1: Okay. Go ahead.
Speaker 4: Honorable Bear and members of the City Council. Since February 2016, city management has met with representatives of the Long Beach Association of Confidential Employees.
Speaker 5: The City Prosecutors Association and the Long Beach Management Association to.
Speaker 4: Discuss their successor and what you terms following the bargaining instructions from the city council. Tentative agreements have been reached with these bargaining units. The proposed successor memo used with these three bargaining units and the city council resolution to approve the normal use are included with the Council letter. In addition, the proposed Council resolution extends the compensation provisions of the memo used to the unrepresented employees, both management and Non-Management, as well as to the city manager. The proposed action, as approved by council at its February 14th and April 11th, 2017, closed session meetings would result in the city manager receiving a 3% one time payment of 7799. A 2% salary increase on October 1st, 2016 to $265155. A 2% salary increase on turn on October 1st of 2017 to $270458, a 2% salary increase on October 1st of 2018 to 2 275,867. The three proposed M.O. use are for a four year term from October 2015 through September 2019, with the following major provisions General wage increase of 2% effective October 1st, 2016. A 2% general wage increase effective October 1st, 2017, and a 2% general wage increase effective October 1st, 2018. And a one time lump sum payment of 3% of annual base pay pro-rated to current eligible employees that worked during the period of October 1st, 2015 through September 30th of 2016. These compensation provisions are consistent with recent agreements reached with the IAM. Other major provisions of the YOU for the three associations include the elimination of slow award in skill pay and increased in health care cost sharing with the employees and an economic crisis re opener you have before you a resolution to approve the memo used between the city and the three associations and apply the terms of the compensation within the EML use to the unrepresented employees, both management and Non-Management and the City Manager, as approved by the applicable planning authorities or governing boards. This concludes my brief staff report.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item? Okay. Seeing none and Mr.. City attorney is this is taking both these is one item, correct?
Speaker 4: That's correct.
Speaker 1: Okay. So please cast your vote for 22 and 17. | Resolution | Adopt resolution amending Agreement No. 30228 with Patrick H. West, City Manager, to increase the City Manager's salary. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04182017_17-0296 | Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next item.
Speaker 2: Item 23 is report from Parks, Recreation and Marine. Recommendation two Adobe Resolution Amending the Long Beach Marina. Rules and Regulations Districts two and three.
Speaker 1: There's a motion in a second and a public comment. CNN members, please cast your votes. I'm sorry. You have a comment? Yes, go ahead, please.
Speaker 10: Thank you. I wanted to just think everybody that worked on this and I wanted to ask city staff if you could just clarify one of the major changes that might pertain to the parking lot in regards to safety and lighting.
Speaker 4: Our Marine bureau manager, Alveda Halloran.
Speaker 10: Thank you.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Honorable Mayor and City Council. Can you please clarify your.
Speaker 8: Question a little bit? Because I don't remember the rules specifically speaking about lighting in the parking lots.
Speaker 10: So it does. Actually, as soon as I said lighting, I was like, it doesn't talk about lighting. It talks about the parking lot and how long people can stay in and refining some of those rules. I wanted to just clarify if there were any major differences from what was already in place.
Speaker 6: Okay. Can you can you tell me which letter you're looking at? Because apparently you're looking at something very specific. So let me flip over there.
Speaker 10: I'm simply just I've had a lot of people talk to me about parking in our marina. And so I wanted to just clarify if there were any changes. So it says parking lots. It's it's n sorry. I know I didn't give you guys too much. Head's up on this.
Speaker 2: No, that's okay. I can answer the question. I just want to make sure we're both looking at the same thing.
Speaker 10: Yeah, it's page 11.
Speaker 0: Page 11. Okay.
Speaker 2: Parking lots.
Speaker 0: Okay.
Speaker 8: Give me a moment.
Speaker 10: While I flip over to the red line version.
Speaker 8: So I can make sure I am answering the right question.
Speaker 10: I mean, I guess I would assume if there's nothing that's.
Speaker 8: The major the the one concern that I remember because we went through a thorough public comment with the boat owners. I mean, they had at least five opportunities to come to us. They were emailed the rules and regs, and they were allowed to give us.
Speaker 6: Comments via the email when it came to the parking lot. Their biggest.
Speaker 8: Question was two things.
Speaker 6: That we changed that were major. One is that right now I have several.
Speaker 8: Boat owners who have.
Speaker 6: RV's that they park, that they sell or.
Speaker 8: Or box trucks that they basically use as closets because they're liveaboard. And these vehicles never move. And it's become an issue as far as sweeping the parking lots. And one of the things that we're no longer going to allow, because I did receive a lot of other complaints from other boaters and that these box trucks and campers and RV that are dilapidated make the marina look trashy where their words and what we're trying to do is kind of clean that up. So per code, they have to move their vehicles every 72 hours. So a lot of these boat owners were not moving those large vehicles. So we have not put in a limit as to how large your vehicles can be to be parked in the parking lot. Because basically what was going on is a few every boat owners allowed two parking passes to park, two personal vehicles that were using one of their parking.
Speaker 2: Passes to park this.
Speaker 8: RV big box truck that was really their closet because they're liveaboard. And that vehicle, like I said before, it didn't move and it was they were causing issues and they were taking up parking. The other issue that the boat owners had with this, with the parking is that in our rules and regs, because it's because of mechanical , you have to move your vehicle every 72 hours for on street sweeping. The rules are regs are pretty clear on that. But what they were confused about, they came to us and said, Well, what if I get on my vessel and I go to Catalina for a week? My car's parked there for 72 hours, but over 72 hours because I'm there for a week. Well, what we explain to them is you just have to come to the office and you let us know that your car is going to be there for a week. And we make arrangements with Marine Patrol so that you do not get ticketed for not moving your vehicle during that time. So these are all policies that we do this. Some of the boat owners were not aware that this is how we actually handle it operationally. But with the rules and regs, I have to have a way of making sure that what we don't have in the past was people were just parked the vehicles and abandoned them.
Speaker 0: All right.
Speaker 10: Thank you so much for taking the time. Sorry to put you on the spot there. Thanks.
Speaker 1: Thank you. There's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes. And we did public comment.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Okay. I think that was our last item, correct? Yes, that was her last item. So we're going to go ahead and go into new business. And I know we have I want to start with just doing some of the remembrances. | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolution amending the Long Beach Marina Rules and Regulations, pursuant to the provisions of Long Beach Municipal Code, Section 16.08.970. (Districts 2,3) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04112017_17-0269 | Speaker 2: Communication from City Attorney Recommendation to declare ordinance amending the Long Beach Municipal Code all relating to officeholder accounts read for the first time and laid over to the next regular meeting of the City Council for Final Reading.
Speaker 1: This was this was the EOC municipal could change recommendation from last time. There's a motion in a second. Is there any public comment? Please come down. It's going to be very good.
Speaker 8: You click as the address. I very face. This measure. Does not and could never pass the smell test period. Those who have proved it and those who approved bringing this forward now have and will forever more, as long as they are in office, have a target on their back. Place their. But the United States Department of Justice, period, it simply does not pass the smell test. And those who voted against this measure in committee are to be commended. Those who voted for it should find the nearest door and leave. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. There's a motion and a second, please. Members, cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries. | Ordinance | Recommendation to declare ordinance amending the Long Beach Municipal Code by amending Section 2.01.380; and by repealing Section 2.01.390, all relating to officeholder accounts, read and adopted as read. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04112017_17-0270 | Speaker 1: Item 17. And then we'll go back to the hearing.
Speaker 2: Report from economic and property development. Recommendation to authorize the city manager to enter into a license agreement with the California Military Department for the property located at 854 East Seventh Street, District one.
Speaker 1: Councilman Gonzales.
Speaker 6: Yes. Do we have a quick staff report?
Speaker 8: Yes. John Keisler, our economic and property development director, can give you the staff report.
Speaker 0: Good evening, Mayor, and members of the city council.
Speaker 8: Tonight's item will allow the city to enter into a license agreement with the state of California, who owns the Armory at Alamitos and Seventh Street. This will allow a temporary use of the facility to install fencing, actually to extend the fencing to further secure the property across the frontage facing Seventh Street so that we can address some of the safety and health concerns that occur because the armory uses it only periodically. So this action allows us access to the property. It does also allow us to to install the temporary fence in the near term and extend the permanent fence over the long term. And we appreciate your support because once we execute this agreement, it will provide indemnification for the armory and allow us to enter the property once executed. That's the conclusion of my report and I'm happy to answer any questions.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 6: Yes. I just want to say thank you, John, and your team. I know that this is a an area that has long been an issue for the neighborhood. It's next to St Anthony's. It's also next to our new combined park. So I appreciate your diligence in this. Thanks so much.
Speaker 1: Hey, Councilman, we ringa everything now? Councilman Andrews? Yes.
Speaker 8: I want to thank our councilman, Lena Gonzalez, who's bringing support, because the fact that this is a very important of for safety is concern. And I think it's an excellent idea. And I think our kids are really enjoying also. Time is of the essence, but we sure want to see this come up. I'm looking forward to this. And thank you again.
Speaker 1: Great. Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item you're going to hear?
Speaker 8: I think it makes sense to fortify it and make sure it's in excellent condition, given the specter of federal troops being dispatched to Long Beach to help patrol the city. Until we get the crime paradigm and the crime eviscerated and the police department staffed 100%, 100% with professionals, with the overwhelming majority of members of the police department . Certainly are. But there's a cadre of. An element in there that our fifth columnists that are at war with the policies of Chief Luna and will soon be leaving. So we will probably have in their place because I don't think we can get people trained fast enough, federal troops providing the security that the citizens deserve. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. See no other speaker. Come forward, please.
Speaker 9: Thank you. I was just unaware of the use that will be for this facility. It could be documented somewhere where I could be advised to read about it. Unless you can answer the question.
Speaker 1: Thank you. It's not and there's not an additional use at this moment. It's just securing the site. I believe there's a motion and a second. Members, please cast your votes. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute any and all documents necessary to enter into a License Agreement with the California Military Department for the property located at 854 East 7th Street. (District 1) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04112017_17-0254 | Speaker 1: Okay. We're going back to the hearing. Item number one.
Speaker 2: Report from Public Works recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing. Find that the area to be vacated is not needed for present or prospective public use and adopt a resolution ordering the vacation of the alley north of Spring Street between Elm Avenue to the east and Long Beach Boulevard to the West Seventh District.
Speaker 1: Okay, great. We're going to go ahead and I'm going to go ahead and have Sast first to the presentation and then we'll go back to staff comment in the public. So, Mr. Modica.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. We'll have Sean Comey, the deputy director of Public Works, give the staff report.
Speaker 1: Q Good evening, Honorable Mayor Council.
Speaker 3: This item moves.
Speaker 1: Forward of vacation of the alley north of Spring Street between Elm Avenue and Long Beach Boulevard. The recommended actions tonight are to conduct a public hearing, make a finding that the alley is not needed for public use, and adopt the resolution ordering vacation of the alley. Just a real quick summary of the actions that preceded tonight's vacation include a general plan consistency finding by the Planning Commission on December 15th and notice of intent to vacate that was brought before the City Council on March 7th. With that, I'm available to answer any questions. Okay, there is a motion and a second I would go ahead and have any public comments first on this item. Please come forward.
Speaker 4: Put it in Mayor Council members. My name is Pedro Blanco. I'm with Current Design. We've been assisting the Salvation Army on this project for a few years. We really are very thankful of the assistance that we have from staff and really appreciate your recommendation for approval. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Brisard.
Speaker 9: I keep referring to the city website for the latest homeless count since it has not been posted to date. I was unable to look at that record, but I couldn't help but wonder with this alley just sitting there and being that the homeless are considered part of our citizen, public and creative cities who are are looking to be more progressive in their assistance toward the homeless. Some are using alleys to create seat slates, safe sleep ways they patios lounging areas. Harvey Milk has a park that now has an outdoor office. And I'm wondering for the homeless, could we not find some creative use? Where were these people who have been asked now to leave the corridors of the city while we build another civic center? And they've been removed, some of them now wandering who God knows where. Only God knows where these people are. And I wonder if anybody spoke for that. And is it too late to say maybe we can take another look at this alley being that the homeless are part of the citizens, some of them job used to hold jobs. Some of them are taxpayers whose taxes purchase parks and and help rehabilitate many of our facilities. Maybe we could put outdoor showers there. Could the homeless feel better enfranchised or helped if they knew that? Over on Elm Street there's a shower every day. Free, free shower. And then maybe somebody can set up a confession, stand where they can get free food in the alley that can be used for public use. Why are we continuing to act like the homeless are not part of our public when we're making these types of decisions? These types. Now we borrow $40,000,000,000 million to rebuild this city. But that vacant lot over there is vacant. It empty and free. And what do we do? Just put a gate up there and close it off. There are volunteers right now who are waiting to work for the homeless, who live right in that area, where if you would provide an atmosphere and a place for them to serve every day, you have free people, free employees who will do it for free. Why would you do this and not consider? Hmm. Can the homeless use that alley? How can you not think about that?
Speaker 1: Thank you. See no other public comment. I'm going to go ahead and close the hearing as they come back to the council and Councilman Ringa.
Speaker 8: Thank you. This alley has been determined by the my staff has all of the practical uses and it is part of the project for the Salvation Army. So I request my staff, my council to support this motion.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 0: Some great projects.
Speaker 5: Thank you for bringing it.
Speaker 1: Okay. Seeing no other comment from the council. There's a motion and a second. Please cast your vote.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. And next up, we have more of our business. So we're going to turn over to item number 16. I'm sorry. Item number 11. | Resolution | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, find that the area to be vacated is not needed for present or prospective public use; and, adopt resolution ordering the vacation of the alley north of Spring Street between Elm Avenue to the east and Long Beach Boulevard to the west. (District 7) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04112017_16-1104 | Speaker 2: Report from Long Beach Airport. Recommendation to authorize the city manager to execute a sublease between millionaire north and the city of Long Beach for office space at 4401. Donald Douglas Drive, District five.
Speaker 1: Canada Motion to second in his Motion at a second. Any public comment? Seeing no public comment back to the council. Councilman Andrews Nope. Councilman Austin Nope. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 3: I'd like to just to get a staff report and if the city attorney could just weigh in on if there's any potential conflicts of interest. Thanks.
Speaker 8: Just Romo can give the staff report for the airport. And then we'd like to hear from the city attorney. Mayor Garcia, members of council. The item before you is a proposed five year lease for office space at Long Beach Airport to help support functions including our accounting group, engineering group and security group. We're in dire need of additional space to house these functions that are critical for the airport. The council letter lays out the process under which this lease was developed, including rental surveys and identifying space that was both competitive and convenient for staff. Answer any questions you have relative to the lease terms itself. Otherwise, I defer to the city attorney on the other question.
Speaker 1: Mr. City Attorney.
Speaker 4: Mayor, members of the Council, thank you. As you recall, on December 13th, the city council requested the city attorney to seek an opinion from the SPC on this lease. We did so in writing on December 19th and then we have followed up with the PPC since that time and as the date of this evening in this Council letter, we have not received any information from the PPC subsequent to the request. Mr. Glen Ray notified the city that he had stepped down from the A.S., the Airport Advisory Commission, and at this time we advise the PPC of his decision to do so, and we are still not received any official word or opinion and have no indication from FBC when that might be forthcoming. That being understood, this office, we do not believe that there is a conflict or that this country creates a conflict or is prohibited. We have a similar issue or had a similar issue with a city employee and we received written correspondence from the see that this was appropriate contract to enter if the individual did not have or act in his capacity while with the city to process or to approve the contract, the AJC does not receive or these items of contracts do are not presented to the AC. So even his sitting on that was not part of the process. So therefore, we believe we can legally move forward with this contract.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Okay, that's fine.
Speaker 1: Okay. There's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes. Motion carries 12, please. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary for a Sublease to Lease No. 9351 between Million Air North, Inc., a California corporation, and the City of Long Beach for office space at 4401 Donald Douglas Drive, to house the Engineering, Accounting and Security Divisions of the Airport Department; and
Increase appropriations in the Airport Fund (EF 320) in the Airport Department (AP) by $303,036. (District 5) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04112017_17-0264 | Speaker 2: Report from Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Communications. Fire and police recommendation to authorize the city manager to execute a contract with the Department of Homeland Security to receive and expend grant funding for the FBI 16 Port Security Grant Program in an amount not to exceed 1,125,450 citywide.
Speaker 1: There's a motion and a second. Any public comment on this item? Please come forward.
Speaker 9: Surely you're sorry. Every time I look at this name, Department of Homeland Security. And I wonder. If this department thinks they can keep this city safe, if God decides it's time to reorganize some things here. I couldn't. I can't help but wonder, do we really believe? I don't care how much money you get, grant money or wherever it comes from. When God decides it's time to move the building, rearrange where the ocean flows on the port. On Artesia. Belmont Shore. Heading toward Redondo. None of this here will matter what we have done, how much money we get from the government. But thank them. Receive the money. The issue with us in this city is that God is asking you, will you please start acting like I own the world? Will you please give me my due and conduct business in a manner that honors me? That's what he's saying. Now, you got some free money tonight. I'm glad. I wonder how much will the homeless benefit from this? They are your first business clientele here. They are the ones there that are outnumbered and undone and underserviced. Homeland Security. Really? And all this is for the record. Remember we went entering into Passover now. And on the night of Passover, first born animals and children and families all died at the same time in Egypt over there. A place that is part of our world history because God decided it's time for some people who have been held as slaves to let go and fill you in on the Egypt. But you won't listen to me. Long Beach. You were in that time frame now. You're in that frame where God is saying, I'm about to show you some things and it will be him doing it. Because you've had people up here telling you, asking you to just acknowledge him and conduct business in a manner that honors him. And looking out for the poor in a way that is if it were you, is how you honor him, not the prayers you say at night, not saluting the flag, one nation under God when you're conducting, conducting business on your own. Now we are entering the time zone where he is about to move some real estate for real, and it will be him doing it.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Others in motion. Any second. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I got five speakers. Can I just have you line up, please? At the front. Dale Whitney. Jim Oberst and Summer Hanson. I think you're all three on the same topic. Then Mr. Goodhue and Ms.. Broussard. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute a contract, and all necessary amendments, including term extensions, with the Department of Homeland Security to receive and expend Department of Homeland Security grant funding for the FY 2016 Port Security Grant Program, in an amount not to exceed $1,125,450, for a period ending August 31, 2019; and
Increase appropriations in the General Grants Fund (SR 120) in the Fire Department (FD) by $250,450 and in the General Grants Fund (SR 120) in the Police Department (PD) by $925,000. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04112017_17-0265 | Speaker 2: Please report from Health and Human Services recommendation to authorize the city manager to execute an agreement with the State of California Department of Health Care Services to receive reimbursement for allowable medical administrative activities and an amount not to exceed 2,250,000 citywide.
Speaker 1: There's a motion and second public comment on this item.
Speaker 8: Very good. Very briefly. This is something I've had in my mind, because I see this every day and it it is deals with the health issues. At the corner of. The transom at ocean and pine as the shoe get off the blue line and walk toward the convention center. There's a sign there that deals with health issues that I think does not represent this city well. And we don't want you know, we want people to have a good mental frame of mind. But that sign lists down anxiety, staph infection, PMS, sciatica, backache, sinus infection and acupuncture here. I don't think that's a sign is. Helping engender a positive image of this city. When we people, they don't want to see that or hear that when they come in. They don't want to hear they want to divorce themselves and put whatever problems they may have behind them and so forth. So I would suggest relocating that same someplace. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. There is a motion and a second. See no other public comment. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: 14. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute an agreement, and any subsequent amendments with the State of California Department of Health Care Services, to receive reimbursement for allowable Medi-Cal Administrative Activities, in an amount not to exceed $2,250,000 for the period of July 1, 2017 through June 30, 2020. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04112017_17-0249 | Speaker 1: Thank you. Next item 15.
Speaker 2: Communication from City Attorney. Recommendation to declare ordinance relating to a temporary limitation of unattended donation recycling collection boxes or bins in or on any private or public lot in the city, declaring the urgency there thereof and declaring that this ordinance shall take effect immediately. Red and adopted as red citywide.
Speaker 1: CARNEY Public comment on this item. Please come forward.
Speaker 8: I support this one 100%, and it's engendered by the experience we went through. I think it was around the year 2002 when somebody who didn't live in the city, I believe the individual with with goodwill wanted to set up a donation spot in at the entrance to Marine Stadium where people would put couches and chairs and whatever stuff they donate. And obviously that would be a blight. And I don't think any neighborhood wants that. There's certain areas. It's certainly things can be put in. No ifs, no answer. No, but. But you don't want to have it in a residential area no matter what district you live in. You just have to find the right place for it. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Okay, there's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. We've already done 16 and 17, so I believe now we're going to is there any second public comment period?
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 1: Okay. Please come forward. | Emergency Ordinance | Recommendation to declare ordinance relating to a temporary limitation on the establishment, installation, placement, construction, expansion, or issuance of permits for the use of unattended donation/recycling collection boxes or bins in or on any private or public lot in the City; declaring the urgency thereof; and declaring that this ordinance shall take effect immediately, read and adopted as read. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0228 | Speaker 2: Thank you. Now moving on to our hearing, which is the first item up, we can have the agenda for the hearing. Madam Clerk.
Speaker 0: Hearing item one is a report from financial management recommendations received supporting documentation into the record concluded the public hearing and Adobe resolution amending the master fee and charges schedule city.
Speaker 2: And. Q We're going to go ahead and turn this over to staff. Mr..
Speaker 1: MODICA Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The staff report will be given by Leah Erickson, our Assistant Finance Director.
Speaker 6: Good afternoon or evening met and members of City Council. City Council's approval is being requested for mid-year changes to the master fee and charges schedule. These changes are identified an attachment to the Council letter for the mid-year adjustment process for departments. I've proposed a total of 30 fee changes to the schedule, along with eight fee deletions. The master fee and charges schedule is updated at least twice a year to allow departments to meet City Council's stated policy on user fees, which calls for full cost recovery whenever appropriate. City Council last approved an amended master fee and charges schedule on September six, 2016 as part of the FY17 budget process. Some examples of fee changes in the report include changes in library room rental fees in order to encourage public use of under-utilised spaces. Fees charged to transportation network companies such as Uber and Lyft operating on temporary permit at the airport. And an adjustment parking permit fees that aligns the city's fees with prevailing market rates. The full list of fee changes and deletions is available in the Council letter. That concludes my staff report, and Department of Representatives are here to answer any specific questions you may have on any of the proposed fee changes.
Speaker 2: Thank you. We'll start with Councilman Austin.
Speaker 3: You know, just have one quick question. Obviously, this is a staff report is pretty voluminous. What are the what exactly are the feed deletions that you mentioned and where are they at?
Speaker 6: So count Councilman Austin, the attachment A has a two page list and on attachment A page three of three is the list of proposed fee deletions for fiscal year 17, and it includes some changes in library services related to eliminating fees for compact discs, video DVDs and other media type of charges. And this is being aligned in order. These fees were collected by the library on behalf of Friends of the Long Beach Library, who pays for the media. And so the Library Department had requested two ladies with books which are being provided free of charge, and so these fees are being deleted. In addition, there was a couple of coffee urn charges that are no longer being offered. So those fees are being deleted as well.
Speaker 3: I see.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Council member are actually based on. Richardson. Do you have anything? No plan.
Speaker 5: Customer Pearce Yes, I want to support obviously a lot of this. I did have a few questions that I wanted to just ask quickly about the TNC. It says here that our fee structure is based on the cost of providing the services. And so I wanted to understand a little bit more what the cost of providing the services are and whether the $3 fee both for dropping off and picking up came from.
Speaker 2: Yes. Councilmember Jess Romero, Director, I want to just first frame this up, that this is a pilot program, as we had earlier explained to the council when it was approved. The fee itself is based on a number of factors. There's a range of fees that we looked at at competitive airports, all in California, most of them here in the L.A. region. And there's a range of fees. They go anywhere from about $2 to $5. And a lot of that is reflective of the fact that each airport is different in terms of its cost structure, what it needs to support, or what they call the landside element or the roadways, parking areas that are out, you know, outside of the fence, if you will. So with this research, you know, we believe that the $3 fee for a pick up or dropoff is appropriate. And really what this is doing is this is helping us continue to diversify the revenue that is required at the airport. We heard from the council very loudly and clearly when there was a discussion on the FISA vote that financial stability was extremely important. And the more money that we make through these programs like this, the less we have to rely on other funding sources, specifically passenger facility charges, which are entirely driven by activity at the airport.
Speaker 5: So will there be these fees be used to invest back in the airport infrastructure parking? Can you elaborate on that a little bit?
Speaker 2: Absolutely. And to your point, this year alone, this fiscal year, the airport has spent about $550,000 on roadway improvements for any recent visitors to the airport within the last few months. They'll notice that the island area that separates the inner and outer curb was lengthened and shrunk to allow for more traffic lanes in front of the terminal to ease congestion. We do resurfacing projects all the time, so this actually is just going to go part of the way toward helping us fund or landside element more appropriately so again, that we don't have to rely on funds that otherwise could go to securing debt on the bonds that are outstanding at the airport and other projects
Speaker 5: . Last question. I see that the yellow cabs, they have a one time fee and this one is pick up and drop off. Can you just elaborate? And I promise that's my last question.
Speaker 2: Well, again, this pilot here was specifically intended to focus on the T and C's. We just completed a ground transportation study through a consultant. And our goal is over the next several months, but also dovetailing with this pilot period, to gather more information and examine fees for all commercial ground transportation providers. The legacy fee, I'm calling it from Yellow Cab is a fee that's been in existence, I think, since the 1980s. There's no doubt that it needs to be updated, but we'll be looking at the appropriate fee structure in the coming months.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I want to thank city staff for this report. I know that they have to do it twice a year. It is a lot of work. We appreciate that. I do want to, for the record, just put on note that and ask a rhetorical question. Leah, can you confirm that any fee made to the fee schedule, which is very lengthy, is outlined in the letter? There are no changes that were not specifically called out in the letter that a constituent who was trying to read this would be confused by. Is that accurate?
Speaker 6: Councilwoman Mango Between the the letter and attachment a to the letter, every single fee change or deletion is detailed.
Speaker 5: Just not exhibit A because that seemed a little bit overwhelming to some, but I wanted to make sure that I was accurate in what I had stated. That is correct.
Speaker 6: Exhibit A contains the full list of all existing fees and charges, including any.
Speaker 5: Amendments that were already that are singled out and identified in attachment A to the memo. Perfect. And then secondly, I just want to thank the city staff for their creative approach to parking. Splitting the day, parking, parking in the evening parking really will open up. And then the hire. Option in terms of our ability to properly sell parking at those locations currently without actually knowing how many days versus night users you have, you have a limit to how much you can sell. So we've a shortage of those permits. And I know that the community and I personally who use some of these downtown lots will really appreciate that they have that differentiator. I think it's a great solution. We've heard the community asking for more parking. This is a way to get there and I think it was.
Speaker 6: Creative and I appreciate the hard work.
Speaker 5: Done on that. And then finally, and to echo the comments of Councilman Pearce related to taxes versus cab and legacy fees, I'd be interested in aligning the legacy fee. I think what's good for one is what's good for all I know in meeting with the cab providers, they said they wanted a level playing field. I think the more appropriate way to level the playing field is that everyone move to a per pickup, per drop off fee. And then I would also like to see us explore. The neighborhoods who are around the airport have recently been significantly impacted by people parking on Friday in their neighborhoods and then now there's not any parking for their kids birthday parties and utilization of those areas. They're there and parking there for more than the 72 hour limit, which is allowable. And so then they're taking either an Uber or a cab from a nearby location to the airport. So they're trying to skirt the fees. They're also parking at our local hotels that are in the area, even though they are not guests in the hotel. So I've seen this and they will park at a local hotel. They will get in a cab and go to the airport even though they are not a guest. So I'd like to see a little bit of that money in the first year set aside to alleviate the pains that are being caused by this, as long as it's allowable under the federal rules related to airport revenue. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Price.
Speaker 7: Thank you. I, too, want to thank staff for the report. And I have a couple of questions. I first wanted to point out that I like the proposed changes, although they don't impact my district with the parking fees and the lots having consistent daytime and nighttime parking fees I think is appropriate. And I've talked with Mr. Beck about that, that we shouldn't be charging more for nighttime permits or daytime permits. We should try to have some consistency there. So I like that that's at least being proposed in regards to some some lots that are mentioned in there. And the master fee staff letter I did. I have a few questions about the TNC fees as well, and I want to thank the airport staff for taking some time to talk with me earlier this week about it. And my concern is really this, and that is if this is a pilot program and we're using it to collect data, why are we not waiting to determine what the fee should be based on the data that we're collecting? And if we believe that there is going to be a need to increase revenues in order to offset some of the detrimental impacts of having this additional flow of traffic through the airport, then where did we come up with the $6 amount? So if there's any answer to that, I'd appreciate that.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Staff Councilman do to clarify it's some the fee is is a an either or fee. So the way it would work operationally is the customer would be brought to the airport passing into the Geofence system. $3 is added to that fare. They have to go out, either leave the it will leave the airport and go on their way to another pick up. Or we have a under the pilot program, we have a holding lot and they can stay there. So it's it's it's $3 for either a pick up or a drop off. You know, they won't necessarily do two transactions during one visit to the airport. Again, as I said earlier, as it relates to the fee, we know that it is costing the airport money to maintain the roadways, to do repairs, to do enforcement. All of that is is ongoing. That's just as it relates to the expense that up to this point, the airport, other than through what I'm going to call it, fairly nominal fees that are assessed for the permits for these commercial providers. We have not kept up anywhere near to what it cost to run the programs. At the very least, you know, it's the goal of the airport at the very least to achieve cost recovery, which I'm not even convinced that we'll get there when this program is complete. And again, part of that is collecting the metrics, the data and determining whether or not these fees need to be adjusted at some point in time. So I think it is very appropriate to go into this with a fee. It's bracketed by the other fees that are being assessed at the other airports. And again, each airport is different. But based on what I know, we're expanding what staff what I've seen staff information, the data and what we're expecting based on these these trip fees, it's not going to cover these costs. It'll get us in the right direction. And as I said earlier, what we're trying to do is diversify the revenues from many sources so that we don't have to rely on fewer revenue centers like parking, airport concessions, things like that. So this is really going to help our overall program.
Speaker 7: And I appreciate that because your answer clarifies to me that it's not an arbitrary fee. It's a fee that is designed primarily for cost recovery. So do you envision that after the pilot program, there will be an adjustment to both the TNC fees and any fees assessed on our cab services based on data obtained? Or is this is this fee estimated to be able to be sufficient and cover what we think it's going to need to cover?
Speaker 2: Quite honestly, I think it's a little too early to tell. I can I can tell you this with reasonable certainty that the $3 fee, I think, is is a good cost point, if you will, a price point for the operators. Again, I think that it's going to help move us toward cost recovery as it relates to the cab drivers and the cab companies. You know, obviously, it and it was mentioned earlier that, you know, the goal is a level playing field and we would we'd obviously support that as well. What we'll have to look at is their cost of operating that particular enterprise versus the TNC, which are you know, they're measurably different. So we don't want to discriminate by, you know, necessarily setting one uniform fee it. May turn out that that's what happens. I want the data to show, though, you know, what what really is defensible, what is appropriate. And again, our eye is toward really making sure that we're protecting revenue streams and growing revenue streams at the airport.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much. I appreciate it.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman. Next up, we have Councilmember Supernova.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I think Mr. Romo just answered all of my questions, but I'll just frame it a little differently. And that is your your wording was the fees are bracketed by the region, almost like a market driven fee. But to clarify that there is no correlation between Long Beach and a lake size airport in the region. Cost could be drastically different. Would that be correct?
Speaker 2: Well, I would say we're looking at, I think, within the fee range or the cost or the fee assessed at the airports that we're looking at, especially the airports there between two and $5. So percentage wise, yes, you can say it's drastic, but from an absolute dollar amount, it's you know, I think it's not as big of a spread. That said, you know, each airport is a little bit different. And I believe that based on the characteristics and the the cost burden and the requirements at bay at Long Beach, that $3 is a very appropriate fee to start this program.
Speaker 1: Okay. And then that's just on the function of the service. And beyond that, we have the cost of the airport. Not all airports in the region have a new terminal, a new parking structures, etc., to pay for.
Speaker 2: Yes, that's correct. I would say this, though, is that it's not necessarily even in the newness of safe facilities or assets at an airport. In our case, we've got aging assets and things that need more attention. And again, if we don't have to take money from other sources of revenue, that's not much more. We can invest in other airport projects. So I believe I'm a firm believer in making sure that elements at the airport, whether it's on the airfield or the landside, that they are being able they're able to generate and extract revenue from various sources in this case, because Long Beach Airport, really, for all intents and purposes, has not had a ground transportation program up to this point. We need to do that anyway. And part of that is making sure that it looks at appropriate funding, you know, to meet the burdens, to repave the roadways, to improve, you know, ingress and egress to the airport. And really even what we'd like to do, if possible, is use some of this revenue to help fund what I'm going to call wayfinding or beautification projects at the airport. That's a that's a longer term goal of ours. But I think that anything we can do to help fund that and offset that from other funding sources that like, for example, PFC, I'd like to make sure that we could keep PFC in place, firm and center on our bond obligations and use these other revenue sources for what I'm going to call operating expenses.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. One last question or just a comment. I concur with Councilmember Mungo's statement about the issue with folks having an Uber or Lyft pickup within a neighborhood or a hotel parking lot. If there's any way to get that into the contract, we'd appreciate it. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 5: I just wanted to highlight one additional line that is also changing the reservation based around transportation and non reservation based ground transportation. Just to be clear, is that, say your limousines, your bus services that are for hire when you drop off six or eight people at the airport, all of those. And it seems as though the permit is only being increased for the one time, but not necessarily on the per pick up or the per drop off. It's on one of three of attachment.
Speaker 2: Yes. In the case of the other, ground transportation is really this pilot program because of the technology that's available and because of industry standards, where it is a per trip fee, that's we're going into this focusing on the tax ideally. And if you've had a chance or do get a chance to read the ground transportation study, one of the recommendations is for the installation and investment of what's called an ABI or automated vehicle identification system, because ideally every commercial vehicle that goes into the airport should be paying some fee based on activity. I said earlier, I it may be that it it results in a single fee, but I know this from my time at L.A. World Airports, they actually have different fees, trip fees for different types of vehicle. I'm not saying we would do that. I'm not saying we wouldn't do that. Part of this exercise is to collect that data. So these fees here relative to the permit fees. Again, in my experience, they were greatly under charging those service providers. We weren't. We are we have not, to this point being, been recovering the administrative time that it takes to process these documents , get them signed and sent out. So this is this right here is is really just to cover the paperwork.
Speaker 5: I appreciate that. I, of course, would prefer to be fee free. I do understand, though, that this program and other programs has an impact to our neighborhoods, which is why I brought that up specifically. I read the memo. I appreciate the research done, and I recognize that it is the industry standard and we're not the first into this market. And so for us to take a major diversion from that might be difficult for both the consumer and the the industry. So I appreciate your work on this and I'll be supporting this item. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And just to just as a clarification, also, Mr. Remo, I mean, I think almost every airport that has implemented the rideshare program has has a fee, correct? That's correct. Okay. Thank you. There's a motion and a second public comment on the fee schedule issue. Please come forward. Just a quick question and a good point Councilwoman Mongeau made, and I'm not sure I followed all of the details, but if a neighborhood is being impacted by that, can there not be what some neighbors have, some neighborhoods have as a parking permit that the neighbors would have and that anybody that has a car parked there that does not have that permit would be towed, period. Thank you. Q Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mr. Mayor and council members. My name is Max Gellar. This is Diana, my colleague. We're from left. We look forward to picking up passengers at the airport, but we have some serious concerns, namely the trip fee. Just a point of clarification, these trip fees. All airports do have a trip fee where we're permitted. Some of them don't have both a pick up and a drop off fee. Especially airports besides Burbank, San Jose, San Diego, a bigger one. It's just a pick up fee. There's no drop off fee. So what we're asking for is for the pilot to begin to gather this data to then determine a more permanent fee structure. And it's not Lyft and Uber that pays these fees. It's the customers themselves. We're sort of a conduit. We get these fees and then it goes straight to the airport for the cost recovery that they're seeking. Also, generally, airports that we've dealt with have provided a really sort of annotated detailed description of the TNT operations costs and where these fees will go down to the point of the salary of the people who point to where a taxi pickup has to happen. We want this pilot to start tomorrow, but we have concerns that if we sign an agreement with a double sided, $3, $3, it will set a bad precedent. And we haven't sent back the agreement for that reason. So what we're asking is that the six months start with all the data being collected and then a more appropriate fee is sort of determined based on the data we haven't been picking up at the airport, so we're still confused as to where they're getting these numbers from their client, you know, all the sort of numbers that they're citing. But we're here for any any questions you have.
Speaker 2: As a resource, too.
Speaker 1: And a follow up for any past experience. We have California airports and experience with airports, the size and that's all.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you very much. Let me go back to Mr. Mr. Romo, because I know I just want to ask a question. The regional airports of the five regional airports, I believe we are the one that currently doesn't have the TNC program in place. Of those five, do they all have which only have one or the other or both? Can you? I would say Ontario Airport currently does not allow TNC. I think they're working toward that here in the coming months. L.A.X. charges $4, pick up and drop off for dollars. Pick up and drop off. Orange County, I believe, is $2 for pickup and $2 for drop off. And I defer to staff. I don't know. Burbank, I think is three and change. I'm not sure if it's just a single fee. So but L.A.X. and Orange County, both do both pick up and drop off. Yes. Okay. And can I get a response? Do we know about Burbank?
Speaker 6: It's a we can. It's $3 only for pick up fees. And one of the reasons actually.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I'm in the discussion. Thank you. So. Okay, and and I know that Ontario right now is doing the same thing we're doing, which is moving towards a policy, correct? Yeah, they're looking toward it's supposed to be from what I hear, it's supposed to be go into effect next 60 to 90 days. Okay. Okay. Thank you, Councilman Mango and work here. Thank you. If you have a question. Well, thanks, guys. Appreciate it.
Speaker 5: So I know one of the things that's a challenge is we want to continue to maintain the quality of the options available. And we would, of course, love for people to get to the airport in any means they like. But one of the things that comes in, at least my discussions with staff related to the drop off fee, is that every drop off sub vents a parking at the airport. And so to Mr. Romo's point related to the budget, I saw in our fee analysis that we actually believe that parking revenue is going to go down because of a lot of factors. Actually, people are using other transportation. People are parking at the airport as long people, the destinations have changed. So they're not going away for as long. We don't have the flight to D.C. anymore, etc., etc.. So these shorter hauls have less days at the parking structure. And so we never want to put ourselves in the red and we don't want to create new fees if we don't have to. But I think that with the pilot program in mind, if we could just encourage the staff to keep in mind that the bottom line , they think that that's really important to our community so that we have a safe and stable airport.
Speaker 2: And some reassurance.
Speaker 1: I just want to respond to Mr. Good Hugh's point about creating preferential parking districts, at least in my district. That's not free. It starts with a 1400 dollars traffic study. The residents would have to pay for signs and also an annual permit. And I don't think I'd ever ask my residents to subsidize a private company doing business in their neighborhood like that. But thank you for bringing that up.
Speaker 2: Thank you. There's a motion in the second. Members, please go and cast your votes.
Speaker 0: Motion carries. | Resolution | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing and adopt resolution amending the Master Fee and Charges Schedule. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0238 | Speaker 2: We have such great kids, don't we? Amazing. Good job, guys. You guys were awesome. And the last item that was pulled was slated for 1112, I think.
Speaker 0: Yes. Item 12 is a report from police. Recommendation to receive and file the application of buy how fresh buy fish tacos for a premises to premises and a person to person. Transfer of an ABC license at 5 to 24 East Second Street District three.
Speaker 2: Councilman Price.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much. Before I make any comments, I'd like to see if we have a staff report from the police department.
Speaker 2: Commander Laverne, Honorable Marion City Council.
Speaker 1: Item number 12 is an application for a premise to premise and a person to person transfer of an on sale general eating place ABC license. This location currently holds an on sale beer and wine license for an eating place, and the police department has conducted our investigation and do not anticipate any adverse impact with the issuance of this license. That concludes my report. I'm available for any questions, if you might have any.
Speaker 7: Thank you. I don't have any questions. I do want to make a couple of comments about this application. I know the business owners are here. You know, when we are operating a business in a corridor like the Belmont Shore corridor, which is a geographically close, very close to residential housing, one of the concerns that are raised any time there's an application for a liquor license or an alcohol license is whether or not that's going to impact the community. And in terms of Belmont, sure. The question we always get as well as everyone going to be approved or everyone going to be denied. And so the way my approach has been and will continue to be that we'll evaluate each application on a case by case basis and do our research to ensure that the establishment that is now going to be having additional privileges associated with its operations understands the delicate balance that we have and the importance of maintaining good relations with our neighbors. So I've had the opportunity to speak with the ownership of Baja Fish Tacos. I have to say, since the day that they opened, they've been incredible neighbors in the community. They're very respectful. They have a great relationship with the council office and understand the sensitivities of the particular neighborhood. They also operate businesses in other areas within the region. So they understand how to operate a business and and really are are not taking too many risks with this particular facility. That's just not how they operate. They're very deliberate. Based on my conversations with them. There are a few changes to the business operations that I think would shed some light into this particular application. Right now there are Counter-Service type restaurant so that you would order at the counter, but before they serve any liquor, if these conditions are approved and ABC grants them their license, they have committed to me that they will change their operational structure so that they have they will have a full fledged sit down restaurant with waitress and waiter service at the tables serving the liquor. They've also committed to me that all of their waitstaff will receive training through an approved agency on alcohol sales and distribution, through any of the courses that are available through the state of California, such as LEAD. This is really important to me because impaired driving and underage drinking are areas of major concern, and they've committed to me that they'll be a partner in educating their staff in terms of responsible service. And they have also committed to not increasing the number of TVs from four, which I know is a is a really big issue in the Belmont Shore area. Everyone is concerned that all of our establishments are going to turn it into sports bars and they prefer to have more restaurants that are family oriented and maybe don't have a sports bar feel. So the owners have committed to me that they will maintain that feel for their establishments. So I want to thank them for their partnership and wish them the best in terms of their success. And they know that some of these particular conditions are not enforceable through ABC. But I feel very comfortable in my discussions with them that they will honor and commit to these conditions as they operate their business. So, gentlemen, thank you. And I don't know if you want to say anything. If you do or you don't, you want to introduce yourselves. You can do that. No pressure.
Speaker 4: Could you bring me to know?
Speaker 0: No. On 12.
Speaker 4: Jesus. Oh, God, no.
Speaker 1: They're okay. Sorry. It's a it's a privilege to be among all of you and the mayor of Long.
Speaker 8: Beach finally get to meet. We spoke to.
Speaker 1: Councilwoman Pryce, and we assure her that our record speaks for ourselves. We're a family owned business. We've been in business for 21 years.
Speaker 8: And we've always open new neighborhoods where families like a quiet living standard. There's there's a lot of neighborhoods, all schools. We are a family business that is growing day by day. And what we're found here in Long.
Speaker 1: Beach is that we want to go ahead and we want to expand our menu. We want to.
Speaker 8: Provide our customers what they're asking for. What we learned from since we opened a couple of years.
Speaker 1: Ago to what we know.
Speaker 8: Now is that customers here, and especially in the area of Belmont Shore, they want something cozy. They want they want to come in. They want to get that full service feel. And that's what we're going to offer them. And we we spoke to Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 1: And the extent of what we are going to do with with our business, and we're going to transform it into a full sit down restaurant.
Speaker 8: And we are not going to sell any liquor until we do that. And we want to thank Councilwoman Price and also Lisa West for working with us and understanding that our interest is always the neighborhoods that we go into. We always want to provide the best thing that we can for our customers, because our business depends from our customers. We are nothing without them. And we want to thank you once again for.
Speaker 1: For for helping us with this. And we want to thank you for your time. Okay.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 2: And thank you for opening a business in Long Beach. Thank you. Thank you for your for your investment. Thank you very much. There's a motion and a second on the on the item. No public comment on this. So please go and cast your votes. | ABC License | Recommendation to receive and file the application of Baja Fish Tacos, Incorporated, dba Baja Fish Tacos, for a premise to premise and person to person transfer of an Alcoholic Beverage Control License, at 5224 East 2nd Street. (District 3) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0155 | Speaker 0: Motion carries.
Speaker 2: Kane A last concern item that was pulled tonight was 60.
Speaker 0: Item 16 is a report from Public Works recommendation to authorize city manager to execute an amendment to contract with Central Park System for providing parking operations and management services to increase the contract amount by $450,000.
Speaker 2: City Councilman Gonzales.
Speaker 7: Yes, thank you. I remember pulling this item about a month ago and had questions. And I want to thank Craig Beck for depicting all of the the information that will are all of the details as to what this contract will cover. However, I did have one question relative to the security, because I know City Place has been in an issue historically with security. So can you tell me a little bit about what that will cover and entail? Exactly.
Speaker 5: Craig.
Speaker 2: Certainly Councilmember Gonzales, members of the council, the item that you have before you is really focused on the operating side of our parking lots, not so much the CHP elements, which we we do have a number of those coming forward. But we felt it was prudent to make a reinvestment in many of our facilities, especially the city place garage in the downtown. And we've added a number of security personnel and security hours over the course of 24 seven operation in City Place alone, we've added over 160 hours of security time. Plus under this agreement with central parking who are now ESP plus they put in somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 additional security cameras in that garage, which are now monitored by the security officers. So we've really tried to step up that experience. There's also increased maintenance, power washing. We've increased the frequency of power washing in those garages where we have a number of other items that we're going to be addressing moving forward. But those are some of the ones under this particular request.
Speaker 7: Great. Thank you, Craig. I just wanted to make sure we clarify that and I appreciate your work on this. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. There's a motion on the second. See no public comment. Please cast your votes. Motion case consent count and the consent calendar and all the pulled out ins have been approved. We're going to go ahead and do a couple of items out of order. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute an amendment to Contract No. 32983 with Central Parking System, Inc., of Los Angeles, CA, for providing parking operations and management services, to increase the contract amount by $450,000, for the period ending March 31, 2017. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0243 | Speaker 2: Thank you. There's a motion on the second. See no public comment. Please cast your votes. Motion case consent count and the consent calendar and all the pulled out ins have been approved. We're going to go ahead and do a couple of items out of order. The first one will be on the agenda will be item 23.
Speaker 0: Item 23 Report from Economic and Property Development. Recommendation to approve the series Draft Blueprint for Economic Development to guide the city's overall economic development plan for the next ten years.
Speaker 2: City I thank you, but I making some opening comments because I think this is a really important discussion and item. And then I'm going to turn this over to to staff. So I just want to remind the council that when when this current council formed, this city did not have a economic development department. And as we probably remember, one of the first actions this council actually took in that very first budget was bringing back the economic development department that had been cut years ago in the city budget. And so I want to again just thank the council. That kind of investment that was made now about two years ago when that budget cycle restarted, the economic development department, which is now, as we all know, have been completely staff led by our director, that department, Mr. Jon Keisler. And in addition to that, the other thing that we did, again, thanks to the support of the Council, is we brought back and filled the Economic Development Commission. The commission had been completely vacant and and unfilled for many, many years. Clearly, in doing economic development work, you have to have business leaders and community members and workers and folks at the table doing this work. And so we approved a really great group of community leaders and commissioners to serve on this body. Their main task, informing the informing this commission and the main task that I had asked them to be involved with was the development of the blueprint that you see in front of you today. Now, just as a note, the blueprint is still in draft form. And so what you're seeing today, well, we printed out a few copies just for the council and us internally. This is not a final document. And so this is what you are seeing tonight is a is the draft of the essential completion of their work and and staff is looking forward to hearing from council tonight about your thoughts about this final draft before it goes into a final, final phase. Let me also just say that they've been working on this blueprint probably for about a year. There has been approximately 25 community meetings. There has been intense conversations and discussions with every single bed across the city. All of the leaders have been involved. There have been deep conversations with Cal State, Long Beach, Long Beach, City College, Long Beach, Unified School District, community groups of all types have been involved, whether it's on whether it's been groups like Building Healthy Communities or business groups that are like Virgin Galactic and others, all have been asked to provide input into the document that you have in front of you. I want to also think, because I think it's important to acknowledge there has been an incredible amount of work that these commissioners have been involved with, and I want to just personally thank them. And that has been Randall Hernandez, who's been the chair. Becky Blair, who will be saying some words tonight. Who is the vice chair? Cyrus Parker. Janette, who is one of the commissioners, also the dean of the College of the Arctic Council at Long Beach. We have Blair Cohn, who we all know, Bobby Oliviera, Frank Colonna, Kristi Allen, Lincoln Bower, Michelle Molina, Ralph Olguin and Walter Larkins. They have been a incredible group of commissioners and have put a lot of work into this. If you have had a chance to to watch them in any of their meetings on this topic, they have they have gone really, really deep and gone into the community and held meetings across the city to put what we have in front of us. And so I know that they are anxious to hear your thoughts on what they've put together. I know staff wants to hear from the council tonight what really stands out and what you really like about this document. And if you think there's anything that can improve this document, I think now is the time to please give those thoughts as well so that we can end up with a really strong final product. Let me also say that this this document is meant to do two things. The first is to really guide our economic development efforts for the next decade. It's going to be a great guide for staff to use as they do their work as a new department moving forward. And it's going to be an opportunity for the Commission to now begin working with the Council, in particular the Economic Development and Finance Committee, on how some of this work is implemented. What's the work plan look like? How do we begin to achieve some of the goals and recommendations that are in the the report? And so all of that I think is in the future, of course. But I wanted to thank the commission for. For their incredible work on this on this project, everything from the developing of the vision to the goals, to the to the to the plan itself. And the last thing I'll say is what Tim and I had a chance to to view this just a week or two ago when it was completed. And I what struck me about the document that I thought was really impressive is to me, at the core of this document are people and you guys really focused on people, on the entrepreneur, on on the worker, on the the business person, on the small business owner. And I think that was really impressive and is very different from from economic development documents. I think that have happened in the past in the city is there's a real strong focus on on people. And I thought that was that was something that really stood out to me. And so thank you to them. And I want to thank everyone for being so supportive of this process. It's one that I'm really proud of to to have been a part of. So with that, I'm going to turn this over to Mr. Chrysler, who's going to walk the council through some of the data and and some of the report. Honorable Mayor and members.
Speaker 4: Of the City Council, I would like to introduce Eric Romero, who has been our staff lead on this project to give you the staff report.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor, and members of the City Council. My name is Eric Romero. I am a development project manager in the Economic and Property Development Department. Today I'll be presenting to you a short presentation on the draft blueprint for economic development. And we'll start with a brief economic snapshot. I'm going to start at the top and move to the right so that you can follow along. So we can see in the first chart that unemployment rate has dropped significantly between 2010 and 2016, which is good news on the chart to the right. We can also take a look at the top industries in terms of the number of jobs and how that compares to the state of California. We can also see on the chart furthest to the right that the economic status of our residents differs depending on race and ethnicity. And then going down to the to the first chart on the left, we can also see that wages differ by industry, with the top wages being in the transportation and warehouse industry. The next chart shows that total private employment has surpassed pre-recession levels, which is good news as well. And then the final chart there, the pie chart shows that the majority of our labor force commutes outside of the city for work.
Speaker 2: Mr. O'Mara, before you move on, can you're speeding through some of the stuff here, which is but I think it's really important to go back to that because this is what also is was was surprising to me. Can you go back to the charts? Sure. I'm going to I'm going to go ahead. So going back to these charts, I just wanted to just say point two things out. The first is the the real historic drop in unemployment that the city has seen is outpacing, by the way, in talking to mayors across the country and seeing what's going on, we are outpacing most cities across the country of our size or larger. So we are doing very well when it comes to job growth and the amount of jobs available to our community. That's something to be very proud of. And to me, it's one of the most important data points that a city should be looking at. When you're looking at economic activity is what the unemployment rate is, and that's something we should be very proud of. The and the other point that I wanted to make, which I think is really interesting, is if you look at the growth of of populations within the city and and the household income, this to me has been impressive. When you look at the five year growth of our populations, when you broke down, our populations are in a black, Asian, white, Hispanic. And you look at the five year growth for our for residents in Long Beach workers compared to the county. That's a striking difference. And look, if you look at, for example, just the Asian population, Asian-Americans in Long Beach had a 15.7% growth in household income versus 3.3% in L.A. County. You look at the the African-American population in the city of Long Beach and the five year growth ahead of 4.2% growth in household income. And unfortunately, there's been a negative point 2% decline in household income across the county. And the same can be said for the white population. You see the growth, the five year growth of 5.9 versus 3.9 across the county and within the Hispanic population of 7.8 to 2.4. So I just I point that out just because of the other, I think data point in the snapshot that I think is is important to note is that when you look at where the city is going and you look just take a look back on the last five years of every worker and every subgroup while certainly there are differences and those I think some some of those are addressed in here. Our growth is outpacing the county currently for everyone. And that's another thing that we should be very proud of. And so I just wanted to point that out and make sure the council saw that as well. So, Mr. Romero, sorry to interrupt you.
Speaker 1: Those were excellent points and thank you for for building on that. So I'll I'll jump into some background on the blueprint. So in 2015, the Mayor and the City Council tasked the Economic Development Commission with developing a vision and recommendations for how to grow our economy over the next ten years. The Mayor and the City Council really wanted the commission to drive this effort and for the recommendations to capture the essence of the steps that we could take as a city to grow our economy. The Commission consists of 11 members from various different sectors. For example, we have the Dean of the College of Arts at Cal State Long Beach, a director of a business improvement district, commercial brokers, entrepreneurs and more. And we feel that the draft blueprint really captures all of their diverse perspectives. And I have to personally commend the commission for their hard work. This commission was meeting every week at one point and biweekly at other points, which is not come in for most commissions. So I really applaud them for for their dedication to this process. The blueprint is a policy document that outlines goals, objectives and recommendations for how to grow our economy in the next ten years, and also will serve as a catalyst for economic activity across the city. The deliverables are a high level policy document, which is the draft blueprint, a work plan for further assessment and strategy. The development will take into consideration how we begin to operationalize some of these policy recommendations and consider our budget and staff resources and sequencing of the different programs and initiatives over time. And we're also looking to develop an online dashboard to track key performance indicators that will help us gauge how our economy is performing at a particular point in time. Some indicators that we're looking at is the total number of jobs, the total number of businesses, per capita income, median household income, educational attainment, and many more. And this will be a public facing dashboard that will be available to all to help gauge how our economy's performing. The Commission went through an extensive research process as a part of developing the recommendations for the blueprint. The city commissioned Beacon Economics for developing an economic analysis which was made up of two different parts. Part one provided essential background information on the city's economy, its workforce and its residents. Part two was a deeper dove into the different key industry clusters in the city, such as health care, logistics and business services, to name a few. And it helped us to get a baseline understanding of how these clusters are performing and how we can better serve them. Moving forward, the Commission also did a great job at organizing various different study sessions that focus on different topics and the organized panels with developers to understand how we can improve the real estate and property development process. We had a panel on workforce development, a panel with city staff, so that they can better understand the business licensing process, the permitting and inspection process, and the planning process as well, and a number of other study sessions that were organized. We also looked at other plans from across the country to inform this planning process and to identify best practices. For example, we looked at the Seattle Economic Development Plan, the Santa Ana Economic Development Plan, and also looked at the L.A. County Strategic Plan for Economic Development and others as well. And we organized a number of different listening sessions or interviews with the commissioners themselves, department heads and other institutional partners to get some insights as to some of the challenges that we're facing and also opportunities to grow our economy. Once the Commission developed some initial recommendations, we organized focus groups in the community to get some initial feedback on the policy recommendations. And we also looked at other key reports to identify best practices, for example, for how to best support small businesses or how to help grow a creative and innovation economy locally and regionally. So with all of this work, the commission did put together their draft recommendations for the Economic Development Blueprint. And the vision for the draft blueprint is that Long Beach is a city of opportunity for workers, investors and entrepreneurs. And the commission really felt that the blueprint should serve as a catalyst for action, so that it should create a vision for different institutional partners across the city to come together behind one vision to grow our economy, that it should create higher wage job opportunities, spur investment throughout all of the city. So investment in the north side, west side, central, Long Beach and everywhere else that it should build an ecosystem that supports entrepreneurs to confidently grow and to start and grow businesses in the city of Long Beach and to provide opportunity for our residents to live healthy, productive and prosperous lives and to positively impact where they live. The blueprint has seven focus areas. The first is engines of growth. And this has to do with making sure that we grow and support our key industry clusters and emerging sectors. The second one is economic inclusion, which has to do with advancing economic equity, particularly for low income communities across the city. The third is jobs and workforce development, which has to do with making sure that we have a prepared workforce so that our residents can get good jobs and also so that we can attract higher wage job opportunities to the city. The fourth is business assistance, which has to do with putting the support systems in place again so entrepreneurs can confidently start and grow their business here. Number five is the development environment, which has to do with ways to make to improve the real estate and property development process, making it more cost effective and streamlining it as well . Number six is quality of life and this takes into consideration the wellbeing of our residents across all of our unique neighborhoods and it considers many questions relating to public safety. The social services some people would need particularly vulnerable populations to lead production productive lives. Also questions about walkability and likability as well. And number seven is economic leadership and cooperation, which has to do with advancing an integrated approach to local and local and regional economic development, and to really have long to be a leader out there advocating for our city and our region to help grow jobs, businesses and opportunity for our residents. If approved, the following implementation process would be recommended for the blueprint. The first would be to work with our city partners and also institutional partners across the city to encourage alignment with economic development goals and objectives. Sorry about that. Number two would be to work with city staff and partners to develop a blueprint work plan to operationalize these policy recommendations and see how we would sequence the initiatives and programs that come out of this plan. Number three is to develop an online platform for tracking and reporting performance. This is the online dashboard that I referred to earlier. Number four is to produce a communications and marketing plan to to market this to the world, to let everyone know what we're doing here in Long Beach, to grow our economy and to also let people know why they should be considering investing in the city. We would, of course, provide regular updates to the City Council, the Economic Development and Finance Committee, and to the Economic Development Commission. And we would organize an annual conference that highlights progress on the blueprint to keep it relevant and to keep people excited about this partnership to grow our city's economy. That concludes my my staff report, and we're happy to answer any questions.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And I think everyone has the blueprint in front of them as well. So let me turn this over to the before I turn over to the council, I believe actually someone from the commission was going to say a few comments. Is that correct? Ms.. Romero.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes. I apologize. I would like to invite Vice Chair Becky Blair to add a few additional remarks if she would like to step up to the podium.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 6: Good evening, mayor, vice mayor and the city council. It's a pleasure to be here tonight to celebrate what we have accomplished through the recommendations for the blueprint. And it is important to show that Mayor Garcia and some of the city council members to whom we've spoken to are all a part of that. It is something that they're looking at for the first time. It's something that they've helped us in participating. They've reached out to the business community and they've asked the business community to help them run the city with development and small business in the best manner possible, more efficiently and more effectively. And when reaching out to the business community like this, the business comments that I have coming back from others are that the city is working on our side now. The city is working collaboratively. The door is open and it's business not as usual, but it's new business. And we appreciate that. I think that I respect and am happy to have worked with each and every one of the commissioners. They come from varied backgrounds and careers, and they have brought such a new sense of where Long Beach is growing and a security for the future for all the areas and economic equality for each and every neighborhood. So I also appreciate two of the commissioners that are here that have done a fine job throughout. Michelle Merlino And also Cyrus. Janette Parker. Thank you very much and thank you very much, Mayor, for bringing this forward.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you very much to our vice chair, Blair, and, of course, to the commissioners that are here for the work. I'm going to turn this back over to the council. Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 5: I want to thank all the members of the commission. Excellent work on more than 25 meetings went into this process. I also want to thank the members of the community who were at these meetings and were constantly involved. I appreciate the many members of the commission who met with me regularly throughout the process to keep me as Chair of Eddie and F apprized of the situation and where we were moving and what it looked like, and also to the city staff of economic development who gave us regular briefings. And for those of you who were able to attend earlier tonight, the Eddie and F committee asked that we move and recommend adopting some form of this tonight with any inclusions of our colleagues, but also that we potentially pulled together a committee of three or four members of the commission. The three members of the Eddie and F City Council to help develop the specific, measurable outcomes that we want to measure over time. We also named a couple of other entities we thought might want to be at the table, including having in the audience when we convene this meeting and then the chair or executive director of our Workforce Investment Board and our city partners in any organizations that have been a part of the process to get us to this part so far. So I want to thank everyone for their work. I've literally handed over two versions of a printout of this in advance, written on and included by input and working with the chair directly . And I'm very proud of the work that our committee has done. I think that it's an exceptional and thoughtful effort in this way. We did not keep track of any of these things before and what gets measured gets done. And so if you have a moment to reflect on what we did earlier tonight, in reviewing the statistics of many of our measurable goals that the EDI and F keep track of, I think that in partnering those together, I think we're going to have something really magical here. So I look forward to hearing from my colleagues and the community on this exciting day.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to take a moment to say thank you to the commissioners for their very hard work. When the commission step up and develop a work plan, it's valuable service to your city because we work very hard to implement this work plan, and it was obviously done in a very cooperative way. You know, when I see friends or allies or colleagues, they all are referencing this blueprint. They're all hands on deck on this blueprint. I want to say it to staff I, John and your team. You know, sometimes I can be a bit cynical when it comes to another plan, right? Another plan. But, you know, I believe in this one. And it's very clear that you're very sincere about inclusion and things like, you know, I see things like vision here, cooperation, an implementation strategy, a work plan. Those are words that that get me excited because it's something to actually get my hands on and work on. So we've already talked about a few ideas for implementation in North Long Beach. I'm really excited about that. And so I would just say, finally, I think, you know, some of our other commissions could benefit from having very targeted direction. As to, you know, looking at developing blueprints, prints or strategies for their specific, you know, expertize, subject matter expertize, particularly. You know, I think that, you know, we're doing some work relooking at the youth commission and I think coming up with a youth playbook would be good. We just had a lot of conversations around veterans. I think veterans could put together something comprehensive like that that puts a playbook together, a blueprint for veterans. So this is a great model and I hope that other commissioners follow suit. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilmember Pierson.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I want to thank everybody that's worked really hard on this process over the past several months. And I really want to recognize the staff effort that has gone into this and also recognize Eric Romero, who was my intern for a great year plus when I worked at Laine. And so thank you for the great presentation today. I think that this does a really great job of talking about some of the core things that we as a city want to do. And I think an economic blueprint is the right direction that we as a city, we are at a critical point in our time right now where the market's kind of exciting. We've got new developments happening everywhere. We've as a council, prioritized things like 1% for the arts. And so having a blueprint that really says, where are we going and what's our vision, I think is really important. It's important in times like this also to recognize the impacts of economic development and really make sure that as we have these conversations, we're doing it in a way that is not too quick, that doesn't exclude people in the population that might feel excluded in the past. And so I want to just highlight a couple of comments that were brought to me by members in our community. I want to thank the the downtown. Well, now I have to call it the downtown Long Beach Alliance for their letter that they've shared with us. And this letter pretty much, I think, does a great job about asking us to include some recommendations. They've listed out a nine recommendations to be included in the blueprint, which include things like housing. That includes not just, you know, market rate housing by using the White House Development Toolkit to put together a policy that's really thoughtful and robust in how we address housing for a growing population. As we seen and as our mayor noted, we do have demographic changes in our city. And how are we thinking long term for that? Making sure that we have online accessibility, not just with our permits and with C P process, but including that overall. So I'd like for us to I'll share the letter with you guys, and I would like us to to try to include this as much as we can in the comments of if some of it has been left out. I also want to recognize some of the community meetings that you guys had with building healthy communities that I think tapped into some of those things around, making sure that we're using empty space, making sure that those that have felt it's been difficult to access housing, that that is included and ensuring as as we talk about the demographics, that we have equity changes in our city, we've got leadership in our city that are addressing issues of equity and that as much as we can include that in our economic blueprint, the city overall, no matter if you're a business owner or if you're a renter, is going to be better off for it. And also just want to, you know, do one more recognition to the fact that whenever we have a city that does three things and I want to recognize the commission for doing this work, making sure that our city is business friendly while looking at those residents that are most impacted. We can do those side by side. And so making sure we've got a uniform licensing and permitting process, making sure that we have predictability no matter if you're a new business owner or someone that's opening up your third business, that we have high levels of customer service and that I think that our city is on the right path to those things. The last thing I'll say is the one thing that I feel like is missing out of here is a little bit on our arts and entertainment. And so I talked a little bit this morning with staff. I would like to see the possibility of reforming the permitting process for live performances in downtown. That's something that we're going to be working on in my office, and I would like to see that are reflected in this plan as well. So thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Price. Well, that's really got to count somebody a Ranka and then I'll go to Councilman Price. Councilman.
Speaker 7: Sorry. Thank you for the report. I saw the presentation earlier at our economic committee meeting, so I want to thank staff again. One of the issues that I raised earlier today that I wanted to highlight again is this is a really great report and I'm impressed by the involvement of the various stakeholders, and I think we have some good data that we've obtained, but I think it's very important moving forward that we have realistic performance measures and that we are held accountable to those performance measures. And if. We need to break that up into phases because I know we have a lot of objectives outlined in the blueprint, but if we need to break it up into phases so that thank you so that we can have some realistic performance objectives to judge ourselves and our progress on, I think that would be really great and I understand that is part of the plan. So thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Council member Sri Lanka.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mayor. I, too, was a recipient of the report earlier with the Aden Africa Committee that we met. And they raised some some points that I thought were important for for me and for the West Side, especially when talking about as we look at economic development and growth and business growth, that we do it responsibly, that we do it with the awareness of the environment, that we keep our air clean, that we that we keep transportation and mobility at the at the forefront of what we do here. Because a lot of what we what we do have has unintended consequences. And a lot of those unintended consequences might be the affect that they have on the quality of life of our residents. And so I want to also include the fact that when we're looking at economic development, we also look at training and the training that's essential to and to ensure that we have the workforce available to take many of these new jobs that we're looking at creating and business opportunities. But with business, you get jobs. And with jobs you get people who are going to be able to buy homes and have a good quality of life. And I want to ensure that that that the the living Long Beach working Long Beach to have fun and Long Beach. The last thing I want to say is that we always keep keep in mind keep open the possibility of having training programs that that come into Long Beach, opening new schools. I know we have great educational institutions here. We have Chelsea, Long Beach. We have limited college and a great school district. But we also have other programs that are out there that provide training opportunities, such as apprenticeships in areas other than high tech or any other business that we might be looking at. Because we still need plumbers, we still need carpenters, we still need service providers. Told us in the report that where, you know, we have a great hospitality business here in LA, which is one of the highest, but yet their salaries are depressed and not reflective of the great opportunities that we had here, Long Beach in the service industry. So we need to also look at how we can increase wages in those areas as well and to create opportunities for people who want to come to Long Beach and work in a service industry that they're going to get the jobs and the wages that are that are living wages for them as well. So keep that in mind. Just a little food for thought for all of you. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 7: Yes, I would like to thank the commissioners as well for being here and all those that are not here as well as the department. I think this is a fantastic blueprint. It's very it's got a lot of great ideas, I think. And there's specifically, you know, streamlining the tracking of the key performance indicators, which I know will be, you know, hearing more about as time goes on, the value of business improvement districts, mapping out areas of our city, lacking key economic opportunities. You know, I think like Councilmember Duran, I think about the West Side that doesn't have a bank or a pharmacy and it addresses, you know, being able to prioritize those areas to add economic opportunities there and then incentivizing innovation. When I think about that, I also would like to see possibly and I've talked about this before, but working with our U.S. Patent Patent Office, I know I've worked I've talked to John Kessler about this in the past on how we can look at ways to encourage patents and innovation in that way. I know some cities quantify how many patents they have as part of their you know, this is City of Long Beach. We have, you know, this many patents in in the city. And I think that's a really key area. We can look into a couple other things. Also to training and retraining. I think just it has been addressed kind of on a bigger level. But as tech knowledge advances and as automation becomes more and more clear, it's kind of looking at ways to retrain people to be either accustomed to new technology or retraining in a different sector that would be more beneficial for them. And then recently, I know myself and my colleagues, we put together an item that will be coming back soon, but it looks at doing business with the city as local businesses. How do we offer preferential procurement opportunities for local businesses? So I think that also should be looked into as well. And then lastly, I know we've talked about the unemployment rate and I'm very glad that our overall unemployment rate is very low. But we do have pockets in the city that are still upwards of 16%. And so looking at that and kind of prioritizing in those pockets as to what we can do for those communities would be essential as well. And then the last thing I think I'll also chime on to what Councilmember Pearce said about music and entertainment. We do have a lot of events that occur in our city and how are we maybe providing more ways to look for economic opportunities there? So in our special events and filming music events, artistic events, I mean, it's really ramping up in those areas. So looking at that and then I think that's it. Sorry. And one other thing. Oh, I'm sorry. The global business imports and exports. So since we are next to the port, I know this probably has been addressed, but if there are any ways we can work, even with the U.S. Embassy on my travels abroad, I had worked with the U.S. Embassy, and they create a matchmaking service for U.S. businesses that want to invest in foreign countries but also have a mainstay here. So maybe creating synergy with the U.S. embassy to be able to do that. But I think this is fantastic. Great job to all of the commissioners and everybody involved. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Ashton.
Speaker 3: Thanks. And I agree with everything that has been stated. I want to congratulate, salute the commissioners for excellent work staff for the dedication. I know there was a number of public meetings. And so to anybody in the public who participated and gave public comment to to add to this this blueprint, and we salute you as well. I think this provides us some great economic statistics. That snapshot is extremely interesting. It provides us with some good, valuable data, data that we can we can come back a year from now, two years from now, three years from now, and measure our our, our, our, our, our, our deliverables and improvement and how we have implemented this plan. I'd like to put a greater emphasis on and it's just, you know, you'll hear me talk about this week after week after week, but the greater emphasis on creating and maintaining quality jobs in this city. And with that in mind, I mean, we always talk about economic development. I would like to see employment kind of mirrored or married to that that term economic and employment development, because it's I think it's really what we're doing but we can't under if. Besides the importance of creating quality jobs in the city, especially when you look at only 77% of the folks in the city are leaving the city to work. That's, I think, very, very important. It would be. And I got to tell you, it is for those who get a chance to to live and work in Long Beach. You you have a you are very fortunate. You're very fortunate. And so so to come off the island, I got to tell you, it's rough out there on an in traffic and on those Southern California freeways to be able to create a greater number of quality jobs in the city. Is that that's something that I'd like to see us truly, truly work on. I know this blueprint will help us get there. But again, I'm in terms of framing economic development, I think in the future we need to to look at marry in that term with employment because it's so, so important as well. And again, congratulations and great work.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilmember Supernanny.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I'd like to acknowledge the hard work of staff and our council colleagues on the committee, and especially to the commission. I believe that this was the only project you had that would be impressive. But having served on a commission for seven years, I know your plate is full with other items too. So thank you and for all your hard work on that. I also just want to give a shout out to the fourth District, of course. I noticed on the list of top 25 sales tax generators, ten of them either have a location, the fourth, or are entirely located in the fourth, as in the case of Serco, Porsche and Audi. So go forth.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Any public comment on this? Please come forward. Good evening again, Robert Fox. Great report. Very much supportive of it. I have a comment to make about disseminating this information. It's nice that we all have it here. We're very involved in this stuff, but we need to get it out to the community so that they understand what we what we're planning. My concern is a very pragmatic one. I am now executive director of the Council of Neighborhood Organizations, went to the Neighborhood Resource Center and tried to find out where is the database for all of the neighborhood associations. We have 132 and we have the Council of Business Organizations and all the business associations are listed there. Also, 40% of the data is not correct.
Speaker 1: It's just gone.
Speaker 8: People moved. Somebody died.
Speaker 1: But all the emails are not working, you know.
Speaker 2: Like 40% of them not working. And the telephone numbers are not correct. The people are not correct. Maybe some of these things.
Speaker 1: Went belly up. We don't know.
Speaker 2: So I went to Margaret Madden, who's a good friend of mine. I've known her since she was 16. And I said.
Speaker 1: Margaret, you know, we kind of get this database together.
Speaker 2: Here, you know. And I wasn't really satisfied, to be honest with with the response. This is such an important report. I've been a business leader most of my life, and I really, really want to get this out there to the community. So rather than waiting for nine months to get the data together at the Neighborhood Resource Center, I would urge you to maybe put another person there or dedicate somebody specifically to make sure that we have at least the communication link that to all business associations in the city and neighborhood associations in the city so that this great news can get out there. Thank you so much. Thank you. Next speaker, please. It's Hansen. Please come down.
Speaker 6: I just want to.
Speaker 0: Congratulate all of you and the.
Speaker 6: Whole city. Who? Oh, my gosh. You accomplished.
Speaker 5: So much. And. And then I met with Superintendent Steinhauser today. Oh, my gosh. The things the wonderful things that are going on in our school district.
Speaker 6: Are just unparalleled.
Speaker 5: With I don't know how anybody else could measure up. But anyway, it just there was one thing that I always have thought that would really help Long Beach, and that would be if we had that must be a reason it hasn't happened. But we are Long Beach.
Speaker 0: That's what we're known for.
Speaker 5: From the very beginning, I mean, that's our greatest resource is that ocean out there. And maybe someday we could have something that's like like they have on Venice Beach with all those little shops and things and people going up and down. And I think it could really.
Speaker 0: Be.
Speaker 5: Something that could be enchanting and so much fun for everyone. And, you know, and it's what you know, Venice Beach.
Speaker 6: Is known all over the world.
Speaker 5: When people come to California, they want to go there. So anyway, just think about that. And the Obama library. Michelle Obama library. I've been there since. You know, fathers with their kids, you know, studying and doing homework. I mean, it's just so wonderful. It's like something that.
Speaker 0: We have always.
Speaker 5: Dreamed of having. You guys are making.
Speaker 0: Really good.
Speaker 5: Dreams come true. Thank you. And then there's other public. We're all trying to do good deeds. And I'm just in the mood to celebrate when I go to the Michelle Obama library and talk, you know, see all these good things happening. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Senator. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Hello. Good evening, Mayor. City council members, city staff. Keeping with the positive comments tonight, I'm here on behalf of the Chamber and our leadership and our members to fully endorse and support this draft blueprint for economic development as presented tonight. Over the last year, we've attended and provided input at multiple Economic Development Commission meetings and study sessions. We're grateful for allowing us to have such input through this process as it relates to the blueprint. And while the blueprint covers seven focus areas, we are particularly excited about two areas the business assistance and the economic leadership and cooperation areas. Ensuring our businesses, our business community has continued to access to technical, financial and regulatory assistance is paramount to sustaining our current businesses while attracting new. At the same time, we appreciate the recommendation of a small business concierge program as we've begun a similar concept for our members and welcome further dialog around this area and how we can assist all businesses in Long Beach under the Economic Leadership and Cooperation Focus Area. We welcome the discussion on a partnership between the city and the Council Business Associations, commonly referred to as COBA. Any time you have multiple partners in this case the Chamber Business Improvement districts, other business associations are at the table discussing customer service, regulatory process and any proposed new audiences that will ultimately impact business. We view this as a good start to a wonderful strategy. The chamber stands ready to work with these various partners who dedicate a significant amount of time to this endeavor and also resources that went into this document. Lastly, as outlined in the blueprint, we look forward to further engagement directed by all of you and also the city manager's office. We appreciate our inclusion to the sterile process to date. Applaud all the work by the Economic Development Commission and staff. Specifically, we'd like to publicly thank EDC chair Randall Hernandez, Vice Chair Becky Blair, all of the commissioners, and especially John Keisler and his wonderful staff and his former staff at the Long Beach Innovation Team. So job well done by all. Thank you for tonight.
Speaker 2: Thank you. SPEAKER.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the City Council. Craig Cogen with the downtown Long Beach Associates. On behalf of our board, our economic development committee, as well as the staff, we want to commend the mayor for initiating this vision and this process that's led to Long Beach being open for business for so many years. As the mayor mentioned earlier, the commission did not exist and the department was not functioning at its at its regular level of personnel. This is really a welcome relief for not only downtown, but certainly the city. And with your vision, this has really helped us propel Long Beach into the very dynamic and certainly competitive market that we exist in. I'd also like to thank the commissioners commissioners. The Economic Development Commissioners did a wonderful job expressing and exercising due diligence on all of the aspects that are covered in this plan. And I also appreciate the work that COBRA, as Jeremy mentioned, the Council of Business Associations did. All the business improvement districts, including the Chamber and the CVB, have been working together to really bring to the forefront the needs of business and recommending and certainly agreeing with Councilmember Pierce's comments earlier that business can coexist with its residents in the neighboring area. So we look forward to working with with our citywide partners. And certainly the jobs recommendations that we've presented to you have already been presented to city staff. They're aware of this. We want to be able to continue working towards these towards these objectives and helping you with the tasks as well as the as well as the work that's necessary to get this done. And this is really an awesome starts. We look forward to working with our continued work that we have already started and with the collaboration that we have with the citywide partners as well as the newly found commission, as well as the city staff. So thanks very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Craig. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Hello, everybody. I'm Sylvia Contreras, and I just wanted to say thank you to the commission that created this blueprint. I took note, Vice Mayor Richardson, that hopefully the veterans commission will take this as a model. I'm here also as commissioner of Veterans Admission or Veterans Affairs Commission. I liked it right away. So I second to your motion and I'll bring it to Gina's attention and everybody else's. And that's all. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. So with that, we have we have a motion on a second to approve the draft and staff will read it the final and of course, synthesize everything they've heard today as well as the comments that have been submitted. Members, please go ahead and cast your vote.
Speaker 0: Motion carries.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Congratulations. Let's give everyone a round of applause for their hard work on that. And you know, one thing one thing I didn't say just briefly that I think it's important to thank the innovation team because, you know, this is one of the things that they worked on early on as an initial project. Then it got transitioned over to the department and that's I think what the innovation team is all about is starting something with the commission and then it got transitioned to the full department. And so the innovation team members worked really, really hard on that, particularly the early days of this of this report. And I want to thank them as well. So congratulations. We're going to go ahead. And the next item that I had a request to be moved up was of the item 2021. I'm sorry. Nope. Item 20. He was only 20. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to approve the City’s Draft Blueprint for Economic Development to guide the City’s overall economic development work plan for the next ten years. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0247 | Speaker 0: Item 20 is a communication from Vice Mayor Richardson, Councilmember Pearce, Councilwoman Mango Councilmember your recommendation to request the City Manager, Health and Human Services Development Services Department to develop an incentive package to encourage landlord acceptance of subsidized tenants through the Housing Choice Voucher Program and return to the City Council in 30 days.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And Mayor stepped down. So I'm going to run this portion. So about a year, a little less than a year ago when I became chair of the Housing Authority, I sat down with the chair, with the executive director, Allison King, to learn more about the various programs and the support that they offered Long Beach residents . It's an amazing program that serves many hardworking Long Beach working families, and we're in a particular time when the status of the program is in jeopardy given the climate in Washington, D.C. and the dynamics of our local rental market. So let's look at what's stood out to me was when I learned that our housing choice voucher program, commonly known as Section eight, is not being utilized to its full potential with a 2% vacancy rate in the Long Beach housing market. It's become increasingly difficult to subsidize for subsidized tenants to find housing. There are over a thousand families and individuals who hold a voucher but are unable to find a landlord that's willing to rent to them or a vacant Section eight vacancy. So we began to look into why this is so. So we partnered with the Apartment Association. We conducted multiple focus groups and surveys to better understand apartment owners barriers to accepting the housing choice vouchers. After speaking with several apartment owners, we found that there's a strong need for modernization for the program to compete with rising rents, coupled with an education campaign to dispel the many misconceptions about the program. Throughout the process, we explored questions like Why would a landlord bother with a housing choice voucher when they can receive a higher premium in the marketplace? Why bother with yet another, more rigorous inspection when we already were already subject to other multiple inspections? Why would an apartment owner hold a unit vacant while a potential tenant conducts a Section eight process? When we can lease up to a market rate tenant and less time with less bureaucracy. It's clear to me that in order for the housing choice voucher program to compete with the open market, we need to modernize and create a better value proposition for property owners. In addition, early on we found that apartment owners felt that applying for the program was a difficult, difficult process to navigate and the website was not as helpful as it could be. So the Housing Authority was able to respond to some of these quick concerns quickly and realign their resources to create an ombudsman position to work specifically with apartment owners who are applying for the Housing Choice Voucher program as well as well as current owners in the program. Further, the Housing Authority is moving forward with redesigning its website to be more friendly and modern before. But there are some elements that require a deeper dove. So let's go ahead and move to a staff report so we can hear a little bit more on the focus groups, the surveys and some of the some of the next steps.
Speaker 2: Alison King, our director of our housing authority.
Speaker 6: Thank you. As Vice mayor stated, our program is one of the largest affordable housing programs here in the city of Long Beach. We provide financial assistance to low income, elderly and disabled residents of Long Beach so that they can live with dignity and decent, safe and sanitary housing. Currently, the Housing Authority, in partnership with 2600 property owners, assist over 6300 households that lease units in the city of Long Beach through various programs, including the Housing Choice Voucher Program. In addition to the Housing Choice Voucher program, we have other programs that specifically support veterans, those with HIV and AIDS and those with mental health challenges. Our tenant based rental assistance program offers much of a subsidy to housing residents. They generally pay between 30 and 40% of their income toward the rent, and the housing authority subsidizes the balance. We currently receive $68 million for the Housing Choice Voucher Program and have the opportunity to serve 7398 families with permanent, stable housing. The problem is that the housing authority for many years was a high performing agency, and that means basically that we achieved a 98% utilization rate of the vouchers that we were allocated over the last several years. There has been a increase in the number of vouchers that we have been provided, largely due to the VASH program, which is the only program that has had an increase of allocation. However, we have had a significant decrease in the number of owners who have been willing to offer their unit in the service of the Section eight voucher program. Currently, we are at an 85% lease up rate. This means that we are in jeopardy of having leftover funds recaptured by the federal government to assist other programs throughout the country that are running a shortfall. Understanding the problem to attain increased program utilization. Vice Mayor Richardson has engaged in a process, along with the Apartment Association of Southern California Cities and the Housing Authority, to engage apartment owners and identify causes for the recent decline in use of the voucher. Through this process, we convened three focus groups with over 40 owners and administered over 150 surveys. The owner demographics are 60% of our owners owned five or less units. 30% own between five and ten units and 10% owned 20 or more units. In our own conversations, there were many misconceptions, such as different rules govern subsidized tenants. The truth is, is that subsidized families are subject to the same rules as market rate families, as long as they are applied consistently, with the exception of the notice to vacate, which must be a 90 day notice. Without cause I can't ever evict or ask a subsidized tenant to vacate. This also is a misconception in that, as I mentioned, the 90 day notice to vacate without cause is always an option after the first year of tenancy and an individual can be evicted for cause at any time. I cannot charge voucher tenants. Market rate rent payment standards are what we publish to owners, and yet they are not the cap on the rent, only the cap on the subsidy. While some of our voucher holding families have significantly low income, they cannot pay more than 40% of their adjusted income in the first year after the first year of tenancy. That can indeed increase as long as the rent is reasonable. Section eight Tenants are criminals, drug dealers and bad people. The majority of housing choice voucher holders are simply low income families, and any owner has the ability and should take the responsibility to vet any individual who occupies their unit. Through these various focus groups and some and surveys, a number of recommendations have emerged from these groups to help increase the voucher lease up. The findings largely included the need for more outreach and education to landlords to address the misconceptions about the program. We believe that this has presented many opportunities for us to move forward. Some of the concerns that were raised are the city mandated inspections and fees that owners pay. Owners believed that if they accepted a Section eight voucher that they had to upgrade the unit, which is definitely a misconception. Voucher holders are hard on the unit and leave them with high costs to fix damages, and the section they process takes up to a month and they are expected to hold the unit for that period of time. These are some of the things that we hope to address along with, as vice mayor said, streamlining our website, having a single point of contact with an ombudsperson and improving our communications with owners via our newsletter as well as other opportunities to engage. At this time, I'll turn it back to Vice Mayor for the opportunities he'd like to propose.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So before continuing with my emotional and take a minute and just thank Alice and her team at the Housing Authority for educating my staff and myself these last few months and working together to think outside of the box, to find new ways to address the needs of both the program participants and the apartment owners. I also want to thank the development services partner for being a well being willing to color outside of the lines and explore some ways to partner and create some efficiencies. I want to thank the Apartment Association for coming to the table, convening multiple focus groups of apartment owners. Your assistance, your support has been instrumental in shaping how we modernize the Housing Choice Vote Voucher program. I also want to thank the tenant rights groups for supporting this effort as it's our single largest resource to keep families from slipping into homelessness. So tonight I'm requesting that the City Manager, Department of Health and Human Services and Development Services Department develop an incentive package to encourage broader adoption of the Housing Choice Voucher Program and return to City Council in 3045 days. I'm requesting that staff work to incorporate the following elements align and streamline the current city mandated inspections with the HUD mandated housing choice voucher inspection. Waive various permits, license fees, inspection costs for apartment owners who accept housing choice vouchers. Create a damaged middle damage mitigation fund, which provides financial assistance to landlords to mitigate damage caused by tenants during their occupancy under the Housing Choice Voucher Program and provide landlord landlords vacancy payments in order to hold the unit while the landlord is going through the housing choice voucher program. These are elements that could be a part of this incentive package. The obviously we've done a little bit of homework, but they still need to be vetted out completely. So we do have the flexibility to come with what we think will work and what we can support. And and so with that, I asked my colleagues for their support tonight. Thank you. So next we have Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 5: Thank you, vice mayor, and thank you staff and the apartment association and all the housing advocates that have done work on this saying in my office, as always, that everybody needs to be at the table and that if we're not talking at the same table together, then we're always going to have misconceptions. And so I really want to applaud the vice mayor for doing that, not just on one occasion, but on multiple occasions where we can really take apart some of the misconceptions and start fixing our program. And so when I first came into office, homelessness was one of my biggest issues in my district, and we continued to meet with as many department folks as we could and many advocates and try to find out some of the challenges. And so I'm thankful that Rex is leading on this. Proud sponsor, co-sponsor, because we know that the housing choice voucher program is a critical tool that can be used to combat and prevent homelessness at any given moment there . Between 506 hundred voucher holders in Long Beach who cannot find an affordable unit to lease. Oftentimes their vouchers will expire, as the vice mayor mentioned, and many have to start the process over and reapply all over again. The impacts on this are huge for our city, and we are now at a new opportunity with new revenue sources as well from the passage of Measure H and unique opportunity to develop such programs as this. I had just two questions on are there opportunities right now outlined in Measure H that directly connect to Section eight housing? That's for staff.
Speaker 1: I can't answer that. Yes, Mr. West.
Speaker 2: I'm going to turn that over to Allison.
Speaker 6: There are opportunities. They have not specifically been defined at this point. Our director of Health and Human Services, Kelly Calliope, is serving on a county wide committee to review those. So, yes, there are opportunities.
Speaker 5: Great. Thank you so much, Vice Mayor, for bringing this item forward. I hope everybody can support this tonight.
Speaker 1: Sure thing. Thank you, Councilman Austin. Well, I think.
Speaker 3: My question was was certainly answered here. I will definitely be supporting this because I think it merits a look in and I'm very interested with what I'm going to be most interested in, what comes back from staff. I think I'm concerned about the funding, obviously, with the at least three of the points here. I'm wondering where those funds are coming from. And I heard Measure H being an opportunity. I'm curious to know you mentioned that that we were at a 85% threshold. So can we use the rest of that 15% toward this?
Speaker 6: Unfortunately, no. HUD funds us in such a way that our housing assistance payments are specifically only for the purpose of paying rent, and that is only once an individual begins their tenancy in a unit. We would have to use our administrative fees, which are being pro-rated at about 80% of what we should be receiving. And we are only getting those administrative fees when an individual leases up. So our revenues have been dipping and do not present an opportunity for them to use in a very broad manner.
Speaker 3: Okay. And I understand the challenge in terms of finding available housing with those who are holding vouchers. And I know we've we've had housing authority meetings pretty regularly. What is the vacancy rate here in Long Beach now?
Speaker 6: It still remains at about 1.8 to 2.2%. I believe that has been the information that has been reported.
Speaker 3: So if we were to actually incentivize Section eight housing, incentivize landlords to to to make that 1.8% available, how many would what does that look like in terms of real numbers?
Speaker 6: I'm sorry, I couldn't answer that specifically, but the challenge has been that many owners in the area are not even giving an opportunity to voucher holding families. We understand and respect their need to vet these families and anyone else who occupies the unit. We simply want them to have a chance to apply and be considered based on their suitability for tenancy.
Speaker 3: Understood. And then and then lastly, on the first point, I mean, it says to a line is drawn line. The current city mandated inspections with HUD mandated housing choice voucher inspections. And perhaps somebody from staff can tell me how those inspections are currently done. Now, are they done by the same personnel?
Speaker 6: Each of them were conducted by two separate departments, and we are investigating where there is synergy in each of those. At this time, we don't have that information.
Speaker 3: Okay. Now, in a.
Speaker 2: Former.
Speaker 3: Role, I was I represented a Section eight housing inspectors in for Hakala. And I know their role is a lot different than code enforcement. So I know that's something that's going to have to be really vetted out and worked out through with staff and with the the impact of labor organizations.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Austin. And those are some of the things we hope to explore. Maybe if one inspections happened in on one day, the other inspection could perhaps happen the same day. So there's less, you know, disruption to the landlord and the folks who live in the complex. So these are all great questions. Thank you for those. Councilman Price.
Speaker 7: Thank you. I want to thank the vice mayor and my colleagues for bringing this item. It's a great item. I look forward to hearing what representatives from the Apartment Association and the tenants rights groups have to say. I know we have received some letters, but I like to hear that everybody was at the table and input was elicited from everyone. I think that's really great. I know that one of the things and I read the stuff, I read the agenda item a couple of days ago. So my memory may not be correct on this, but I think I also heard Vice Mayor Richardson make a statement about maybe needing an ombudsman, too. So my concern is I'm wondering what staff resources we already have, at least maybe for a pilot. Graham could we use our existing staff resources? And that's something that I think would be included in the city manager's report. Is this something that we can explore without taking on an additional cost in terms of staffing for the city? So the city manager can look at this issue with an eye towards us not having additional staffing? I would feel a lot better about it, at least for a pilot period of time, until we can figure out whether we can use measure funds and things like that.
Speaker 1: I think we can say to a rest we already figured out the Ombudsman without spending an additional dollar rate.
Speaker 7: That's fantastic. That makes me feel a lot better. And I think the other thing I was going to ask Allison is I think I had read an article about something, a similar program to this being used in other municipalities in the Western Cities magazine. Is this something that other cities are exploring in terms of incentive packages?
Speaker 6: Absolutely. Our neighbors have it. The County of Los Angeles Housing Authority and the City of Los Angeles Housing Authority are already doing many different things. I was at a recent meeting where they identified 1553 I'm sorry, strategies that they are using to combat this issue. They, however, have elected to turn over all of their new vouchers for the purposes of homeless persons only. So there was a recent article that indicated that their waiting list has over 40,000 persons, and that is because they are targeting specifically homeless individuals.
Speaker 7: And in in terms of that, were they experiencing the same problem with the the that the voucher is not being utilized to their fullest extent?
Speaker 6: There were challenges in getting owners to the table. They are already doing things such as the vacancy payment and the security deposit. Yes. Okay.
Speaker 7: That's that's an interesting consideration. Utilizing it for exclusively for homelessness. Is that something that you think down the road might work for, for the city of Long Beach based on your expertize?
Speaker 6: That's not an answer that I can really give. However, I will say that we currently do set aside vouchers to our multi-service center. They are our coordinated entry system and they do already identify those persons who would be a good candidate for the voucher. We have been increasing that number as the need arises. Fortunately, we are all in the same department and will continue to be responsive to the need as it presents itself.
Speaker 7: Do you know if all the vouchers that the Multi-Service Center has get used to any of those not get used?
Speaker 6: Every one of those that they get allocated are referred to us. Now, of course, those persons are also struggling to find places to use them. But every voucher that we set aside for them, we get a referral from them.
Speaker 7: That's great. Thank you, Will. Thank you for the report. It was really informative. And again, thank you to my colleagues for bringing this item.
Speaker 1: Thank you and council members.
Speaker 7: Yes. I, too, want to just say thank you for bringing this item forward. Vice Mayor and council colleagues. I think it is a fantastic item that, you know, where we need to look everywhere to find housing opportunities. And so thanks to everyone in the audience as well for being a part of it. I have just a couple of questions on the item, and I want to also thank Housing Authority Alison for your great work as well. So the damage mitigation fund, I was talking to Council Member Pearce and what other cities have something like this and what are the logistics?
Speaker 6: The county is doing this program as well. It's a $2,000 fund that they set aside with very strict policies on how it is used. They implemented this in February of 2016. At a recent meeting last week, they indicated to date that they have only had to pay one damage claim for an individual who had only been occupying the unit for two months before they destroyed something. But they also do have supportive services in place to follow up with families once they lease a unit.
Speaker 7: Okay, great. That's good to hear. And then next question. I know you had mentioned that we received an abundance of ash vouchers, and I know we haven't we haven't gone through all of them. Is that correct? At this at this time.
Speaker 6: We have not least of all of our ash vouchers, they, too, have the same concern of not having places to be able to use them. However, we do have a new project based development that is coming online in the fall anchor place on the property of the villages of Cabrillo. Those will be 75 project based vouchers. Vouchers.
Speaker 7: And those are specifically for veterans. Correct. Okay. So if we don't have and who knows, you know, the specs, of course. But do we have an ongoing need for veteran housing? I mean, it would seem like we would, but I know we don't have a place. So I guess my question would be if if say we don't have any more veterans out there that need these types of vouchers, would this with these vouchers possibly, is it possible to convert them to just generic vouchers at all?
Speaker 6: No. These vouchers were specifically identified by HUD for the voucher program. We receive all of our VASH referrals directly from the Veterans Administration, and those are sent to us. And I do believe that they still have a very significant number of persons that are in need of housing.
Speaker 7: Okay, great. Thank you very much for that. And again, appreciate all your work.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And that was a good, robust discussion. It's not so often that we see, you know, something come the council that has apartment owners and renters both saying the same thing. And that said, let's let's go ahead and have public comment. So please come forward and you have state your name. You have 3 minutes.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Robert Fox again. Sorry to be in front of you so often tonight. I gave you all a letter, and I hope you will read it. It sounds a little harsh, but it's my personal experience. The Section eight Housing Department. At one time, I worked very closely with the head of the department, Laura Joseph, when she was the director. And we did have a reform of Section eight housing, and it worked pretty well for a long time. Unfortunately, in the meantime, that those reforms were kicked out the window. So I appreciate the fact that we're at least coming to the table and talking about reforming this department. Let me tell you what my problem is with it, because I don't accept Section eight anymore. Like many, many landlords and I'm I'm just angry that I don't because I'm like this crazy, generous person. I sat on the board of the Gay Lesbian Center, so I accepted Hopper grants, you know, and I wanted to help people. I furnished an apartment for somebody who didn't have any furniture, you know? I mean, I've done way over-the-top stuff, but I got burned so bad by this department. It was amazing. The inspectors would come in and literally tell me if my toilet didn't flush in 3 seconds, I had to replace the toilet. And I thought, Where in the hell is that in the code? You know, I helped write the building planning code for the city of Long Beach long time ago with Jeanne Zeller. So I thought that sort of weird, you know, they had inspection standards that would be like for a mansion in Newport Beach. What I in my buildings are in great shape because I'm fanatic, you know? But it's like they cited me for all this stuff and I going, What? What are you talking about? Oh, what the PSA is and how high enough in your your kitchen faucet.
Speaker 1: Really? Because mine is just the same as that in my house.
Speaker 2: We need to codify the kind of inspection that we are going to do on housing. We are not in Section eight giving palatial palaces to rich and famous folks. We just want good, standard, clean housing. That's what we want. And I provide it. I don't provide anything else. But. And yet. When you're in an inspection process with Section eight, they can just withhold your rent and it doesn't matter that you took care of it in 10 minutes, you lose a month's rent and there's no negotiation with these people at all, period. So it brings me to the other issue that, of course, me as a landlord and as a person have that department is so hostile. And when I go up there trying to do my best to get a friend of mine into the Section eight program and he's going to move into my unit, it's like the two of us just I mean, Vince and I just were freaked, you know, he was treated like some sort of lowlife criminal and I was treated like some greedy jerk. They'd close windows on us. They'd make us wait for two and a half hours, you know, sitting there and it's like, wait a minute. So I go up to the window. I said, How long do we wait for this stuff? Shall I make an appointment with you? Now you just have to wait. And rudely. So I got to tell you something.
Speaker 6: It's about staff, Allison.
Speaker 1: You have.
Speaker 2: Got to.
Speaker 6: Train people.
Speaker 2: To have good manners. You know, you. If you anger people that much, what landlord wants to go through that.
Speaker 1: So if you can direct. Well, it looks like a few minutes, but thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Good evening to Mayor Garcia in his absence. And greetings to all on the panel tonight, especially Mayor Rex Richardson. My name is Rhonda Butler, and thank you so much for being concerned about the housing problem that we have in Long Beach. I am one of the ones who is unable to use my voucher. I was on the list for 18 years before my name was chosen. I was issued my voucher in May of last year. I'm at my last extension and I have nine days left. No one will take my voucher. I have always worked hard and have always paid my way. Being a city employee, working my way up from the bottom custodian, parking enforcement officer, and then to public works as a parking checker, I made the 525 when working a city vehicle, came out of gear and pinned me up against a parked car. I was let go due to my non career status. I'm not looking for a handout, just a helping hand. Thank you so much. I've been here since 330. I need to say something to you tonight, and I just want to thank everybody that came. I don't know about the gentleman in the red shirt, but I've never came to office, man. And nobody never treated me wrong there. I've never waited longer than I should have. I waited for my name and I waited for my number. And I always got service when I was there. So maybe he just showed up on a bad day, but I never came here and got mistreated. And I'm so glad to see you here tonight. And I'm so glad that everybody is here tonight. I know that Long Beach is working. I've been in this city for 60 years. Me and my mother came here when I was a little girl. Before all this stuff was even here. So I just want to say thank you for. For looking out for us. We need somebody to look out for us. And I don't want to be homeless.
Speaker 4: But I'm on my way.
Speaker 6: I ran out of all my options. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, sir. I read that article. Somebody hurt us and God is using you. He's using you. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Hello again, Sylvia Contreras. I just wanted to make a comment. Years ago, I had a family member that lived here in Long Beach, worked in Long Beach, and moved out of the city and then moved out of state. Came to a point that when she moved out of state, she needed state assistance and she wanted to come back to Long Beach. And I said, well, you know, what? Does she have state assistance out there? Maybe you can qualify for state assistance here. So so let me call a section, a group, and see how this can work. So when I did, what they told me is that, no, it cannot be a family member. They have to wait in line. I don't know if that's true or not. But what that made me feel, I said, Well, if I can't help my own family, like, you know, I felt bad helping strangers. So that deterred me from going to Section eight. She came back again about a year ago and I said, you know, that's what they told me years ago. I can't help you unless I become the subsidized person, and then that would affect my income. So yeah, incentive maybe an incentive would be to let landlords, you know, if they have a family member in need and they qualify, why can't they be the ones to move in? I don't know. That's just my comment. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Good evening, everyone. Can we fight and live at 17 Pacific Avenue? And I'm with the Long Beach Gray Panthers. And affordable housing is one of the key issues that we are addressing this year in our campaigns. And I'm very heartened to see that the working towards creative solutions to an affordable housing issue. And I just want to commend the Housing Department. And Ms.. King has been amazing in her willingness to work with the community to create solutions that really help our community. But we still have a number of issues with affordable housing and unjust evictions, and there's just going to be more and more demand on our housing and our landlords. So I'm very hopeful since we're beginning to take steps to address some solutions. Thank you for all your efforts.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Good evening.
Speaker 5: Mayor Garcia and Honorable City Council. My name is Johanna Cunningham, the executive director for the Apartment Association, California Southern Cities. I am happy to come before you this evening on behalf of and in support of work that was spearheaded by Vice Mayor Rex Richardson and included ARCC and the Housing Authority. ARCC boasts over 2500 multifamily property owners, landlords, management companies and vendors who support this industry an industry that contributes greatly to our local and statewide economy, but an industry that has also been misrepresented by a few bad owners over the past few years. It has been our mission to connect with our city representatives and to inform and educate the truth about owning rental property. For over 98% of our owners in our city, you have responsible, compassionate and reliable owners who care about their residents. This is why it was a welcome partnership to engage in a conversation on some of the challenges that exist with a program that so many owners participated in and supported. In the past, over 98% of housing vouchers were being used, but it became clear that the changes in policies had not been adequately passed along or adopted by our owners. After several meetings with both the vice mayor and Alison King from the Housing Authority. There were issues that were not only cleared up as misunderstandings, but also made both sides aware that communication needed to be consistent. Needless to say, the meetings resulted in positive outcomes for both parties, and we look forward to continuing to work with willing partners. So I come before you this evening to thank you for including the Apartment Association California Southern cities in this process, for being willing to listen to our concerns and for being willing to work on an incentive package that will help increase participation in the housing voucher program. In conclusion, I want to thank Vice Mayor Rex Richardson, Alison King, and I want to thank you for those who have signed on to this recommendation. Janine Pearce from District two. Roberto, you on the from district seven. And Stacey Mongo from District five. We look forward to continuing this partner and we look for it as an industry that is more than just people oriented but is family oriented. Thank you for your time this evening.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Hello. My name is George O'Hara, and I have a small apartment in District seven.
Speaker 1: I'm new to residential housing, and I'm an insurance agent by day. A couple of years ago, I bought a small property built in 1955. Since that, it has required regular maintenance and repairs to plumbing systems, landscaping. And I just replaced that entire bathroom because of rot to the supporting beams under the floor. I guess that's to be expected for a 60 year old building. By chance, I was already a member of the Apartment Association of California Southern Cities. Their input has been instrumental in educating me on how to operate as a property owner.
Speaker 2: And inspire me to maintain a.
Speaker 1: Clean and attractive property. I want to thank Vice Mayor Rex Richardson for opening dialog with the Apartment Association on how to improve the Housing Choice Voucher Program in Long Beach for both landlords and tenants. I also want to thank Alison King for giving me an education on how Section eight of the voucher program works. I feel more confident with it now. I thank you. Thank you. Next bit of news.
Speaker 6: My name is George. I'm the total and I was here in October. I want to thank you, Mayor. You gave me a card and I got my section it. But five months I've called at least 400 numbers and either it's like we don't want to work with them and they hang up. Or there's just nothing there. There's nothing there. So my daughter is getting ready to run out. And I was told I don't get an extension. I know another young lady with three kids living in her car. When I was here last time, it was because we got evicted by. It's called the Dome now. It was the Mike Dunphy group. And they told us when we got kicked out that they were going to remodel and that we would have a chance to move back in where they're remodeled. So I went to a to apply for an apartment in the same building with Section eight. They accept Section eight, but they still want you to make twice that amount of rent. When I lived there, I was paying 750. A little small studio now. LS 1195 section. I don't pay that much. They only pay 1128. You guys build them all so everybody can be homeless. You know, it's just it's crazy. I've been here 52 years my whole life. And now I'm here again. Go again. Going to be homeless. There's got to be. Maybe when we turn, if we get our package turned in, if we bring our package in to section eight, can they get them going faster? So the managers don't give us you know, don't want to give our apartment away? Or is there a way that because I'm doing Multi-Service Center, if they can pay the deposit to guarantee that we're going to have that apartment, because a lot of managers said, well, we have to wait, you know, they don't want to wait. They don't want to leave their apartments sitting for a month, sometimes two months. There's got to be some. You know, we got all these abandoned buildings around here. You guys are building all this stuff. Redo a building for people that need it. Not all the homeless people out there want to be homeless. They don't want to be out there in the street. But there's no housing. None. There's more kids homeless out there than I even care to think about. So one more time. June. If I don't find a place and they won't give me an extension. What am I supposed to do? I'm 57 years old. I have lupus, I have Parkinson's, and I'm on a liver transplant list. And I'm in recovery, so I got ten years clean. If I have to go back out there and be homeless.
Speaker 1: Well, we understand. Thank you. Thank you for your time. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Mayor and city council and staff. I want to commend Vice Mayor Richardson and all the coauthors on just thinking out of the box and really thinking about innovative ways to help solve this affordable housing crisis that we have here in the city. I think it's a it's a great first step to, you know, to to move towards actually housing the people that need it the most. As you heard from Georgianna, Georgianna is definitely you've been having a hard time as well as another person out here in the in the audience that is also in Section eight, having a hard time finding a place to live. So and it's also just a shame that we're we're at the brink of losing all this funding from the federal government if we don't find, you know, find a way to actually keep it here. And then and then on top of that, the new administration and the threats that come to to the housing authority because of that, you know, and all of this ties in together, because I know the homeless the homeless or the people without homes is a huge issue and problem that the city is trying to tackle. And this is just one way, one step in moving toward actually solving that issue or finding a solution for that issue. If we can't if we can't remedy this, if we can't save this this great resource that that our city has, then we're just going to find ourselves piled up, piled on top of more people without homes . I mean, we have two people here in the audience, three people that are on the brink of that right now. And I know we can't build housing that fast, but we can try to encourage property owners to take Section eight and do whatever we can to think outside the box to make sure that people do have homes . So I do commend everybody on working, working on this and just let me know, you know, again, I didn't introduce myself. I'm sorry. We're hearing that our program director of Libra. So anything that we can do to help, to help educate the community, to let us know. And when you do come back with some educational program, I do recommend that you probably give VIP seating to Robert Fox because he definitely needs to to be educated on maybe dispelling some of the myths that he has on Section eight voucher holders, because that's definitely something that we need to do. Not everybody that holds Section eight, as you saw, is Georgina is not a drug dealer, is not a gang member, is not some sort of criminal. And we're not trying to to protect them because there are laws to get them out if they do if they do violate some sort of laws. But we do need to educate the community and those property owners that still holding on to those myths about Section eight tenants and and just maybe educate them and open their minds a little bit. Thank you very much for all the work on this. And thank you for your time. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Mayor. Vice Mayor and other members. Other council members actually came here for a different reason, but I thought I would propose an idea. It's a long term shot, but I actually represent a landlord that borders a Section eight housing community in North Long Beach. The people there are generally good people. My proposition is find contractors, contractors, people that are willing to donate lumber, maybe renovate some projects in Long Beach that could use an uplift and find these people that were normally going to use the vouchers. Because it seems like there was two problems with your report, ability to use the vouchers and problems with the landlords so the city could then themselves become the landlord. And you hire or you teach these people that are willing to do contractors that are willing to donate their services, help people in need, learn a new craft. Therefore, they can be employed by the city afterwards, stay in Long Beach, pay taxes to Long Beach, and they live in a home that they helped build. Thank you. Thank you for your time. Next speaker, please. John dilatory names on file. Mr. Honorable Mayor and City Council. I appreciate the opportunity to come up and speak with you tonight. Before I can go into my speech, first thing I'd like to say is I think, you know, what we're hearing here tonight is that there's hope, right? You're hearing from all sides and from everybody. There's hope because we do have a crisis. Right. We have too many people and not enough housing. It will take just like the last two gentlemen said, it's going to take a while and hopefully working together, we can come to that. So I think it's just it's encouraging as a citizen of Long Beach that we do have hope. So I am also an association member. I would like to thank you for the opportunity to speak. I just want to let you know, we fully support the recommendation that that's in front of. And we really appreciate all the work that Allison and city staff and the council members have put in putting this together. And we like that we were included as a part of this solution because really solutions only come if everybody's at the table has been said many times tonight and we really look forward to continuing being a part of the solution over the next 30 days, whether when this comes back. So, again, thank you. And we do support this. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Thank you council for tackling and looking to tackle this project. I'm a Bill Davis and I'm actually a property manager who does accept Section eight and I can testify that some of the inspectors do get a little bit unreasonable with their inspection items.
Speaker 8: But that being said, for.
Speaker 1: The most part, I haven't had too much.
Speaker 8: Of a problem with that.
Speaker 1: I do want to address I do agree with the three points that have been made in regards to on the incentive.
Speaker 8: Side and the education side. Those items are good.
Speaker 1: There is some very practical, non expensive methods.
Speaker 8: That can be used to alleviate some of.
Speaker 1: The timing gap that occurs and that would be in the preapproval aspect for the tenants. Currently I have a unit, I've had 20 people, 20 on on vouchers come through. Most of those were people that had their we're looking for a ground floor unit because they had some type of a disability. And in regards to a comment that was made that the price per zip code is not a fixed point in total. My experience is that is not true. The local office does treat that as a mandatory cap. They don't take the person's available income under the 40% and add two. They merely say what that zip code cap is, is what we're going to.
Speaker 8: Pay no matter what.
Speaker 1: So that has been an issue that has caused almost all of the 20 that have come to look at the unit to say, you know, look, I'd love to take it, but, you know, they're not approving it. The pre-approval thing that I've been working with the local office on is to be able to basically say, Look, here's the stuff that you're really looking for. It's pages three and four of the owners packet. That's what they're looking for. It says We have this many units that we've rented at this price. Here's the amenities that we're putting with this unit and to be able to subject that for the pre-approval, if we can keep that on file instead of having to refill out every time someone wants to come and apply for it, to be able to work with that local office and say, Hey, look here, you already know you're going to need a price exception or you know, because you're doing a mandatory cap on that zip code. If you could just keep these pages on file so we don't have to the managers don't have to constantly fill this out and send it back. It would speed up the process.
Speaker 8: Okay.
Speaker 1: If we can get the approval times down to a day, we can then get the inspections done in two weeks because that's generally about how long it takes them to get out. And that alleviates having to pay the apartment owners for an extra month. Thank you. Thank you for your time. Okay. Next speaker, please. Good evening, members of the council. My name's Andrew Weil, and I live at 1995 Canal Avenue. I lived in Long Beach since 1986, and I've got rental property in the first District, the second District, the seventh District, and the eighth District. And I'd like to especially thank Councilmember Pearce, because I found out about this meeting and from one of her relentless emails. And what I want to tell you is why I'm no longer taking Section eight. And there are two reasons. Number one is last year I had an inspection for one of my tenants and they point out some things are wrong and we fix and they put in a time and they did the rent anyways. So I'm quite angry about that. And now the end. But here's the main problem. I think that probably affects most other landlords, that makes them reluctant is, you know, over the years I got my first Section eight tenant back in 1991 and over the years maybe they had a dozen or two. And I found that the vast majority, the vast majority of them are bad housekeepers. A lot of them don't even know they're bad housekeepers, but they're bad housekeepers. And a huge percentage of them are horrible housekeepers. And what's the consequence of that? Always, roaches. And when they move out, it's just a terrible condition to try. You get to do so much cleaning, replace so many things. So, you know, every year and over the years, how many how many times have you ever been cited for this bad housekeeping? None, even though it's right there on the inspection form. So what I would recommend is that, you know, you hold us accountable to a certain standard because we have a yearly inspection, is that you should hold the tenants accountable to a to a standard, hold up their end of the bargain. And for those that need a little help and and a little direction that you provide that to them so that we know that when we rent to Section eight, we're not going to get someone who's going to be creating a problem for the neighbors and a problem when we have to come and redo the apartment. So and was those are my $0.02. I thank you very much for your time and have it evening. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. I really wasn't planning to come today and speak tonight, but I've got to take this time to thank everybody that's up in front of us. Let me just say, I've lived in Long Beach for 77 years. I've been on housing cabinet and, you know, helping them. And nobody is doing a better job right now.
Speaker 8: Than Rex and Alison.
Speaker 1: Let me just tell you, I've been up the 50 vouchers that I've had under my control. I grew up in the projects of the Carmelites, and now I live in a better part. I love this system because it's better than the projects where you put everybody. The kids are playing with other people that are going to work and doing it. All I can say is we're here tonight. Fox I mean, everything that people have said here, it's true. It is truly true. I haven't heard anybody get up here and say something that I would say was a lie. But the thing is, is what we're doing now is we're correcting it. This is the first time. And believe me, I've been way before, Alison and Reggie and Laura and, you know, the whole bunch. We used to have committees that got together as owners. Now I'm the chairman of the board for the Apartment Association. I think they gave it to me because we never had a chairman of the board just because they didn't want me to leave. And I've been in that even longer. So with that being said, we're on the right track, guys. And let me just tell you, Robert, believe me, talk to them, because I've had the same thing happen to me that's happened to you, but to communications. We're going to change it. Thank you. That's enough for my time. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Bill, Mayor, City Council. Thank you for taking.
Speaker 2: A minute.
Speaker 8: To listen to me. I work for our county, contracted our peer run community center in Huntington Park. And I worked in a lot of there this this nonprofits, agencies, places throughout the county because we have over 200 groups that are assisting individuals who have lived experience and are now doing better recovery. The part of the system that we're discussing today and I thought it was important to show show up and converse for a few seconds about our agency. There are alternatives. There's a share program. They have a program where they share space to individuals. They have different places like National Affordable Housing, where they have Section eight listings in different states and they let you apply there. There's, you know, a few alternatives, but as you can see, it'll all work somehow. And the Wells Fargo Bank has a two year waiting list with Habitat for Humanity. And that's because they have to do all the process, find the people that volunteer for them. So we've discussed some of those particular alternatives. But when I went to Japan a few times, it's really difficult because they have a place where I went to and it was just outside of Tokyo and it's a combination hotel, hot springs and restaurant, and they train individuals who leave the mental health hospitals with a ten year minimum stay, and only one owner is a doctor of that place. So he's responsible for everybody there. So it's really difficult over there. I brought this to the attention of individuals here at the county level where I am assisting with peer run wellness centers throughout the county. There are 69 of them and I let them know that it's not enough because basically there's a lot of people and I can show statistics where Proposition 63 was put to the vote twice and twice. The voters said, do not use that money for anything else but mental health services. So the.
Speaker 3: Money's there.
Speaker 8: Somehow we have to find more inclusiveness for individuals like myself, who is a person with lived experience and has continued to work diligently to somehow alleviate the problem with what is available out there and what people can understand and want to be a part of. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Very good to address on file. Following up on this comment from the speaker a few moments ago, relative to some of the Section eight people being bad housekeepers, as it were. Perhaps what the city should do is take a city staff member well-trained in that, you know, our Marine.
Speaker 1: Bureau.
Speaker 2: Has. I know. People that do a great job of keeping the restrooms around the area clean and other facilities as well spotless and had that as of have them go in and if they are challenged, if their housekeeping knowledge is challenged, show them what to do. And if not, then read in the riot act and say, if I got to come back and clean this up again, you're out and see how that works. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And say no further comment. I just want to thank everyone who joined us tonight. And later, comments like to the city council and the staff. And even if we move the needle just a little bit, it's going to make a big difference to Long Beach families in need. Seeing no further comment. Comment members, please cast your vote.
Speaker 0: Motion carries.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. And thank you all for coming and for your involvement. Appreciate that. Okay. We're going to go back to the regular agenda. We do have some members of the public that signed up on on non agenda items. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to respectfully request City Manager, Department of Health and Human Services and Development Services Department to develop an incentive package to encourage landlord acceptance of subsidized tenants through the Housing Choice Voucher Program, and return to the City Council in 30 days. The incentive package should incorporate the following options:
• Align and streamline the current city-mandated inspections with
the HUD-mandated Housing Choice Voucher inspections;
• Waive various permits and inspection costs for apartment
owners who accept Housing Choice Vouchers;
• Create a Damage Mitigation Fund which provides financial
assistance to landlords to mitigate damage caused by tenants
during their occupancy under the Housing Choice Voucher
Program;
• Provide landlords vacancy payments to hold units while the
landlord is going through the Housing Choice Voucher
Program approval process. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0014 | Speaker 0: What about 18?
Speaker 2: 18? Sorry, I skipped over that. 18.
Speaker 0: Key Item 18 is a communication from Councilman Alston, Chair of the State Legislation Committee, recommendation to request approval of the 2017 state legislative agenda as recommended by the State Legislation Committee.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: Yes. Well, the item is before you, I'd like to get a staff report from Diana Tang or Mr. City Manager.
Speaker 5: Mayor, members of the city council. The State Legislative Committee did meet on January 10th, 2017 and received and filed all of staff's recommended changes for the agenda for this year. Staff's changes were predominantly organizational in nature. Last year, the.
Speaker 7: Federal Legislative Committee chose to reorganize the agenda so that it would perhaps be.
Speaker 5: A little bit more accessible and easier.
Speaker 7: To read for the public. And so we made those same changes to the state agenda.
Speaker 5: We also added language to say that we would support legislation, policies and grants in addition to simply state legislative proposals. The committee at the time also asked staff to add in three new items. The first was related to minimum wage. There was a discussion related to the restaurant industry and discrepancies between tipped workers and untapped workers. So we went and did some research and came up with language to.
Speaker 7: Support legislation that minimizes wage disparities between.
Speaker 5: Tipped and untapped workers in the restaurant industry without impacting existing scheduled.
Speaker 7: Minimum wage increases.
Speaker 6: The committee also.
Speaker 7: Asked us to add in language related to.
Speaker 5: Grant funding for local governments as related to law enforcement and marijuana growers that may, may pop up in the city as a result of new state laws. And so funding to local governments to eradicate illegal growth of marijuana plants has been added to the agenda. The committee also asked us to add an item to support additional funding to local governments to support housing, animals and.
Speaker 7: Animal care shelters beyond three days. And so that change has been made as well.
Speaker 5: And so those are the only three changes.
Speaker 7: The committee requested.
Speaker 5: Beyond Staff's.
Speaker 7: Recommended changes which are in.
Speaker 5: The item before you. With that, I'm available to answer questions.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Miss Tang, for your very, very complete and brief report. I also want to recognize other members of the State Ledge Committee and thank council members Gonzalez and Mongo four for their work in helping to frame this agenda. I know there are a lot of other moving pieces going on in Sacramento right now. I think our state legenda is is one that is, I think, pretty comprehensive in really, really, I think embodies the the the the the the vibe and the the direction of our city council. And so I would ask for your approval. But before I do that, I'd just also like to just compliment Diana Tang for her tremendous work as our government relations director in Sacramento, but also her work in just keeping the council informed about changes going on in Sacramento, which we have a big one happening just this week. One of the our state legends over the last three years has been to push for a statewide fix. Our Highways and Roads campaign, which will, I'm happy to announce, should be voted on tomorrow by the state legislature, SB one and AB one. This council has supported those bills in concept over the last three years, and it will yield a tremendous amount of new resources to our city for infrastructure repairs to the tune of about $11 million a year. Is that correct?
Speaker 6: That is correct, yes.
Speaker 3: And so congratulations, city council, for your efforts in that regard. And so with that, I would ask for your your support and in adopting the state legenda. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much and any public comment on this. Before I turn to Councilman Gonzalez, not Councilman Gonzalez.
Speaker 7: Great work, Diana, and thank you, Councilmember Austin and Councilmember Mongo, for your work on this as well.
Speaker 2: Okay, Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 5: Thanks to my colleagues for their collaboration. And then I just wanted to. Earlier today at EDF, we kind of started talking about some of the sales tax implications and some of the things that have changed. I know that I've mentioned it to Diana.
Speaker 6: Since our hour five 4:00 meeting.
Speaker 5: But specifically, I think that it's.
Speaker 6: Time that we start looking into legislation related to how the sales tax has changed its movement with the sale of solar.
Speaker 5: And so it used to be that.
Speaker 6: If you sell solar and you're a contractor where you sell.
Speaker 5: It, etc., but now.
Speaker 6: That they're selling it out of Costcos and Home Depots and the such.
Speaker 5: That transition has happened and we're going to have some more leakage in those areas if we don't address it. So I don't I'm not sure where we want to go on that, but I.
Speaker 6: Just want to throw it out there. So the next time we have.
Speaker 5: An item that the community and our staff could look into that for us and give us a little bit more background. Thank you. But great working with everyone. Team proud to be a new member of a state. Let's.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 1: Just want to say good work to the committee and to Diana and $11 million for STS. Nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And congratulations to the whole committee. Count on us and a great job of winning the state, the state committee. And that vote tomorrow is very important to us. We've all been very involved. And if that happens, is, as we all expect it to, to go through that will be some immediate major highway construction money for us, for the city. So that'll be additional support. So thank you for that. There's a second. There's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Mongo. Bush and Kerry's. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to respectfully request City Council approval of the 2017 State Legislative Agenda as recommended by the State Legislation Committee. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0246 | Speaker 0: Councilmember Mongo. Bush and Kerry's.
Speaker 2: Okay, now item 19. Councilman Urunga item.
Speaker 0: Item 19 is communications from Councilman Miranda, Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilman Andrews and Vice Mayor Richardson. Recommendation to request the city manager to gather data on illegal dumping and draft an illegal dumping action plan.
Speaker 8: Get married, guys. Well, go ahead and take it. Thank you. Elizabeth Tatum says it is a consistent and visible problem in the city of Long Beach. It contributes to blight in our community. It is also one of the most frequent calls we receive in our city council office. Decided to allow us to take a closer look at where items are being dumped citywide and develop a comprehensive approach to solving illegal dumping. We would like to study to explore current barriers to reducing illegal dumping. One of the biggest barriers is that we have no plan for our multi-unit dwellings as it relates to bulky item pickups . Our current policy as it relates to items dumped in alleys also needs updating. Currently, items don't do it and now they are the responsibility of the adjacent property. Owner and I are forced to call enforcement action. This is a policy that needs to be reexamined. And as we know that nine times out of ten the adjacent adjacent property owner has not played a role in the owners being behind their property and are now responsible for the disposal of it. I know that if we look at our goal on beach data, the calls for service we received through the illegal dumping hotline and the calls to city council offices, we can draft a comprehensive plan to proactively educate and reduce occurrences of illegal dumping in our city. I am glad that we are having this conversation and I know that we can make some improvements as it relates to illegal dumping. I want to thank my colleagues, Councilwoman Lena Gonzalez, Councilmember de Andrews and Vice Mayor Rex Richardson for sending in to the Senate with me. I also want to thank Craig Beck, Nicole Marconi in and the Public Works Environmental Services Bureau team for their work on this area as well. Thank you all to staff.
Speaker 2: Next up is Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Councilmember Turanga, I'd say you're spot on. This is one of the largest, most significant reports that come into our office about dumping we got in our district. We've got two freeways that bisect our district and that, you know, makes us a little more susceptible to different items being dumped in the different pockets and the different alleyways that sort of end right at the freeway. So the more we can do to work with our neighborhood associations, to have a strategy that really targets these, you know, highly susceptible neighborhoods, I think that's that's the right direction. So you have my support for Councilmember, and I look forward to seeing what staff comes back with. Thanks.
Speaker 7: Yes. So, Councilmember Suranga, thank you. Thank you so much. I cannot thank you enough for bringing this forward because I will agree with you that, yes, this is like the number one thorn in our side as a council members. It's just really taking care of the little things, which is the illegal dumping. And as you can see, how horrible it could be in all areas of the city. I think that we do need to explore additional options, whether it's education, even looking at technology. I know we have go Long Beach, but how can we further support that through technology in getting these items picked up right away? So I look forward to that. And and again, thanks so much for bringing this forward and look forward to hearing more.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I do want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward. Illegal dumping is a really big issue in my district. My team is out there every weekend and every single neighborhood cleanup. Our dedicated volunteers that there's always new stuff in the alleys. Last week alone in seven days, we had 31 cases of illegal dumping reported just directly to my field deputy. And so I think it's important that we're starting the conversation tonight. I know that Los Angeles also had a big challenge with illegal dumping and great good over there that works for Garcetti. I talked to me months ago about some of the work that they had done with changing the way that all their city staff addresses illegal dumping. And so I hope that in looking at a best practice, we are also looking at other cities and what has made the most sense and how they've done some of their work . So, again, thank you, everybody, for bringing this forward.
Speaker 1: Councilman Super. Now, thank you, Councilmember, for bringing it forward. And you know, it's a serious problem when Councilmember Durango wants to do a study. I would say, generally speaking, he does not like studies. So I think this reflects about how big an issue it is in reading over some of the materials and how these are just ideas , bullet points. But one of them I wanted to speak to is hiring of a waste enforcement officer or something like that. I want to take this moment to give a shout out to Frank Ramirez. I think he's one of the most meritless employees we have in the city. What strikes me is his institutional knowledge. Anytime I have an issue, I swear he knows the history of it, no matter where it is. And that's just my district. I can't imagine all the little nuances he knows about the entire district. So what I would like to recommend moving forward, if we can find a way to have Frank hold this position or somehow encourage him to hang hanging around a while because I think he could add so much value to this whole piece. So I'll get off my soapbox. But thank you.
Speaker 7: Yes. I forgot to request. I'd like to add a friendly amendment if we can have its states 120 days, I believe, for it to come back to council. Can we make sure it comes back to this body versus the two from four? That would be my friendly amendment. Would you accept? Thank you.
Speaker 2: Councilman.
Speaker 6: I would also like to add a friendly I would like to start off on.
Speaker 5: A positive note. I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward.
Speaker 6: I also want to.
Speaker 5: Thank the member of the city council who.
Speaker 6: I've actually seen pick.
Speaker 5: Up dumped items in his.
Speaker 6: Own vehicle. Councilmember member supercar just driving through the community, literally picking up vehicles and putting them in his trunk.
Speaker 5: And taking them away. He's a good member of the community. We're happy to have him as.
Speaker 6: Both a trash pickup and a council.
Speaker 5: Member.
Speaker 6: And now onto a more serious note. The Long Beach app needs to be fixed. It is unacceptable. Our IT department needs to get it together. I have been complaining about this app since I was elected three months ago. It's inaccurate the.
Speaker 5: Information. We are constantly putting.
Speaker 6: Community members to work for us to gather the.
Speaker 5: Data and the.
Speaker 6: Behind the scenes of it all and the guts of it all is broken. The we have too many vacancies. We have other priorities. All of those things are all it's been too long and we need it fixed. And so I would like the go along each component and the community engagement component of illegal dumping and pick up to be a part of the report back to this council with a serious deadline with ramifications and implications to staff members.
Speaker 5: Who don't follow through and meet deadlines related to this app and the dumping.
Speaker 6: Because we have such an amazing resource of community members who care so much. I have reported in the fourth District.
Speaker 5: Many dumping off of Cherry on that app and it's.
Speaker 6: Terrible. They're picked up. They're not picked up. They say they have been picked up. You go by, they haven't been picked up.
Speaker 5: And so having used.
Speaker 6: The app on multiple things, I don't actually think it's public works fault at all. I think the app, I literally am willing to set aside money in the budget this year if that is.
Speaker 5: Necessary to have some.
Speaker 6: College kids design an app that would be more effective. And obviously our city staff wouldn't have to build it and I'm sure that it would meet whatever measure requirements because these college kids can data and donuts over breakfast and do something which would be more remarkable than what we have today. And it's just been too long and I'm so sorry to be negative.
Speaker 5: But the time has come.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilman Mengers phoned me up, so I'm going to comment. I was going to not say anything because I haven't seen most of the things. I think the staff and I just I just publicly say a few things. The first is I want to thank everyone that brought this up. I want to start just by saying that, you know, obviously, sometimes you forget the amount of work that happens. And so a lot of folks don't know. I think our public works team, they probably pick up close to 50 or 60, 60 mattresses a day. Is it a day or is it a week?
Speaker 6: A day?
Speaker 2: A day. Okay. 50 to 60 mattresses a day, which is unbelievable to think that that's happening. But that's what's happening. So and so is our our our, our, our, our folks doing an incredible job working with the resources. And they're absolutely doing great. And so you guys are out there, they're picking stuff up, we're calling things, and I'm incredibly grateful. But it's also clear to me that we do not have enough resources when it comes to cleaning the city. I've already mentioned this to you and Mr. West in this year's budget. I want to see how we actually begin to take care of this issue, which it's not acceptable to have litter and trash and waste in people's alleys and in the neighborhood. It's just it's not okay. And we must do a better job at at this. I think as a community and as a city, I've always I've been saying to staff, we have to sweat the small stuff. And the small stuff are the basics of just keeping the city clean and neighborhoods clean for the community. And so I expect that the amazing job that we're already doing because it's it's damn good Craig and you and your team are picking up tons of waste every single day. These guys need more resources to go out there and and do more. And if, if, if we need to double the effort that's currently in place and we got to double and figure out how we how we get there. But we've got to do more than what we're doing now. I'll just add to the Columbia conversation, and you've obviously been sending some messages about that. When the when the app first launched in its first two or three years, it was working so well. And I'm not sure what happened over the last particularly two years or so, but the particularly on the reporting of dumped items and other issues, it's not working. It's broken on the back end. And and we're providing and confusing residents by the messages that we're sending. And so I'll just uplift a lot of what Councilwoman Mongo said. She's absolutely correct. All this needs to get fixed immediately and we need to put more resources into this area because we're working hard, but we need to do a lot better. And every one and all the department heads and all the managers in the work force, they need to take ownership of the city in the way it looks. And, you know, be interested to know how many of our own folks are actually reporting stuff outside of the people that are actually picking up the trash , because I think that that is to me, this is everyone's job. Whether you're the department, head of another department or whether you're manager of another area, everyone should be interested in ensuring the city is as beautiful and a good place to live and work. And so that it's, I think, a challenge for our team to figure out in this next budget cycle. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I want to thank the people, my members, from bringing this item forward. Obviously, this is one of serious concern. I want to just just kind of piggy back on some of the latter comments regarding the app. I think it works. It has worked pretty well. But I think we also need to be mindful that there is a you know, it's great to be able to push a button and expect a result, but understand that there's human resources behind those buttons that we push. I had a conversation with the Public Works director a little earlier, and I was kind of astonished at what some of the challenges that he is dealing with as a department in terms of having the personnel to actually do that work. And I think, you know, that that merits some of our attention as well to assist with making sure that we have adequate a number of personnel to actually perform the duties because it is very laborious work. Folks who do that work suffer back injuries and other sorts of repetitive motion injuries. They're dealing with heavy loads on a daily basis. We have to be mindful of that as well. And so one week it could be working great because that team is out there and it's fully staffed. And then the next week it may not be working as well because there may be staffing shortfalls and so on. I don't want to make excuses. I do concur with the mayor's comments that it's everybody's job and my staff. We have a motto. We don't drive past the graffiti, we don't drive past dumped items. We make sure to report them. And I think if everybody had that mindset, not only city staff, but but residents, we'd have a much better city.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. Thank you, Smith RICHARDSON.
Speaker 1: Well, thank, councilwoman. Go for kickin up the comments for a second round. I got a little inspired by your, uh, your comments. So I wanna say first, good job for whoever handles the public works Twitter. I get a lot of Twitter stuff and if we just, you know, tag public works team it's handle 100% of that 100%
Speaker 2: . One of the best in the entire city is is the public.
Speaker 1: With the words Twitter. Fantastic. Secondly, you know, because I have two freeways that run through my district, I have 24 on or off ramps in my district. And simply, it is hard to navigate for a resident who wants to clean up an off ramp or complain. They come to us, they go to different departments. They hear it's Caltrans. Their process isn't clear. I'm not saying that the city should maintain the on ramps, but if someone takes a picture of it, we should at least make sure that Caltrans gets a copy of whatever, whatever is submitted because they should hear what we're hearing about the on and off ramps. So many times we we, you know, direct them to a field deputy or someone with Caltrans. But we should streamline that process because to a resident, they don't know the difference between the right away. It's Long Beach to them and it reflects poorly on our city. So but thank you, Councilman Tarango, for bringing this up. I think we're we're going to get something good out of this.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 6: I just wanted to clarify and in my passion, I may have spoke a bit quickly, but I specifically did say, like public works is doing a great job. I think the big issue with the app is it will tell you it's picked up and you'll drive by and it's not picked up or it will tell you it's not picked up and you'll drive by it and it'll be like, We'll get back to you in a couple of days and it won't be. There was a television in front of someone's house for three weeks and I thought to myself, I am just going to put this on the back of my truck. And I thought, Where am I going to put it? I don't want to be in that little dumper dumping it into some other trash bin. So you're in this tough position.
Speaker 5: Of wanting to help but not knowing how.
Speaker 6: To do that. And so I hope that those statistics can come back to us on what is going on with the Long Beach, because I think that it's just too important.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Tauranga.
Speaker 8: Well, I guess I touched a nerve with this item here. Glad to hear all the suggestions in the comments and it's been an important topic for us in the seventh District. I also have two freeways in the river going through my district. So there's it's a big issue in my district and I'm glad to hear. Let me rephrase it. Now now I'm hearing that it's a big issue in yours as well. So, yes, it is another study, but I think it's going to be coming one with some great results. Thank you for for supporting this.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And I think it's important to note, of course, I think everyone appreciates the work that's happening already from staff and in management here. So any public comment on this kind of please come forward. Good evening.
Speaker 1: Again. So as I stated before, I work for the landlord AP Atlantic, which is right, 5150 Atlantic Avenue, which is in your district. Councilman Suber Now my initial question is, I didn't see you on this. Are you included in this or is the city entirely included in it? Okay. What address did you get? 5150 Atlantic Avenue. It's right next to the city of Long Beach. Which center? Oh, I thought this was your district. I apologize. So my main concern is I. The property. Where do I start? North via parcel, which is behind the Wick Center. There is severe dumping behind this, which comes at a great concern because when I walk behind the property, I find needles and bottles full of schizophrenic drugs. And you've got this in relation to dumping with mattresses, homeless people sleeping on the mattresses that are obviously using these drugs and needles. The street, to my knowledge, so serves no purpose to the community because it's directly behind the building. There would be no purpose for anyone to either exit or enter that street unless they were doing something that they shouldn't be. So my question to you is, should I be if I've been spending hundreds of dollars every month to take care of this junk? And I think cleaning it up, sweeping it up. And I really want to know if I should be filing for a prescriptive easement. And that's all I have to say, because, I mean, I'll clean it up. I'll put Gates on the side of it to help prevent the dumping, and I'll take care of it when it's dirty. So. That's it.
Speaker 2: Okay. I am sure. I'm sure that someone will will connect with you. We have already. Mr. West. Mr. Harrison, if you could talk to this gentleman. Yeah, great. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Thank you very much. To me, the public comment. Okay. There's a motion of a second, actually, Councilmember Supernanny.
Speaker 1: Just a quick shout out to Craig Indico. Thank you for all your work. I agree with my colleagues. You guys do a phenomenal job. I just want to mention Frank in particular. So I hope you didn't feel slighted there. Also, just a follow up on the Caltrans issue. We met with Caltrans at the quarterly meeting a couple of weeks ago and they talked about the adopt a highway program and I ended up adopting a highway. So that's one other option that we can do, that council officers can get our own volunteers out there once they have training from Caltrans or you can hire a crew to do that. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Kim. We have a motion on the floor and members, please cast your votes. I'm sure it'll be unanimous.
Speaker 0: Motion carries.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Okay. We're going on to the next item, please, which is with the 2021. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to gather data on Illegal Dumping and draft an Illegal Dumping Action Plan to address the City's approach to resources, education, reporting and enforcement related to illegal dumping. The report should be drafted and returned to City Council within 120 days with subsequent updates on progress annually. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_04042017_17-0186 | Speaker 2: Thank you. Okay. We're going on to the next item, please, which is with the 2021.
Speaker 0: Item 21 is a communication from Council Member Pearce Chair, Elections Oversight Committee recommendation to request the city manager to study the feasibility of aligning Council member and other elected officials. Officeholder counts to those of State FEC regulations.
Speaker 2: Council Member Pearce.
Speaker 5: Thank you for this. We had our Elections Oversight Committee meeting a couple of weeks back where we looked at this. Right now, the municipal code sections 2.01.380 and 390 currently prohibit the use of office holder funds as transfers, loans or contributions to any other candidate for elected office. I would like to make a motion to request the City Attorney to amend l l BMC Section 2.013.80 and three nine to permit office holder funds to be used and consistent with the provisions of state law. California Government Code Sections 89510 as amended. This would include the use of office holder funds to purchase tickets to fundraising events for candidates for elected office. I ask for my colleagues support.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzales. Not any public comment. Senior members, please cash customer support now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just I just want to include here that I dissented on this vote. I sit on the election committee. There's a lot of good things about getting old. But I do remember when this, uh, this ordinance changed when a previous council voted this in, and I thought it was a good idea then, and I stand by it. I don't. I can't understand why if someone contributes to my campaign, why I'm going to turn around and give that money to someone else, to that person who donated to me, did not endorse. So that is the basic premise. I realize tonight we're just looking for a study. We're not looking for that absolute decision. But that was the rationale behind my my dissent before. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Just to clarify, I actually think the council was actually asking for a change in the municipal code.
Speaker 1: That's correct. The way I understand the motion this evening, it is a request to prepare an amendment to the ordinance which would make those changes and not a study in that this would come back to the council for a first and a second.
Speaker 2: Reading at that.
Speaker 4: Time.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thanks for that clarification.
Speaker 2: Okay. There's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to study the feasibility of aligning councilmember and other elected officials officeholder accounts to those of state/FPPC regulations. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03212017_17-0219 | Speaker 0: So we'll move right along. Next, we're going to be taking up item number 30. Clerk Please read.
Speaker 10: It. I will have to because I'm going to do an amendment on this. So I will be reading it.
Speaker 0: Oh, the clerk let the clerk read the item first, then you make the motion.
Speaker 10: No, no. Because I'm going to do an amendment on it. Oh, okay. Yes. Great. Fine. Thank you. Vice Mayor.
Speaker 2: No, I don't think it's fine. Go ahead.
Speaker 0: Tells me.
Speaker 2: Yes. Yes.
Speaker 0: Typically that typically the clerk opens up the item, then you make your your motion. Okay. Even if you want to change it, you can just. Okay. Madam Clerk, go for it.
Speaker 1: Communication from Councilman Andrew's recommendation to approve the use of the six council districts one time infrastructure funds in the amount of 150,000 to support a partnership being entered into with Killing Fields Memorial Center.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 10: Thank you, Vice Mayor. And I'd like to make an amendment to that, and hopefully I will get a second from this because I'll need it, because the fact that this is something that we have been trying to work on for the last five or seven years now will be coming to fruition. The recommendation to approve the use of the Six Council District one time Infrastructure Fund transferred from the Capital Project Fund, CPW, which is public works department into the entire economic project. Poverty and Economic and Poverty Development. Operating budget in the amount of 150,000 to support the partnership and enter into a Killing Fields Memorial Center in order to redevelop the Killing Fields Memorial location at 1501 East Anaheim Street, Ottawa authorize the city manager to execute the necessary documents with the Killing Field Memorial Center, a nonprofit organization, in order to develop the Killing Fields Memorial Location at 1501 East Anaheim Street. Increase appropriation in the general funds in the economic and property development budget by 150,000. You're not likely to get a second, if I could, on that.
Speaker 0: Thank you. 1/2. By Councilwoman Pierce. Councilman Pierce.
Speaker 4: Yes. I just wanted to say how much I appreciate your forward thinking and trying to partner with such an important organization that raises a lot of awareness, but also provides an opportunity for people to reflect on their history and learn from that. And so I think this is very noble of you.
Speaker 0: Great. Thank you. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 11: Thank you. And I'd like to just support Councilmember Andrews motion. Obviously, this is a. Something, an endeavor that will will certainly embolden and recognize the rich culture of the Cambodian community here in Long Beach. But I think it's also an appropriate use of infrastructure dollars as it will go into building infrastructure in the community. So I congratulate you and were happy to support this motion.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And we'll come back to Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 10: Thank you very much, Vice Mayor. Okay. With this item, the Cambodian, you know, celebration community, there are brothers and sisters that escape the killing. We called the cameras and came to America and to settle here in Long Beach, where they have built up the American dream. Long Beach has had a long and large population of Cambodians outside Nam PIN. And I know that in my district especially in Cambodia town, many of the residents survivor and the. And they are. Genocide and will never, ever make the trip back to Cambodia. This money will go towards completing the dream of the Killing Fields Memorial, first of its kind, outside of Cambodia, and to provide some healing. And this is why we think this is so important. And I want to thank everyone for coming out here tonight. And I know we have a few speakers who will come up here to talk with you right now.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Andrews, or any public comment on this item, please come forward. I know there's a number of speakers that will be the time. Okay. So I see that there's a request for some speakers before we go to public comment. Who are who raise your hand if you're here to speak on this item. Okay. Let's just do this and public comment all together. So please come forward. You have 3 minutes. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and Member City Council. My net metering and. I think my republic veteran, an acrylic survivor and a president, not the caliph where member of center. I see. On behalf of the board. The member or Cambodian American in Long Beach. And Cambodian all over the world. I would like to. Express our deep gratitude. To City Council Bay and to. And the city council. On your vision and relationship. To help. Rely on our team soon. The clearly frail Memories Garden, the first of the kind outside Cambodian and inside the most diverse city in nation. With the hope. The hope. From important stake holder and partner. So. Yes, the theosophy line we. And the Cambodian Train Association. We hope to read. Our construction. Google within the list time timeframe. Thank you so much. God bless you and God bless America.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Two groups who are. Good evening, Mr. Vice Mayor. Members of the City Council. Thank you so much, Ms.. Pearce. Mrs. Price. Happy Persian Holiday, New Year. We actually we do have a great man at the courthouse, a great public defender named Nima Farhadi, a champion of human rights. Ladies and gentlemen. Compared to the size of. The Holocaust Museum or the Armenian Genocide Museum. The Killing Fields Memorial Garden is a very, very small place. It's a miniature size of those two. But to the Cambodians in Long Beach, it is a giant a giant step for them. Two word closure and hearings. Healing the wounds and. Broken dreams and. Not. Probably no prize can ever be. Redeemed. Actually. This one here is a home to many, many Cambodians and the hope of many elderly survivors of the killing fields that they hope in their lifetime to come, to reflect and to remember their loved ones who perished tragically in the killing fields for four years, 42 years ago. We believe that the the killing feels like other genocides before and after it. Just as a part of the history of the humanities, where a people of a nation being subject to atrocity in human suffering, mass killings and the rest the remain of that destruction, the ash of that destruction got nurtured, brought to life back by another group of nation such as the city of Long Beach. And we're very grateful for that. Long Beach has been very, very good to the Cambodians, verse 13, to Hebrew. Don't forget to show hospitality to strangers for some who have done it. How pain angels without knowing it. And the city of Long Beach has done even more. In 2005, the city of Long Beach. Proclaim 17 April as the official city Monday council your anger it was your wife. My starting out your anger. Who co-wrote that one? And in 2012, Councilor Mandy Andrews. BRADY You did you wrote that one wit along with our group for the Genocide Awareness Month. And that was great because we embrace everything about genocide. We observe the Armenian genocide, the Jewish Holocaust, and also the Rwandan massacres. So the city of Long Beach has done a lot and. Recently, Mr. Parkin and Mr. Patrick West already signed a lease. Thank you, sir. We got the lease right now. And finally, we thank you again, Councilman Lee Andrews, for being the champion of the killing fields costs for the survivors and. With that, we will be very humble and honored and grateful for your consideration. Thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I believe we have one more speaker in the group.
Speaker 2: Honorable Vice Mayor Richardson. Members of the Council. City Manager and City Attorney. City clerk. And your staffs. My name is Ernest McBride Junior. I've been a resident of Long Beach since 1938. You know, I've lived in the city. But I'm here to support my friend Paling Salve, who I met when Councilman Andrews first. You know, I ran for the council district and through him I was able to meet a lot of these people and they're really great and wonderful people. And I'm here to kind of support the efforts to get this killing memorial made. And I first became aware of this. There was a film that came out in 1983 called The Killing Fields, and it portrayed two journalists. One was for the New York Times. He was a Cambodian gentleman named Pran Death Praying. And then it was an American journalist, and his name was Sidney Cronenberg. And they had got a the plot of the movie was they had to go to a city in Newark, Lou Luang in Cambodia, because they heard that an American B-52 bomber, it bombed the city. And when they got there, they found out that that was a true fact. And so while they were there, they were they witnessed the execution of the Khmer Rouge operatives, and they tried to take photographs and they were arrested. Well, they managed to get out of there, you know, to get released. And then two years later, they went, you know, to the Pan-Am pan, to the French embassy. And then while they were there, the Khmer Rouge marched in the print arm pen to take over the city and doing a parade. And the these gentlemen were arrested. And then the Cambodian pran he because he was a Cambodian, he was on an arm. He negotiated the release of his friends. And then so they were able to escape to Thailand. And then several months later, Schanberg was in New York City, so he wanted to go look his friend up. And so what happened? His friend Pran was enslaved in. And, you know, he was in slave and he escaped one night. And he he ended up in a muddy cesspool filled with rotting human corpses because he happened to stumble upon the killing fields itself. And then we kind of heard about there were over 2 million Cambodian citizens were murdered by the Pol Pot's regime. And I think memorials are a great reminder to help us remember atrocities that communities face in our young people need to know be aware of this because this is like the Jewish Holocaust, right?
Speaker 10: Yes, please. Your time is all right. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. So, as I understand, at the end of the presentation, we're going to open up to public comment if anyone else would like to speak. You have 3 minutes to speak.
Speaker 2: Dennis Dunne, $150,000. Do you know how much that would help the homeless hungry? Those who can't find homes? Better yet. How would it help the Cambodians to have a gravestone? Glorified in the United States when good causes for Cambodians could be spent on education, jobs, and particularly language development. Not on a graveyard, not on a tombstone. They could even make it even have The Killing Fields movie screened at schools to see how atrocious the actions really were. Cameras. That would be far more descriptive, entertaining, informative and educational than a museum. What are they going to have with the museum? Who will go?
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any further public comment?
Speaker 2: William Shibley I've been involved with the Cambodian community for many years and. It's an honor that I feel that I have earned because of my upbringing in Long Beach. I hear people talking about being in Long Beach 35 years. My grandparents came to Long Beach in 1921, 96 years ago, and my father, uncle, brother and I all graduated from Long Beach, probably my son graduated from Long Beach in turn for Senator Feinstein and is now doing a pre-med program on the East Coast. But one thing that I learned from my father is that none are better than the least of us and that we support everybody. In fact, in the forties, Mr. McBride and my father helped organize the local chapter of the NAACP. There was a murder case called the Sleepy Lagoon Murder case that they made a movie called Zoot Suit Out Of. I would not be here. But for that murder case, because in the middle of the trial, my mother, who'd been married to another Long Beach alum, guy named Van Heflin, had gotten divorced in the late thirties, come to California. And in 1941, friends said, you've got to go to this trial. Six days later, they they eloped. But I have always grown up and my family always believes that we must support our newcomers. Those in need, those under risk. And the Cambodians have suffered more than most of us. I mean, I congratulate Councilwoman Pryce on the Persian the Iranian New Year. And my family is Lebanese-American. We came to the States 1899 also to flee the Turks, because the Turks were massacring not only the Armenians, but the Greeks, the Syrians, the Lebanese and anyone else they could get their hands on. But we need to support the Cambodian community, and building a memorial for the Cambodian community will help heal their wound and help us understand. The importance of the humanity that we must treat each other with. And I thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any further further comment on this item? Please step forward.
Speaker 2: For. Very good. Just briefly, I want to commend Councilman Andrews. This is a type you know, he's doing this not for making political hay. He's been around long enough. He doesn't need that. And and he ought to be commended for that. This is certainly one of the greatest strategy tragedies that the world has ever seen. Thank you for bringing us forward.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any further public comment?
Speaker 2: My name is Michael Ferrara and. I would like to just say a few words on this. It's not just for the Cambodians. In fact, vice mayor, members of the board and or council and also public. This is probably the best spending of public funds that I've seen in a long time. And I'm going to tell you why. Because it's not just for one community group. This is for everybody that lives in Long Beach. All right. This is a teachable moment. This is building a space, investing in a space where it's not just where you go to relax or meditate or even just to think about what is genocide about. And it's not just about Cambodian genocide, from what I've read about it. They are making this a genocide awareness place. And it's a it's a place where you can actually have what they call an experience. All right. It's an experience. There will be some of the people from our Cambodian community who have gone through the horrors of the killing field. And our younger generations will be able to sit there and and make a touch. I mean, if you look at it's a touching point. It's a teachable moment. If you look in any of our history books and you look at The Killing Fields and what they teach them in high school or middle school, it's a paragraph about this large. And they say, yeah, that's genocide. This is a look. We do a lot of things in Long Beach. I remember by my house, they made a park called Rosie the Riveter Park. Why? Why did we do that? Just to have a cute name and a cute symbol from World War Two. No, because we were sitting there and saying women are valuable in the workplace and deserving of recognition, and we put a park to that. So parks are spaces where we express something about our community, where the community comes to meet in a teachable moment or for recreation. But this is very specific. This is something you guys are doing. One of the best things I've ever seen. Making an investment. An investment in the entire city for all people, not just the Cambodians, so that we can have a space where the conversation about genocide can be a real conversation, where it's a meaningful place to have a conversation about genocide. And I think we look at the world right now. The place is rife with it, boiling with it, and our history, recent and far back, is boiling with it. Let's make this a public space to start that conversation and hopefully into the future. Genocide will just be a bad dream or bad memory. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any further public comment?
Speaker 2: The Honorable Vice Mayor Rich and Honorable City Councils, all members of City Council. My name is. But which. I come here to say thank you. Want to say thank you to Phelps and Academy. Thank you to Dartmouth College. Thank you to P.S. you law school. And I would like to say thank you to everyone here. I am here not for myself, but for my baby sister. I am a martial artist. I'm a teacher. Every time we talk about it feels that I got to hold myself so well. No idea what kind of hell it was. Thank you. I would like to let you know. As a martial art teacher. We do fight back. We we sue you. As you remember, Saturday, April 9th, when this son of a dictator came to Long Beach. What happened? He. He knocked a process over Paul Hayes unconscious in front of La Lune restaurant. We sued a dictator. We fought back. That memorial is very crucial just to let the elders here, who are a lot of them, are survivors, to have three instance stars to burn to to be peace. So I would like to let you know, we are not weak people. We are very we would like to thank you, all of you, just to let us have some peace. Thank you. That's all I have.
Speaker 0: Thank you to all of our speakers. So we will take it back behind the real Councilwoman Pearce. You seconded the motion?
Speaker 4: I already spoke on that part. I just wanted to just say how inspire it's been to hear you share your stories and that you are a community that is resilient, that's courageous. And again, just thank you for creating that space. And my staff and I will be out there in the next month for a staff retreat so that we can learn from you all and be a part of your community. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Durango.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Mayor, back around 1980, 81. I was part of a ceremony where the Cambodian community had just. Become a major population group in the sixth District right off of Anaheim. It was a part of the city that was highly Latino at one time, and there was a community center there called Centro de la Raza. Which the United Cambodian community bought and did a groundbreaking to change the building into a Cambodian community center. I was part of that ceremony to make that transition symbolically, make that transition from an area mostly populated by Latinos to now a the idea of the upcoming of a Cambodian population in that area. And it was our way. My way. The Latino of of Long Beach, in a way of welcoming the Cambodian community into Long Beach and providing them with a place of sanctuary, a place where they can come and receive services such as taxi services, tutoring. There was a bit of a little library in that in that center. So this opportunity now to recognize a dark period in the in Cambodia's history is something that we need. We need to, again, commemorate and welcome because it is part of history and we can't forget history. We always have to remember where we came from and the struggles and the challenges and the travails that we all face as immigrants and community groups here in not only Long Beach but across this country, and have that history be part of our community. And so I look forward to the day when I'm able to join you. When you had a groundbreaking when you had a ribbon cutting for that memorial. Because I will be not only celebrating with you, but I will also be sharing your memories with you, because it's something that we all share together. And we are all of one community. We are all one long beach. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 6: Thank you. I want to thank Councilman Andrews. He is a true champion for the Cambodian community. And ever since I have known him and I've had the opportunity to serve with him. He's always advocating for the needs of that community and fighting hard to make sure that the history, legacy and opportunities for the Cambodian community are at the forefront of our policymaking. And I just want to thank him for that. And, of course, I support this this motion wholeheartedly.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember. Super or not.
Speaker 9: Thank you. I'd like to thank all the speakers here tonight and also thanks to Councilman Andrews. For this motion. And this memorial will be in the 1500 block of Anaheim. And the fourth Council district that I represent starts at the 1900 block of Anaheim. So a large portion of Cambodian communities is in the fourth Council District, and it will certainly be shared by my constituents.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 10: Yes. I'd just like to thank everyone for coming down. And as we say, Leah Ackerman.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 0: All right. Now I'll just add, you know, congratulations to Councilman Andrews and his staff and working really hard. Congratulations to the elders and the community for for staying in front of the city council, making sure that we're aware of your culture, your community, and the needs of how we can serve it. And I just want to say, you know, I completely support memorials when I travel to different cities. Personally, I like to go see the landmarks, the memorials. It really says something about the richness of that community. And I make it a point to go into those things. So I will be there in 18 months when the project is finished. I think this is going to be something amazing and we're all going to be able to go look at this. In addition to all our other memorials like the Vietnam veteran, the Lonesome Saint, Lone Sailor Memorial, and all the others will be able to go and see that. So congratulations to all of you members. Please cast your vote.
Speaker 1: Motion carries a zero. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to approve the use of the Sixth Council District's one-time infrastructure funds transferred from the Capital Projects Fund (CP) in the Public Works Department (PW) into the Legislative Department (LD) operating budget in the amount of $150,000 to support a partnership being entered into with Killing Fields Memorial Center, Inc., in order to develop the Killing Fields Memorial located at 1501 East Anaheim Street; and
Increase appropriation in the General Fund (GF) in the Legislative Department (LD) by $150,000. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03212017_17-0209 | Speaker 0: Thank you. Let's have item number 2025. Thought we took 24. Well 25 lots have. I'm number 25, please.
Speaker 1: Report from Parks, Recreation and Marine. Recommendation to authorize the City Manager to create and implement a partnership to enhance parks, programs and services program for the Parks and Recreation and Marine Departments Citywide.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. West.
Speaker 2: We have a quick report from our Parks Recreation. Marine Director. Marine Knight, supported by Assistant Director Steven Scott.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Vice Mayor. Members of the council. This evening we're bringing to you a proposed program to enhance partnerships in our parks, programs and services. In 1996, there was a city wide policy on sponsorships developed for city wide agreements. In 2012, that policy was updated to allow for more competitive proposals, donations, programs and service sponsorships. In 2016, the Council requested the development of a new program to include public private partnerships benefiting programs, facilities and services. The program that we are bringing to you tonight was researched and informed by best practices and modeled after successful programs throughout the nation, including the cities of San Francisco, Minneapolis, Seattle, Kansas City, Sacramento and New York. The program that we're bringing to you tonight has a few things that we've done. We've taken all of our city wide policies on sponsorships, and we've put them into one program and one policy. It also includes our public or prime fee waiver policy, our right of entry permits and existing agreements for uses of facilities and provisions of services and programs. Currently, we have over 100 existing partnerships and they range from anything to some of our garden clubs, groups and organizations that support animal care services organizations and nonprofits that is existing currently use our city facilities and some of our businesses in town that support our programs and services. The staff looked at our current needs where we would enhance programs and services or need to fill some gaps or expand our programs and services. And those needs fall into three categories of needs for our parks and facilities, needs for additional and expanded programing, and needs for additional new and expanded services. So I proposed new program partnerships to enhance parks, programs and services incorporate incorporates our existing policies. It includes current partnerships and allows for expanded partner opportunities and provides a more consistent framework. It is intended not to supplant existing programs or services, but to either enhance services and programs or bring new services and programs or revenues. Fill gaps or bring more programs than we are able to do with our existing resources. This new policy includes several partnership opportunities, includes donations, sponsorships and programmers, service delivery partnerships, revenue sharing, volunteer support, park or beach maintenance and stewardship facility amenity naming opportunities through sponsorship, user fee waivers and appropriate commercial concessions. There are several guiding principles that any new partnership under this policy should bring. There should be new revenues, resources, ideas, technologies, programs, or services that meet a community need. Partnerships should have a positive social, financial, cultural, environmental impact. The partnership should protect and enhance the city brand and image, meaning the organizations and businesses that we partner with should be in good standing with the city and they should have a proven track record of success. They should also demonstrate the financial capacity to take on the partnership that they are endeavoring. The partnership should be self-sustaining and not needing additional resources from the city. It should be inclusive and free of participation barriers, not conflict with existing policies and practices, and follow all current laws. A process for a business or an organization would be to submit a letter of intent. It would go through our review process so that we can make sure it meets the guiding principles outlined in the policy. And if so, then it's moved on to the existing approval processes that we have in place. There are a few recent examples that we are working on that would meet this new policy. The first is a dog play yard ax has identified that one of the things that will help us socialization and adoption of our dogs and the health of the animals that we have at the shelter would be to have an expanded playard. But as you know, we are very constrained with our footprint at the current facility. So we are looking at moving into part of our corporation yard for our maintenance facility and expanding that into a dog playard. Resources are needed to do that and the friends of the Long Beach Animals has come forward willing to fund the construction of that playard. We have another great partnership right now with an organization called Heart of IDA. Part of it provides a lot of free senior services, mobility classes and information for our seniors. And they came to us a little while ago and needed some extra space to operate. So in exchange for some space at the Fourth Street Senior Center, they are providing free services to our seniors and our older adults in our community. And finally, we're working with our Conservation Corp partners on a partnership that would help us move forward community enhancement projects. We often have members of the community coming to us wanting to do enhancement projects in our parks. However, we don't have the current resources to sit down with those organizations, plot out their plans and programs and move those forward. So the Conservation Corps is going to be our subcontractor, so to speak, in this endeavor, and they will work with the community organizations and move that forward. That will also give them the opportunity, as is one of their core service models, is to provide job training as they do that. So the next steps would be approval of the policy this evening. And we will market this new policy and program once it's approved, and we will be seeking letters of intent from interested parties. And that concludes my report, and I'm available for questions.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And we'll go to counseling in the Mongo.
Speaker 4: Thank you. I want to thank Parks Recreation Marine, along with the city manager for their work on this. I know that when we started getting questions from different community groups about the deals that had been made or not been made and the the terms of who between the City Council and the Parks and Rec Commission had jurisdiction over different kinds of partnerships, the types of partnerships that were available. People would ask questions like, Why does this business have a poster on a fence in the baseball diamond? But the soccer fields don't have the same kinds of opportunities. And I think that putting everything in one place where we can all start to know and understand the rules by which things are made would be a huge help to all of our nonprofit groups. I think that there are a ton of people out there with great intentions who are out in the community wanting to better the city and to donate that money and or time to the city. But it has to be done in a meaningful way and an efficient way because you and your time is also very limited and you have a lot of acreage to cover. And every park is a priority and every program is a priority. And so putting it all together in one place is an amazing opportunity. I received some emails. Specifically asking, can volunteers clean up the park? Can the start of the other happen? And I think that through discussions with you about your projects and timelines that you have in mind with working with the Conservation Corps and other things, our parks will be cleaner. Our youth will be better trained. The partnership programs available will be.
Speaker 8: More.
Speaker 4: And we'll be able to fill those gaps areas at some of our parks that have really struggled. I know that Councilman Andrews and I spoke at length a year ago when this started and then most recently a few hours before this meeting about some of the partnerships that he's desired to have at MLK Park, but that they're the process by which a nonprofit comes to the table and fills out what to whom, by when and what is. That need was not really clearly defined. And so now I'm in the pocket. It has a sample sheet that the Parks and Rec Department has, so you can fill out your request. There will be a record and a file. And when I started in this office, there were lots of questions about what had and had not been approved because almost everything was required to come through the city council and no one really knew what had and had not been approved. And so for that, I really appreciate the work and diligence of this because I feel that it'll be a much more transparent process with open lines of communication that will benefit everyone. So I look forward to hearing the feedback and I hope that we get a lot of applications over the next 12 months to fill in those gaps in the areas that I know you've identified and taken a lot of time to identify. So thank you for your hard work.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And I'll speak to my second now. So this my thoughts here are, you know, there's certainly need to count on the private sector for certain things. You know, I can say it's not clear right now how to say raise money to support the building of a facility. We we just finished the the construction of the Michelle Obama Neighborhood Library. And concurrent with that was the endowment to help support library programing, you know, and maintenance of the building and things like that. And and we it was very clear we were able to work with the Library Foundation. We've raised over $1,000,000. We're really proud of that. At the same time, we have a convention center out in park as an example, and we don't know the process to go solicit private dollars. And this helps for us to streamline that process, to find private dollars should we need it in the expansion or the improvement of how in part there's been interest in, you know, doing things like, you know, using creating kiosks and things like that to make, you know, help those areas where the park transitions into a business corridor. And it wasn't even clear on how we engage in those discussions with the business improvement district or businesses who may want to have a footprint there. I think with respect to our monuments and memorials that are in our parks, we have to have a clear understanding on like facility and amenity naming processes because that could be a part of how we establish endowments and structures to pay for the ongoing maintenance of these facilities in the long term. And that should be clear. I do want to you know, I see the point that it says we are, you know, just the pivot for a minute, that we're filing all laws and and things like that. And I just want to go to staff with with a question when, you know, I do see program and service delivery here. I want to be crystal clear that we you know, whether this requires and have we followed any labor requirements in terms of meeting confer I mean, consult additional? Will this trigger any requirement for us to have any negotiation as it relates to services that currently are delivered by the rank and file or services that may be become delivered by the rank and file? So can you speak to that just for a moment?
Speaker 4: Absolutely. So on page three of attachment C, which is the actual policy under program and service delivery, about halfway into that paragraph, it says these programs or services should either be new to the community or something that enhances existing programs or services. Proposals will not be considered that seek to assume the delivery of an existing program or service whereby that action would create a violation of Proposition L.
Speaker 0: Great. I think it was important that we draw that part out, that what we're talking about is, you know, and what what we initially that's consistent with what we originally requested with this study. And I'm glad to see that that's the intent as we move forward. So I want to say, I'm look, you know, we are going to embrace this opportunity and look for new partnerships to improve our parks and our facilities. And I and I want to thank Councilwoman Mongo, all the council members who've been involved in this, and particularly Marie and her staff for really helping clarify this. This is really solid work. Thank you. So next is Councilman Austin.
Speaker 11: Thank you. And I think some of my questions were actually addressed. I briefed earlier with the director of memory for Parks and Recreation Marines and expressed some of my concerns regarding what's not written here. And that is and that would be the the unintended consequences. I want to be clear as well, and I'll be a little bit more clear that I am not interested in contracting out any existing work as a result of public private partnerships with the Parks and Recreation and Marine. I'm not interested in violating any existing collective bargaining agreements or prop properly in any way. And I would just hope that that we we move forward with this, that we don't. We don't get into those issues. We can. We seek to avoid them. Now, what has been also stated is that you said that existing services would not be impacted. But if we're creating new opportunities, it's not going to preclude our city employees from being involved in those.
Speaker 4: I don't think it would preclude our city employees from being involved in those. I think each partnership opportunity and we we have sort of a catchall category here for innovation because there are things that we probably haven't even contemplated yet that businesses or organizations could bring forward, that there may be an opportunity for the city to partner with someone in the provision of a service where maybe they underwrite our staff providing the service. So I think that there are those opportunities there. But I would clarify again and reassure you that, you know, as throughout here, we talk about new and enhanced programs and services and new and enhanced revenues. So the intention is not to take away from our employees or the services that they're provided, but really look to fill the gaps. And there are large gaps in our service provision here and the needs in the community. So this really will hopefully help us move forward and fill those gaps versus supplant what we're already doing.
Speaker 11: Okay. Well, I think that this is a policy that is going to work. I mean, obviously, I'm going to support the what's on the proposed to do tonight with with those that that clarification and when those provisions that I. I set forth. I think the language in here is pretty good. I just you know, there's a. Under the guiding principles. The the last bullet point states that partnerships must not conflict in any with any existing city policy practice initiative or procedure and partners would be required to follow all city, county and state and federal laws. I would just like to to add any existing labor agreements to to that if as a friendly amendment or to. To the guiding principles.
Speaker 4: We could add that under that section and we could also add it on page three at the end of program and service delivery. Just to reiterate that point, if that works for you as well.
Speaker 11: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Price.
Speaker 6: Thank you very much. I too want to thank staff for their work on this. I just wanted to ask a few questions about this. Is this going to be a pilot program?
Speaker 4: It's not intended to be a pilot program. It's intended to be a program that we once approved by the council will be able to immediately implement. There will be, I guess, a pilot piece of this as things come to us that, again, we haven't contemplated or done before. But we want we intend to be able to move forward immediately with some of the requests that we've received. We have a few things on hold, as well as seeking out what we feel are some of the service needs. So we'd like to move forward with it. There may be some things that come forward and we discuss at a staff level and bring that up through the council that maybe it's not something, a direction that we want to go in. Some of the what's contained in this policy already exists, as I mentioned. So we've pulled and cobbled together a few existing policies and then there's some new things in here that we're going to be trying. So I guess in that sense it's a pilot in that we're going to be trying something new. Our hope is that it moves forward. We may come back to some point in time down the road to tweak it a little bit or add to it. If we find that there are things that we didn't think about and we want to be able to add to this, that makes sense for the community and services. Okay.
Speaker 6: Are we going to have any sort of an outreach campaign to inform people of these partnerships or partnership opportunities?
Speaker 4: We'll do our standard marketing, so we'll use our social media sites and our website, and we'll reach out to some of our current nonprofit organizations or those that have reached out to us in the past. Some of our other user groups or people that we have had, some of the previous types of agreements that now we're going to fold into this. So we'll be doing a little bit of outreach on all ends.
Speaker 6: Okay. Now, is this I know that throughout.
Speaker 8: The report, though, the.
Speaker 6: Term park is referenced, but does that include medians, parkways and roundabouts?
Speaker 4: It would include anything that comes under the purview of Parks, Recreation and Marine.
Speaker 6: And I ask that because, as Ms.. Knight knows, and I'm very proud at some point we're going to do a presentation at council. One of our staff members is a member of this year's Leadership Long Beach team and one of her. Her idea of adopting a media and a kind of a a program that we could implement citywide for community groups that might be interested actually was one of the projects that was selected. And so it's Antonella Schaub who's here. So we're going to be working on a partnership and with leadership Long Beach to make that project a reality. And of course, that involves the media. So I wanted to make sure that this this this policy that we're contemplating would encompass those areas as well in regards to community groups. Can they, if they wanted to partner.
Speaker 4: Would.
Speaker 6: PRM be providing them a list of partners that they could connect with to do community service?
Speaker 4: I'm sorry. Can you say that again?
Speaker 8: Sure.
Speaker 6: As far as like community groups who may want to do an enhancement project would PRN be providing them with a list of community partners that they could work with?
Speaker 4: I guess I'm not quite sure what you're asking for as far as community partners. Would we be part? Would we be matching them with other groups that want to do projects that have come to us? Is that what you're asking or.
Speaker 6: Well, I guess I'm kind of going off of your PowerPoint presentation. And in terms of your partnership with Friends of Long Beach Animals. Your partnership with Heart of Ida.
Speaker 4: So some of our existing.
Speaker 6: Partnerships or existing or future partnerships. So how would a community group know about that, those partnerships?
Speaker 4: How would they know? Well, that's a great question. That could be something that we could add to our website. The existing partnerships that we have so folks could get an idea of what we're already doing. We would also not want to take away from if we have a very successful partnership right now with one of those organizations , have someone else come in and, you know, try and take over that partnership as well. I think there's plenty of needs to go around, so I'm not so concerned about that. But we could certainly list those on our website.
Speaker 6: Just just to give community groups a little bit of assistance. If they wanted to get involved in a particular enhancement project, like how would they go about, you know, what, what would be the partners that the city has already worked with, like Conservation Corps, which is the medium project that we're doing or other groups that they could work with.
Speaker 4: Right. So we have several that do enhancement and cleanup projects. For example, the Friends of Bixby Park. They do regular monthly cleanup projects in the park. They do some other programs and service projects for us. So we have neighborhood groups throughout the city. So when when we do get phone calls from people and they're interested in participating, we often do hook them up with the key members of those organizations so they can reach out to them.
Speaker 6: And that similar partner would be maybe the like the stewardship program that we have with Lenny, Arkansas. Yes, I know he works with community partners and organizations all the time.
Speaker 4: We have often sent people towards Lenny's way that he could use all the volunteers he can get.
Speaker 6: That's perfect. That's great. Would a community group be able to submit a one time intent to partner on a particular community project, or would it have to be like an ongoing thing?
Speaker 4: Yes, they can do a one time, for example, of a one time park enhancement or park cleanup or park project. Or it could be a partnership over the next five years. It could be that they submit it for a long term. Depending on if they are able to show that they have a proven track record of success for a long term agreement, we may start out with maybe a one year or shorter agreement that's renewable, depending on how they do after their first year. But absolutely, there's latitude to do short term one time or long term.
Speaker 6: Okay, that's great. Well, I think it's great that we are looking at opportunities like this because I know resources are limited in terms of financial resources, but in terms of volunteer resources and and a heart for the community and a willingness to do things in the community, we're certainly not limited in that area. So to the extent that we can kind of use that that desire to fuel some projects, that would be great. I do want to ask that because outreach and communication and encouraging these partnerships is so important. I want to encourage PRM to continue to work with community groups or interest groups who might be interested in getting the word out and providing information to community partners of how this could happen and how we could effectuate these policies at the, you know, at the very local level in neighborhoods and to kind of use use other agencies, as, you know, ambassadors to help us get the word out about these opportunities. I think that would be really great.
Speaker 4: Absolutely.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much. I also want to say just great job to Councilmember Mungo, who I know began this conversation. Anne Marie Knight, for your hard work on this, partnerships obviously is something that is really important to me and my district. And we have unique opportunities in our district like Arts Park, like Bixby Park, that really are going to require partnerships to help us create an above and beyond experience for folks. And so I just wanted to ask a couple of questions. One is, if an organization that's a listed in the sheet is fundraising for, you know, like the friends of Groups, if they're fundraising for a park, what is the process that they go through before they can spend those funds or fundraise in the first place? Is there an agreement where that fall into this category where they would have a form that they could work on? It would fall under this policy, and there has not been a consistent policy in the past. So that's one of the benefits of this, is that we would be able to have a, you know, a running total of who's doing what. It's been approved. So we know that their fundraising, we know what they're fundraising for. And if it is for something in the park, then we've approved that because we have we have a lot of great groups out there. They're very well-meaning groups. But we get calls all the time about someone being approached by someone who's fundraising for something that we're not even aware of. So this process will help us solidify that. Absolutely. Great. Thank you for that. And then I wanted to ask a question around the revenue sharing. I know it doesn't exactly say that every project would share X amounts. Can you talk about when we do revenue sharing, say with like an arts park, we are going to do a partnership with the Arts Council and the Dolby and hopefully have some concessions there . What would happen with the revenue sharing percentage that the city would get from that? So each contractor agreement is going to have to be negotiated separately because there's going to be there are so many opportunities that it could be such a broad spectrum of what they're raising money for, what they're charging for. It is a is it a concession versus is it fundraising? So each contract, as they propose to do some type of concession in the park, we would then look at and negotiate separately with each one about the revenue sharing that would come back. Some may be doing that concession or raising funds, and none of those funds would directly be related to that park. But we would be asking for some of that to come back to take care of maintenance and needs in the park that they're using to fundraise for or to sell their concessions in. If it's a straight concession agreement, then we would negotiate that as we have some of our other concession agreements, for example, down at Rainbow Harbor or in the Marina. So each one is going to be different. Great. Thank you so much for your time and effort on this. And I hope that we can really look at the form and make sure that as we move forward, if the form is getting to our needs, that there might be an opportunity to adjust it just to make sure that we're doing checks and balances with some of those agreements. So thank you. Absolutely.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Durango.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mayor. This is more like a general big picture type of thing. I guess what we're trying to do here, you're getting principles, new revenue sources, ideas, technologies, programs, services, positive social, financial culture, environmental impact, protect and enhance the city brand and image. And of course, somebody must have a proven track record of success. In your guiding principles, you have in there to protect and enhance the city brand and image. What is it?
Speaker 4: So that means that we would want to partner with we want to make sure that the individual businesses, organizations that we partner with have the same mission as the city, has the same service, excellence of service that we have as a city. And so that when we partner with them, they are at the same level we are as far as what our city brand is. So we just want to be protective of who we are because oftentimes when these groups are out in the community and doing what they're doing, the average citizen does not know that they are not part of the city. And everyone looks at that as a city program or a city project. So we want to make sure that the customer services at the level that that we would require as a city and our standards as well as the end product.
Speaker 3: In the other sense, it also is that, you know, many I have been approached by. Community groups wanting to. How about as my assistance in sponsoring an event that they want to put through in a in a community room or a corner of the park? And one of the considerations here that we always are confronted with is that they may not be a federal agency. Whatever I want to see free or nonprofit, and they ask for that kind of assistance in order to get whatever they want to put in there. They want to do it for a benefit, for some for a cause of, let's say. Asthma. I had asthma. But they don't have. If I want to see how we're going to handle that with the in terms of the application process, are we going to require that they be a nonprofit and eventually a nonprofit, or are we going to host them in one way or another? Well, we're going to waive the fees for them in order to be able to do the.
Speaker 4: So that's a great question. So this policy encompasses, as I mentioned earlier, several of our existing, one of which is our our fee waiver policy. So the Council has given our Parks and Recreation Commission the authority to entertain those types of requests and grant fee waiver approvals. So if someone wanted to use one of our city facilities or parks, they would have to go through that application process. And it is actually heard at the Parks and Recreation Commission. They are not required to be a501 C3. What they have to demonstrate, though, is how their activity that they want to have the fees waived for. How does it serve our community? How does it benefit the community? So we have several a month that come to the commission. So that's the current process that would be covered under this and it would still remain that way.
Speaker 3: What about insurance?
Speaker 4: For some types of activities, they may have to provide insurance, others they don't. So it really depends on the activity and what they're doing. But that process is included and covered under here. So they would go through that process, and that's been in existence for quite some time.
Speaker 3: Well, in principle, yeah, I agree with the effort here because I think that we've been remiss in a lot of opportunities to have major projects here that would be self-funded or funded in other ways that would help a brand in that way. And I think that this would be very helpful in getting more out, more participation from major sponsors to come in and hold events here. I see I see the potential for this. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 4: I want to appreciate the comments of my colleagues because a lot of what they spoke to was the original intent of this. And early on when I was elected, the transparency factor was the key concern for me because I was being told one thing by a community group, one thing by the attorney, one thing by a department head. And I really just didn't know what was the truth. So I would like to ask and I won't add it to the motion, but for you to find a way to work with data, L.B., that every application that you approve gets scanned and posted on the city website somewhere, because then we will all know who has been approved and perhaps if it's going to be rejected that it's a discussion on Here's why this is not a good time for us. We already have enough programing at that park. We already have what? And the other. But all approved city related organizations, whether they're using, let's say the Conservation Corps, is a legitimate partnership and they wear their t shirts and they're cleaning up the park. They are certified to be there versus someone who wants to just clean up the park on their own. That's fine to do, but we need to know who's verified and who's not verified. Would that be something that you can work towards? Absolutely. Thank you. I really appreciate that.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman Pier.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I just wanted to ask that Marie Knight, if you guys could, outreach to nonprofit partnership as a way to get the word out. That that would be helpful. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilman Price.
Speaker 6: Just to echo what Councilwoman Mongeau just said, I think it's a really good idea to have that information and make it easily accessible. And one of the things Miss Knight's been working on with Antonella Schaub from my office is what leadership Long Beach wanted to do with this project is come up with an actual like brochure or kind of educational piece of what people would have to do in order to be able to do a partnership like this, like with a Conservation Corps or another group, and so that they can help the city. Because, again, our resources are are somewhat limited in terms of staff resources. But that's another way to get a community leadership organization to educate the neighborhood organizations about what the what steps they need to go through if they wanted to do an improvement project. Because like Council member Mungo just said, we get requested requests all the time from community groups who want to do things. And just through this process I've learned that there are different steps that they have to go through. And Councilmember Yanga is absolutely right. I mean, we need to we need to know exactly what they have to do, make sure that we comply with everything, educate people, things like insurance of the legal issues. Those are all very important. So I think having, you know, some consistency in place and taking advantage of partners who want to work with us to get the word out and educate the community and make it easier for those partnerships to happen. I think we should be embracing those at every opportunity and encouraging that kind of partnership from our local interested organizations and allied partners. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And before we cast our vote, I just want to say that, oh, we have to get a couple of comments, so I'm gonna make a comment here. So, Parks people really care about their parks. I mean, parks are really important. I get it. And so I would say that it you know, these policies have been looked at in a long time. And we should not ignore the fact that this is probably a really heavy undertaking on behalf of staff. And so, you know, staff, thank you for taking this on. I hope that this is successful. I hope you continue to defend it like you did tonight. And and let's and let's see what comes out of this. Sometimes you have to take a risk and try something new to, you know, to shift an outcome. And so I'm hoping that that happens. Is there any public comment on this item tonight?
Speaker 5: Karen retired, and I'm a resident of the First District, and I also represent a number of community groups, and I also am a part time worker with partners of Parks. And I can assure you this is going to be a great opportunity for community groups and for partners of Parks, too. And as your question, Councilmember Turanga Partners of Parks does do fiscal sponsorships for organizations that don't have a5013501c3 and for all of the council members. And we do that for any organization that is going to be doing events in parks, we charge a 10% administrative fee, which is very, very low if you look at other organizations. And we also are able to provide insurance certificates at no cost to people that affiliate with us. So those are part of the services that Partners of Parks offers. And I think this will be a wonderful opportunity. Speaking for Gray Panthers, we have a great partnership with the senior center and with parks, been there a number of years. We loved the park scene being at the senior center. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: When I was not. Yes. My name is Priscilla Suarez. I'm the executive director of the Arts Council for Long Beach. And first of all, I really want to thank the Department of Parks, Recreation and Marine for updating and clarifying their parks sponsorship policies. Thank you so much. Community partnerships between local organizations and our city's parks help fill the gap in many ways for our resources and in some cases, activate underused space and bring residents together. As the Arts Council, I know the value of as head of the Arts Council, I know the value of community groups. And many times we get artists and creative organizations wanting to use the parks as a place to bring everyone together to do creative work. And so this would help greatly. A lot of those organizations are willing to create sustainable partnerships and bring together a shared vision. We are currently working as an Arts Council where Councilmember Janine Pearce, the downtown Long Beach Alliance, the East Village Association and local businesses to activate East Village Arts Park, which has been closed for three years. And so even in in in asking the question, there were other questions to me and I was like, I don't know. So thank you so much. Again, this is really, really opens up many avenues. So our collaboration with East Village Arts Park is the perfect example of how business and community groups can come together to activate public spaces. I look forward to being part of the process. As an arts council. We can educate our creative organizations. We can educate our artist. Our musicians are performers on how to go about this. So count on our support on that and we look forward to leveraging some more resources for our parks and our communities. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: My name is Mary Martinson I with friends of El Dorado Dog Park. And I'm the president of a nonprofit.
Speaker 7: 501c3 And we've been here since 2010 and I feel hardly support this. It's just been.
Speaker 5: Type of.
Speaker 4: Where you don't really know what's going to be approved. What is it? We've fundraised first. We were supposed to fundraise for the dog park.
Speaker 7: And an.
Speaker 8: Infrastructure. Gerry ships.
Speaker 4: Keep it the infrastructure.
Speaker 8: Through.
Speaker 7: And we were really happy about it and was a one time.
Speaker 4: Infrastructure.
Speaker 7: We've spent close to $8,000, which is not a lot. But the problem was we wanted to go after corporate.
Speaker 8: Sponsorship and we.
Speaker 7: Didn't have any guidelines.
Speaker 4: For it. And it would really.
Speaker 5: Help our.
Speaker 4: Group and our nonprofit to.
Speaker 8: Have some type of guidelines.
Speaker 4: To work through this. So we.
Speaker 7: Appreciate this. I thanks Stacy Mongo for bringing it forward. I thank the Parks and Recreation.
Speaker 5: And I am so.
Speaker 8: Happy that this is going to.
Speaker 4: Finally.
Speaker 8: Be something that we.
Speaker 7: Can look at and say.
Speaker 8: Yeah, this is going to work. This is really.
Speaker 4: What we.
Speaker 7: Need. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Larry. Good. I haven't had a chance to go over the details with this night. I did. With the predecessor and so forth. But a. A program, a paradigm that will be set, ready to go is will be centered around what used to be Marine Stadium three s, which was raised as a result of a criminal ruse. What's going to happen with that? And this will probably take place later this fall, before the end of this year. It will be rebuilt in the same footprint, no larger than the old footprint. And we'll get somebody like Schooner or later that will operate what will be open for breakfast and lunch only period. Half of a probably 80% of the seating will be portable chairs and tables that they will bring out in that location. It will do a land office business, and a percentage of the profits will go to offset the fees that are being charged for to the nonprofit. Cal State and Long Beach Junior Crew. A percentage of the profits from sooner or later will go there. We've already got a name for it. It's going to be called the brig and it will do an absolute fantastic business for breakfast and lunch. It will not it will not be open for dinner. But that's something we we're coming up with in three or four months that will come forward. I'll give you all the same, all the details. And you don't I haven't given you all the details of the background of that. I'll give you the same the information that James Comey has. And you'll see you'll understand the full history of that. Thanks.
Speaker 0: Thank you. So seeing no further public comment members, please cast your vote. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to authorize City Manager to create and implement a Partnerships to Enhance Parks, Programs and Services Program for the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03212017_17-0210 | Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Zero. Thank you. Item number 26, please.
Speaker 1: Report from Public Works recommendation to award a contract to all American asphalt for street improvements in an annual amount not to exceed 40 million citywide.
Speaker 0: I can't remember your anger. Okay. Staff report, please.
Speaker 2: Craig Becker, Public Works Director. Yes. Good evening, Vice Mayor, members of the City Council. What you have before you is one of our on call contracts. That's a request to allow us to spend up to $40 million to do street work. All American is our contractor that won the bid. They are a union contractor that we've worked with in town. They they've done some really good work addressing streets in numerous neighborhoods. And we're looking forward to working with them moving forward. This is primarily funded out of our street dollars and we don't have a $40 million budget this year. But with some of the recent passage of Measure M and if there is any federal infrastructure money, we wanted to ask for additional capacity should that come through? That concludes staff report and I'm available for questions.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Miranda.
Speaker 3: More of a comment than anything else. I want to thank American Asphalt for accommodating the mayor and myself and Councilmember Austin during the the breakthrough Street fixture fixing that we did out in the eighth District. They've done great work. They did a lot of great work in my district, in Santa Fe. So I'm very pleased to support this country. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Price.
Speaker 6: I have nothing to say.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Is there any public comment on this item saying no members, please cast your vote. | Contract | Recommendation to adopt Specifications No. R-7084 and award a contract to All American Asphalt, of Corona, CA, for street improvements, in an annual amount not to exceed $40,000,000, for a period of one year, with the option to renew for two additional one-year periods, at the discretion of the City Manager; and, authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to enter into a contract, including any necessary amendments. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03212017_17-0014 | Speaker 1: Motion passes six zero.
Speaker 0: Next, there's requests to continue item number 32. My understanding it does require a motion. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 11: So move.
Speaker 0: Okay. It's been seconded by councilman. I'm sorry.
Speaker 2: Do we continue to a date certain? April for April. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. Motion will continue to April 4th. Is any public comment on the motion? Seeing the members, please cast your vote.
Speaker 1: Motion carry six zero.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And that concludes our agenda. So now we move on to our second public comment. Please come forward. If you wish to comment on an agenda item, speakers have 3 minutes.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Please give us your name. You have 3 minutes to provide your comments. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to respectfully request City Council approval of the 2017 State Legislative Agenda as recommended by the State Legislation Committee. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03142017_17-0172 | Speaker 1: So, Madam Clerk, hearing number one.
Speaker 0: Here, item one is a report from Public Works recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, concludes a public hearing find that the area to be vacated is not needed for present or prospective public use and a resolution ordering the vacation of the alley west of Cedar Avenue between La Reyna Way and Seventh Street, District one.
Speaker 1: Staff, please.
Speaker 5: Yes. The presentation will be given by Sean Crombie, our Deputy Director of Public Works.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Honorable Mayor and Council. Item one on the agenda is a continuation in a process to vacate property located off of Marina and Cedar. Vacation of property has.
Speaker 7: It's a multiple step process and this this.
Speaker 6: Property, like any property going through vacation, has gone through through those steps. This property was found to be compliant with the general plan, the vacation. The Planning Commission heard and approve that item on December 1st, 2016.
Speaker 7: It also came before this.
Speaker 6: Council on February 7th with multiple actions.
Speaker 7: First to deal with California Environmental Quality Act and then to.
Speaker 1: Set a.
Speaker 6: Public hearing for tonight. One of the the boarding property owners requested that this item be continued until May 16th because they couldn't be here. And so it's our recommendation that we that we do that.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 3: Yes, I just on behalf of Councilwoman Lina Gonzalez and the residents would like to make the motion that we continue till May 16th, which is the earliest date that was available for this hearing.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. With that, there's any comment on the hearing. The postponement of the hearing. Please come forward. This is a public comment on the postponement of the hearing.
Speaker 4: I live in that area. I don't I've never heard of this before. I don't know what vacation means. Does that mean abandon it? To vacate it and between. Between Cedar and Laredo. I heard between Marina and Dana. That's on Cedar, that's on Main Street. And they did. Is that what it is?
Speaker 1: No. So just to explain that work and so we're not going to actually hear the item today. It's the motion is just to postpone it for another day, but just for your own, so that, you know, they're looking at possibly vacating an alley west of Cedar. No, not cedar itself, but an alley. And so that discussion about whether or not vacating it, which essentially means not using the alley, so it would go to another use and Mr. Crumby would use would be in this case.
Speaker 6: The property was previously used as an alley. And what this would do is.
Speaker 1: We find.
Speaker 6: That the the property is not needed for public benefit and a return it to the private property owners. So currently it's fenced off.
Speaker 7: And it's not being used for anything other than growing weeds and.
Speaker 1: Collecting trash.
Speaker 6: This would allow the property owners that are there to incorporate it into their properties and use it.
Speaker 1: So I think.
Speaker 4: That just completed last year in order to turn it into a recreation area and put park benches in it and and so at a very large cost.
Speaker 7: So this would this would.
Speaker 1: Border that property. That's not our property currently. It's fenced.
Speaker 7: Off. You cannot get access to it. But behind the.
Speaker 1: Fences.
Speaker 7: Weeds are growing and trash fills in there and.
Speaker 6: It's serves no purpose.
Speaker 4: Currently it's on Marina way.
Speaker 1: Yes. And so it will do it so, ma'am. So because today's and actually we're not doing the hearing.
Speaker 4: Oh, I understand.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I will.
Speaker 4: Because I own property, right?
Speaker 1: Absolutely. So we're going to do is we're going to have someone as soon as this hearing votes over is going to come chat with you from the first council district. And we're going to get you the information. And then when this comes back, we'll make sure that you're here for the hearing. Okay. Absolutely. And so there's a motion in a second to postpone the hearing at the request of the the person making the hearing request. Any other public comment on postponing the hearing? Seeing nonmembers, please cast your votes.
Speaker 0: Bush and Kerry's. | Resolution | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, find that the area to be vacated is not needed for present or prospective public use; and, adopt resolution ordering the vacation of the alley west of Cedar Avenue between La Reina Way and 7th Street. (District 1) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03142017_17-0177 | Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Goodhue. Now we're going to move on to the regular agenda. Item six, please.
Speaker 0: Item six is a communication from Councilwoman Pryce, Councilmember Peers, Council membership, and Councilman Andrew's recommendation to request the city attorney to prepare a draft ordinance allowing drivers with valid disabled driver plates and or park carts to park for free in city owned parking lots.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to thank my Cosigners for signing on to this item. This item came to our office as a direct result of some constituent observations. There appears to be an inconsistency with state law in the public right of way and the laws in terms of what handicapped parking spots or folks who park in those spots can be charged in city owned lots. This is an issue for us where the accommodation is afforded throughout the state and if there's a minor revenue loss in the city in order to make it more consistent for handicapped residents, then to me that seems like a very fair trade. The inconsistency results in confusion from residents, and they have a sense that the cities might be intentionally misleading them in order to perhaps get revenue money from writing tickets, which is absolutely not the case. This ordinance that we're requesting be drafted is meant to apply only to the lots that are already patrolled, not automated lots. This this request is in no way limiting the city's move towards automated lots. And we hope that there is a technology available in the future where automated lots will be able to take into account those with handicapped placards, perhaps at the entrance of the parking lot where a ticket is pulled. So I ask my colleagues to please support this item and allow for the city owned lots to have the same policies in place in regards to charging handicapped residents as public right of way spots on the streets. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 3: Yes. I just want to thank my colleague for bringing this item up. I also have heard this concern from folks at our senior center on Fourth Street and several other folks in our communities. I think it makes a lot of sense to try to align us where we can. And so looking forward to council support. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 5: Yes, thank you, Mayor. I want to thank our concentration for bringing this item forward, because this ordinance would be about making access easier and making all of our policies in the city owning pilot parking lot. You know, the same you know, someone is wrong with our policies. We need to fix them. You know, and thank you very much to our residents who brought these concerns to our attention. And thank you again, you know, Councilwoman Parks, for bringing this forward. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item? I see no public comment. Members Pisco and Castro votes.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Mongeau the motion carries.
Speaker 1: I'm going to skip the next item to serve councilman mangos here. So let me go to item eight. Okay. That's one. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Attorney to prepare a draft ordinance allowing drivers with valid disabled driver plates and/or placards to park for free in city-owned parking lots that are enforced in the same manner as parking meters in the public right-of-way consistent with CA Vehicle Code 22511.5, while all other operational policies and rules for these lots remains in place with no effect to privately owned lots. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03142017_17-0179 | Speaker 1: I'm going to skip the next item to serve councilman mangos here. So let me go to item eight. Okay. That's one.
Speaker 0: Item. It's a report from Economic and Property Development recommendation to execute all documents necessary. With the U.S. Department of Labor to receive up to 1 million in Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act funds to implement the Pathways to Justice Careers for youth programs citywide.
Speaker 1: It's a motion in a second. Vice Mayor Richardson, any comments?
Speaker 6: Just quickly, this is for the past program and it's one of the final grants come.
Speaker 7: Out of the Obama administration.
Speaker 1: We're really proud of this. Good work to all the partners. Thanks. Thank you. Stretch those dollars out. Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 3: Just congratulations on all the work you've done on path, so keep it up.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 5: Thank you, ma'am, because, you know, I like to say that this is a wonderful opportunity for, you know, the Long Beach youth. And I'm very grateful for the hard work staff that allowed the city to secure these funds. You know, I've always said that a job would stop a bullet. And this is a program like these that keeps our youth off the street, engage them in a learning opportunity. Thank you again for bringing this forward.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Any public comment? Seeing nonmembers, please cast your votes. Motion carries item nine and then we will go back to item seven. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents, and any needed subsequent amendments, with the U.S. Department of Labor to receive up to $1,000,000 in Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act funds to implement the Pathways to Justice Careers for Youth Program, for the period January 1, 2017 through December 31, 2019; and
Increase appropriations in the Community Development Grants Fund (SR 150) in the Economic and Property Development Department (EP) by $1,000,000, offset by grant revenue. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03142017_17-0178 | Speaker 1: Thank you. Item seven, please.
Speaker 0: Item seven is a communication from Councilwoman Mango. Councilwoman Price Council member Sabina and Councilman Austin. Recommendation to request the city attorney to direct the Department of Financial Management to report on how the city puts its financial policies into practice.
Speaker 2: Thank you. This started out as a joint item of my colleagues on the Budget Oversight Committee. I appreciate Council Member Supernova for learning about the item and signing on when we weren't quite at enough signatures because we wanted to make sure it is up to date. We wanted to have this discussion or availability of these items tonight since we did the budget overview. I appreciate the hard work that's been done. I think that the financial policies of the city are something that need to be looked at every now and again. We have done well in reaching and achieving some of our goals in terms of what we thought was accomplishable when it came to reserves, balancing certain funds, adding different types of reserves and percentages to other areas. And I think that as times change, we need to look at what our risks and liabilities are and how these policies protect us. So I really appreciate this item and I appreciate that we are all united on this, on the Budget Oversight Committee, and I hope our colleagues will support it.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Pryce.
Speaker 2: I want to thank my colleague, Councilwoman Mongo, for bringing this item forward. I think it's very ripe for us to start having these discussions now. Well, in advance of the budget cycle and in the discussions leading up to the budget vote. So I think, you know, we've been very mindful of the budget with every decision that we've made. And I'm hopeful that we can continue that path moving forward, especially as we are seeing some deficits in 2019 that hopefully we can mitigate through responsive policies and practices. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember Pier.
Speaker 3: Oh, yes. I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this item up. I had two questions. Whenever the whenever we bring this back, if we could include what the processes for developing our financial policies. Can you tell me when was the last time that we looked at adjusting our financial policies? Sorry.
Speaker 1: Mr. West.
Speaker 5: Lia Ericson.
Speaker 4: Councilwoman Pier or Councilmember Pierce. We actually adopted these policies, the set of policies that you have in contained in the budget book in 2013.
Speaker 3: And is that done every three years typically?
Speaker 4: So one of the one of the financial policies is to revisit them about every three years. So we are we are due to to look at these.
Speaker 3: Okay, great. And when we bring some of these back, if we could just have some of the conversation around the governing for equity piece, which I'll share some with with staff in our next meeting, but really looking at how are we prioritizing some of the the work that we have taken on over the last couple of years and how we're balancing that out with other priorities. So I just really want to thank my colleagues for bringing this item forward. Thanks.
Speaker 1: Excellent. We have a motion seconded public comment. CNN. Please cast your vote.
Speaker 0: Motion carries. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to direct the Department of Financial Management to report on how the City of Long Beach puts its financial policies into practice, review any such policies that may require updates or revisions, and advise on how the Fiscal Year 2018 Budget outlook may impact the City's long-term general financial plan. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03072017_17-0156 | Speaker 2: Okay. And now we're going to do we'll come back to 16 in just a minute. We are going to go ahead and do item number 24. Believe it is. Hold on 1/2. It is. Yep. Item 24.
Speaker 3: A report from the Police Department recommendation to execute all documents necessary to enter into a contract with L.A. Metro to provide law enforcement services in an amount not to exceed 30 million districts one, two, six, seven and eight.
Speaker 2: Okay. Think you're going to make some some comments and then I might turn this over to our our chief of police to also make some some comments. So I want to, first of all, obviously thank the Lombard City Council for their unanimous support of doing this contract with with L.A. Metro. That happened, I know, a few weeks ago. As we as we now know, L.A. Metro has contracted with the Long Beach Police Department to for the first time be able to patrol our own metro system. The blue line here in Long Beach beginning this summer. The Long Beach Police Department will be transitioning into full jurisdictional control of the Long Beach Blue Line and all eight stations, as well as the the route between each station across the entire city of Long Beach, from old from north Long Beach, all the way through until the downtown. I want to just note that this is an incredibly significant moment for the city of Long Beach. We are not only gaining a $30 million contract, which which is obviously exciting, but this will be 30 approximately 30 new police.
Speaker 0: FTE.
Speaker 2: Personnel added to the Long Beach Police Department. And it's not every day that this council will get to vote on adding 30 new police officers to the Long Beach Police Department. These 30 officers will make up what will be a Long Beach metro detail for the city of Long Beach. And there will they will be assigned to the the Metro Division. We know I certainly know as a councilman that there are a lot of challenges on the blue line. It is not a safe experience for for most folks that that choose to write it. There's both a problem of safety and a problem of perception of safety when it comes to the Long Beach blue line. And so I know that our Long Beach police officers, our chief, are going to do a fantastic job of not just patrolling the blue line, but the synergy that will be created, as are patrolling the areas up and down. The blue line is going to be something that is going to be pretty great to see. And so I want to I want to ask the chief to say a few words. And I also ask the chief to invite his team that helped work on this. This was a incredibly difficult effort. A lot of manpower went behind this on from the chief's team. This was not an easy to get to. To get to the vote and where it went. And so I want to congratulate our chief of police for his leadership on this issue. And I want him to also introduce his team who did a fantastic job. And so let's give our chief of police and his team a big round of applause for their work. And, Chief, congratulations. You've just expanded both your force and your area of patrol. So, Mr. Chief.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and members of the City Council. Any time something of at this level happens, it's so great. It is a team effort and it does start with all of you back there. There's so much work that was done to get us to where we're at today. And it's not every day that we can talk about adding approximately 30 officers to our police department. And for all of you who are sitting back there, you know how impactful it's been over the years in reducing our police department. But we're turning it around between Measure three and this blue line contract, if you guys approve it tonight, what an excellent opportunity for the city. And the city has been asking for this. There's many places I've gone our constituents, our community, our stakeholders, our business community. Everybody wanted the Long Beach Police Department to acquire this contract. And that's exactly what we did. So what I wanted to do is give credit where credit is due. And over my right shoulder is more of a law school. She is our financial our chief financial officer. And standing next to her is Brandon Walker. And both of them started this venture back in December. It was a very lengthy process going back and forth. There were a couple of times where, frankly, we were told the sheriff's department would retain this contract. As you're aware, that did not happen. So a lot of paperwork, a lot of planning, a lot of research. And throughout this process, I was contacted by several people who worked at Metro who continuously stated that the the request from the city of Long Beach was so much better than the one received from the city of Los Angeles and the sheriff's department. So I'm very proud of the paperwork that was done, the contract requests from Mara and Brandon. And then now we start transitioning into actually working if you guys approve this tonight. Now the operational part of this starts and standing over my left shoulder is Deputy Chief Mike Beckman, who runs our support bureau and Commander Joe Cook. And they'll be in charge of the daily operation of what I think is going to be one of the best well policed transit systems anywhere in the country. And they're responsible for it now. They've been working their tails off, putting plans together. So the team standing before me is what did it. Mara and Brandon will continue to work on it for the next five years and the 34 years that we have. Please remember that a couple of weeks ago, all of you voted on another measure re staffing proposal to upgrade our Academy staff. What you and in essence did is you assisted us in recharging our recruiting and hiring and training efforts. And that's how we're going to get there, where we hire the additional staff not only for the thefts we're talking about, but the other 17 for measure. So, yeah, good times. I think congratulations is in order for all of us. It was a excellent team effort and I'm really looking forward to this opportunity. Thank you very much for recognizing the people behind me. They truly worked their tails off and they will continue to do so. So thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Chief. And congratulations again to to the team. You guys did a fantastic job. I know that our our management team also were very active in this whole process. I wanted to also just think I wanted to thank I asked Sharon Weisman, who's behind me to come down. Sharon is my new transportation deputy metro, and she spent a lot of time working with all the other board members and staffs of all the other board members just to ensure that they have the information and to me, to ensure that we would end up with a unanimous vote, which is which is what we did. And it wasn't going to be, I will tell you that for sure. But I think once the writing was on the wall of where it was going, everyone else came on board. And so Sharon behind me. Sharon, I wanted to thank you, too. Thank you for your work on this. Give a round of applause.
Speaker 0: And, Mayor, if I may, you're right. The city manager's office was instrumental in this. And financial management working from a city perspective, just working out the numbers so that everything would go our way, was very instrumental in getting this done. So I didn't want to forget about them.
Speaker 2: Great. And let me go to let me go to the Long Beach City Council, Councilmember Pearce. Oh, I'm sorry. Count's embarrassing.
Speaker 7: Well, it's okay. I could have gone after Councilmember Pearce, but I wanted to just take this opportunity, Chief, to congratulate you and your department on this new responsibility. I think it's great for the city of Long Beach. I think it's more of a congratulations to the residents in the riders of the Blue Line. Yes. Because this this this agreement will make our blue line, I believe, much safer. I think one one key point that was raised that was pretty compelling is that how response times will be improved from having local police department patrolling and assigned to the blue line. Response times will be cut from 15 minutes to 5 to 6 minutes, and I think that is a a number that is very, very compelling and and one that we should all look forward to to see it. It will speak to a real change and a much safer experience on the blue line. I also want to remark on just our mayor and Mayor Garcia and his his work. Early work on the on the MTA board on this this agreement came about I think he was he had been on the board for maybe a month, a little over that. These conversations obviously were being had prior to his joining the board. But I think it speaks to having a seat at the table and the importance of having a seat at the table. And for those of you who know me, for a long time, I've been a strong advocate for a Long Beach, having a seat at the MTA board. And so I'm glad that we finally have a strong leader there to speak for Long Beach. And obviously he's yielding great results immediately. And I honestly think that there are still great announcements ahead of us and the best is still yet to come. Again, congratulations to everybody involved here. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman. Councilmember Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 8: Yes. Thank you, chief, and to all of you for being here and for your hard work. I know the next five years is going to be we're going to have a great start. It will be a lot of work. But I really do believe that having our own Long Beach Police Department, enforcing on the blue line and hopefully just being there, of course, as a positive element to the riders along the blue line, especially when they come into the Grand Prix and they're coming here for amazing events that they'll be able to see. Our own police department there is going to be fantastic and thanks for Mayor and Supervisor Horn as well. I know that they were integral in that this whole situation happening and this is a huge, huge win for downtown, a huge win for the city. So thanks again.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 6: Well, now I'll start everything that I needed to say. And I'm kidding. I do want to just congratulate you guys and congratulate the mayor and everybody that worked really hard on this. I know seeing something turn from a maybe to a big victory with a unanimous vote is really important. And I was honored to speak at Metro that day, and it was only a minute which maybe we need. No kidding. It was really hard to speak for only a minute, but the one thing that I think was really enlightening is that our response times are going to change. As Councilmember Austin mentioned, I think it's, what, 7 to 10 minutes difference, which can be really important for people riding the metro, riding our blue line. And as someone who's written that for many years, I know how important that is. I listened to the comments that were made at Metro that day, and I just want to say that I'm really proud to have our PD on our metro line. I think that the training that we're doing, the equity lens that we're talking about, the investment that you guys are making in the community to be able to have that throughout our entire city on our metro is really exciting. So I just wanted to make sure that I mentioned how proud I am of all the work that you guys are doing. I did have one question that I probably could've asked offline, but when tickets are given on the Metro, where where do those dollars go?
Speaker 0: They do go to the county. We in the past, when we've given very Bayesian tickets, it now is change where it's a civil action and it's all done within the county. But there is going to be a process that we're following where Metro wants to do a different job, or they want to approach fare evasion in a very different way. But I think one of the things that we're very attractive to them is we have an outstanding juvenile diversion program. So it does involve juveniles. We can enter them in a diversion program that we have here in the city with our private partners.
Speaker 6: You know, maybe we should look at free rides for youth. I don't know, Justin, but just thank you for the information, guys, and congratulations.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 8: Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. And a big congratulations and appreciation to our mayor. Like everyone has said for leading the effort on this, I think this is fantastic. And Chief, there is a few questions that we are getting from the community as we're out there. And I thought this probably would be a good time to ask you about it right now. One of the things that we've been telling the community is this is this is a great development for the blue line in our ability to enforce in those areas. But in addition to that, it's going to relieve pressure citywide for the police department. And that's something that we've heard. Can you speak to that a little bit?
Speaker 0: Yes. When we have more uniformed presence along our corridors, which would be primarily Long Beach Boulevard in Pacific, if you can picture at least a half a dozen more officers per shift in those areas. That improves the visibility, which in turn will have a positive impact, we believe, on crime and the quality of life. We're going to have to work up to those numbers, of course. But when we get there, when you're adding 30 new officers to our department, how can you go wrong? And that's what we're really looking forward to.
Speaker 8: Now, will these officers also be available to respond to citywide emergencies or things that may be called upon for their services and their assistance?
Speaker 0: Absolutely, yes. On both ways, when we need help anywhere in the city, they can respond. And when Metro needs help, we respond just like we currently do with any contract that our police department serves now.
Speaker 8: Well, that's fantastic. I think it's a win win for the whole city. So thank you. Congratulations to your department.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Mayor. I want to add my voice to the kudos that are being distributed here today, especially through the great staff work that was done today by not only your command staff, but also by your civilian staff as well. And I think that the AKUTAGAWA in this whole thing was getting the mayor on the MTA board. And I will congratulate you, Mayor, on your efforts on making sure that this happened. Good job.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 0: Yes, thank you, Mayor. Also, I want to congratulate everyone you know who has been able to make this contract happen. But most of all, I want to thank the mayor for you and your hard work and efforts on the board, you know, being a board member. And thank you, too, for the Long Beach Police Department, you know, able to embark on this process. You know, public safety, the metro line is important, I think, to all of us and the residents who rely on public transportation, and they deserve to feel very safe and free. And I know you individual will be the one that makes that possible. So I'm glad that the city is able to provide this type of service to our residents and everyone is playing on right on, you know, our metro. So thank you guys again and keep up the good work. You haven't started yet, but I'd tell you to keep up the good work because you have to start somewhere.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Orson.
Speaker 7: Yes, I did have a quick question for the chief, more of an operational type of question. I rode the blue line just the day before yesterday, a couple of days ago downtown, and there were several announcements being made. I was reading some of the signage in the blue line. Some of the signage said, it's okay if there's a problem, contact the sheriff's department at this number. Will there be a pass through for those that information for for Long Beach PD on the metro train? Will people have to contact the sheriff's department to get to Long Beach PD or will there be something specific for for us, for for our city? Or have we worked those details out yet?
Speaker 0: Yeah. We're still in the process of working all that out. That's part of the next several months where the L.A. County Sheriff's Department is demobilizing what they're doing. Then figure out exactly how our system's going to integrate with them. But I anticipate that whatever model we come up with is going to be a whole lot better than what they had.
Speaker 7: Well, it's important to note that that currently to boot that line runs through several jurisdictions. And so. Correct. That's one of those issues that need to be worked out. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just want to chime in and say congratulations to everybody. This is. We shouldn't sort of we should be reminded of how difficult this actually was. A number of people in the county did not think this was going to happen. And, you know, I had conversations as early as recent as last week with, you know, different folks on supervisors that they didn't believe this was going to happen. And, you know, having this this seat on the MTA board had a real a real shift in the attitude about this this proposal. And then I would say, you know, the blue line, you know, cuts west and north. Long Beach doesn't connect the blue line. But we border Compton, Bellflower, Lakewood, Paramount. We we travel east, west plenty off pretty often. And we pick up a lot of times we pick up at the Compton station. And so our colleagues in Compton, they're actually really excited about this. And I think it really says something for North Lambie's residents. When they do hop over to a different city, they're going to be greeted by a friendly face. They're going to see that Long Beach PD is, you know, from that Compton station, you'll sort of have some kind of seamless connection there to make it a little bit less forum for our local riders. So congratulations to everyone. Welcome and keep up the good work.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Great. Thank you. And I think, you know, Mr. West, I'm trying to remember, but the last time that we added 30 cops, it's got to be not even with. It's got to be 20 years more. I don't know. I mean, it's been a long time. It's been a long time. So. Okay. Congratulations, Chief. And to the longest PD. Any public comment on this item? Of course, Mr.. Good to you. Come on down.
Speaker 0: Very good. Clark has the address. As I said last week, there's probably 3 to 4 people, none of which are in this room that has more experience with the blue line in mass transit. This is an absolute disaster, period. This will take the police. And you laugh, sir. But you don't understand the death rate now. In the city. Is equal to that, the shooting rate of the city of Chicago. The Long Beach Police can't do that. Period near the council. The public has been used to seeing disingenuous members of this council go in different directions. To back programs that make little sense. But wasn't. What was surprising last week is the number of people that are there are not elected officials. Our representatives as a city that disgraced themselves. By the hue and cry. All our visitors coming to Long Beach need that are the restaurant patrons the Grand Prix people. The mantra for the and the understanding that's come out of the visitor and convention bureau is that what everybody knows is is the truth. The delivery comes to Long Beach. To fill our coffers, we need filled in terms of entertainment, in terms of restaurants and hotels that ride the blue line. The only mass transit use is the Grand Prix when it is so packed. That there's no criminal activity because there's not enough room for it. And they know that. Period. What you're doing is taking the officers away that would be otherwise patrolling and keeping a lid on the shootings and killings. In your own neighborhood. Nobody comes to a downtown restaurant. A five star hotel riding on the blue line. When I say nobody. Probably less than one half of 1%. Period. This is a money grab. You haven't even and so long as this line has been over the able to negotiate a deal with Caltrans to green light trains period that's very simple to do. You could reduce the travel time by some 22 minutes if they didn't have to stop at every red light. But you sat with your head up your rear ends for 20 some years, as long as the blue eye has been there. Watch and compare the death rates. And when your neighbors ask why the police aren't there, well, tell them they're on the blue line. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr. Good here. Again, I want to thank you for making the personal trek down to Mexico to speak out against the city, hiring 30 more police officers like you did a week ago as well. And again, this is 30 new police officers on top of the budget officers we have currently that we didn't have before . So thank you for coming down to meet you. I appreciate that. Next Speaker Yes, sir.
Speaker 4: Hello, Mr. Mayor. City Council members. I think this is a great opportunity. I think it's a great opportunity to integrate the police department, have them follow the traffic that comes in and out of the blue line and have more control over the city. So I think this is a great thing and I'm really happy to hear it. That's it.
Speaker 2: Great. Thank you. See no other public comment. Well, go ahead. One more condenser.
Speaker 0: Good evening.
Speaker 7: My name is Joe Collins. I was here on a completely different issue. I think it's a great idea. I don't know if they're going to take the the blue line to a hotel, a five star restaurant. But I do know from.
Speaker 0: Experience that with law enforcement officers around that area, they will make contact with citizens. They will have a better handle on gang members. They will see them.
Speaker 7: Coming and going.
Speaker 0: And this particular apparatus is kind of like an artery.
Speaker 7: Which brings people in that maybe you don't.
Speaker 0: Want in you need to keep an eye on. So I think it's great that you have 30 extra officers.
Speaker 7: That you can bring into the department.
Speaker 0: And train them up and move them on.
Speaker 7: And I think at the end of the day, it was the right decision.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. With that members, please. Gordon Castro votes.
Speaker 3: Councilwoman Mongo. Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. And congratulations to Long Beach Police Department. And now we're moving on to item 18. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to enter into Contract No. PS5862300LBPD24750 and any amendments thereto, with the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, to provide Law Enforcement Services, in an amount not to exceed $30,074,628, for a period of five years; and
Increase appropriations in the General Fund (GF) in the Police Department (PD) by $5,459,271, offset by contract revenue.
(Districts 1,2,6,7,8) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03072017_17-0132 | Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. And congratulations to Long Beach Police Department. And now we're moving on to item 18.
Speaker 3: Communication from Councilman Austin, Chair of the Personnel and Civil Service Committee recommendation received Charter Commission Appointments approved by the Personnel and Civil Service Committee.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Austin.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I guess about a week ago, the two weeks ago, our personnel, the Civil Service Committee, met and approved and made recommendations to approve a couple of new appointments to a charter commission. The charter commission being the Citizen Police Complaint Commission. Two excellent candidates were nominated by the mayor's office and unanimously approved by the committee. And so with that said, Ryan Howard, a new appointment was. Was a and I'll give her a little bit of background on her. She was born and raised in Long Beach, has participated in various civic engagement projects, including work for food finders, volunteering with Hemet, Habitat for Humanity, to build benches for parks and developing community gardens that are as a part in. During her time at Woodrow Wilson High School, Ryan remained active as a vice president of the Female Leadership Academy, a member of the Young Black Scholars Program and a competitive swimmer. And she's currently a student at Cal State University of Long Beach. And we recommend her appointment without reservation. And also Leonard Adams Jr is also being brought forward for appointment to the Citizen Police Police Complaint Commission. I've known Leonard for for many years. He's worked for the city of Long Beach for over 40 years. I recently retired. He likes to stay civically engaged by serving as a commissioner for his community. He's been dedicated to understanding how police work the Long Beach Police Department operates and how he can bring the community together. In his last position with the city as a homeless veterans outreach worker, Leonard assisted police in their efforts to find and provide services for homeless clients. And I can just say that just underscores a small part of his activity in the community. Somebody who is very well respected, has great stature, and I think he's an excellent candidate for this role. And so with that members, I would recommend your support on this matter.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilmember. I can summary Ranga.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Mayor. I too want to lend my voice in regards to the two appointees. Excellent choices. I personally had interaction with Mr. Adams when he worked with the Health Department, the homeless and the homeless bureau. And I know that he will bring a fresh and different perspective, especially when we deal talking about dealing with the homeless , because he worked with them quite a bit in his in this job, whether it's an outreach worker. So I want to welcome you and thank you for your continuing to be engaged with the city of Long Beach.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilman Andrus?
Speaker 0: Yes, ma'am. I want to thank and congratulate every commission and begin this journey today, because as a city, we need a commission is made up of these residents to really remind us what proprietors our propriety are and the need that we have to have in the city of Long Beach. Know, I want to thank you for your services, both of you individuals. But I am very, very honored to see Mr. Leonard Adam begin appointed today. And this is why I create a special certificate for him today, because he is a loyal and hardworking city employee, and now his service in the city will continue because Leonard is one of those individuals. Whenever you call, I don't care where he is, he's there. And I want to thank you again, Mr. Adams, for being such a large part, especially for our homeless situation and the things that you do. So continue to do this work and we'll continue to always have you, you know, as one of our workers, too. Thank you again. And if you'd like if it's okay with the mayor, would you like to say a few words? Because that was a difficult one.
Speaker 2: Let me finish. Go through the council members and with Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to congratulate both Leonard and Rianne, and I want to just say a few things about Ryan. So I've actually known her family. She's a very bright young lady. And I remember her in literally high school. And many folks may not know this, but she's been sort of preparing for this for a long time. Her mother, Crystal Howard Johnson, was was one of our first people we've nominated to the Citizen Police Complaint Commission. So she got to follow and learn under her mother. And now Ryan is stepping up, representing the ninth District and really excited about that. And so she she sort of knows the process. She knows a Nedra. She came in, she was very mature. And that says a lot given she's she's and according to Nedra, going to be the youngest person to have ever served on this commission . So this is a this is a really big deal. And she's studying criminal justice. So we're really excited about that. So you obviously have my support and we're going to expect big things out of you. So congratulations and welcome.
Speaker 2: And if I can, please have both Rianne and Leonard just stand so we can just give them a round of applause. Let's give them a round of applause and graduations. And if you guys can just come on up. Both of you just come forward. We're going to do our our photo. We always do with the council. And you, commissioner. So.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 0: Yeah.
Speaker 8: I know what you want. All us.
Speaker 0: You want to. Okay, ladies.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor. Councilmembers and the community. I just want to say I'm truly grateful for this opportunity, and I look forward to serving the city of Long Beach. Thank you.
Speaker 9: Good afternoon to our council members.
Speaker 0: Honorable mayor, police department and also city managers as well as the citizens of Long Beach here. Along with my family here, I am deeply thankful and honored to be here tonight to accept this position as a citizen. Police Complaint Commissioner. I have worked in this city for about 40 years and I probably know half of the half of the council people here and some of the council people that I don't know. I have worked in your district. I probably have hit the floor every morning around 4:00 in the morning, chasing down homeless people. So with that being said, thank you so much, sir.
Speaker 8: Congratulations.
Speaker 0: I'll get back to.
Speaker 8: You.
Speaker 0: In. You know, it's just like, oh, you come here. Rex, thank you so much.
Speaker 8: You wear them very well.
Speaker 2: Okay. We're going back to the consent calendar item that was pulled, which was item number 16 from earlier today. So, Madam Clerk, item 16.
Speaker 3: I believe you still need to take a vote on this item.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Yes. We just did some public comment, right? No other public comment on this item saying nonmembers, please cast your votes.
Speaker 3: Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Congratulations to them as well. And on 16. | Appointment | Recommendation to receive Charter Commission appointments approved by the Personnel and Civil Service Committee pursuant to Section 509 of the City Charter and Section 2.03.065 of the Long Beach Municipal Code. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03072017_17-0155 | Speaker 2: Thank you. Congratulations to them as well. And on 16.
Speaker 3: Report from Public Works Recommendation to authorize city manager to execute an amendment to the contract with Central Parking System to provide parking operations and management services to increase the contract amount by 450,000 citywide.
Speaker 2: Councilman Gonzales.
Speaker 8: Yes. Thank you. Craig, can you provide a staff report, please?
Speaker 0: Certainly Councilmember Gonzalez, the mayor and other council members. This item is before you tonight requesting to increase the contract authority with Central Park, which is now ESP plus central parking, provides oversight of all the city parking operations, including the downtown city place garage. And in particular, we are needing this contract increase to be able to cover cost associated with increased security in our downtown garage and some of the infrastructure improvements that we've done. I want to share with everyone that we are in the process of updating our parking RFP and that should be on the street by the end of the month. So we will be refreshing some of our requirements within our parking operations and we will be looking to have that new contract in place within the next few months. That concludes my staff report.
Speaker 8: Okay. Thank you. I have a couple questions. So I know that we had met and we went over a list of various items that would be improving the city place garages specifically. And so from that, I remember.
Speaker 6: We had also talked about.
Speaker 8: Smart meter money that was to be used for improvements. And then I know measure a money will also be used for improvements at City Place. So I guess my question is why we would need an extension of the 400 or an additional $450,000.
Speaker 0: So I think those are two different items. This is the operating side of the garage. So ESP plus again not only operates city place garage but our beach lots in any location where we collect fees for for parking and where we have attendants that are working in those lots. So this is, again, primarily needed to cover increased security cost for the garage. If you recall, at some time ago, the city extended an opportunity for Molina Medical to park in the garage. And with those additional parkers, there was a requirement to increase the level of security within those garages that that at the time, we did not come to council and ask for a contract increase. So this increases essentially to cover those increased costs. So the operational portion of the parking lots and garages is going to go out in a new RFP. The physical improvements to the garages are being accommodated under a different contract. So that would be a construction contract and a design contract, not necessarily under ESP. Plus they do do small maintenance issues. So if we needed to add a security camera, for example, in a garage, we would usually rely on our parking operator to do that for us. But if we are talking about some of the things that you and I reviewed in City Place Garage, those are going to be handled under a different contract.
Speaker 8: Okay. So then, just so I am clear, and when is this contract is this contract up with the current with ESP plus? Is it up any time soon or. I know.
Speaker 0: Yes. So we're currently on an extension that I believe takes us through I want to say February, but we don't believe that we'll need that entire term of the current operation timeframe because we think we'll have a new vendor in front of council. Or it could be SB plus, but that will have a new contract in place ready to go for council approval by June.
Speaker 8: Okay, great. And so with all that, I would like to ask if we could if I'd like to just make a substitute motion, if I could, to be able to get an itemized list of these improvements first prior to approving this tonight, because I think I need to get a little bit more clear on what we're doing and also to provide that to our public, because I don't think I've been verbalizing that to a lot of our downtown residents and business owners, but I just don't think that they realize what is actually happening at the city place garages. So all of the security measures you're talking about, the improvements to solar lighting, I mean, all of this. In addition, I'd like to know the. The space is available because I know there has been some confusion as to the private spaces available and the public spaces available. And I think we need to clear that up first before making a decision on this contract or extending. This. So that is my motion.
Speaker 2: Okay. So there was a substitute. Mr.. City attorney.
Speaker 0: Is the motion to lay it over until next.
Speaker 4: Week, or do you have a date that you would like to continue it to?
Speaker 8: Let's lay it over for the next 30 days. So if we can. April, I don't know when that would be. Let me take a look.
Speaker 4: And I think the issue with laying it over into April may be they may run out of contract authority for the for the existing contract. So, Councilman, we just we'd like to bring that back as soon as we can answer those questions, because we are nearing the time where we would need some additional decisions to be able to move forward. So we'll bring it back as soon as we can, whether it's 30 days or less. If that could be the direction, we'll get it back to you as soon as we can.
Speaker 8: Okay. That would be great. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Okay. There's a motion and a second. Councilman Andrews. Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 6: Now I just want to thank the council member for bringing this to my attention. And I think, yeah, if we could just get a list of what those improvements are so we understand where we're at and what we need to do moving forward. I think it's a great motion. Thank you.
Speaker 2: There is a motion and a secondary public comment.
Speaker 0: Like to suggest you add to it at something which would not require reconvening the Council of Trent, and it's presented itself a number of times. I don't know if the Council's aware of this, but when there are other meetings taking place in the evenings here, a number of times people lose their tickets. So what needs to be done? And these are members of the public and sometimes even a commissioner. They lose their ticket. The gates are locked. That is. The arm is down. So there should be some arrangement by which. Whoever locks up the building for the night, has the ability to raise that bar, allow the people to get out in the car without having to hand over the cold, hard and ready to wear. And I don't think you need to wait for this contract to do that. Just figure out a common sense way to do that. Imagine yourself locked in here. You lost your key. How would you get out?
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. See no other public comment on this item. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 3: Councilman Andrew. Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Okay. Just so you know, our next two items are are item 20 and item 19. We've both been requested to get moved up, so I'm going to try to get in there. We have folks here for both. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute an amendment to Contract No. 32983 with Central Parking System, Inc., of Los Angeles, CA, for providing parking operations and management services, to increase the contract amount by $450,000, for the period ending March 31, 2017. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03072017_17-0158 | Speaker 3: Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. Graduations, everyone, and thank you to all of our library friends out there for their support. Give them a round of applause for their work. Okay. We're going on now to Madam Clerk. Adam 19, please.
Speaker 3: Communication from Councilwoman Price, Council member, Super Council Member, Your UNGA recommendation to request the city manager to work with City Attorney to report back regarding the feasibility to limiting median access near major intersections to improve safety for pedestrians and drivers.
Speaker 2: Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 8: Thank you. I want to make sure that I hear from the audience and all the people that came out tonight. I know this is a really big issue with some of our busiest intersections, PCH and second, as well as seventh and Bellflower at the Iron Triangle. And so I'm going to be very brief in my opening comments. I want to thank everyone for coming out. I also want to make sure that everybody knows and understands that this is really a it's a public safety item. It's it's designed to address the concerns that we've seen at these particular traffic intersections and many other traffic intersections. I have here a list of the traffic intersections in the city where we've had the most collisions. And I think avoiding distracted drivers, minimizing the chaos and the noise around those intersections is a very important thing for us as a community to focus on. And so I think it's it's important to to note that we've done things like road diets, put in bike lanes, traffic calming, and many other measures to improve pedestrian and traffic safety. And now median safety is one of the major concerns that we're facing at our intersections. This item is really asking for the city attorney to come back with some options for us in terms of how we can limit access to certain medians, not every median. In fact, there are some medians in the city that have access points for the public, but there are medians that we all know are not safe for people to be standing on or the one that one of you in here sent me a photo of today with a man and his keyboard. I've seen a man and his drums. I've seen pets. And those are definitely intersections that are way too crowded. And we want to make sure that we improve traffic safety to the best of our ability. So what the item is intended to do is to apply a common sense measure that takes people on foot out of harm's way and reduces driver distractions by making intersections unsafe. And with that, I'd love to listen to my colleagues and the people that are here, and then we'll all give some final comments. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. We're going to go to Councilman Andrews. Councilman during question first going to the public that we were requesting?
Speaker 8: I think so, yes. There's no leaks unless anyone has.
Speaker 2: If there's any objection, we'll go to the public comment first. Okay. If you have a public comment item, please come forward and line up on the on the microphone and just make sure you. So just please come forward and line up if you have a public comment.
Speaker 0: Please.
Speaker 4: Mr. Mayor and city council members. My name is Gary Morrison. I live at 385 Clinton Alameda Heights. I happened to be the president of the Interstate Improvement Association, and I probably only get to see this once. But Councilwoman Price is part of my constituents. So thank you, Councilwoman. You know, we can't drive in Texas text. We can't drive without talking our cell phones in less. We're hands free people on them on the medians are distractions. I mean, the picture of the guy in the keyboard on the median, I think it was Bellflower in Seventh Street was pretty funny. But it's pretty much a distraction and. It puts drivers at at risk. It puts pedestrians at risk. We've got a lot of rules and regulations in our society to make things safer. We've we've got OSHA. We've got, you know, just think of everything that you can think of. There's always a rule or regulation to make it safer for us to function as human beings. I support item 19, the median access at major intersections, a proposal that the councilwoman is presenting. And I would like your consideration to make our medians safer, to make our lives safer, and to make our environment safer. And I'd like you to do it sooner rather than later. I think this is a one time opportunity for us to come and talk to you about this issue. It seems kind of strange that this would be an issue, but it really is. It's crazy to go out Saturday morning, Sunday, Monday and see all the different people hanging out on the medians one in our attention. So please give us your honest and clear consideration to make our streets safer and sooner rather than later. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Alex. Speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Hi.
Speaker 1: Mr. Mayor. Members. My name? Kristy Fisher. I totally understand and get why we have panhandlers who are out on our busy intersections on the medians, because it gives them a chance to try and interact with as many people as possible. But that said, we need to weigh that concern against traffic safety. Some of the medians in the iron triangle, which I live nearby and I drive through several times a day, are really narrow, super narrow. And they're standing on there sometimes one, sometimes two of them, and there's nothing there to protect them. The other day I was coming home and there was a fellow who was sitting on the median on PCH with near the in the Iron Triangle area and had his feet on PCH. Now, I mean, it's not that his feet were that big, but it was like, well, what is he going to do next? At one point I've seen a woman who was lying on the median. I caught her in my rearview mirror and thought, Oh my gosh, do I need to call 911? What's going on? And she rolled over and moved. But during that period of time, I was very distracted. I was very concerned for her. And I think the instances that concern me the most are when I see them there with their dogs and they're even though they're on a leash, I'm thinking, when is that dog going to bolt and when is that owner going to bolt after that dog right into the street. And I going to be the reckless driver that hits them. So please, if you can come back and I'm sure that there's a way to legally do this. I very much appreciate it. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 10: Lucy Johnson, resident of the fifth District. And I wanted to say I completely support this recommendation. I drive through PCH, at least daily, both directions, sometimes north and south, most of the time east and west. And also through this, the iron triangle. And I'm concerned about the dogs up there as well. But even more so, I've watched people in the medians who bend over to pick up stuff that's been tossed down into the street, whether it's coins or somebody trying to hand them a dollar bill or whatever before they drive off. And they're actually getting into the street as traffic is going through. I also called our police dispatch a few months ago as I was going westbound on Second Street and there was a young man in the median on that side. I stopped at a red light. He immediately starts going from the median across the street on the south side of second towards the gas station, right as the lighted turn, so that the people turning left from southbound PCH onto Eastbound Second Street, they just walked right through. And he was clearly in an altered state. And it was, you know, very scary to see what might happen with people making a big left turn in that area. So I think it's absolutely a safety issue. It does concern me when I go through those intersections and see people reaching down or not in a completely sober state that are weaving around as they stand there. So I urge you to approve this recommendation. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Next week or please. Thank you. Sorry.
Speaker 10: Sorry. I didn't get the nice little hand.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Hi. My name is Christine Barry. When you consider 100,000 cars going through in one day in an intersection and then you see two guys having a shoving match on the median. Not only is it a distraction for the driver, but what's going to happen when one of them lands in front of a car because they didn't notice traffic had begun to move and somebody gets killed. And we'll all be responsible for it because we didn't do anything about it. We need to stop this. Whether it's two cars hitting each other and one jumps on the median or whether it's somebody falling in the street. There was a woman the other day walking to visit her friend who was on the median. She became distracted. She stopped in traffic and didn't notice that the traffic had started moving. These medians are an opportunity for something bad to happen. You have the ability to put a stop to that and maybe save someone's life. But at the very least, to save all the anxiety that everybody who goes through the intersections looking at this experiences. So I would plead with you, please do something about stopping the access to the medians. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Hello. My name is Janine Sausalito, and I am a resident of Long Beach and I.
Speaker 1: Live in the neighborhood of Alamitos Heights.
Speaker 6: I'm here to express my support for Councilwoman Pryce, looking into limiting the access of pedestrians, standing on medians and walking on medians in these highly congested city streets and intersections. I'm personally concerned with where a seventh street crosses Bellflower and PCH.
Speaker 1: This is in my neighborhood.
Speaker 6: I travel this intersection daily.
Speaker 1: There is not a time. I am not distracted by someone.
Speaker 6: Standing on this median. It's a daily occurrence.
Speaker 1: Just this past Sunday.
Speaker 6: Driving my daughter home from her.
Speaker 1: Volleyball tournament at three in the afternoon, there was two.
Speaker 6: Pedestrians loitering.
Speaker 8: In the median at the intersection.
Speaker 1: Of Seventh and.
Speaker 6: Bellflower. I needed to move to the right one, to my right and one to my left. I continued.
Speaker 1: West on seventh Street.
Speaker 6: Crossing PCH, where the three lanes merge to two. I needed to be aware of a car emerging to my right, aware of the person standing on the median to my left, as well as a person turning from Seventh.
Speaker 8: Street onto PCH.
Speaker 6: Where two more individuals.
Speaker 1: Were sitting on the curb.
Speaker 6: Somewhat blocking the turn lane with their belongings. This was a total of five individuals loitering at this intersection as I drove through. This is one of the busiest intersections in Long Beach and one of the main gateways to our city. As a driver through here, I already need to be alert because there is it is a diagonal intersection. And it's an Elise. One more block. You go through another intersection. It's already busy with pedestrians walking to Long Beach State.
Speaker 1: The VA.
Speaker 6: Hospital and the retail stores nearby. And if there.
Speaker 1: Is a way to prevent the additional distraction of pedestrians.
Speaker 6: Standing where they don't need to be standing or loitering is a welcome. Safety for all involved. I hope that you will look into this. I support council. Isn't woman's price desire to improve the conditions and make it safe for everybody? Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Stephanie Dawson. So Democratic Socialists of America launch this study as it is proposed today, is not designed to promote a facially neutral, narrowly construed law to address an imminent threat to public safety. If this was the case, then this measure would have been a come forth. When Kolb or Wilson students were advertising car washes or other sets for fund raisers in these same controversial meetings. Rather, this is an attempt by the co-sponsors to at best, remove poor people out of sight and out of mind. And at worst, it represents a continuing trend by the city to criminalize poverty. The intersections mentioned so far have and have other major elements that contribute to traffic collisions besides the fact that they also happen to be the most the most prominent places for homeless people to panhandle bars. If we were truly constructive, if we were clearly concerned with distracted driving, we would eliminate the dozens of bars, as well as the dozens of built of billboards in those same areas, especially in the Iron Triangle. CARTER Congressman Lowenthal, his office is right now producing a study study on traffic, on traffic distractions and traffic safety. They'll provide the same exact objective analysis on this issue without impacting city resources. Lets any minimum weight into the results of this study or available before making a rash decision that will open up our city to the very real threat of a lawsuit from the ACLU, who has already established a firm precedent recently in favor of the rights for the homeless. The Supreme Court, as well, has also made several recent rulings concerning facially neutralized limiting speech in public areas such as such as these medians, especially when it has a discriminatory impact as this law would. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Thank you, councilwoman.
Speaker 6: Members in there. My name's Maureen Neeley. I'm on Termino Avenue in Belmont Heights in the third District. And at first glance, I.
Speaker 1: Didn't think this was a very important request.
Speaker 6: Or that we really needed this. It seemed to go.
Speaker 1: Against the idea of free movement in a free society. I kind of get that. But I started really looking at these medians and they're not intended to be used as sidewalks. I have no problem with people congregating on sidewalks.
Speaker 6: And exercising free speech and liberty, etc. But standing on a raised concrete.
Speaker 1: Strip while cars.
Speaker 6: Are whizzing.
Speaker 1: By at 50 miles an hour is no protection at all for anyone. And that's not what the intention of those medians were. With more and more people using these.
Speaker 6: Medians as sidewalks and for purposes of to.
Speaker 1: Interact with drivers and holding signs and apparently dogs and keyboards. I didn't know that. It's only a matter of time that someone is going to get hit and or a driver causes an accident trying to avoid a person or an object. I nearly hit someone.
Speaker 6: Who stepped out of the center divide on Willow.
Speaker 1: I wasn't expecting it. I wasn't ready for it. I had the green light. This woman had children in tow and it took everything I had.
Speaker 6: To not hit them. I don't want that feeling.
Speaker 1: For anyone in this room or anyone in the city to experience something like that. It's a horrifying experience. The medians are just that they're medians. Let's try to figure out a way that people can still practice their civil liberties on the sidewalks or in open.
Speaker 6: Open areas that are safer.
Speaker 1: But let's not have to use a strip of concrete that could potentially put their own life and the lives of others at risk. Asking for a staff report on best practices and how other cities address this problem seems reasonable. And I ask that you support this. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Sarah Sang Meister, member of the third District. I want to thank Susie Price for bringing this forward. And just to remind everyone that this is basically a recommendation to oust the city attorney in the city manager to look at this. I don't think anybody's asking the city council tonight to make a decision, and I understand the other speakers concern. I think what you're hearing is a number of people from essentially the east side of town. And I believe that the three councilmembers who brought this forward are hearing from a number of their constituents about this concern. One of the reasons I'm here this evening is I live close to second and PCH and I'm almost on a daily basis. I generally don't come down here to talk about these things, but on almost on a daily basis, there is not a time from 6 a.m. until ten or 11:00 at night when I'm going through there , that there is not somebody out there on that median. And I have been in situations where I've watched near car accidents, dogs running across other situations that I think really are a public safety issue. I guess I would say one thing is when the city manager and the city attorney are looking at that is to perhaps talk to the police department, maybe talk to some of the neighborhoods, because I think a number of people in who are here tonight and are concerned enough who took off time to get here early enough, really see this as an issue. So please just look at it as I don't think we're trying to ask you guys to make a decision tonight. I know city attorney Perkin will look diligently at it and try to find some answers to try to find that balance between civil liberties. But it is definitely a safety issue as well. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Hi. Excuse me.
Speaker 8: Hi. My name is Sharon Hagen.
Speaker 1: I'm a resident of Alamitos Heights. I just wanted to bring maybe a little bit different perspective prior to that. I would like to say thank you very much for having us on the agenda. The entire neighborhood of Alameda site is quite concerned about this. This is definitely an ongoing situation. I feel since I walk the neighborhood daily that this has become a business on the medians and as such, perhaps the people that are conducting business on the medians as they are quite regular people should perhaps be required to have a business license. I understand that some cities do require that, and perhaps that is another avenue that we could pursue. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Very good. Somebody left a pen up here. I commend the makers of this motion. It's obviously a very serious issue. One of the things that I like to hear. The individual that said that it's a violation of civil rights and. That people should be allowed to do that, if they will, that that individual will put his money where his mouth is and agree to pay any liability that flows from any accidents that would come flow from the type of activity we're talking about. I think an easy way to address that are one of the inexpensive way is to put rubber stanchions like we already have on highways that funnel traffic off like on the Davis Bridge. Are there places inundate that median with those stanchions? They're relatively inexpensive to put in there all around the city, and that would reduce. Bottom line is they wouldn't have it. Nobody would be able to stand there and look for it. One final thing reference to just permit me for 10 seconds and representative councilman, your anger's a good idea relative to sending out the library notice on the water bill. Make sure that people understand it's not a threat to shut down your work. Cut off your water. Some people make that.
Speaker 9: Thank you. So we'll take you back behind the rail. Councilmember Suber now.
Speaker 0: I'm fine. Thank you to all the members of the public who came down here tonight. This is an issue in multiple districts, as some of the speakers indicated, and primarily on public safety issues. Thank you.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 0: Yes, thank you, Vice Mayor. And I also want to thank Councilwoman Price for bringing this item forward. And I think it's very important for all of us to take a look at the change that medians can bring about. You know, I have quite a few in my area also. But I think the saddest part, a lot of the individuals who decide not to go down to the crosswalk or to the light, they would rather go out from the medians. And that's where we are going to have some problems. So, you know, I think traffic and pedestrian safety is one of, you know, my number one priorities. And I would want to want to avoid any tragedy possible in the city. So this is why I'm truly in favor of this item. Thank you very much. God surprise, for bringing this item forward.
Speaker 9: Thank you. Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 8: Yes. Thank you for everybody who has spoken on this item. And so I after reading this item, I was a little bit confused because I see one thing, but I so I just want to get some clarity around this. And I understand the goal and the mission of the community members. But this item says with with safety as.
Speaker 6: A specific focus.
Speaker 8: Correct. Says safety is a specific focus. And so with that, is there data that backs up the car accidents, the collisions that we're talking about here? Because I know for in my district from experience, when we've had some of the largest and most dangerous intersections, we've had data to back that up. To be able to say this is why it's such a problem in the in the area gun Byner Park was one of those areas. We collected the data, we had community meetings and then finally we got a park. But I don't see that here. So do we have. Any information.
Speaker 2: Mr. West.
Speaker 8: You know, if I could answer that, actually, you're correct. So we worked with the city attorney's office to draft this item. In fact, Jack Cunningham from my staff has been working with the city attorney's office for a few months now. And yes, we do have data. As I mentioned in my initial comments, we have data for highest traffic volumes and highest traffic incidents for the last ten years. The last five years. In the last year. But what I was hoping for is that tonight would be allowing the city attorney to go back and look at the different options that are available to us. Because if public safety is truly the concern, then the goal wouldn't be to ban people from all medians. It would be to ban people from medians where there is high traffic volumes or collision related data that would support it. So yes, we have that that data available. We can make it available to anyone's officers that they would like. We have the top 25 busiest intersections where there is a high incidence of traffic collisions. Okay. So then my next question would be, thank you for that. It would be good to see that information first. But why? So instead of having the city attorney look at this information, why don't we do a traffic study and have our public works traffic division? Look at this information that would seem to me a little bit more within their purview and realm. Yeah, the data we have is from our traffic engineers. They've already done the data analysis. And then which intersections? I mean, it's because I think we're just giving the information to our city attorney. But there's I don't have any we don't have any data to go off of based on. On this item. So I guess what I'm suggesting is that perhaps going to our traffic engineers, getting some information and data on that. First, I believe we also have master plans that are in place.
Speaker 6: That have.
Speaker 8: Information related to lessening traffic collisions, lessening pedestrian collisions, lessening bike collisions. And so I think gathering all that data first would be, I don't know, the most feasible in my opinion, but. That's the information on I'll share. And then which I mean if you have that data, it'd be nice to see it. But if you have that information, which of the I don't know, are there top three medians that have the most what are the top three medians? I don't even know what those locations would be. Sure. And again, just to clarify, we're not directing the city manager to prohibit people standing on specific medians. We're asking him within the legal parameters that he has. There has to be a neutral reason to limit people's access to medians. So whether that's high traffic volumes or high collision data, those would be recommendations that they would come back to us on. We're not saying that we would like you to draft an ordinance that would prohibit median access for the highest volume intersections. We're not saying that at this point, but in the past ten years, the top three intersections where there were most collisions were Long Beach Boulevard and Ward Low Redondo and Seventh PCH. And second, that was in the last ten years. In the last five years, the three top intersections in our medians were Pacific Coast Highway in Second Street, Redondo Avenue and Seventh Street, Long Beach Boulevard and Wardlow. In the past.
Speaker 1: Year, the top.
Speaker 8: Collisions were Redondo and Seventh. Pacific Coast Highway, Outer Traffic Circle and Anaheim Street at Long Beach Boulevard. Okay. And I again, I'm.
Speaker 6: Just.
Speaker 8: Focusing on the safety aspect. So I think I don't know in terms of process, I guess in my mind works is that we ask for information back from our traffic engineers, we get the data and then we're able to make a determination as to which what to do. Then I don't know why we would just jump to the city attorney's office to find out feasibility opportunities and constraints both legal and practical. So limiting media access. And so I think it's just a little off. So I don't know that I'll be supporting it as is. I would like us to consider possibly going back to our traffic engineer and bringing that information back to the council so we can have a little bit more informed information prior to just sending it to the city attorney. So after hearing my colleagues, that might be the direction I may propose.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 6: Yes. I want to thank the cosigners of this for the intent around public safety, but I definitely am going to talk through one as I think process, I think. Councilmember Price. Councilwoman Price, you have a lot of information in front of you that if we all had that same information, it might have made tonight a little easier to kind of go forward and say, okay, now we really understand the intent. And so thank you for working with the staff and having your staff do all that work. It would be great to have that information upfront on future items. I have a couple of things. One is it's my understanding that we already have a law on the muni code that prohibits people from soliciting in medians. No persons shall so offer, give, distribute any merchandise or manner or manner and description whatsoever, including newspapers, printed material. No person shall solicit contribute donations for my position or place upon any public street in the city. Public street using means highway roadways, streets, medians, divider islands. So we already have some policies in place. Number one, that's in our muni code that already says that it's illegal to do a lot of that activity. So I would want us to be really careful. I do think that, you know, I have gotten some concerns from my constituents around who would be most impacted by a policy like this. And my response is that it's already on the books. Number two, if we if the concern of this item, which I, as someone who's had three fatalities in my districts from pedestrian and car collisions, definitely care about public safety in this, we already have adopted a Vision Zero strategy last year and staff, I believe we received a $250,000 grant to bring a consultant on to talk about Vision Zero. Can you guys give us a little bit of background on Vision Zero and if it would include what the council members are looking for today? Sorry.
Speaker 4: Our public works director, Craig Beck will respond to that.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Yes. Mayor, members of the city council, I believe recently a staff report was sent to all of you to talk about Vision Zero. And essentially the goal with Vision Zero is to get to a point where we don't see vehicular and pedestrian incidents. We want to create safe corridors, safe passages for our pedestrians within the city. We are bringing on a consultant with the grant funds that we just recently received. We will be looking at a number of call them hotspots or dangerous intersections within the city and elements that we can do to improve pedestrian safety within those intersections. So that will include kind of a Vision Zero task force, if you will, that will be able to come forward and make a number of additional recommendations to council as we move our Vision zero plan to implementation.
Speaker 6: Great. And so these medians obviously would be areas as we've listed that we already have a priority list would be included as a top priority for the Vision Zero work.
Speaker 0: Well, certainly we don't encourage pedestrians to be in medians. That's not a safe area to be. We want to try to keep people to not only cross at signalized intersections when at all possible, but if not make sure that they are in a crosswalk. And that rarely includes crossing and being in a median area which isn't typically safe.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and I thank you for your comments on the Vision Zero. What's our timeline on the Vision zero?
Speaker 0: So I hope to have a consultant on board within the next 60 days. And then I imagine we're looking with community input and in finalizing an implementation plan somewhere in the 4 to 6 month time frame to get that ready for council adoption for implementation.
Speaker 6: Great. Thank you for that. I think there's. Let me see if I have one more question. Um, I think that's it. I think that, that the intent of this item is already carried through with the Vision Zero work. And so I would not want to ask our staff to double the work or to look at prohibiting people where we already are, prohibiting them in our muni code. And so I will not be supporting this item, but I definitely support the intent and want to continue to make sure that working together with the Vision Zero team and with our staff directors on making sure we can create a safe community for everybody. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I got to tell you, when I saw this item, I didn't think this would. Bring on so much debate that this would be a pretty quick item. And in my opinion, it's a it's a pretty common sense, no brainer. I will be supporting it. I want to thank Councilmember Price and Supernormal and Urunga for bringing it forward. Obviously, these are concerns that these council members have in their district. I'm as well I'm very concerned about pedestrian safety, period. I do understand and think some really good points have been raised about there already being an ordinance on the books and us engaging the need to engage our traffic engineers for solutions. I think this this the recommendation in asking this item actually looks for a legal opinion on what best practices are and what what options are available on the legal front and in the end, as well as what can be engineered. So what type of solutions can be engineered through. And I think that is the task of the city manager's office and that's why I read this. And so, you know, I hope we can we can get through this. This is, like I said, a pretty, pretty common sense item. And I look forward to getting the report back. And again, I will be supportive.
Speaker 2: I'm going to go to Councilman Mungo. I just want to add just one thing also real quick here and correct if I'm wrong, Councilman Price, but it's my understanding that the reason this is being directed to the city manager and the city attorney's office is also to get, like Councilmember Orson said, just the legal clarity. I mean, the truth is, is that there is actual case law. There is a lot of court conversations that have happened around this issue. And so I think Councilman Price is looking to get some legal framework of what actually is or isn't possible in this area, that she's able to take that information and can give it to her constituents and ensure that the people that are making these requests and asking of the information have the information and that we and that the city is able to know what we can and cannot do. So I, I have viewed this item as an opportunity to request to get to gain information. There is no there is no asking it to create an ordinance in this item. It's asking to get some legal clarity and some information from staff to bring it back so that the council has the full information of what is. Allowed both legally and not allowed. And I think that's really, I think, important. And and I also think that there is enough folks in the community that have asked about this issue. And I think it would be it would be wise to get the community that have asked for the information, the information from the attorneys office. So I just wanted to throw that out there. Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 1: So. I'm going to talk to the the broader point on this. First, I'm going to start with stating that I'm going to support the item tonight. And then specifically on the information that has been provided to many of us, has been very decentralized in specific to our districts and we go out into the community. I was at a community meeting, I think it was last week where we had 70 neighbors who had similar types of concerns, and we have a similar discussion with each different group of neighbors related to the traffic issues and instances in their district, in their area where they live. Within the district, there are several intersections and neighborhoods that have impact. And when one neighborhood's impact is fixed, we have to work really hard not to just be moving that impact to another district. And so I'd like to add even just to put it out there, it's not completely in alignment with going to the city attorney. So I'm just going to state a few things that I think we need to be talking about and considering. One, all of the data that is provided to each of our offices related to these medians needs to be put on the Internet immediately. We have open data. Data LBE should have the number of accidents per intersection. It should have all the information that each of us know about our own council districts. And so while it's easy for us to say, Well, Councilmember Price, I don't have your data because I also don't have that data, that that really is the responsibility of data lab. And so we need to be open and transparent about this because what ends up happening is we end up getting the data, then going to our community meetings and then the community has to both digest the data we're giving them and talk through the risks and potential solutions and and potential best practices and some of the case law and issues with some of the things they're asking for. I'd like to take it a step further and say that once we get to this point, the traffic engineer that came and spoke at our community meeting last week, hands down, A-plus, a professional who knows and understands this stuff. We need just to have a mini video that each of us as council members can direct people to, because we want the community to be able to come up with solutions. But sometimes the solutions they come up with aren't legally allowable by the state. Or there's past issues with a solution, for instance, a boulder being cemented into a median. There are other issues that have come up with that and other legal challenges, and that's not a possibility at large at certain intersections of certain sizes. So all of that needs to be outlined and available so that community has the access to that information without giving up 2 hours of their night on a weeknight when they would rather be at yoga or watching their favorite TV program or having dinner with their children or helping with their homework. And so I hope that this is a bit of either if the staff are understanding where I think we as a council think we need to go, that's great. If not, I'm happy to work with two other council members to put an item on the agenda in the next several weeks that this is an important thing for us as a city. And I think that public works has been such a help. But to continue to draw on our city engineers, to come to community meeting after community meeting after community meeting, in my neighborhoods, we have almost 15 community groups. That's just a lot of resources of a highly paid staff member who already has a backlog of traffic studies that we need to get done. So just a thought. Let's use that technology available to us and I will be supporting the item.
Speaker 2: Counsel for Supernanny.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I signed on to this item and I seconded the motion tonight, so I will be in support. I'd just like to speak to the concept of narrowing the focus at this point, or as a suggestion. Let's come up with a finite number of intersections. This is not the time to narrow the focus. This is when we need to expand the focus. An example, Councilman Price red off. One of the intersections was PCH, an outer circle. That's in the fourth district that the traffic circle in general has issues. The other thing we have to understand is PCH is under the jurisdiction of Caltrans, as is the traffic circle. You go north on PCH and the well north, by the way, is described, but the northern side of PCH is Signal Hill. So where it's multi-jurisdictional, we need as much input here as possible. The other thing we have in our district speaking with Caltrans are our freeway on ramps, which we get calls on weekly on those. So I would just like to suggest we keep this open at this point. We move to exactly what the proposal is and be all inclusive in the information gathering mode. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 8: Yes, thank you. And I would like to say that I will first like to add a friendly amendment, if I could, and I'd like to add a few things that after hearing my colleagues, I want to make sure that we are and I didn't expect this to go on and be this big deal. But I really feel that in terms of process, we need to add additional information. So there's just a few things that I'm going to ask when we're looking to send this to a city attorney. So a friendly amendment will include the information to Councilmember Janine Pierce's point that will include Vision Zero information, meeting information. So all the data that a council woman price has related to medians and traffic and collisions that should be provided in a two from four as soon as possible. Again, I think this information is pertinent to not only the community but to the council members to look at, you know, issues all over the city and then the attorney language. You know, again, just want to clarify that this is a feasibility to focus on safety first, not any other issues, that it should be separate. So safety first is as noted here in the agenda. So if those are accepted, I would hope so. Then I would be. Gladly to support. I'm happy to accept. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Pick Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 4: I agree with the the amendment as provided. Truthfully, I was somewhat hesitant to sign in on this on this item, but I want to thank him to do so. And the reason I was hesitant, because in the past years, 18 Lions Club members, I have seen firefighters donate to the boot, also on medians, asking for donations for the foundation. And so, I mean, I was like, okay, well, we need a better clarification as to what can we legally or legal or illegal or illegally or not accept in terms of what's a medians. There's also people who are making statements or just just using their First Amendment rights on medians. So, I mean, there's there's a lot of other things taking place other than panhandling or people just illegally crossing in the middle of the street to go to the other side. So a totally in agreement with the need to study this further. And that's why I signed on to this, because I think that it's important that we get complete information and clarification as to what's taking place here in the use of medians for public information or for other types of purposes, such as panhandling. So I will I will be supporting the title.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 6: Yes. I want to thank my colleague for bringing up your your friendly. I did have a question around. The task force is still here. Yes. Sorry. Can you let me know if we have community organizations as a part of that Vision Zero Task Force?
Speaker 0: Councilmember Pearce we can certainly expand to community members. I think initially we were looking at representation from both the traffic engineering group, our health department, our police department to focus on some of the more enforcement and safety issues. And then once we came up with a number of recommendations that we would go out to the community and share with different community groups and gain input from that perspective.
Speaker 6: Okay. I'd like for us to just have a conversation about it, and it doesn't need to be part of this item, but how we include organizations that might come in contact with people that panhandle or in those medians so that we can talk about an education program for them or what legal things, besides giving them a citation , might we be able to do to be in alignment with the rest of the vision that the city has laid out around trying to do wraparound services and everything like that? So I'll say that. And then, you know, I think being really clear on the item that it is around public safety, that we're including the vision zero part, the red flag for me, just as always, any time that we can get in a situation where we're criminalizing one group, but like my colleague said, not criminalizing another, whether it's people at the boots, I just have to be really careful and cautious. And so I'll support this item with the friendly amendments made and I look forward to report coming back where we're being really clear about this being specifically for public safety and how we can ensure that we're not isolating one or one type of of people to be targeted. So thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 9: Thank you. I just want to chime in. You know, we like the here Long Beach is a collection of neighborhoods and there's clearly neighborhood support for this recommendation. So I you know, I have no problems with what was brought forward. I do want to acknowledge the sensitivity that was brought up about, you know, making sure we're clear about what the intent is. And but I think that this is just being a responsive councilperson. So congrats on that. I would also say, you know, I don't want to get a ticket for going and pick up any couches or mattresses up the median. So so if you see me in the median picking something up, you know, is that okay? Do I get a pass? All right. I think we're fine. But, you know, I also would say, you know, there's these flags that keep popping up, you know, these big flags. And it's not you know, I don't I don't know who's putting them up. These flags keep coming up and our business district keeps take them down. It is a you know, maybe a safety issue will say. You know, this this blight gets there somehow. Thanks.
Speaker 2: Councilwoman Pryce.
Speaker 8: Thank you. And I want to thank my colleagues. So just for clarifying, so actually a few things. First, I want to thank Councilman Turanga for signing on to this item. I think the beauty of this body is, for the most part, we have a group of people who are willing to work with one another, even when we have differences in our particular neighborhoods that may not bleed into other neighborhoods. And I appreciate that. So and I've sat in his office before and he's enlightened me on things that are important to him that I may not see in my neighborhood. And I appreciate that collaboration. So I want to thank you for that and for signing on and for giving it an opportunity. And I agree with you. I think the filling the boot, the you know, we have an issue in the third district. And I think some of my neighborhood association presidents who are here will understand where we have people in the medians. We call them guerilla gardeners. They go out there and they garden in the medians. That is dangerous. We we don't want that either. I don't want Girl Scout cookies being sold on the medians. It's just I don't want car washes being solicited from the medians. It's just a dangerous traffic hazard. And people get confused, especially. I mean, it just you have to be on your game when you're driving. And if there's a distraction or someone, you know, a foot or two away from your car, it can be really distracting. Regardless of what they're doing or what uniform they might be wearing. It doesn't matter. And in fact, if there were car washes on the corner, every time I went to the iron triangle, we would be bringing an item. But those are so few and far between that they don't necessitate the issue that we have here today because it's something we're seeing. This is my community, the people that came out here tonight, I represent I proudly represent them. This is an issue that is a big concern for them. And I and I think can appreciate my family, my colleagues, for giving them consideration and letting their voices be heard tonight. It affects their quality of life every day and it affects public safety and the health and wealth welfare of our community. I just want to clarify that the the item with the friendly includes a TFF will come back with some traffic collision data, some traffic volume data and that the city attorney will continue as by way of this motion to engage in its legal analysis and provide us with options in terms of what other cities have done, what connection must be made legally in order for us to prohibit behavior at a particular location so that it's a neutral analysis and that council will have options to consider in terms specifically of medians and traffic safety. And is that Mr. Park? And is that your understanding as well?
Speaker 4: It is, yes.
Speaker 8: Okay. Thank you. So with that, I want to thank my colleagues for their support. I want to thank my community for coming out. And I ask everyone to join me in support of this item.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. We had public comment already. Thank you all for coming out. We had our council comment. So with that, there's a motion on the floor second by Councilmember Supernova. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 3: Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you all very much. And we will be moving on to the next item, which is 21. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to work with City Attorney to report back regarding the feasibility, opportunities, and constraints both legal and practical to limiting median access near major intersections to improve safety for pedestrians and drivers, including in this report how other jurisdictions manage this traffic safety concern. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03072017_17-0161 | Speaker 3: Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Hey, thank you very much. Now we're moving on to item 22.
Speaker 3: Communication from Vice Mayor Richardson recommendation to request City Council approval of the 2017 federal legislative agenda as recommended by the Federal Legislation Committee.
Speaker 2: There's a motion and a second Vice Mayor.
Speaker 9: So just a few updates here we have. So we met in November on November 15th to review staff's recommended recommended changes for the 2017 federal legislative agenda. The committee made some fairly substantive changes to the agenda last year when we were reorganized and consolidated some of the statements that may have been repetitive in years past. And because we made so many, so many changes in the last update, and as the new presidential administration gets up and running, the first large committee will be focused on protecting existing revenues that the city current receive currently receives from the federal government, such as the Housing Choice Voucher Program, commonly known as Section eight, CDBG, other HUD programs. We're also going to take a look at workforce programs and supporting those as well. And our existing legislative agenda already empowers us to do that. The committee heard that, you know, the committee may have heard that there's one particular area of the of the legislative agenda, legislative agenda that could use some additional language. That's the area of violence prevention and services to stem the homeless crisis in L.A. County. And because of all of our work, our mayor, city council, city staff have done around violence prevention staff recommended that we add language in the public safety section to support federal legislation that would assist with the implementation of violence prevention programs and in the area of homeless prevention. Staff recommended that the City Council support the city, support federal assistance toward establishing substance use treatment facilities in the region. Language to support mental health services is already existing there. Our committee voted to receive a file. All of staff's recommended and recommended changes and for those to the City Council for Adoption tonight. Since our meeting in November, a number of executive orders signed by the new president make it so that we need to update an existing statement in our in our agenda supporting the expansion of dockets. Read one that reads supporting federal legislation that maintains existing allowances for undocumented immigrants to who qualify for the DOCA program to remain in the United States, as well as being as well as any legislation that protects safety and well-being of all Californians by ensuring state and local race resources are not used to support deportations, collect information about individuals or religious beliefs or affiliations that ultimately hurt California's economy. Specific to the DOCA program, we're talking about immigrants who enter the U.S. before the 16th birthday and before June 27 are currently in high school or high school graduate honorably discharged in the military under the age of 31 as of June 15, 2012, and have not been convicted of a felony, significant misdemeanor or other or three other misdemeanors otherwise pose a threat to national security. So these recommended changes come because there's been, you know, since these executive orders, a number of bills that have come out. And we wanted to make sure that our language and our letter agenda is wide and comprehensive enough to support different bills, whether it's, you know, Feinstein's bill or other other people's bills that go forward, it still maintains the intent to support the DOCA language. And so that is sort of a highlight on what we're doing tonight on the failed agenda. Thanks.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilmember Yuri.
Speaker 4: Councilmember Gonzales. I'll defer Gonzales first.
Speaker 2: Councilman Gonzales.
Speaker 8: Q I don't know what's going on, Mayor. I'm sorry. No.
Speaker 2: It's it's Election Day.
Speaker 1: I know.
Speaker 8: That's okay. I just want to say thank you to Diana and to Vice Mayor Richardson. And now we have Councilmember Saranga that will be joining us at our next Fed. Federal legislation relation trip. And so I think vice mayor reiterated many of the new actions that we'll be taking when we go to D.C. and also here on the dais when we're discussing Long Beach initiatives. But the things that kind of pop out in my mind, the items, of course, are immigration issues related to DOCA and the new executive order, specifically with the ban on predominantly Muslim countries environmental protections, which I know we'll have to really look a little bit more into, and then securing our major capital projects like many of the initiatives that we have citywide. I want to make sure that we're securing those and that funding is going through us as we see fit. So thank you very much for your work and I look forward to working with you all again.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Mayor. It's going to be my first year on this committee and I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be quite a challenging year. Obviously, we've had a change in in our presidency and a different focus. And so I'm looking forward to advocating for the city on behalf of a Long Beach. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I just want to say, you know, I took the time to read through everything on the agenda and I just it made me really proud to be a part of this council and to look at everything from immigration to gun control, violence prevention, affordable housing. A lot of the things that we aspire to do that sometimes are challenging and tough. And I know that we can't do it all, but I just really thank you for making sure that this is comprehensive and that we, despite what's happening at the federal level, are continuing to advocate and protect those that live in our communities here. So thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Any public comment on this saying please cast your votes.
Speaker 3: Councilman, your anger. Motion passes. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to respectfully request City Council approval of the 2017 Federal Legislative Agenda as recommended by the Federal Legislation Committee. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03072017_17-0163 | Speaker 3: Councilman, your anger. Motion passes.
Speaker 2: 25.
Speaker 3: Communication from councilmembers Hooper nor Councilwoman Price Council member Urunga recommendation to adopt a minute order declaring a moratorium against. Oh, I'm sorry. Wrong item 25. Item 25 Recommend Report from Public Works Recommendation to authorize the City Manager to execute all documents necessary to amend contract with worldwide construction to increase the contract amount by 970,000 for additional necessary fire station. Workforce. Privacy Improvements and repairs. Districts two, three and six.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Yes. Can I get a second, please? Any public comment? Please cast your votes. Actually, Mr. Good, you.
Speaker 0: This absurdist comedy was prompted by the unfortunate death of a good resident of Long Beach who lost a. Long battle with cancer and her husband had was during that as was too many people in such situations had to deal with the disposal of drugs. What I'm going to suggest is you amend this contract to allow for a facility, an extra drop box, if you will, at every fire station. So when residents have drugs that they have to dispose of, they have a safe place to do it. And the majority of cases, what will happen is they're flushed down the toilet, thrown into the or throwing in with the trash. And eventually, a large percentage, even the health department recognizes, ends up in our waters. So it seems to me what we could do is put a slot in each local fire station with a secure. And so they go into the fire station and then once whenever necessary, the fire department would take them up to the disposal place, up at San Pedro, up into Signal Hill, which is now the only place that Long Beach has to dispose of those drugs. And I think it makes a lot of sense. One final note. Just I just happen to notice here on the air on RFI, when you were debating that, as you were debating as you were debating the blue line issue, two more shootings at 4:00 today, downtown area. Your police should be out on those and not on the blue line. Check the Long Beach report. The flash news posted at 4:00 around at the same time you were taking away police from the downtown area.
Speaker 2: Thank you. It's important to report correct information or not false information. These are 30 new FTE positions. New if you have two positions, it's called. Thank you very much. That's new positions, staff members. Thank you. I think I think I'm not you know, I don't think anyone's in the mood for alternative facts tonight. So moving on, we have a motion in a second. And is there motion? Great. Counselor Andrews.
Speaker 0: Yes. Thank you, man. I'm very excited to see that these renovations will go, you know, under way, because the fact that our our foreign service men and women deserve it. Do you have a safe, you know, functioning number of, you know, stations? And I think that since they've been taking care of us, it's our time to start taking care of the places in which they work. And I really want to be very excited about promoting this. I don't know. It was right for today. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Please cast your votes. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to amend Contract No. 34164 with World Wide Construction, of San Pedro, CA, to increase the contract amount by $970,000, for a total not-to-exceed amount of $3,472,512 for additional necessary Fire Station Workforce Privacy improvements and repairs. (Districts 2,3,6) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_03072017_17-0162 | Speaker 3: Motion passes.
Speaker 0: 23.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And next up, item 23, which I skipped, which is unfortunate because I think it's a great item. So let me go to have Kirk read item 23.
Speaker 3: Communication from Councilmember Super Now Councilwoman Price, Councilmember Durango recommendation to adopt a minute order declaring a moratorium against the establishment for the placement of unattended donations slash recycling collection boxes or bins on any public or private lot in the city.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And Councilmember Supernova.
Speaker 0: Thank you. This is largely a legal item. So I'm going to read four sentences to get the legal language correct. And the nice thing about this is we get to learn a new acronym tonight and that is an intended donation. Boxes are you beads. So I'll use that in my description here. During the past year, the city has received several inquiries from you bead vendors asserting that vendors have the absolute right to place your beads in various locations throughout the city because of recent federal case law changes. Currently, there's an inconsistency between the city's business license regulation and the zoning code that has created confusion about whether or not updates are permitted as a matter of write in the city or are in fact currently banned in the city. It's important that you beds be specifically addressed in the zoning code, as other cities have done recently. And because if left unregulated, these boxes become a blight and nuisance in the community because of the tendency of people to dump all manner of junk and other material in and around the boxes. And finally, adopting a moratorium will maintain the status quo until the city can fashion appropriate zoning regulations that will address nuisance concerns, comply with new federal case law, and will resolve current inconsistencies between the city's business license regulations and the zoning code. And if we could, I would like to go to public comment right away. We're honored to have Janet McCarthy, the president and CEO of Goodwill, in the audience. And thank you for your patience.
Speaker 10: Good evening, everyone. Thank you for your service. Truly, I am Janet McCarthy. I'm the president, CEO of Goodwill, serving the people of seven Los Angeles County. And I do appreciate the fact that you've placed this recommendation to adopt a minute order declaring a moratorium against the establishment placement, construction expansion or issuance of any permits for the placement of unattended donation recycling collection boxes or bins on any public or private lot in the city on your agenda. I personally and my board at Goodwill and all those that we serve wholeheartedly support the Council's adoption of a moratorium for the following reasons Goodwill SOLAK. That's our acronym for the long serving the people of some Los Angeles County. So that, you know, I will repeat that our mission is to help individuals in our community with barriers to employment, either get to work or get back to work. Our mission is funded by the sale of donations received by residents of the 24 cities and southern Los Angeles County of which we serve. And Long Beach happens to be one of those 24 cities. Given our ability to accomplish, our mission is dependent upon the revenue we generate through the donated goods and retail operations. It's a business model that requires professionals in operations, logistics, transportation, retail and recycling. It's also one that requires knowledge of and compliance with a host of city, county, state and national and environmental regulations. The proliferation of middle of the night unattended donation bins being dropped is a concern so great that it has rose to the attention of the state capital and took shape in legislation AB 918 and SB 450 also designed to combat the problem. Unattended donation bins pose several problems for our community. They are run for by for profit companies in nonprofit clothing. They often attempt to buy communities off by minor contributions that are very small fraction of the profits that they realize as corporations. The salvage business is a multibillion dollar industry that is publicly traded. Like any other commodity, these dollars permanently leave the community without sustaining it in any way in which goodwill has for over 100 years. Unattended bins are blight magnets, routinely riddled with graffiti and surrounded by refuge, refuse that is unusable and simply dumped there. In essence, they are mobile alleys. Personally, I am, uh, called upon often by our community because they think it's Goodwill's problem. They think that we're the ones that caused that. And quite honestly, I think we're quite great neighbors in the community of Long Beach and we do everything we do and can to keep all of our community clean. Many of these unattended bins are run by companies and or individuals that are excuse me, impossible to contact and are therefore unconcerned and unaccountable for the problems that they create for the communities they exist within. With limited contact and accountability. The problems unattended bins create leave residents with one destination for their concerns. And that is all of you and all of your staff.
Speaker 2: Thank you. I got to the time here in Boise.
Speaker 10: No, it's.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 10: I but by the way, I recommend that you hope have a moratorium on this thing. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening. Thank you so much for everything Goodwill does. Amazing organization. And we know Long Beach is a partner, obviously, and we are so thankful for the workforce development that happens on site and for the partnerships and just you're such a good partner in building this community, so just thank you. So I really appreciate you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Absolutely.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Austin, actually, Councilman Price.
Speaker 8: I support this item. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Councilmember Austin.
Speaker 7: Thank you. I certainly would support this item. I think I brought something an ordinance about three years ago to ban these these. And unmanned you beds in the city. I'd like to get some some clarification from the city attorney as to what has changed.
Speaker 4: Held seven Austin members of the city council. It's a little bit complicated, but I did not realize you brought an item a few years ago. But what's happened is in the last two years across the country, these companies that want to put these boxes in communities have sued in federal court on a theory that these donation boxes are no different than a panhandler in the street, and they have an absolute constitutional right to locate pretty much wherever they want in a city. So there's a trend in those federal cases that did not exist two years ago that is currently there. And in addition, within the last year, the City Department of Planning and Department of Development Services and the city attorney's office has been contacted by individual companies that desire to put these and are asserting that they have a constitutional right to do it. And we've also been contacted by different lobbying companies that exist outside of Long Beach, actually in different states, making the same argument. So we started looking into the matter and saw that cities locally, some locally, like Torrance, for instance, which were threatened with litigation City of Oakland, which was actually sued in 2015 over these unattended donation boxes . Litigation was popping up. So in order to get ahead of the game, so to speak, we thought it was appropriate to suggest that a moratorium be put in place because our current zoning ordinance doesn't. We have what's called a specific a permissive zoning ordinance. So unless you are specifically allowed to do something, you're denied. So if you brought this matter forth three years ago, that would have been the case. It wasn't a use that was regulated. And in doing the research, we determined that there is currently an inconsistency between what is in Title five about and manned donation boxes and what is currently in Title 21. So that's the difference between then and now.
Speaker 7: So from what I can glean from that, it would be totally impermissible and unacceptable to put you in a median.
Speaker 4: Well, it depends. Research it.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 8: The median advocates will be here next week. Thanks a lot.
Speaker 9: Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 6: Thank you. You learn something new every day. I had no idea that there are for profit companies that were using this. So thank you guys for bringing this item up. I did have a question. Are there Long Beach nonprofits that that use these youth bodies? Do we know? Anybody.
Speaker 4: I don't know the answer to that, but I do know that this will not result in a total ban on you. The goal will be to put in place regulations that will meet constitutional requirements and will still allow them. But you will probably see such things. What other cities have done. They have spacing requirements. They can't be, you know, within 1000 feet of each other, for instance, specific requirements for how they look, how they're maintained, lighting things so that people can't drop articles at night after dark, for instance. So there's just junk around the boxes. So that's what we're looking to do.
Speaker 6: And requirements also around how often they pick them up and everything. Correct. Okay. Um, well, when I first took a look at this and the other item that kind of made my hair stand on ends, but I definitely support this and thank you guys for doing the legal work on this. Appreciate it.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 8: Yes, thank you, Councilmember. Super not for bringing this forward. I, too, was a little unclear on this to begin with, but now it makes total sense. And just have a couple of quick questions. How many do we know off the top of our head? How many bins we have citywide? How many of these you. You would.
Speaker 1: So, Councilmember, we do have some of these citywide, but they're related to existing businesses. So, for example, if there is a drop off location that's related to goodwill or Salvation Army or someone like that, they're considered accessory to the main use and we can permit them in that regard. The unattended donation bins, we have been very clear that we do not have a permitting process for that. And so when we do come across them, we have taken code enforcement action against them. So I don't know the the the full extent of it, but it's the ongoing concern that we have about constitutional challenges that we'd like to move forward with tonight. Sure.
Speaker 8: That's great. It would just be good to know how many bins we have. I mean, I've seen them here and there, and I know that they can be a blight. And while we figure out the constitutional issues, if we can just get some information back as to where they're located and how many there are.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure I would be able to because they are technically unpermitted.
Speaker 8: I see. Yeah. Okay. Well, I don't know. Do we go out and.
Speaker 1: We go out on a complaint.
Speaker 8: Basis? So that complaint information maybe would be sure to give us some sort of idea. I know that. Right. Okay. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Appreciate it. Well, Councilman, you'll be happy to know that many of those complaints are probably mine, because I complain about these things all the time, always emailing staff and so very, very glad councilmember super and I brought this forward. I think these things unfortunately are our blight and they have very little to do with the services being provided and everything to do with graffiti and trash being not picked up around them and they're not maintained and then the resources don't go back into the community. Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 1: Yes. I want to thank Councilmember Super not for bringing forward this item. I think it's a really great partnership that we have with the Goodwill. Many people know that Goodwill does not only collect these items for their purpose and mission, but they also do a lot of work, development and a lot of other things in the community that the revenues from the donations go to. And so I think it's important that we select our partners wisely. And I think that I have seen where a bin can turn into a mess. And without the types of things that my colleagues have talked about, regular pickups, requirements adjacent to a facility where every morning it can be emptied and ensured that it's not at capacity. Also, some people are putting things into the bins and if they are contaminated with bedbugs or other types of things, it contaminates a whole lot of things that it's much better to have a person available like you have at a goodwill store or an AM vet's or any of those other options. So I appreciate the item and I'll be supporting it. Thank you.
Speaker 2: And Councilman Mungo wants to know if we can put the bins in the medians.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Yes, thank you, Mayor. Congressman, Super. And I truly, truly, you know, support this item. And I want to tell you, on the last count, I think it was about 40,000 or more. That was only in my district. So we're working on it. Yes.
Speaker 2: Thank you. We had public comment. I appreciate everyone. Please cast your vote. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to adopt a Minute Order declaring a moratorium, against the establishment, placement, construction, expansion, or issuance of any permits, for the placement of unattended donation/recycling collection boxes or bins on any public or private lot in the City; and request City Attorney, in cooperation with the Department of Development Services, to prepare an interim (moratorium) ordinance pursuant to Chapter 21.50 of the Long Beach Municipal Code for notice and placement on the City Council agenda for hearing at its third meeting following adoption of this Minute Order. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02212017_17-0117 | Speaker 0: I think contribution. Kerry will be back. Great. And then let's do 13, which is pulled off consent.
Speaker 1: Item 13 Recommendation to authorize City Manager to execute an agreement with the County of Los Angeles for a one year pilot shuttle service to Alamitos Bay Landing Accord. Accept up to 100,000 of Proposition eight grant funding and increase appropriations by 100,000 District three on price.
Speaker 2: Thank you. If we could just get a brief update from the Director of Public Works regarding what this project is, how long it's been going, and what the next phase looks like.
Speaker 9: Craig Beck.
Speaker 10: Good evening, council member, members of city council. This is a shuttle system that was put in place in mid to late November of last last year. It was done to try to address some of the parking impacts that.
Speaker 9: We were experiencing in the Seaport Marina Village area.
Speaker 10: It was a grant that came to us from the county.
Speaker 0: And this is really the paperwork to allow us to.
Speaker 10: Recoup the costs that we have fronted as a city organization. It was a one year pilot program, which we are tracking the number of riders and the experience that they are having and how it alleviates the parking issues.
Speaker 9: That we experienced. And so that's the item that you have before you this evening.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And I want to take a moment to thank staff and, of course, some of the business owners in Alamitos Bay Landing who made this a reality. From what I've been told from some of the the business owners in that vicinity, this shuttle program has really alleviated the parking that was very impacted when Ballast Point opened . That parking lot is now very much usable. Usable. And it was not for a while because of the number of people driving around looking for parking spots. And I'm hoping that this is a program that we can actually expand, perhaps later down the road as a pilot into other areas, maybe Belmont Shore. I think encouraging people to ride together to destinations that are impacted from a parking perspective is a really great idea. And I want to thank our city staff for working collaboratively with the county and of course our county supervisors office for helping with the financing to make this happen. This is an excellent project and I felt that it was worthy of a special attention. So thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any public comment on this item saying none. Members, please go ahead and cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Motion carries. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute a Cooperative Agreement, and all other documents and amendments related thereto, with the County of Los Angeles, for a one-year pilot shuttle service to the Alamitos Bay Landing; accept up to $100,000 on Proposition A grant funding; and
Increase appropriations in the General Grants Fund (SR-120) in the Public Works Department (PW) by $100,000, offset by grant revenue. (District 3) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02212017_17-0134 | Speaker 0: Thank you. Okay. We're moving on to the agenda. We have a hearing on the agenda. I'm going to go in here. Councilmember Mungo's item, I think for some people that wanted to speak on item 24 and court.
Speaker 1: Item 24. Communication from Councilman, Councilwoman, Mango and Councilman Austin. Recommendation to request City Manager to direct the Department of Development Services to review existing planning and zoning law and to provide recommendations for by ordinance the creation and or allowance of accessory dwelling units in single family and multi-family resident residential zones.
Speaker 8: Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Today we heard a lot about affordable housing and the need for more inventory. I think this is a step in the right direction. I think we need to be creative with this. I know that some of the granny flats that are within our city are micro units and others have different types of opportunities for people to come in at a rate that is affordable for a different lifestyle. And I hope that we can put together a process that's streamlined and easy so that these can be safe, affordable places for people to live. I appreciate Linda Tatum's work in supporting the information that was necessary to get this item on the agenda tonight. So thank you, Development Services and Linda, specifically.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 11: Thank you. And thank you all, Councilmember Mongo, for bringing this forward. I watched this legislation in Sacramento pretty closely and carefully over the last year. And when it was signed into law, I thought myself, well, perhaps we'll build one ourselves at our at our home. I mean, there are a number of neighborhoods and space in our city where this would, I think, be a good fit and would help us deal with our affordable housing crisis here in the city. And I'm very, very confident that our Development Services Department will give us some sound guidance on on how to make this. The secondary units, granny flats, top quality and in the way, in the spirit of of our city, the way it needs to be. So I'm happy to sign on and look forward to getting a report back from my staff.
Speaker 8: Councilman Price.
Speaker 2: I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward. I think this is an excellent item for us to at least consider and talk about. I do know that we have, in addition to talking about the affordable housing issues and concerns and goals that we have as a city, the the situation of senior housing and aging parent housing, you know, the traditional granny flat type scenario is one that is becoming more and more relevant for people in my demographic as our parents begin to age and want to maintain their independence, but being near family. So I think this is a really great consideration for us to have as a council. The one thing that I would hope the item would include is the issue of density and what areas this would be appropriate for. Because my biggest concern is we have some in some areas that we have parking impacts and we also have a some infrastructure and resource limitations. And certainly we don't want to continue building in those areas. And so if we could have the report back includes some possible areas where consideration could be given to modifying our current ordinances. I think that would be a really great, informative and meaningful report. So thank you for bringing this item forward and I think it's an excellent one to learn more about.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilwoman Pierce.
Speaker 5: Thank you. And thank you guys for bringing this item forward as well. I have the same concern that my colleagues Price has, which is looking at parking requirements or any mobility requirements. I mean, and Alamitos Beach. My street has multiple of the back houses. And so just including that in but I think it's a great opportunity to talk about affordability and increasing our housing stock. So thank you guys for bringing it forward.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 4: I misspoke. Do you want to mention anything regarding the parking requirements in the state ordinance or the state law and how it was passed? Perhaps I could shine a little bit light on the requirements.
Speaker 7: You know, I actually do not have the requirements with me right now, but we can report back on that.
Speaker 4: Wonderful. Thank you so much.
Speaker 8: Thank you. And I'll just add, I think it's important that we do explore this seems like pretty good stuff. As long as you like grandma, it might not be a good thing if if you know Grandma step grandma, you might not like too much, but in theory, in theory supportive here. Is there any public comment on this item?
Speaker 9: Race to the podium. I go home? Actually, I wanted to stay for this one because this is very important to me. I brought with me today the article in From Hawaii. I keep a house in Honolulu as well as a house here. Life is good. You can join it. Guest bedrooms available. We call them ohana units in Honolulu. Ohana means family, but we extend the idea of family to being besides mother and father. Because we do something called hanai. We can adopt people outside of our own family and they become actual parts of our family. So in a way, Long Beach is our hanai. You know, we have a huge family here. We used to have zoning for this, but we restricted it quite some time ago. I've been in the city since 1984, so I remember when we did that there was a movement in Belmont Heights that they wanted to down zone. So they changed the zoning from our two end to our one N so that the only one house on a lot and it was supposed to preserve the quality of the neighborhood and it was justifiable. Absolutely. However, there are areas of the of the city where traditionally we've had ohana units, Rose Park for one. A lot of ohana units and or Granny Flats, as you want to call them, throughout the city. But at this at this point, we're not allowed to develop them at all. There are some statue requirements in this thing here that I think that maybe you should take a look at, for instance, the size of the lot requirement . They say that you must have 3500 square feet or more in order to buy because we have five foot setback requirements in the zoning code. Makes sense to me. Also, they're talking about how big it can be. So in Honolulu they limit it to 800 square feet. So at least this is something where we don't have to reinvent the wheel. Let's take a look at what Honolulu did, because it's a really important issue for them, because if you think housing is expensive here, go to Hawaii. There is no more land to get. You know, that that's unless you're going to the big island. And I wouldn't recommend that area where we're getting more land. But the Ohana Unit thing, if we could loosen our zoning and this is about really making an analysis of what sections of the city this would be more appropriate for . Like it maybe it's not appropriate for Belmont Heights. But on the other hand, it might be an incredible first of all, property tax increase and value increase for the sixth District or the seventh District. And I think we can all get on the same page with this working together. So I applaud you all for bringing this forward, and I will give this to the city clerk if you want. I'll review this or come to Honolulu and see me. Thank you.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilman Austin. Okay. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Hi. Good evening, honorable vice mayor and council members and those of you out in TV. I want to commend the council. This is a great idea. It's low hanging fruit. And Nancy Ah, my mentor, before she passed away, a story that she told me she used to love to say. Did you know that in World War Two, the City of Long Beach issued a call to action to its residents to help house American servicemen? So the residents of Long Beach were building things to house people, you know, garages, attics, things were built. And and this was a patriotic act. This was part of the war effort to help our country. And and so they were rewarded. We got some housing for the servicemen. And then in the intervening years, that notion was lost. And these things fell through the cracks and they became illegal bootleg units. And I think that if we could find a way Nancy was very fond of saying we if we could just do a permit holiday and allow these units to be made legal, and they would bring in more revenue, they would bring in more taxes, everybody would benefit. And it would be a very low hanging fruit way to get more affordable housing for the city. So I just want to thank you again for bringing this up and have a good evening. Thank you.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Good evening. My name is Elaine Hutchison, and I'm going to continue the trend here very much. Honorable vice mayor this evening and members of the city council. I am here to say thanks to Stacie Mongeau and to Lena Gonzalez and Councilman Nelson for signing on and putting this measure forward. It is a very important measure because it is one of the things that can be done quickly to make legal and to give permits for the housing that's already here so that people can legally rent those houses and make it available. We have a need for more affordable housing in Long Beach. This would free up some nice housing that's already here and allows for more to come to pass. So thank you very much. We urge your support. Thank you.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 11: Yes, thank you very much. I just wanted to address some of the points that were made. And like I said, I followed the legislation in Sacramento. There was quite a bit of debate over over this particular legislation from many of the cities because they were concerned about losing local control. This is state law now. And so we have to comply with the law. I think what we are asking our development services department to do is to help us, you know, make sense of this for us as a city here in Long Beach. And like I said, I have full confidence that they'll do a great job and bring us back some guidelines and our residents guidelines to move forward with with honoring this law. So I look forward to supporting it.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilmember Young.
Speaker 9: Yeah, I just came out right now because I. I've never read this law. I have no idea. No clue what it is. Can somebody clarify it for me? Or if nothing else, I request that when you come back with asylum to please explain first what it is that we want to study.
Speaker 8: You mean state law? Councilmember Mongo, you want to chime in?
Speaker 7: Certainly, sir. We are preparing a memo that describes what occurred. But there is a state law that was passed and is effective January 1st, 2017, which does require cities to allow accessory dwelling units. As of right, there are certain limitations and we're exploring what those limitations are. But they are as of right. And we are trying to determine what sort.
Speaker 6: Of.
Speaker 7: Development standards, if any, can be put.
Speaker 6: On those.
Speaker 7: Accessory dwelling units.
Speaker 9: Well, thank you for enlightening me and excuse my unawareness of.
Speaker 8: Thank you. So no further public comment. Members, please cast your vote.
Speaker 1: Councilman Pearce. Motion carries. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to direct the Department of Development Services to review existing planning and zoning law and to provide recommendations for, by ordinance, the creation and/or allowance of accessory dwelling units in single-family and multifamily residential zones. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02212017_17-0107 | Speaker 1: Councilman Pearce. Motion carries.
Speaker 8: Thank you. I believe the next item is 14 hearing.
Speaker 1: Item two.
Speaker 8: Okay. Item two.
Speaker 1: Item two requires an oath. Report from Parks, Recreation and Marine recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record. Conclude the public hearing. Consider the appeal by Barbara O'Neill and uphold the decision of the Parks and Recreation Commission to deny the fee waiver request for the Tuberculosis Alliance. Step forward for the current walk cure. Walk citywide.
Speaker 8: Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 4: Yes.
Speaker 8: Oh, you have an oath. Is there an oath here? Yes. Okay. Let's have you.
Speaker 1: Please raise your right hand. You and each of you do solemnly state that the testimony you may give in the cause now and pending before this body shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God.
Speaker 8: Thank you. And since this is a hearing, we the order is we go to the staff presentation next. So, City Manager West.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. Vice Mayor. The staff report for this will be given by Marie Knight, our director of Parks Rec, and Maureen.
Speaker 5: The mayor, members of the Council. On Thursday, December 15th, 2016, the Parks and Recreation Commission voted to deny the feed fee waiver request for Barbara O'Neill on behalf of the Tuberous Sclerosis Alliance for a fundraising walk to be held in El Dorado Regional Park, the Golden Grove, in May of 2017, pursuant to Section 2.54.010 of the Long Beach Municipal Code. Ms. O'Neill is appealing the decision of the Commission to deny the waiver of the applied fees. The permitted activity is a fundraising walk to be held in El Dorado East Regional Park. The fees collected and subject to this appeal include $595 in facility rental fees and a $30 permit fee. The Commission determined that there was not sufficient benefit from the proposed activity directly to the Long Beach community to warrant the waiver of the fees. The Commission believes that this action was made pursuant to the adopted fee waiver policy and in the best interest of the residents of Long Beach. The Commission vote to deny the request to waive the fees was unanimous. Under Section 902 of the City Charter, the Parks and Recreation Commission has the power and duty to establish fees for public recreational programs and for the use of public parks and recreation facilities, and have, since 2011 used a utilize fee waiver policy when evaluating the waiver requests. Ms.. O'Neill is the appellant and the representative of the Tuberous Sclerosis Alliance. I do not believe she is here any longer this evening. I believe she did leave earlier this evening, and I believe she left a notice with the city clerk when she left. And so with no testimony, the council may, with a two thirds majority, decide to affirm, modify or overrule the action of the commission. And that concludes my report.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Is there an appellant here that would like to speak? Okay. Seeing none. We'll go back. Is there anything additional on the staff site?
Speaker 9: No. Vice Mayor, thank you.
Speaker 8: Okay. So at that point, at this point, we'll go open it up to the public. Is there any public comment on this hearing? Seeing none. We will close the hearing and bring it back behind the rail. Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 4: Yes. I appreciate the hard work of our commissioners. It is a tough job that they have before them. They took this waiver very seriously and they stuck to the policy and I'm very supportive of them doing that. Our parks are a treasure and an opportunity and they are applying the rules as this council has guided them. So I appreciate their hard work. It is always difficult to say no to anyone, especially a nonprofit that's out there doing great work that we appreciate. But there are costs of doing business in the city, and it is important that we maintain our parks with those fees and we appreciate their work. I hope the Council will support the Commission's decision.
Speaker 8: Thank you. So it's been moved and seconded and we've already had public comments from members. Please cast your vote. | Public Hearing | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, consider the appeal by Barbara O’Neill, and uphold the decision of the Parks and Recreation Commission to deny the Fee Waiver Request for the Tuberous Sclerosis Alliance’s Step Forward For a Cure Walk (Permit No. 8213). (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02212017_17-0124 | Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 8: Item 20, please.
Speaker 1: Item 20 Report from Parks, Recreation and Marine Recommendation to receive and file information regarding restoration of the senior meal program at Cesar Chavez and Silverado Park District one and seven.
Speaker 8: Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: Yes. Can we get a staff report first, please?
Speaker 9: Yes. Marie Knight, our director of Parks, Recreation and Marine.
Speaker 5: Good evening, Mayor and members of the Council. In July of 2005, the Human Services Association HCA, a nonprofit organization under contract with the County of Los Angeles, began serving congregate meals at six senior service sites here in Long Beach. In 2012, HCA notified the city of its intent to eliminate the senior meal program at Cesar Chavez and Silverado Parks beginning in June 2012. The decision to eliminate services came on the heels of funding reductions from the county that HSA anticipated for fiscal year 2013. At that time, the congregate meal programs at both Cesar Chavez and Silverado Parks, along with the site in the city of Lakewood, were chosen to be discontinued, primarily due to their low attendance. At that time, the staff prepared a two from four to the council, indicating that it would cost approximately $73,000. At that point in time to restore those sites. Currently the meals are served at four of our sites, and the numbers that are served to date on an annual basis are on par with what the six sites were at that point in time. In 2016, our Senior Advisory Commission again raised the question regarding what it would be, what would be needed financially to restore these sites, and therefore that would prompted the report to the city council. Per HSA. The current cost to the city to restore a congregate meal program at Chisholm, Chavez and Silverado Park is just over $51,000 per site, and this cost assumes serving an estimated 30 meals a day per site at $6.95 a meal for 250 meals annually. So I do want to mention and apologize to the council, I know that this report has been delayed in coming. The original request was before I came on board, and so for a while it was lost in a little bit of my transition. It was also lost in my understanding of what a two from four was and who was it to and from and what was it for? At one point in time, it was my understanding that this was an item that was to come from our with our strategic plan for senior services. And when I realized that that was not the case, we moved it forward to our commission. Our commission, our senior advisory commission then established a subcommittee to look into the issues. They wanted to meet with Long Beach Transit because at one point in time they thought that there were some changes in the transit route that might have affected the number of seniors attending the meal sites. So they wanted to hear from the representatives of Long Beach Transit, and that proved to be a little bit difficult. They scheduled several meetings and unfortunately at those meetings, Long Beach Transit did not have the appropriate folks in attendance to answer their questions. So staff reached out and made a determination that the routes indeed had not been changed. And so subsequently then we moved this item forward to the council, and that ends my report.
Speaker 8: Thank you for that very detailed report. Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: Well, Marie, thank you for the staff report and just being forthcoming with the delay, because it was very frustrating, to be quite honest, that we hadn't received anything until a year later. The report specified 90 days. And so now we're here at a year. And in quite frankly, the information in here I don't think is as comprehensive as we could be. So what I'm going to request is that we look at this a little bit further because I think this is very important for the community. I'm going to ask that we actually go back to the drawing board and come back on April 18th. That gives us almost about another two months to look at these two items again. So specifically with the first part, and I understand that the meals it looks like at Chavez and Silverado have gone down. But I truly believe it is relative to the transportation issues. And so in the eight years that I've been with the city of Long Beach, I know for a fact that we've had passport service cut back around Chavez Park. The free passport service also cut off at Park Pacific Towers. This was some few years ago, seventh and Pacific. And then the free passport, although it's not related, but it does still contribute to the overall issue with seniors getting access to the senior center and food programs. As I know that the Free Passport Service was cut off, passed a fourth on on fourth Street, passed Alamitos. So there was a charge after that which was on the path to the senior center there. So those elements, I think, kind of changed. And it'd be good to to see how that when they when they were cut off and how they affected the meals served at each of those locations. And. The first part, I would like us to get really creative with funding. I know that we just. I think a few agenda items ago, we had just collaborated. I know our public works department collaborated with the city shuttle or I'm sorry, a county shuttle to be able to provide additional shuttle services to Alamitos Landing. And so I don't know what could be done there, but I'm asking us to get a little bit more creative, to figure out some opportunities, whether it's through transportation, whether it's through working with our health department, food finders, nonprofits, whoever it might be to add a food program back at these two locations because we don't have any food programs for seniors on the west side of the city. And the transportation issue is still a prevalent issue for seniors getting to those locations for that reason. So, again, asking to come back April 18th with more information and we'll continue to work with you. But thank you very much.
Speaker 9: Robert. I am taking this motion alone to support the comments made by Councilmember Gonzalez. She hit the nail on the head when it comes to these two locations. They are in the highly needed areas, especially when you look at Silverado Park. Anytime you remove a program, that's one less program that that area has. And we need to find the financing. We need to find the money to support these programs regardless of how. It comes out like saying that they don't participate. We need to have programs here regardless of how you feel or how staff feels about it. So I want to have the I want I want my colleagues to please support the motion on the floor as we need more information so that we can make it clear that programs such as these are needed, even when there's a belief that they're going being fully utilized.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 4: I'd be interested to know what the protocols are, but when when we talk about C one and C two funding that was awarded to either HSA or any other agency that is broken out at the state level by zip code and income and a couple of other factors. And so I'd be interested in that staff report for it to come back and or to actually have a dialog with decision makers, both at HSA and the county level or any other agency that currently has a contract with L.A. County that would be a certified provider that would be able to provide us both types of meals within the C two funding. There's different strata of meals that we could qualify for. And so I'd like to see that outlined as well. And I'm happy to provide any background and guidance from my time when I was on the the budget side of C one and see two for L.A. County, because I think that we actually have more discretion in this that we're probably utilizing so happy to serve or attend any meeting that I'm allowed to in my capacity as a councilperson or as a non council person resident if possible. Thank you.
Speaker 9: Councilmember Mangold. Would that be friendly that you're coming back with some kind of funding plan as well?
Speaker 4: I'm supporting the staff report and hoping to make suggestions if they would be taken as a friendly. I'm happy to have a. Sure we can do that.
Speaker 6: Great. Great.
Speaker 8: All right, Councilwoman Pryce.
Speaker 2: I think my questions have all been answered. I want to thank staff for actually bringing this forward. And as Councilwoman Gonzales said for the candor, I, too, did not know what a two from four was until about a year into the position where I finally asked someone why all of the city manager's emails with memos have a subject line that says TFF, what's a tiff? I did not understand for a long time what it meant. So I get that and I appreciate you bringing it forward. I'm sure that wasn't the first of the items that you realized were sitting in a pile, and.
Speaker 5: I thought it was a cute way of saying the.
Speaker 6: F for a while.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 11: Thank you very much and was looking at some of the data here reminds me of a luncheon that I attended just this past weekend. I was honored by a group called Women in Action Reaching Out, and they have been in existence for about four years. They provide about 1500 meals per month to seniors and child care centers throughout North Long Beach, mostly in the eighth District. And they operate out of the Carmen Alito's housing development where they feed the seniors there. They Carmelita those that are a district, expose seniors twice a week. And so I would just make a recommendation, Mary, to possibly connect with them to see if there's a way that they may be able to to assist with some of these other senior meals. I'm looking at what's going on here, 41 meals per day at Highland Park, 51 meals a day. And McBride, you know, they're doing at least 60 meals at at Expo. I know. And probably more than that at Little Seniors. So it would be just a matter of understanding their capacity. But they're doing some wonderful work.
Speaker 6: Great.
Speaker 8: Thank you. So there's a motion by Councilwoman Gonzalez, seconded by Councilman Ranga, to bring it back, continue, study and bring it back April 18th with the feedback, the additional friendly amendment from Councilwoman Mungo's. Any public comment on this?
Speaker 6: Karen resides part Pacific, Oregon. I'm one of the recipients of the smell program. I participated in both the Eldorado Park program and currently since the park officers got flooded at the Fourth Street Senior Center, where Partners of Parks has been relocated to. This program is a vital program for seniors. And Lena is right that when the bus route changed, that that impacted the attendance for Cesar Chavez, not just for the lunch program, but for all the programs, senior programs to go to Cesar Chavez. If I'm going to go from my building, it takes two busses and it takes me about 40 minutes. And it's not that far. So what's more important about the lunch program that that hasn't been stated is that it's voluntary. The seniors do contribute donations. And seniors that have more money tend to put money in the box. So that's recovered as part of the cost. I think it's important that, you know, that it's not a total giveaway. And the seniors, what's more important than the food, which helps a lot of seniors make it. Through the month and having a hot meal. That's why I go oftentimes. That's the only hot meal I get during the day is the social interaction that you create with the people that you sit with. And there's quite a social hierarchy and who sits where in these tables? And there's a lot of strong relationships that get built out of it. So it's a vital program. It's really sad that there's not a program on the West Side because that's where the largest concentration of senior buildings are.
Speaker 8: Thank you. So saying no further public comment, members, please cast your vote on the TFF. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to receive and file information regarding restoration of the senior meal program at Cesar E. Chavez and Silverado Parks. (Districts 1,7) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02212017_17-0125 | Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Next item, please.
Speaker 1: I am 21. Report from Parks, Recreation and Marine Development Services. Recommendation to adopt resolution authorizing city manager to submit a grant application to the California Department of Housing and Community Development for the rehabilitation of park facilities and grounds. Accept such grant. Funding in the amount not to exceed 1,326,000 District one and six.
Speaker 8: Thank you, sir. Staff report.
Speaker 9: Marie Knight.
Speaker 5: Yes, Mayor and members of the council. This is a grant administered by the California Department of Housing and Community Development. It is in the amount of 1.3, just a little bit over $1.3 million. And the projects that we are proposing, the funding be used for having access to the low income housing units, where the funding that was related to the grant and that would be Drake Park, Peace Park and Mt. Martin Luther King Park. And the funding would allow us to do such things as replacing play equipment, refurbishing interior public spaces, addressing exterior accessibility issues and general safety and site improvements.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: This is great. I'm I'm glad that we are bringing this forward and those parks definitely need additional love. So thank you very much, Murray.
Speaker 8: Councilman Pierce. Thank you. Any public comment on this item saying no members cast your vote. | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolution authorizing City Manager, or designee, to submit a grant application to the California Department of Housing and Community Development, through the Housing-Related Parks Program, for the rehabilitation of park facilities and park grounds at Drake Park, Peace Park, and Martin Luther King, Jr., Park; accept such grant funding in an amount up to $1,326,350; and, execute all documents necessary to accept the funds and implement the projects. (Districts 1,6) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02142017_17-0098 | Speaker 4: Moving on to item number 19.
Speaker 1: Item 19 is a communication from Vice Mayor Richardson. Councilwoman Gonzalez. Councilwoman Mango and Council Member. Your Urunga recommendation to proceed with the restorations. A paramedic rescue 12 and the reinstatement of police academy operations pursuant to the City Manager's proposal for additional restoration. Using Measure A Thank you.
Speaker 4: I turn this over to Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mayor Garcia. Public safety is a core responsibility of our city. Without a safe city, our families, communities and neighborhoods cannot thrive, expand and prosper. As a Lumbee City Council member, I am committed to our city's public safety needs. Our entire city council has demonstrated that and will always seek ways to improve our service delivery to our residents. I was honored to support restorations in East Long Beach and with Engine eight and reestablish the South Division. But today is particularly special for me because of the history and significance of what today's recommendation means not only the North Long Beach, but the entire city. It's not a new conversation. It's been almost seven, seven year campaign. It was the first budget that my predecessor, Councilman Steve Neal, worked on in 2010 when Rescue 12 was eliminated due to dire budget circumstances. I was there as chief of staff and we were forced to have a very uncomfortable conversation with our community expanding, explaining that we were losing a very important asset and that response times would certainly be affected. Since then, we faced increased response times across the city and the safety of our residents has been has been significantly compromised . For example, we know that in 2005, our average response time for all emergency services was 5 minutes and 29 seconds. But in 2015, the average spot's time was 6 minutes and 16 seconds. In 2015, after the county, Los Angeles, eliminated the Rapid Medic Deployment Model Pilot Program, we lost the R&D Basic Life Support Rescue in District nine , and our office launched the Save Our Services campaign with the community to talk about restoring that paramedic service. We came back to City Council and asked staff to find answers to restore the service utility utilizing GMT funding. And first response was a first responder fee and it was determined then that the resources were not yet in place to restore paramedic service to District nine. Then on November 22nd, 2016, after the voters adopted Measure A and a number of additional revenue measures, I made a motion asking staff to create a plan to restore Rescue 12 and additional services in the first quarter of 2017. Once we saw a complete revenue picture and in processing of the results of the November election on February 1st, City Manager West responded to the Council by submitting a fiscal, fiscally prudent and responsible plan to restore Paramedic Rescue 12, as well as the reinstatement of police academy operations allowing for faster response times and the capacity to more effectively train new police recruits. I want to take a moment to thank city manager Pat West, financial management director John Growth GROSS, both Fire Chief De Re and Police Chief Luna. The rank and file police officers and firefighters who struggle year after year to achieve the paradox of doing more with more with less. So today it's with great anticipation that I move that we accept staff's recommendation to proceed with the restoration of paramedic paramedic rescue 12 and the reinstatement of the police academy operations effective March 1st, 2017, pursuant to the city manager's proposal for additional restorations using Measure eight. With these restorations, we have a lower paramedic response time across the entire city. A paramedic stationed at Fire at Fire Station 12 to serve North Long Beach and a fully capable, fully capable advanced life support services. I want to also thank Mayor Garcia, Budget Oversight Committee Chair Stacy Mongeau and the members of the City Council for your support. We've been discussing this for years and have always made public safety a top priority. And now we have a fiscally and structurally sound plan to restore service that we can count on and that our residents deserve. And that's my motion.
Speaker 4: Okay. There's a motion by Vice Mayor Richardson. Is there a second?
Speaker 6: That's my.
Speaker 4: Second about. Councilman Mongo. Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 3: I think it's great that we're able to restore this. I think that Councilmember Vice Mayor Richardson has been a leader in this. And I also know that this has also been a big priority for Councilmember Austin. I know the east side is going to be able to benefit as well, because when one fire paramedic station is put back or resources put back into circulation, the entire system works more efficiently and effectively. So this is a win for all of Long Beach.
Speaker 4: Councilman, your anger.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mayor. I want to thank Vice Mayor Richardson for allowing me to participate in this this motion. As a former recruitment officer for the city of Long Beach, I'm very pleased to see that we're going to be reactivating the academy. It's a very important aspect of recruiting and getting more officers into into our department. So I'm very glad to see that we're going to be reinstating the academy with full time personnel to continue our recruitment of excellent personnel for our city. Thank you.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 3: I yes. I just wanted to say congratulations to everybody that's worked really hard on this. I know that it's really bringing us up into the 21st century and so excited about the new academy, excited about PD and excited about fire. So good job, everyone.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Councilman Pierce. I'm sorry. Councilman Price.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I want to echo the sentiments of my colleagues. I want to thank Vice Mayor Richardson and Councilman Austin. I know they've both felt very strongly about restoring services in North Long Beach. And I agree with Councilman Mungo that that relieves pressure for the whole city. I'm also very happy that we were able to look at our measure funds and reallocate some funds and defer some of our street projects as the item referenced in 2017 to allow for this to happen. I've said that, you know, we're going to have to take a look at our measure spending to make sure that we're in proportion in terms of public safety expenditures, as well as infrastructure expenditures, so that there are some balance there in light of the public safety needs of the city. So I was happy to see that in the item that my colleagues filed that that language appeared in there. So that was great. Thank you very much to the city team for the great work that they did. And I look forward to more restorations as as in the coming years. Thanks.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Let me let me just also add and say that I want to thank staff for working. I know hard on this. The Chiefs, the entire council, obviously, Vice Mayor Richardson and Councilman Austin's been advocating for this as well as a bunch of other folks. And I'll repeat that. I think thanks to the support of the citizens and the voters, these restorations are possible. And so because of Measure A, we restore to engineer in Beaumont Shaw, we restore South Division in downtown because of Measure eight. Tonight, we're restoring the rescue in North Long Beach and we're restoring the Police Academy unit to ensure that training is the best possible in the city of Long Beach. And so this is exactly what what the measure was about. I remind people Measure eight started on January 1st of this year. That was 45 days or so ago. So we're just getting started and we're excited about the progress. So with that, as any public comment. Seeing none again. The machine still not working. So all those in favor say I. Any. Any oppose. Okay. Motion carries. Thank you. Why don't I do? I do have. Thank you. Thank you. And for the community. I know it's a I know it's a big deal. We're going to do item 25 and then we've got three three members of the public under public comment. So let's do item 25. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to proceed with the restoration of Paramedic Rescue 12 and the reinstatement of Police Academy operations effective March 1, 2017, pursuant to the City Manager's proposal for additional restorations using Measure A. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02142017_17-0104 | Speaker 1: Item 25 Communication from Councilman Austin, Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilman Andrews and Councilmember Durango. Recommendation to formally support the proposal by Metro to enter into a contract with the Long Beach Police Department and the Los Angeles Police Department to perform security and safety services on the Metro Blue Line.
Speaker 4: Thank you much for this. Over to Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And we ask that this issue be placed on the supplemental agenda due to the sensitive timing of the matter. Next week, the Metro Board will be considering this particular issue. So it's very important, I think, that the city council here tonight weigh in. Improving blue line safety has been and is a high priority for this council and for thousands of residents who use the public transportation moat of light rail in an effort to improve safety and quality of ridership. Metro staff has proposed entering into contracts with Long Beach PD and LAPD to partially replace the L.A. County Sheriff's Department and to increase coverage of policing during each 24 hour period. Response times in Long Beach would improve from 12 to 14 minutes to less than 5 minutes. This is a local policing approach that should be strongly supported by this council. And for that, I'd ask for your I vote and encourage our new MTA representative to support as well. And that is Dr. Robert Garcia, obviously our mayor. And so with that, I would ask for your support on this matter.
Speaker 4: Okay. There's a motion by Councilman Austin. Is there a second? Yes. Second by Councilmember Andrews council managers.
Speaker 2: Yes. Thank you. First of all, I want to thank councilman also for bringing this item, you know, forward. You know, I also want to thank and congratulate the mayor, Robert Garcia, as he's, you know, settled into his new Metro board seat. And congratulations, you may on that. Metro is a wonderful access to our city and we can't get from Long Beach law says in less than an hour. This thing you know, this kind of service requires safety and welcoming assets to the Long Beach residents. Also, our Long Beach officers know that the understanding our community and needs better than everyone else, it knows about the situation. I would also be wonderful to know them, to be a part of this process and make our station safer and actively patrolled and directed enforcement. You know, Law Order on these are on that platform. So thank you again is also bringing it forward. And again, Mayor, for receiving that, you know, position.
Speaker 4: Thank you. I know we can't log in or any other councilmember comments. Councilman Pearce.
Speaker 3: Yes. I just want to say how exciting it is to be able to finally have some great representation on our Metro Board and colleague support. I think reducing the travel times of someone who rode that blue line for 3 hours straight every day is going to be a big deal for folks that are traveling to downtown and public safety. Being able to take off some pressure from our PD is really exciting. And when we talk about mobility in our city, it's transparency, it's accessibility and dependability. And being able to do that with our blue line through the whole city is going to be really great for everyone. Thank you.
Speaker 4: Thank you. And just to add, I want to thank customer Austin under his leadership as president of the COG. They've been very involved in metro issues. And so I know that Councilman Austin as as president has been pretty involved in this issue and a bunch of other issues around Metro. And just to summarize, again, the Metro board of 13 members will vote on this not this Thursday, but next Thursday. And the vote is essentially to allow Ambridge Police Department to be able to control its own destiny when it comes to the Long Beach blue line and patrol the blue line ourselves, which is something that we've been wanting to do for for a long time. And so I've been on record supporting this already. I support the council's efforts tonight. I think it helps for the board next week, and I'd like to open it up for any public comment.
Speaker 2: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the city council.
Speaker 0: Craig Koch with the downtown Long Beach Associates. As the.
Speaker 2: Mayor articulated, there's been a strong effort for many, many.
Speaker 0: Years.
Speaker 2: To bring this to fruition. I strongly support this this movement. Our board strongly supports it.
Speaker 4: The community is very much behind it.
Speaker 0: We have joined forces with the Chamber and the CVB in order in order to support this this motion being.
Speaker 4: Presented to the Metro Board next week.
Speaker 0: We will continue to mobilize.
Speaker 2: Our community and encourage them to help support this initiative to make Long Beach as.
Speaker 0: Well as the Metro.
Speaker 2: Line, much safer than it is today. So I appreciate your consideration and look forward to your support. Thank you very much.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 2: Very good. You work as my address. My perspective comes from one who that is, I would venture to say, has a better understanding the blue line and every system that the MTA operates than anyone in this city and with the exception or two or three anyone in the tri county area, period. This is, I would say, one of those items. What I would in first reaction would say it would be divorced from intelligence. But the problem is it would never had a nexus with intelligence, period. That's separate and distinct from the fact that we don't even have enough police to police our own streets, let alone a paradigm that is entirely different. Then policing a city, period. No ifs, no ads, no buts. I had more knowledge of this blueline than any single person in this room. Period, as I said. But also the MTA system itself, as well as comparative systems within the backwash I transportation corridors, very policing of a transit paradigm is entirely different. No ifs, no answers, no buts. And anybody who says otherwise has their head firmly in a position that they need to see a proctologist buried. I'm absolutely sure there are serious problems. It no question. I think the answer and this is way out of the box thinking. The only way to really solve this problem. Is to enter into an agreement with the Holy See, hire a platoon of nuns, well-trained, know how to use a 12 inch wooden ruler and a bar of lava soap. And you give them the guarantee that the AFL-CIO will not be allowed to interfere in that, and only that, with the possible exception of ending the DNC program of encouraging people to get household income by popping out a kid every 18 months. That's the only way you're going to have the money needs to go to the trained professionals, i.e. those that Jim McDonald and captain and excuse me guy believes now Captain Thomas do a very well great job training. They're the ones that the county board of supervisors needs to funnel the money to not Long Beach police. That again cannot even protect its own streets period. There are only limited there are only the Long Beach police should only be in call. Call to take the purpose of this the station or out of a train. Beyond that, they should not set foot on a blue line.
Speaker 4: Thank you. See any other public comment? Please come forward.
Speaker 3: Karen replied. I live in the corner in seventh and Pacific Avenue. As someone who takes public transportation every day and regularly rides the blue line, I am very excited that our officers locally are going to assist in safety. I think it will stop a lot of the drug dealing that happens on the platforms and will keep a lot of people that come from other areas to our city on the blue line to do illegal activity and cause problems downtown from doing that activity. So I'm excited. I know this has been a long time in process that this is finally.
Speaker 11: Coming to fruition, and I believe that.
Speaker 3: Our Long Beach police will do a far better job than the sheriffs do because they will know.
Speaker 11: Who the local perpetrators are. Thank you.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Seeing no other public comment and no other council comments. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: Yes. Thank you. And before we take a vote, I'd like to just make sure that this this vote is married in intelligence and considers the the colossal paradigm shift that we are going to be embark on. I'd like to call the police chief up and just ask a couple of basic questions. Hello, Chief. So an understanding the motion before us. And I'm sure you are aware of the the the issue. Does Longbridge PD have the resources to effectively police the blue line should this measure passed MTA.
Speaker 2: So the question is tied into your previous vote, because of the leadership of this Council and the foresight, you have supported us in hiring back to back academies that started last year. We are going to hire two more academies this coming year. So as we are becoming more healthy, as we're considering attrition and some of the other factors, we are well-positioned to join in this multi-agency security plan. And I got to emphasize that it's not just Long Beach taking over the blue line, it's Long Beach taking over the blue line. And then the Los Angeles Police Department taking over a significant amount.
Speaker 0: Of the rest of the.
Speaker 2: Metro line. That's going to positively impact, I believe, the entire system. But for the city of Long Beach itself, to have our own police officers patrolling the the the rail itself or on the train itself and the platforms and the corridors adjacent only enhances the visibility up and down our primary corridors, which I believe, based on my experience, will positively impact not only crime but the quality of life. No one can patrol or knows their city as well as their own local police department. And I have heard for years for many of our stakeholders and our citizens that they're unhappy with L.A. County sheriffs, and they have wanted us, the Long Beach Police Department, to patrol this blue line. And through the mayor's leadership and all of yours. This sends a strong message. I'm not saying we're going to get it, but I think we're well positioned on February 23rd that the vote may go our way and the city our city is going to benefit greatly.
Speaker 8: Thank you for that. I don't think I have any other questions. I think, you know, that helps me make an intelligent decision this evening. Thank you, Chief.
Speaker 4: Okay. Thank you. Seeing no other public comment members. Again, the Granicus system is down. So all those in favor, please say I, i any oppose. Okay. Motion carried unanimously. Thank you. I'm going to go to think and thank you all for your support on that. I'm going to ask so the Granicus system is down. And so we've been trying to move some things around here. But if I can have an Cantrell, Larry Goodhue and Larry Boland all, please come up. And just one after the other. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to formally support the proposal by the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority to enter into a contract with the Long Beach Police Department and the Los Angeles Police Department to perform security and safety services on the Metro Blue Line. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02142017_17-0078 | Speaker 0: So all five motions have been adopted, right? City clerk. Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations, everyone. Thank you. So we're going to go ahead and move on to hearing number two. And Madam Clerk, would you please go ahead and deliver the oath for number two?
Speaker 1: Item to require that all those who wish to speak on this item, please raise your right hand. Please stand up and raise your right hand, please.
Speaker 6: Mm.
Speaker 1: You and each of you do solemnly state that the testimony you may give in that cause now and pending before this body shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. So help you God.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Item number two, please.
Speaker 1: Item two is a report from Development Services. Recommendation two received supporting documentation into the record, concluded the public hearing. Consider the applicant's appeal and find the proposed vacations of 11 7.62 feet of an east west alley located east of Daisy Avenue and south of Willow Street, behind Fy20 West Willow Street. Not in conformance with the adopted goals and policies of the city's general plan and uphold the Planning Commission's determinations of non conformance or overturn the Planning Commission's determination of non conformance and approve categorical exemption. Number of 14 Dash 007, District seven.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. West.
Speaker 2: Deputy City manager Nita Dempsey will introduce the item. Thank you, vice mayor.
Speaker 6: Members of the Council Planning Bureau. Manager Linda Taylor will provide the staff report.
Speaker 11: Good evening once again, vice mayor, members of the Council. I'd like to give a brief overview of this presentation because it is an early abandonment. We do have a graphic presentation that I think will aid in in presenting the the specifics of this project. This this item is an appeal of an alley general plan. Conformity. Determination. And just for purposes of orientation, this is a vicinity map that shows the location of the alley, which is highlighted in red. It is located at five, the property at 520 West Willow. So Willow Street is there to the north and Magnolia Avenue is the property to the west of the property. Again, the the alley that's being requested for a general plan, conformity determination is highlighted in red. That adjacent parking lot to the south serves the building at 520 west Willow. All of these properties are under one ownership of the appellant. The request is to vacate a 117 feet segment of the alley and the zoning of the property of the alley itself and the adjacent park. The parking lot is p. However, the property on the frontage of Willow is actually zoned community oriented, commercial or automobile oriented community commercial. The reason that we are here for this council action is that state law requires that before the city disposes of any property or abandons any public right of way it has to, the Planning Commission is required to make a determination that the the abandonment conforms to the city's general plan, specifically to the land use element and to the mobility element. And that determination goes before a public hearing of the planning commission. And in this case, that determination was heard by the Planning Commission. And what we're here tonight is to have the planning, the city council consider that finding of a determination of conformity or non-conformity. I would just point out that this is just the first step of the process. If the council makes a decision regarding the conformity of this, this particular item, it would need to come back to the city council for an actual abandonment through a formal public hearing. So this is just one step. Once the conformity determination is made, it would then come back to the Council for an action on the actual abandonment. So I'd like to just give you the history of the project. The Planning Commission heard this item and on December 1st, 2016, and at that time, staff recommended that the Planning Commission make a finding of conformity after having reviewed the circulation element and the land use element. Staff found the the requested determination to be in conformance with the general plan. However, after the public testimony and the Planning Commission's deliberation, they found the abandonment not to be in conformance, and they directed staff to come back to the Planning Commission with a determination of non conformance at the January 5th Planning Commission hearing. The staff brought back the finding of of nonconforming determination and the Planning Commission adopted that finding on a vote of 5 to 1. Again, just to give you a little bit of context here, if you can see there south of Willow, you can see that if you look west of the property, the subject abandonment on the left , traveling west. You can see that the alley goes immediately south of Willow. And on this segment, you can see the proposed abandonment. The abandonment would only have been in one segment on the westerly side of that property. The alley would continue to be an open and public alley on the eastern portion. And that eastern portion does travel south. So that portion of the alley would remain open and available for public use. The reason I wanted to show this slide is that you can see that the alley is not continuous throughout that neighborhood. You can see on the block immediately east of the site, there is no alley. There is an alley on the block adjacent to that. And then again, just west of Cedar. There is no alley. So it's a very disjointed configuration for some properties. Have an alley and some do not. Next slide. So on. After the Planning Commission action on this item within the ten day appeal period, the property owner did file an appeal requesting that this item be heard by the City Council to reconsider and to make a determination of conformance performance inconsistent with the general plan. The applicants contended that the Planning Commission improperly characterized the subject properties having the same condition as the surrounding properties, and they felt that the the subject alley did not have the same characteristics of the surrounding property. And they also felt that the Planning Commission didn't recognize the safety issue of having to cross the alley to access the parking lot for that for their building. Next slide. So we've talked about the the alley and the vicinity. I think you can get a good picture of that. I'd like to just conclude the presentation by summarizing the recommendation. The recommendation of the Planning Commission is that the City Council find that the proposed vacation of the alley is not in conformance with the adopted goals and policies of the general plan. However, because staff felt that the City Council should have an alternative recommendation, considering staff's initial recommendation that the alley is in conformance, we are presenting the City Council with two alternatives. One is to uphold the Planning Commission's determination that the alley abandonment is not in conformance, but also to consider that the alley is in conformance so staff is available. This concludes our presentation where available to answer any questions you might have, and we also have public works staff available as needed, if any questions come up regarding the abandonment specifically.
Speaker 6: And Vice Mayor Richardson, if I.
Speaker 2: Might add, before we conclude, there are findings that accompany each for and against this particular project. So regardless of how council votes, they would also be voting to adopt appropriate findings either for or against this alley vacation. And they are in your packet.
Speaker 0: Thank you. So we will hear from the applicant and then we'll have public comment.
Speaker 12: Hello. Good evening. I thank you for hearing me tonight, Linda. Wonderful job, as always. Thank you. Pablo, do you have my presentation?
Speaker 2: There we go. How do I have a clicker?
Speaker 0: Just say next.
Speaker 12: Just say next.
Speaker 6: Year. Yeah. It'd be fun. Next. Thank you.
Speaker 12: Thank you. Appreciate it. Which which button is it?
Speaker 6: All right, great.
Speaker 12: So real quick, just to talk about Westlund and who we are and what we do. Western real estate group is a Long Beach based family real estate company. We've been in Long Beach for 40 plus years. We have we are a company that has about 10,000, what we call 10,000 doors. That includes about 8000 or 7000, give or take, apartment units in Southern California and Nevada. And we've also got about a million square feet of commercial shopping centers and strip centers. We do development as well. As you can see, we've developed this nice building. We've developed some other buildings around Southern California, and and we continue to seek development projects. When we moved out of North Long Beach in 2014, we had 60 employees. We redeveloped this 1940s building here on the corner of Daisy and Willow. Improved it to its original and restored it to its original beauty, I guess you can say. And we moved in with 60 employees. Today, we have about 90 employees working out of that office. We're also in the same building. We're housing the Long Beach Beer Lab, which is coming in as a brewery next door to us. And so this is a pretty well used the building. Next. Got it. So as Linda spoke, the Planning Department originally found positive findings for this allocation. Went before the Planning Commission a few weeks ago, a few months ago at this point. And it's important to kind of note what they said in their positive findings, and I'll read them really quickly, even though they're in front of you. All elements of the general plan were considered and staff finds this vacation to be in conformance with all applicable elements. The land use elements, land use element, which is a key element as the existing parcels develop with a parking lot associated with an existing commercial building, vacation of the alley would conform to the land use element and they spoke about the mobility element as the second element that's necessary to get the abandonment. It is the alley abandonment would therefore not prove detrimental to the movement of people and goods through the area. When the Planning Commission seemed to get stuck on some issues that were not addressed at the Planning Commission hearing. But it's important to note that when the Planning Department went back and found those negative findings, the Planning Commission ordered them to. They didn't actually change their findings, really what they did or they they what they did was found that the Planning Commission determined that it wasn't in conformance but didn't actually change the results of their findings , which is interesting, I think. But the planning commission seemed to get. Caught up on three main issues, it seemed to us anyways, from what they from kind of where it went. Trash pickup, fairness and cyclists. And I'll get into all three of those issues and kind of address what the Planning Commission had a problem with. And and maybe that helps you guys look at what we're doing here. And this time I brought a laser pointer. So as you can see, this is our this is our office building is right here. The alley that we're trying to abandon is right behind our building. And this is our parking lot. This is an old aerial view, obviously now. And many of you are aware we have a very large solar project that covers our parking lot. The trash enclosure here on the corner is actually designed to open up to the north south alleyway. And in fact, right now, when the trash comes and picks up, it does come from the south or north. I guess that is. I'm confused. It goes north and then east and it picks up. That can pick up the trash right here on this corner. So abandon this alley won't affect trash at all. The trash enclosure was designed that way. The fairness issue. They talked a lot about why would it be that we'd be able to vacate this alley and not the other alleys and not some of the other alleys like our neighboring properties? And they said, hey, this building looks like all the other buildings out there. What would be the what would be the value of abandoning this particular piece? It's really important to note, and we highlighted in yellow, as you can see, all around every there's a bunch of alleys on this corridor and every one of the buildings on the corridor has what you're seeing is a yellow highlight. That yellow highlight is the buffer zone between the door and the parking lot of the or the door and the alley, basically. So, for example, the Bank of America, you come out, they're exit door that you walk into a parking lot, not an alley, and then pass the parking lot into an alley, save a lot of time to react to fast moving vehicles. Our neighbor next door has about 20 feet between his door and the alleyway. And across here, you can kind of see all of those. They've got these parking lots right by their back doors. Ours doesn't have that condition, as you'll see on the next slide. This is a picture of the back of our building, which is actually our main entrance. That's the main entrance to our office where we have 90 employees. We have obviously tenants, customers coming in, paying rent, etc., all the time. This is there's constantly people traversing back and forth along this alleyway or from the alley to the parking lot. And this picture down here is actually a picture. The picture of down here is taken from the door itself. So you can see there's a very small sidewalk between the door and the alleyway. And cars speed through this alley to go from daisy to Magnolia or magnolia to Daisy, and it creates a significant hazard in our view. You can read more of the slides that I mean, you guys have access to this. I just want to summarize. I know it's late and nobody wants to get to their Valentine's dates.
Speaker 2: Before it's too late.
Speaker 12: Cyclists, as I'm getting I'm getting there. Apologize the cyclist issue, which was an odd one to us because in our view, they mentioned that they've noticed that cyclists use this alley to get from Magnolia to Daisy. But as you are all aware, the general plan, the city of Long Beach has been a you guys have adopted a general plan that tries to maximize cycling. And in fact, you've created or are creating the Daisy Lane bike corridor here, which is meant to be the connecting piece between downtown or part of the connecting piece between the downtown and North Long Beach through Daisy. So the idea here, there are going to be some dedicated bike lanes on this, in fact. And you're also adding, interestingly enough, just to accommodate this bike traffic, a new traffic signal right here. And that's going to be happening, as I understand it, within the next 12 months. It's already been approved. That Signalized intersection right there. We'll do a couple of things. One is it'll actually completely moot the point of having to go back from one magnolia to daisy and vice versa. And it will also slow down traffic on Willow Lane. The reason why this is so important is because as bikes are coming back and forth on Daisy Avenue and cars are speeding along this alleyway where our building kind of ends, this is big pictures, a bit deceiving, but the building actually ends literally at the corner of the alley and the street. So cars flying by here really quickly are not paying attention because they have to now come out of the alley, turn right and turn left. To go through the alleyway are actually increasing the hazard to cyclists that are going to be traveling on this Daisy Avenue. And then in conclusion, this was an interesting one, and I'm going to read it for you as well, because I think it's important. We did have one vote on the planning commission that went our way, and this is what he said. I've also walked past this alley. The truth is that the traffic enters that alley pretty fast sometimes and it does have somewhat of a blind spot and it can be dangerous to people walking along the alley. I've experienced it firsthand myself. From my own personal experience, I can see the potential for someone being struck by a vehicle while walking on that side of the alley. I think that anybody who's been in this building and many of you have, as we've we've chaired the North Long Beach Boys Improvement District meetings there and we've done other community events, etc.. It's obvious that there is a hazard here. And I think that closing down this alley is going to hopefully save some lives. That concludes my presentation.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir. So is there any public comment on this hearing?
Speaker 2: Hello. Council people. Vice Mayor. My name is Levi Freed. I'm the founder and owner of the Long Beach Beer Lab, and we're one of the tenants at Westland. We are. From what I understand, the first ABM license in Long Beach, and we're very proud of that. We want to establish ourselves as a community brewery and a community structure. And I think that abandoning the alleyways is going to help our business in many different ways. One is my employees and myself. We park in the alley and we use this alley all the time. And I've seen firsthand how unsafe people drive through this alley trying to cut the traffic on Willow and there. So they're using the alleys as a thruway. So I've I've witnessed firsthand people driving past very fast. Second of all is I get a lot of deliveries being a manufacturing facility. When my trucks park back there, you could see traffic build up with people trying to cut through that alley while I'm trying to unload goods from what I'm told is they we they will be able to use the parking lot to do a full U-turn and drop the delivery goods off without having to cause any disturbances to the to Westland and the business and to people just trying to use it as a shortcut to get from Magnolia to Daisy. And lastly, when I'm thinking about the future, when we want to hold community functions that are beer related, to have people walking from the brewery to the alley to the parking lot where I would hold such festivities would become a tactical nightmare, if you will. If there are cars speeding past that alleyway where my patrons would come and and try to have a good time. So I am in support of this effort. And if you have any questions, I'm available as well. Thank you, sir.
Speaker 0: Thank you. No further public comment. This hearing is closed and we will take it back behind the rail. Councilmember Ringa.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mayor. I want to, first of all, thank Mr. Greenspan for being here and presenting his appeal. I also want to thank staff for the for the great work they've done on this. They've had to do it twice, apparently at once, finding a positive result, and then secondly, going back and doing it again. But I want to can you put up a slide? I think with four four of the staff presentation with the map, actually, that shows Willow and Magnolia and Daisy in the building with only the red stripe that has the. There's the vacation that's there. And the reason I want that put up is because you could see it more on an invisible perspective that the only vacation basically is is a safety issue, maybe. Yeah. That right there is a is a an issue of safety. One of the major issues there is that that alley is used as a traffic right away when Willow is congested between the corner right there of Magnolia and Willow, when people are see that there's traffic backed up and Magnolia, they figure they make a left, make a quick turn through the through the alley right there and go to Daisy and then make a right and then continue on through the alley all the way up to Golden, which is a fairly long distance and creates traffic issues further on down for other businesses down that line because traffic traffic seems to race down there. I've seen it myself. The quote there that was presented by a planning commissioner of go is absolutely correct. I mean, the the exit to that building is right onto to the alley. And if you have cars coming presently real fast through there, there is an issue of public safety there. Also, the other aspect of it is that there is going to be a back path going through Daisy and there's going to be a traffic light put right there on Daisy and Willow, which is going to mitigate many of the traffic issues that are presented that are there now with people coming through the alley. That will be hopefully mitigated because of the fact that there is a vacation there and people will be now used to going down to Willow and the traffic battling bike lane will be unimpeded with any traffic coming across that portion of the alley to go continue on to the bike path through through Daisy all the way up to North Long Beach. So there were some the neighborhood concerns about that. And I want to thank Mr. Greenspan again for doing his diligence. He went to there's two associations in that area. Wrigley, the Wrigley Association and the Wrigley Area Neighborhood Alliance. One, he went to both of those meetings. So those neighborhood associations and nobody actually complained anything about it. But there was one that might have been concerned about the safety to the bicyclists, but with the understanding that there's going to be a traffic stop there, that concern went away because now people can just continue on into Daisy and not worry about any traffic coming out of that, that alleyway. So having said all that, I think that what I will have to do is now make a make a motion. And that motion would be to receive the supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, consider the applicant's appeal and find a proposed vacation of 117.62 feet of an east west alley allocated east of. Located east of Daisy Avenue and south of Willow Street, behind 520 west Willow Street. In conformance with the adopted goals and policies of the city's general plan, and overturn the Planning Commission's determination of nonperformance and approved categorical exemption number 14 007. And I ask for my colleagues support of that motion.
Speaker 0: So that has been moved and seconded. Councilman Austin in comments. Any City Council deliberation, seeing none. Members, please cast your vote.
Speaker 6: Hi.
Speaker 2: Hi. Oh, hi.
Speaker 0: And he opposed saying none. This motion is approved. Thank you. Moving right along. Congratulations. Moving right along. All right.
Speaker 6: Was.
Speaker 4: Okay. We're going to do item. There's a request to do item 18 that will go to 1618. | Public Hearing | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, consider the applicant’s appeal, and find the proposed vacation of 117.62 feet of an east/west alley located east of Daisy Avenue and south of Willow Street, behind 520 West Willow Street, not in conformance with the adopted goals and policies of the City’s General Plan and uphold the Planning Commission’s determination of nonconformance; or
Receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, consider the applicant’s appeal, and find the proposed vacation of 117.62 feet of an east/west alley located east of Daisy Avenue and south of Willow Street, behind 520 West Willow Street, in conformance with the adopted goals and policies of the City’s General Plan and overturn the Planning Commission’s determination of nonconformance, and approve Categorical Exemption No. 14-007. (District 7) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02142017_17-0091 | Speaker 1: I item 16 is from Councilwoman Price, Councilmember Pearce and Councilmember Angle recommendation to request the city manager to report back within 60 days with a report on how other cities with similar environments address coastal parking challenges.
Speaker 4: Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I want to thank my colleagues for signing on to this item. This is a really important topic that we often get questions about for those of us who represent coastal communities. Parking is obviously very impacted in some of these communities and oftentimes people will ask us why other cities are able to offer preferential parking permits while the city of Long Beach does not allow those, other than the ones that are grandfathered in for homes that are located within a certain distance to the coastline. So what what the request is, is to have the city manager's office cause a report to be generated that will educate us on the parameters of preferential parking districts in coastal zones. Hopefully, the report could also cover some of the issues, regulations, limitations and opportunities that we have with beach parking lots in regards to residential parking access. And I think this would be a this hopefully could come back not just as a report, but perhaps not just as a TFF, but perhaps a report from the staff as an agenda item. Because I think this is a question that we often get asked, and it would be good if we had the same consistent information. So I'd really appreciate that. And I want to thank my colleagues for signing on and ask my other colleagues to support this item. It's very important to the residents who live along the coastline.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 4: Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mayor. And I want to thank Councilmember Pearce Price for bringing this forward. It's very important that we brought this was brought up before. And as a member of the Coastal Commission, I raised the fact that there are some other jurisdictions up and down the coast that have these kinds of issues. And I say now to this item in support of having that kind of a study done in support and report so that we can make sure that Long Beach is on the right track and on the right side of of the Coastal Commission. So I would hope that city staff will be coordinating this report with the Coastal Commission staff to come up with a report that will show what we can and cannot do within the coastal zone in regards to not only residential parking but also overnight parking, which is the the major concern that is being raised in this item . So I'm in favor of moving forward with the study. Thank you.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Seeing no other council comments? Councilman Pearce.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just wanted to take a moment to say thank you to Councilmember Price for bringing this item forward and really working with my office ahead of time to kind of draft the the item. I know that parking is something that is intense for our communities and it's not very easy. And I also wanted to thank all the work that the staff has already done on this, and I really look forward to the item coming back. And so just thank you for this being a good process for the an agenda item that's not necessarily easy for everybody. So thank you.
Speaker 4: Any public comment saying none of the papers say I write. Okay, then hippos. Motion carries. Next item.
Speaker 1: Item 17 is communication from Councilwoman Price recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund in the Legislative Department by 25,000 to attend 12, offset by the Council District three. F Wise 16 office budget surplus. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to report back within 60 days with a report on how other cities with similar environments address coastal parking challenges as well as a review of the feasibility of residential parking permit programs to address the problem of non-residents parking in residential neighborhoods near our coastline, and the possible residential use of beach parking lots. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02142017_17-0092 | Speaker 1: Item 17 is communication from Councilwoman Price recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund in the Legislative Department by 25,000 to attend 12, offset by the Council District three. F Wise 16 office budget surplus.
Speaker 5: Councilman Price I've just asked my colleagues to support us on this. We're just reallocating some surplus moneys. And while it's not 177,000 and surplus, as my colleague in the fourth has, it's still a minor surplus. So we're asking to be able to reallocate that. Thank you.
Speaker 4: Give the second. But Councilman Andrews, any public comment? Easy money, seeing none. And. Mr.. Mr.. PARKIN And I'm assuming that I have met you and other state agencies to it, but I can also call for a motion to say if there's no objection. Moving on to the next item. Is that right?
Speaker 2: If there's no objection, yes, you can do it by consensus. But we need to be able to identify the motion and the second. First, yes. Okay.
Speaker 4: So the motion was by Councilman Price, second by Councilman Andrews. And then this was in the objection, a motion by consensus. Moving on to the next item.
Speaker 1: Item 20 East Communication from Vice Mayor Richardson Council Membership in Councilwoman Mango and Council Memo Durango. Recommendation to request the City Manager to work with South Coast Air Quality Management District to report on the impacts of the City of Paramount air quality to Long Beach residents. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to increase appropriations in the General Fund (GF) in the Legislative Department (LD) by $25,212, offset by the Council District Three FY 16 office budget surplus to be used for community meetings, events, and public outreach efforts. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02072017_17-0061 | Speaker 0: So we're going to do those items first. And so let me begin. To these to look at these items. The first item we're going to hear is item 15.
Speaker 1: Communication from council member Yarrawonga Councilwoman Price, Vice Mayor Richardson recommendation to request the city manager, the executive director of the Civil Service Department and Human Resources Director to collaborate in gathering data on existing workforce demographics and hiring pools in the city of Long Beach and draft a detailed report open to the public within 120 days.
Speaker 0: Okay, thank you. Going to turn this over to Councilmember Ranga.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mayor. First of all, I want to thank my colleagues who joined me in signing for this item. I also want to thank Garcia for his leadership and being a strong proponent for increased diversity here in Long Beach. I appreciate all your leadership. I want to thank both the civil service department and the Human Resources Department for working with us as we prepared to sign them and for the work you do each and every day to ensure that we hire the best employees possible here in the city of Long Beach. It goes without saying that the city of Long Beach is one of the most diverse urban cities in America, and we should be striving to ensure that our workforce matches the diversity of our city. Diversity is a key driver of innovation and is a critical component of being successful in a large scale. Many Fortune 500 companies look inward and adapt inclusion and diversity strategies. And I'm excited to take this first step towards developing such a strategy in our workforce in the city of Long Beach. As many of you may know, I worked for the city of Long Beach in a civil service department as a recruitment officer for the city . In that role, I worked to ensure the city's employees and fire, police and other departments reflected the diversity of the city. And I are proud to say that I've had I had some successes, such as the current chief of police, Robert, who was a recruit and other senior management battalion chiefs, fire engine engineers and captains in the fire department as well were recruits that I had an impact on. So I want to continue this kind of success. And I hope that we can work together with the Civil Service and Human Resources Department to look at where we're at. And where we need to go to ensure that our city. Family reflects that of the city's diversity. So I want to urge my colleagues to please join me in supporting this motion. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 10: Thank you. I'm happy to sign on. Thank you so much, Councilmember Ranga, for this recommendation tonight. I think it's important that we use data in tracking and analysis to make sure that we are being intentional in terms of being diverse in our workforce and making sure that we as public employees reflect the community, that we community that we serve. And that's a challenge at times given, you know, there are, you know, laws we have to follow, process we have to follow, but we can always do data and reporting and those things are important to do. So we should always have a good read on, you know, on a good gut check on where we are in terms of our diversity. Does our city, you know, does our workforce look like the crowd or does it look like our city council? Well, we don't know and we'll find out. So thank you so much for doing that. And I'm glad to support you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I'm going to go ahead and let the city attorney has some comments and then I'm going to go to the rec down the rest of the. Those are plugged in.
Speaker 7: Thank you, mayor. Members of the council councilmember during the. The motion includes under item B additional language regarding disability and veteran status. And there's ADA issues with recording and submitting those. So we will assume that your motion will say collect all of this data as applicable or in compliance with state law. Thank you for that.
Speaker 0: Excellent. Thank you, Councilwoman Pryce.
Speaker 3: Thank you. I want to also thank my colleague, Councilman Turanga, for bringing this item forward. Absolutely. Trying to have a workforce that represents the constituency and the demographic makeup of the city is very important. And I think our city should be committed to that. I agree with Councilman Turanga that first and foremost, our recruitment commitment should be to finding the best candidate for the job regardless of their background. We certainly want to make sure that we have qualified candidates working in the city. But to the extent where we have the opportunity to allow for greater diversity in our workforce, we should definitely make that a priority. So thank you for this item, and thank you for including me.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 3: Yes. I, too, want to thank Councilmember Suranga for bringing this forward and the supporters of this item. I think it's great that we are looking at this a little deeper and that we can include we can look at diversity in so many different levels. I do want to ask if we are able to and I must I believe it's in here and the intent of the item. But if we if I can offer a friendly amendment to add the LGBTQ community, I know when it says data should include gender, ethnicity, age, disability and veteran status. I'd like to see if we can include our LGBT community as in that as well.
Speaker 0: Mr. City, attorney.
Speaker 7: Mayor, members of the council that maybe fall into another category where we don't record that or ask that at the time of the hiring. So we would want to be you and I, as I mentioned earlier, we would take the motion, be as forward as we can in compliance with state and federal law.
Speaker 0: Councilmember, you really want to respond also.
Speaker 9: Although it's an excellent suggestion, I think that falls under voluntary information such as male or female ethnic background and that that type of work that would be difficult to gather.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 8: Certainly understood.
Speaker 7: That's correct. We would get all the information that we're legally entitled to accumulate and assimilate and then report back to you.
Speaker 3: Okay. And I guess I was reading this a little bit differently because it's it's just in the practice of hiring, is that correct? So it's not after the fact as we are. Is that correct? I would have thought it would also be just our demographic after hiring. But maybe I'm getting it.
Speaker 0: Incorrect, I think. Mr. City Attorney. I think what the councilman is asking for is, is are we doing data collection post hiring as well so that, you know, we track that on any sort of dashboard. Is that something that's possible? If it is, maybe you can come back and let us know if we can if we can track information or voluntary, of course, on LGBT representation.
Speaker 7: Yes, we'll certainly report that back. Okay.
Speaker 5: Okay.
Speaker 0: That's perfect. I'm sorry Councilman Durango wasn't done and I cut him off. So it comes from your anger. Then Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 9: You know. One of the additional items I want to add to this and I didn't see it in the report, is I would like to have this institutionalized in respect to every year. I would like to have an update as to where we are in our hiring practices, the number of recruitments that we conducted or our hires , and what the results of those recruitments were in hires on a yearly basis.
Speaker 0: That included a yearly report. Thank you, Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 8: Thank you. And I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward. I think when we're drafting policy and talking about things that we're doing in the city. Overall, it's important to know if we're being reflective of our values. And so I thank you for that. So just clarity, if we're going to be doing this report yearly, this would be something that we would be able to look at our current staffing. I think that Councilmember Gonzalez just asked that question. But city attorney, I wanted to just double confirm that we would be able to look at current higher staffing as well as ongoing. That's correct. And then I had another question, because it talks about building an online portal for this. Is it something that we can already include in the open lbe data? This is already included in that.
Speaker 0: I think the intention would be that it would be part of our open data portal.
Speaker 8: Great. Thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Okay. Let me before we go to a vote and go to public comment, I just want to add that I'm a very, very supportive counselor here, and I want to thank you for moving this forward. I do want to also just recognize, I think, Mr. West, I think if you look at today, the the diversity of the management and the department heads, there has been great progress made just in the last few years. And, of course, it's not just folks that are that are reflective of the city, but incredibly qualified leaders in their field. And so that has been, I think, some important progress. And I think to have a open dashboard that is open to the public and accessible to the public so that anyone can go in and view departments by departments and see hiring trends, whether it's gender equity issues or whether it's issues around diversity, I think is pretty exciting. And all data that can be transparent and open I think is a really good thing. So I strongly support this thanks to the council members that are moving this forward. And is there any public comment on this item? Please come forward.
Speaker 11: Very good new Coke as he addressed. I've always thought the best standard to use is the same standard you'd use if you rushed your kid to the hospital. In critical condition. You could give a rodents rear end. What color? Gender. Orientation the person is. You want the best that there is. And that's the only standard that should be used. Anything else? Invites disaster. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. Any other public comment? Please come forward.
Speaker 8: I'll just. My name is Anna Christensen. I feel compelled to speak. After this last speaker and point out that not everybody who rushed their child to the hospital was allowed in the hospital. We have a long history of discrimination in this country. Thank you so much for moving to change that. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. We have a motion in a second seeing no other public comment. Members, please go ahead and cast your vote on council or your rearranges motion.
Speaker 1: Councilwoman Margo. Motion carries nine zero.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. Congratulations, Councilmember. And and just so you guys know, Councilman Rank has been working on these issues. This. This was one of your leading issues when you were on the College Board. And I remember because you would always, always bring it up on the board. And so thank you for for doing that. Let me move on now to our presentation on. We have a couple of items have all been moved up. And so just so we know the order so folks can can know what we're doing next. We're going to have the presentation on the county homelessness initiative. And then right after that, we will have the presentation. Councilman Gonzalez's presentation on the Senate on the Senate bills moving forward. And then after that, we will have the conversation around 19, which is around the turfs and the turf field project. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager and the Executive Director of the Civil Service Department and Human Resources Director to collaborate in gathering data on existing workforce demographics and hiring pools in the City of Long Beach and draft a detailed report open to the public within 120 days.
This report should include, but not be limited to, the following for both Classified and Unclassified employees:
a) Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) statistics for each
City department of both Classified and Unclassified
Employees,
b) Data should include gender, ethnicity, age, disability,
and veteran status, and each grouping should include
salary averages and EEO category and job cluster
breakdowns (i.e., officials and administrators,
professionals, technicians, protective service workers,
administrative support, skilled craft workers, and service
and maintenance).
c) Track employment practices, including available labor
market demographics and applicant and hiring diversity
for both Classified and Unclassified Employees.
d) Comparisons | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02072017_17-0073 | Speaker 0: We're going to have the presentation on the county homelessness initiative. And then right after that, we will have the presentation. Councilman Gonzalez's presentation on the Senate on the Senate bills moving forward. And then after that, we will have the conversation around 19, which is around the turfs and the turf field project. So those are the next couple items. I think most people here are for though here for those items. And so we'll get try to get through those pretty quickly. So let me begin by going over the next item, please, which is going to be about the county homeless initiative. I know we have folks here from the county. So, Madam Cook, if you can read that item.
Speaker 1: Report from City Manager recommendation to receive and file a report and presentation on Measure H citywide.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. I'm going to turn this over to staff who's to has a report for us some presentation. And then I know we have some some folks here from the county that are going to also be a part of that presentation.
Speaker 7: Mayor councilmembers. I'm going to turn this over to our manager of government relations, Diana Tang, as well as our Health and Human Services Director Kelly Colby. So, Diana.
Speaker 12: Thank you, Mr. City Manager. Just waiting for the PowerPoint to be loaded up here. But. Well, while we're waiting, I'll just go ahead and provide a brief summary of the expenditure plan and the ballot measure that will be before voters March 7th. That is coming up on March 7th. And generally speaking, it is a quarter cent sales tax for ten years. It is assessed county wide. There it is. Okay, here we go. Mrs. Measure H. A L.A. County ballot measure countywide again. And the vote is on March 7th. And we'll do a quick overview with the purpose, the revenue mechanism, the election date, which is March 7th, as well as revenue collection methods. So the purpose of the present, the purpose of the ballot measure is to combat the homeless crisis in Los Angeles County. And the revenue mechanism, as we had very briefly discussed, is a quarter percent special sales tax beginning July one, 2017. Short Measure H path. The county is estimating that this revenue mechanism will generate about 355 million annually and it will be for ten years. Again. The election is on March 7th. And because this is a revenue measure, a dedicated sales tax to combat homeless, the homeless crisis in L.A. County, it does require a two thirds vote. So the ballot language is pretty simple. The snapshot there is what voters will see in their ballot when they go to the ballot box on March 7th. And the revenue collection is county wide. So this is a sales tax that is least county wide. So whether you shop in Long Beach or elsewhere in the county, you will be assessed the sales tax at some points. I would like to note that Measure H respects the local sales tax that has been passed in several cities, including Long Beach. So Long Beach, La mirada, Linwood, Pico Rivera, Santa monica, Southgate and Compton. All of these cities are at our local sales tax cup at the moment. And so Measure H is written in a way that does not require us to give up any of the sales tax that we have are collecting as a part of measure A until measure A decreases in six years to a half percent sales tax, at which point in time in Long Beach we will be paying the quarter cent sales tax towards Measure H. So the baseline working information that we have.
Speaker 0: Is saying, let me I just want to just go back one slide just cause I think it's important for the public. The election's 30 days from now, just so they understand this part. So I think it's really important to note that the cities and listed that Mr. Tang listed behind us or have all essentially reached their sales tax limit. And so the top that's set essentially by state statute, the way the sales tax so taxes go. And so in in essence, if Measure H, which is put on by the county supervisors, were to pass the county in the election, then Long Beach residents would not pay into the tax until year six, which is when the measure a tax goes down. And then the the the the quarter cent would then go into the the tax. In addition to that that the tax would total is a total of ten years. Is that correct.
Speaker 12: Me saying that is correct.
Speaker 13: Okay.
Speaker 0: Okay. Excellent. So let me go ahead and continue.
Speaker 12: So moving on, we are going to go over a couple of baseline working information that we have countywide need. The county has identified about 450 million in need per year and this is their unmet need. So in addition to what they are currently investing in homeless and housing services, they recently did a study that was published last year that demonstrates this amount. The county also did. A recent homeless population counts as a count of persons experiencing homelessness, and they're seeing a growing population as well as a growing population of unsheltered individuals who are experiencing homelessness. So the ballot measure has a plan to to use a collaborative approach to develop an expenditure plan for the allocation of these new revenues. If Measure H does pass and the expenditure plan is one that the County Board of Supervisors will adopt as part of their their their budget for the next fiscal year. And if Measure H does pass in March, then a working group of approximately 50 individuals from across the county representing Council of Governments. The service providers will will come together and work on the recommended plan to present to the Board of Supervisors. There's a unique opportunity in in Long Beach, Glendale and Pasadena. We are unique because these three cities, which included our own continuum of care. And so the county recognizes that we are unique in this aspect and has opened a line of dialog with us to see how best to allocate revenues in Long Beach to address the homeless issues that we are experiencing here as well as throughout the county. I'll really quickly go through the six investment areas that are stipulated in the framework that is in the ballot language resolution. The first one is to prevent homelessness. Second is to subsidize housing. Third is to provide case management and services. Fourth, increase income for those who are experiencing homelessness so that they can sustain housing on their own. The fifth investment area is to create a coordinated, county wide system to address homelessness. And the SEC filings to see if there are opportunities to invest in affordable housing for individuals and families experiencing homelessness. So the timeline. March 7th is Election Day. We hope everyone goes out to vote in mid-March. If the ballot measure does pass, a working group will be convened and in April there will be a formulation of the expenditure plan. April. May We're hoping that that expenditure plan will start to come together and then in early May, take that expenditure plan out to the community and reach a consensus. Late May, the county homeless policy deputies will meet to review and discuss the recommendations that the working group has developed in order to present to the Board of Supervisors. And then in June, when the Board of Supervisors adopts their annual budget, they will also include in it and then expenditure plan for Measure H if the ballot measure does pass. So I'll at this time, turn it over to Kelly Culpepper, director of Health and Human Services, to go over homelessness and Long Beach.
Speaker 14: So within the city of Long Beach, July 5th, 2016, the city council declared a state of emergency to combat homelessness within the city of Long Beach. When we conducted the 2015 count, we had 2345 individuals are experiencing homeless in the city. 94% or 3094 were unsheltered veterans, and 731 were what we consider chronic, unsheltered individuals. We just completed the point in time count two weeks ago. And so we are calculating those numbers now. So we'll have more current numbers available to us coming up in the next couple of months. We provide services on average to 1100 individuals and families each month through the Multi-Service Center and through the continuum of care for a total of over 13,000 client contacts over the course of a year. Right now with our service providers, we get about 90 to 100 requests for outreach and engagement every month at the Multi-Service Center for Homeless. Our existing investments right now, we we spent about $10.9 million a year on our services for individuals and families who are homeless. That is from the Housing and Urban Development Continuum of Care Hour. We received when we were just announced a $7.6 million funding for this next year from the Continuum of Care. We also receive it. We also receive additional resources from private foundations and from the city as we move forward. So about $10.9 million a year specific to homeless services. We have the multi-service one stop shop where we folks who are homeless can come in, be assessed and connected to services and move toward permanent housing as well as we do a lot of street outreach. So we are out on the streets every day reaching out to individuals and families who are homeless to connect them to service. We have a lot of different housing and shelter opportunities within the city, so I'm not going to go through each of them. But you'll see that we have quite a continuum of housing with 1452 permanent supportive housing beds. We also run the winter shelter that's opened for three months and it looks like it may be extended this year for an additional few weeks. We also have emergency shelter opportunities. The Housing Authority provides 70 vouchers annually to individuals who are experiencing homelessness. And also we have over 700 vouchers for for veterans. So if they're coming through the VA, we are we are able to house them through the housing authority for veterans. And we also have supportive services. The heart team within the city is the fire department. They were here in front of the council in the last couple of weeks, really being able that are moving forward sort of street medicine and education to be able to connect with individuals who are homeless and then the quality of life teams through the police department. As we've looked at what our funding needs are moving forward and that we'd be looking to address through the Middle Ages a year round shelter permanent supportive, additional permanent supportive housing, transitional housing, additional rapid rehousing. Preventative supportive services and mental health and substance abuse programs. And with that turn it of questions.
Speaker 0: Okay. Let's go ahead and go. We're going to take questions first just because this is a measure item. So let me go through questions. I might turn it over to to Vice Mayor Richardson, and then I'll take it I'll take public comment as well. But let me let me just make one clarification point that I think is important. Councilman Mongo also just clarified which is which is correct. Just to clarify the position that Mr. Heng and I said, of course, sales tax, as you all know, doesn't follow you. So I just want to make sure that's clear so that the sales tax is not increased in Long Beach for Long Beach residents. But of course, someone who went to another city, that sales tax rate is depending on what the sales tax rate is over there. So. Well, that's you know, I know it's obvious to most. I just want to make sure we all know that sales tax doesn't follow us around. So. Right. Unless it's an automobile. Okay. So going on to Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 10: Thank you. And before I get my my comments. So in terms of process, you want to go through a discussion before making any motions?
Speaker 0: I think it'd be I think if there's questions first, it'd be great to go through any questions on the measure. And then if there is going to be a motion, I also want to hear from the public if there's any public comment. I also know that there's one of the supervisors deputies is here who wants to comment, since I know that she put it on the agenda. So if we want to do some of those things, first, we can get back.
Speaker 10: To you because I want to make a motion here. So I think if everybody respects that, we'll just have that discussion.
Speaker 0: Let me let me do that first. Let me let me ask. I can Supervisor Janice Hahn was one of the two supervisors that put this on the ballot. So I know that Mr. Linda Chico is here representing the county supervisor. And so I know she wanted to say a few words about the motion she made for at the county level. So I'll start we'll start there.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mary Garcia, for giving me the opportunity. Thank you, city council, for considering this item. As you know, Long Beach is the second largest city in L.A. County, and the supervisor is committed to working with the mayor, city council and staff on facing this crisis. We've actually met quite a few times already addressing some of the issues. On any given night, there are 47,000 people living on the streets in L.A. County. 3000 of them are veterans, 4000 are children. So just over a week ago, the body of a homeless man was found in the fourth stoop of his aureole district in Wilmington . He had been living in homeless camp. He had been living in a homeless encampment in Harbor City. And despite the best efforts of law enforcement, he was swept away and killed during a heavy storm. This is just one of the many heartbreaking tragedies caused by homelessness and a reminder that this problem has reached crisis level. I participated in the homeless count here in Long Beach, and I got to tell you, the stories that we heard out there were heartbreaking. So that's why we're here today, to educate voters on Measure H using Measure H. We will work to break the cycle of homelessness and connect people in need with proven solutions like mental health services, addiction programs, rapid rehousing and job training. With Measure H, we will work to move 45,000 people into permanent housing in five years and help another 30,000 people avoid homelessness. Voters know that this is no longer a problem isolated to Skid Row or even the city of L.A.. Encampments are in communities, including Long Beach. I know there are some who have reservations about adding to the sales tax, but know that homelessness is already costing taxpayers in ways that are less productive and more painful. The L.A. County Sheriff's Department spends $41 million annually on arrests, jail stays and probation supervision for homeless individuals. And we know that Long Beach PD is feeling the same impacts. Our health care system spends millions of dollars a year caring for sick individuals who would be healthier if they had a warm, dry place to sleep. We are asking for this small sacrifice that will allow us to attack the causes of homelessness and provide real solutions. A quarter cent sales tax would amount to an extra dime on the price of a $40 sweater. A dollar on the cost of a $400 TV. So both the South Bay COG and Gateway City's cog have voted to support Measure H. The election is on March 7th. And with this comprehensive plan, we're confident voters will say yes. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, thank you on behalf of the supervisor. And I'm going to what I'm going to do on that. Take it back to Vice Mayor Richardson. If you want to make a motion, that's fine. But I'm going to go through the the council comments and then go to any public comment. So. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 10: So my thoughts on here. Well, first of all, thank you to Supervisor Hahn and to her, Linda, for coming down in and giving us those comments. And we do want to acknowledge and thank city staff for the presentation. And this is something that we've we've all sort of paid attention to from different different points of view. But to have a presentation here in a solid action plan, I think makes a lot of sense. Something that stood out in that presentation was the number a half billion dollar a year problem. And that's the gap that's not inclusive of the funding that's already allocated across the county. So it can be safe to say this is $1,000,000,000 a year problem with a half a billion dollar a year gap. And and we see this personally here in Long Beach and North Long Beach has been home to the winter shelter for the last five years or so. And we know that, you know, every year it's a rush for us to get it open. And and we know that we have a number of rights of ways flood channels, freeway on and off ramps that are very complex from an agency standpoint to get a handle on in terms of really counting and servicing the homeless in our community. It really requires a county wide coordinated solution. Just just here in Long Beach, along our river, you have the 17 freeway on ramp, the 91 freeway on ramp, Southern California Edison right away and county flood. That means four different law enforcement agencies and multiple health agencies, just the direct service to one encampment. And it's it's completely challenging. So I'm really glad to see the county step up and really lead this this effort because we can't handle it alone as Long Beach. I think it's really interesting to note not only that, Long Beach residents wouldn't pay initially because I believe that they would, but the fact that we do maintain a seat at the table through the continuum of care says a lot about our health department and our city city team. The fact that they've sort of carried on this fight and have built that respect countywide to make that happen. And I think that puts us in a really strong, unique position that we should, as a city, take a position in support of this. And tonight, you know, the thought was this would be a receiving file presentation, but multiple councilmembers have expressed interest here and taken a position. And I didn't agree. So so I want to make a motion that the city council tonight takes a position in support of this measure and and communicate that position publicly.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. There's a motion. Is there a second, Councilman Ringo?
Speaker 9: I want to thank Councilmember Richardson for making that motion, because as a member of the Gateway City Council government, I made a motion at that meeting to support this measure, and I'm glad that we're going to be moving that forward here today as well. There's no question that homelessness is an issue in Long Beach, and I think Councilmember Richardson. Oh, sorry. Excuse me. Vice Mayor Richardson brought brought the motion forward and basically described adequately as to what the issues are. And, you know, I have a major issue with homelessness in my district as well. Just recently we had to vacate the Willow Springs Park from a major encampment that cost us hundreds of thousands of dollars to vacate because of the level of encampment that was there. So with a measure like this would be able to address that with less of a cost to the city. And as has been described, there's no cost to us, not for at least six years. And that that would be the most significant part of this measure that we can live with. So as far as I could see, it's a win win situation for the for the city, for us to support this and to move forward with it. And it's a win win for the county as well. So I would wish to have the support of my colleagues as well in this on this motion. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 5: Yes. I think that one of the things that's remarkable about this opportunity is it really answers to questions. One of the things that came up with the increase in the sales taxes that neighboring cities would be less than ours now we would be closer to an even playing field, if not on an even playing field, determining depending on which city is discussed. And because of the way that the allocation structure is, the county supervisors were very mindful of knowing that just because homeless populations are residing in a particular city or the sales tax comes from a particular city, it doesn't necessarily mean that's how the distribution is. We soon will have a mental health center that will service the region and therefore we would be a part of that. And so I would be very supportive of this motion. I think that on multiple levels this is really great for Long Beach and really great for the communities that have homeless individuals and the homeless individuals themselves . So I really strongly support this.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman. Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 8: Thank you so much for the great presentation and to Janice Hahn's office for coming down and putting this on our agenda and in our attention and our minds. I know that homelessness is something that impacts our entire city, but in downtown we definitely feel the impacts in a very strong way. From Pine Avenue. Then branching out to retro are different business corridors, and each one of those people has a story that is unique to them that we in Long Beach for the last ten years have really changed the way that we think and talk about homelessness. And so really thankful that we've gotten to a point where we can have a measure like this, be something that so many people on our council want to take on and really thankful to have people like Kelly Colby and our staff that have worked really hard to say homelessness isn't just about moving out of our sidewalks, but homelessness is about moving into shelter. Homelessness is about finding a detox bed with love and care that we can help support people, change their lives. And it just really want to recognize this moment in history that ten years ago it wasn't like this in Long Beach. The conversation was very different. And so I definitely support the motion made by the vice mayor. I wanted to ask one question of staff if someone could let us know if the residents of Long Beach decided to renew, measure or bring in another tax, would that affect this tax in Long Beach?
Speaker 7: Mayor's member of council. I'll try and answer that. I think the answer is yes. It would impacted by the quarter percent. So in year six, when the city's tax is reduced by a half a percent, you create, if you will, a little room in the tax bucket. It'll only go down in year six by a quarter percent because it'll be replaced by Measure H. So in theory, you have a quarter percent area that you could renew Measure eight, but you could not renew it for the full one half.
Speaker 0: Let me also add just one other thing. I think it's important to note that I believe Measure H is a ten year. That is correct.
Speaker 7: Okay. Or in ten years, the.
Speaker 0: Measure a measure expires in, I believe in ten years as well. So. Okay.
Speaker 8: Thank you. And then one other question. The work groups. I'm sorry if I missed it. Who compiles those work groups? Are we? What's the decision process for who's involved in that meeting?
Speaker 12: The County Board of Supervisors is compiling that working group. There are two representatives from each of the Council of Governments that will be requested to participate, as well as the service providers in the region, both those in Long Beach and countywide. I believe the County Board of Supervisors, their deputies on the homeless issues will also be involved. So it will be a fairly large working group.
Speaker 8: Great. Thank you so much. And thank you, everybody, for your hard work on this.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. Baer. And I do appreciate the motion and I will be supportive. Measure H provides this critical issue of homelessness, the attention that it really deserves. I want to thank Supervisor Hahn and the Board of Supervisors for being bold in addressing this issue. It's all it's it is, actually. Well, the issue of homelessness has actually grown and transformed before our eyes in a very, very short period of time. The numbers have gone up significantly in the last just five years. As the president of the Gateway Cities Council of Governments. I must mention that we do have a great continuum of care. This is not just a Long Beach problem. It's a regional problem. And the Gateway Cities also, as Councilmember Urunga mentioned just last week, voted to support this issue. And this was 27 cities in the southeast counties coming together in support of this measure. I see this as a small sacrifice that we all can afford. This is a moral and humane commitment as citizens that we have to commit ourselves to to to really address this problem. Nearly 50,000 homeless, homeless individuals in L.A. County is not acceptable. Of nearly 3000 in the city of Long Beach is clearly not acceptable. And this measure measure will help us address that. And so I will be supportive of the motion.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you. I also want to extend my support. I think this is great that we are talking about this again. I also think the supervisor's office for bringing this forward. I'm excited about the different investment areas that especially creating a coordinated system where we can all be on the same page and discussing each of our respective cities issues and how we can work together in conjunction with the county, which I know we're already doing for the most part. But I also want to thank Kelly Colby for all your work. You've done a great job. I personally participated in the homeless count two weeks ago. It was eye opening. I will continue encouraging residents. If you are not a part of that, please be a part of that. Even tour. Some of our facilities get to know what the city is doing and the county resources that are being expended already. This will just enhance that. So thanks again.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Council member, supra.
Speaker 13: Thank you. And I'd like to thank Kelly Coffey also for all our hard work. And I do have a question for you with the count that was conducted two weeks ago. Now, historically, that number doesn't come back to us till around April, which would be after the ballot measure. Is that is that what you anticipate this year?
Speaker 14: That is that is what we anticipate. But we're trying to will be working our best to try and get it a little bit earlier. I don't know that we'll have it before the.
Speaker 13: Ballot, but that's that's kind of the nature of my question. And I don't want you to speculate, but it has been speculated by my constituents that we have more people experiencing homelessness today. And I put that in perspective. I participated in the count in 2009. In fact, Long Beach, Small World, Miles Evans was part of the team I was on. I mean, Miles Nevin, who we just approved tonight for a commission position in the area on the eastern fourth district. That is from Clark to Studebaker. The four or five freeway is the northern border to Atherton. We counted one person experiencing homelessness in 2009, and I think my constituents would speculate that the we'd have more people today. So can you put a number on it or a percentage, or would you not want to speculate where we are
Speaker 14: . And we're not ready to put a percentage one way or the other. Moving forward, the numbers are being analyzed right now and we'll be moving forward. But at this time, with the different data and things coming out, we're not ready to speculate.
Speaker 13: Okay. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember. Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 3: So I just wanted to thank staff for the presentation. The questions that I had have been answered and of course, thanks to Supervisor Hahn and her Linda Chico for being here. This certainly is probably the issue that has resulted in the most inquiries from our residents in terms of long term planning. And I'm happy that we are having these discussions and very mindful that we need additional resources to provide long term solutions. So I think staff for the presentation and for the education tonight. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Andrew. Yes, thank.
Speaker 7: You, Mayor. And also, I'd like to thank Council Vice Mayor Richardson and Mr. Rangel for bringing this item forward, because the fact that I think all of us can remember when we took that big dove back about nine years ago, and a lot of those individuals have not, you know, recuperated from that situation. A lot of those individuals, some of those individuals out there that are homeless today and no, I don't think any of us thought that it would be at this, you know, count of individuals as being this homeless. So I think we are going to have to take a deep look in and really seriously think that it's not about money, it's about compassion. And we know that those individuals could be as individuals. You know, we're just very fortunate. So really, you guys are going to have to take some time and really seriously know that we're in a crisis here and we'll have to do something about it. And don't look at the tax about $1 one cents or whatever it is. Let's be compassionate and try to help these people out there who are homeless. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Let me thank you. We're going to take public comment in just a minute. I just want to add to our supervisor, thank you for being one of the two supervisors to bring this forward to the county board for adoption. I'm also incredibly proud of every member of the city council for their words and support for this measure. This will bring resources that we currently do not have in the city of Long Beach. We currently do not have these resources to be able to do this really important work in the years ahead. And so to be able to have this additional source of support of revenue, to be able to go and do the programs that we need in this community, like a year round shelter, like permanent supportive housing, like rapid rehousing, like the mental health connections that we need to make in the community. This is really, really important, I think, for the community, and so I'm also happy to support it. I look forward to working with the supervisor, Long Beach, which is the supervisors largest city, and also probably the city with some of the largest need in her in her community. And so we look forward to working together on ensuring that these funds come down to the city and that we're able to address some of these large challenges that we have as a community. And to close, I just want to remind us and I try to do this whenever I can, is that every single person that is experiencing homelessness has a name. They have parents. They have people that they've loved in their life. They are individuals, and they deserve our respect and our support. And so with that, any public comment on the item?
Speaker 13: Good evening. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And Distinguished Council members Gerard Wright with Move L.A. and I just have various all been already said about this wonderful measure and the importance of providing the services that will get people up off their feet and be able to stand for themselves again. And that's the importance of what of what will provide the ability to bring them back into the society, bring them back into being Americans that can stand here and do the things that we that we need to be in a compassionate society. So this is an important piece. Thank you, all councilmembers for your support. I'm just going to pass this around. This is almost a fait accompli because there's over 150 organizations that are in support of age right now. And it's growing because this is such a vital need for L.A. County, for L.A. County, and can be a vision for the rest of the nation, as we desperately need right now. So thank you all very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Can just pass it to the clerk over here and we'll go pass those out. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Good evening, in control. And I'm glad you're talking about this tonight. I just got my mail in ballot, and I didn't even know this was going to be on the agenda on the. Be on the ballot in March. This is a very short time for you to educate the public about this. And I'm sure one of the things that Long Beach is going to say is we're already paying the highest tax. And I'm glad to hear you say you're trying to even this out. I see there's a number of other cities that are also going to be exempt from paying this one fourth tax. My question is. Are the cities that are paying this tax going to object to the fact that there's many cities that aren't paying the tax and they're going to have to bear the burden of the cost of this. How is this going to work out if we're not paying into the county? All all of our extra tax is staying in the city. Is any of our tax a money going to the county to. Help pay for this major. I hope some of you can answer that question. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I just want to just make a comment. I think this is an important issue for for for everyone so that this was discussed as part of the deliberations of the county supervisors. And they realize that in their deliberations of putting this on the ballot, that there were a handful of of cities in the county that were essentially at the cap of the sales tax. And so they anticipated that it was part of their deliberative process. They understand that most folks in the county shop all across the county. And so their part of the determination was that folks, whether they live in Long Beach but might work in Burbank or might work in West Los Angeles, and so that they they understood that that would move around and essentially even itself out. In addition, they've been very clear that the the payment back into communities is going to be based solely on where the need is. So they're not interested in, you know, what, what city might be at 10% versus a 9%. They're interested in solving the the the crisis that's happening across the county. And so that's where the resources are going to go, regardless of that. And so but they I do I do know that the county had extensive conversations about this question, as did our staff with them as well. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the City Council. Josh Butler, executive director for Housing, Long Beach. And as rents continue to rise in Long Beach and vacancy rates continue to fall, their need for housing measures and measures to support homelessness are greater than ever. Housing Long Beach is in full support of this measure and has been in full support of this measure since the days Supervisor Hahn was sworn into office and put this item forward. We encourage the city council to do the same. Voters in L.A. County have shown support for addressing homelessness by putting skin in the game. The city of Los Angeles did so last fall, and they'll raise, I believe, $1.2 billion over the next decade to support housing measures. The county has recognized the vast shortage of housing and the need to support and stabilize our communities as we build housing to meet need in the future. These early, these county, these countywide resources are designed not only to help stabilize communities, but also to stabilize lives. We hope that this measure will support the efforts of Mayor Garcia as he works to address affordable housing here in Long Beach. We need your support tonight. We need it more than ever. Ultimately, this money will come back to Long Beach and come back right away. As Mary mentioned, it will go based on need. The need here is great. And we also have to remember all the folks that aren't currently out that we see on the streets, that we're not able to count in the mornings. The folks that are living in hotels, that are sleeping on couches, that the hidden homeless population. And also remember that our homeless count only represents the homeless count for that one particular day. It's not a static number. It's constantly moving. We need this more than ever as we can expect the safety net at the federal level to get even smaller and smaller. And Californians know that tonight, not only with issues like sanctuary cities, but also issues like this, that we need to know that our local leaders will have our back as we know that our safety net is going to get yanked out from under us. We have a shortage. These funds are needed. And we thank you for your support tonight.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 7: Please. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and Council. My name is Andy Kerr. I live in the eighth District and I represent Councilman Austin on the Homeless Services Advisory Committee. I, too, was able to participate in the point in time count a couple weeks ago. I'd just like to commend Ailsa Ramos and the staff, Theresa Chandler, the staff at the Multi-Service Center for just doing a phenomenal job of organizing that event. It went very smoothly and I was really impressed by everything that happened that day. I was on Mr. West team. I think we had the best team. We were with the the new heart team in the fire department, which is a really impressive team, and thank the city for supporting their efforts. During the count on Third Street, we encountered a gentleman by the name of Richard, and Richard really had a hard time understanding what was going on with the information we were trying to get from him. It was very clear to me and in doing this work for for quite a while, that Richard was suffering from severe mental illness and. It's it's very frustrating for me just to know that if Richard were suffering from cancer or if he was suffering from a lot of other similar acute illnesses that wasn't related to mental illness, it wouldn't be okay for him to be sleeping on Third Street. And it's a breakdown of public policy and governance at all level, from the federal level to the state to the county that for for 40 years this has been going on. And it really warms my heart today here the council and you, Mr. Mayor, for the support for this measure h i to support it. I think this is a tremendous opportunity to correct all those decades of bad policy on this issue, issues related to substance abuse. That also contributes to the level of homelessness that we've seen throughout the county in the city. And I'd like to echo Councilman Richardson and Councilman Austin the words that that that really this really is a regional issue. And I'd also like to commend Kelly Collopy and Theresa Chandler and the city's team for the level of collaboration I've been seeing lately with the county. And I think it's a level available at the collaboration that's there really is unprecedented since I've been involved in this work. So thanks again for your support for this measure. I know it's going to be a really big push to get the two thirds threshold of the voters. And I'd like to offer anything I can do personally to to help and inform the public to encourage people to get behind it. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Good evening, honorable mayor and council members.
Speaker 5: My name is Maria Lopez. I'm an organizer for housing lobby and first district resident. I'd like to commend you all today for having.
Speaker 3: This difficult conversation. Right.
Speaker 5: Homelessness and housing has become the issue of our generation with rapid gentrification that has impacted rents, which has led to the displacement of vulnerable communities, which has an an overall affected and increase the amount of homelessness.
Speaker 8: Which continues to take a lot of our resources. So for me, as an individual having to.
Speaker 5: See and help these families.
Speaker 8: I see Measure H as.
Speaker 5: A light at the end of the tunnel. Right. Personally, I have experienced the restraints and services. Right. To get in a shelter. You need your ID, your birth certificate, your Social Security, even in some cases. Right. How many homeless individuals carry that around? Not necessarily. Right. So there is restraints.
Speaker 3: And getting.
Speaker 5: These services to get a family of four to get a TB test done, they only take the first five. I had to drop off a family in the middle of a storm at 7 a.m. and the Multi-Service Center offered a ride, offered.
Speaker 8: To pick them up to get them there on time so that they can take.
Speaker 3: Their nine year old.
Speaker 5: Boy who at eight who had.
Speaker 8: ADHD into a shelter. Right.
Speaker 5: So there is barriers that these individuals face and that we as individuals cannot help with as well. Right. So I do see the deep need for case management, affordable housing and also protections against displacement. Supporting those in need has always been the heart.
Speaker 8: Of our Long.
Speaker 5: Beach residents. Right. That's what we do. That's why we live here.
Speaker 8: And so today.
Speaker 5: I am glad to live in this city, because once again, we're standing up for the little guy. And once again, we are seeing a great.
Speaker 3: Need and we're solving it.
Speaker 5: So a huge thank you to all of you. And I look forward to to March 7th. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And please, sir, so be our last speaker, this gentleman here in line, and then we're moving. We're going to go ahead and take a vote. So please.
Speaker 4: Mayors. Council members. First of all. Jesus. My, my, my. I wasn't going to say anything on this, but I heard Mr. Butler, Joshua Butler, speak, and he mentioned about the high prices and all this Long Beach and everything. And I was at a meeting a few weeks ago with him and he was telling that he was telling the meeting how some of the highest in the nation, when I just read is some of the lowest cost in the nation. Everybody who for what, 1100 dollars living right off ocean one bedroom. You can't do that anywhere. Anybody knows that. Not in Hermosa, not in Redondo. And so and then I called him up on that and he yelled at me. So my thing is this. And court, if you say something and it's not right, they usually impeach your testimony. So that's the reason why I'm up here, because I heard all the bleeding heart stuff, he said. But what I'm thinking about this whole situation, I hope this goes. We're supposed to go because we have other issues like the fact that this sanctuary city may not get the federal funding. We just voted down expanding the airport, so we just lost about a billion something there or whatever is money lost. So these taxes are going to the citizens and there's some rich citizens in Long Beach. But as far as the people who are just barely making it like me, that's hit me hard. And, you know, we paint rainbows in the streets charging $30,000. I'm not for that, but my taxes have to pay for it. And there's a lot of stuff going on and I have to say it. So by another tax, is it going to help? I mean, right outside, since you step out, shoot. As soon as I walked in here, I saw homeless setting up right at the library. Library wearing clothes. They put their stuff up, stinking and everything. So is it really going to help it along? Third Street, all that stuff we need to really do. So we're going to do something, do it. I mean, I've been here stuff for years. I want to see to be done. I'm from neighborhoods all over. They know, I know control going to help is going to drive everything up. It's going to make it just like Santa monica frisk on New York, the highest in the nation. We need we don't need any just cause eviction because then you got the dope dealers that you can't get out. And anybody black here, who knows you didn't have to go with your gun or something to go to Big Momma's house because them because next door they keep on selling dope. And they disrespecting the women and anybody who's from the eighties and nineties really knows the new jack city, you know. So we don't need nothing where you can't get where you can't get the molesters out. Well, you know all this. I don't want to be hostage. I'm a black man saying so. All that stuff and all the falsehoods. No. And I'm here to say my last 7 seconds. Josh, they don't believe Josh Butler.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. We have a motion in a second on the motion, which is to support county measure H. Members, please go ahead and cast your votes on that.
Speaker 1: Motion carries nine zero.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. Thank you. To the county supervisor and that that election. Madam Clerk, I know the election is is March 7th, is that correct? Is there any information that we need to give the voters on the election? I believe that ballots are being dropped around.
Speaker 8: You vote.
Speaker 1: By mail. Ballots are now being accepted in the city clerk's office.
Speaker 0: Okay. Or they can just make them incorrect.
Speaker 1: They can just mail them in. But we are one of the drop off sites. The city clerk and the lobby.
Speaker 5: Level of city hall right here.
Speaker 0: Okay, great. And so on. I believe if you are a vote by mail voter, I believe the counties probably sent those ballots out, as someone had said earlier. So thank you very much. Okay. Thank you all for that. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to receive and file a report and presentation on Measure H, a ballot measure that will be considered by all Los Angeles County voters on March 7, 2017. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02072017_17-0072 | Speaker 0: Okay, great. And so on. I believe if you are a vote by mail voter, I believe the counties probably sent those ballots out, as someone had said earlier. So thank you very much. Okay. Thank you all for that. We're going to move on to the next item here, and that is going to be item number 23.
Speaker 1: Madam Court Communication from Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilmember Pierce, Councilmember Urunga, Vice Mayor Richardson, recommendation to support SB 54, the California Values Act and SB 31, the California Religious Freedom Act.
Speaker 0: Okay. Let me turn this over first to Councilmember Gonzalez, since it's her item.
Speaker 3: Yes. Thank you. I want to thank everybody for being so patient and thank you all for for being here. So I'll start with when this came to my office, I couldn't help but support it 150%. And I'll explain why. As many of us know. But I have to reiterate and reaffirm my belief and certainly many of your beliefs as well, that immigrants and those of diverse religious faiths are valuable and essential. Members of the California and Long Beach family and communities in Long Beach, it is said. One in every four people identify as foreign born per the last U.S. Census Census data. And our city's residents are comprised of over 40% Latino. We have the largest Cambodian population outside of the country. We celebrate a Persian New Year, the API celebration and History Month. We have amazing friends who are Muslim and LGBTQ. And now here we are today. And unfortunately, our country's newly elected administration is incited in negative and divisive debate over how best to address immigration and the freedom of people to celebrate their culture and religion. Currently, our state legislature considering is considering two bills that pertain to immigration and religious freedom. SB 54 and SB 31 brought forward by Senator Ricardo Lara and Senate Pro Tem Kevin de Leon. I'd like to ask first Diana Ting, our manager of government affairs, to come up and give us an overview of these two bills. So there's clarity around each bill. And then I would like to hear from the public on this item before I make a motion. So, Diana.
Speaker 12: Thank you, Councilwoman. I'll give a brief overview of both of these bills and of course, be available for questions afterwards. I'll start with SB 54. This is legislation that is authorized by Senate Pro Tem Kevin de Leon, and it is known as the California Values Act. The bill would limit state and local law enforcement agencies from using money, facilities, property, equipment or personnel to investigate, interrogate, detain, detect or arrest individuals for immigration enforcement purposes. This bill specifically states that the state and local law enforcement agencies would not be able to inquire about or collect information about an individual's immigration status. Detain an individual on the sole basis of an immigration, hold request. Respond to requests for notifications for transfers solely for immigration enforcement, provide non publicly available information about an individual, for example, home address or work address for immigration enforcement purposes. Give federal immigration authorities access to interview individuals in the state or local law enforcement's custody for immigration enforcement purposes, or assist federal immigration authorities in carrying out federal immigration enforcement functions. The bill also directs that the state and local law enforcement agencies shall not make databases of information available by the state and local governments to federal immigration authorities. For the purposes of immigration enforcement, though, nothing in this bill shall prevent the state or any local law enforcement agency for responding to a request from federal immigration authorities for information about a person specific criminal arrest or convictions, as is currently permitted by state law. SB 54 is an urgency bill, which means that it requires a two thirds vote to pass the state legislature before being presented to the governor for consideration. So that is SB 54. And I believe there was also a request for a summary on SB 31, which is authored by Senator Lora, and this is the California Religious Freedom Act. This bill proposes to prohibit state and local law enforcement agencies from providing, disclosing or supporting, whether financially with personnel or equipment, the collection of personally identifiable information regarding the religious beliefs, practices or affiliation of any individual. For the purposes of compiling a registry or database of individuals based on religious affiliation, national origin or ethnicity. Nothing in SB 31 prohibits any state or local agency from sending to or receiving from a local law enforcement agency, state or federal agency information regarding an individual's citizenship or immigration status. And nothing in this bill is intended to prevent any state or local agency from compiling aggregate, non-personal, identifiable information about religious belief, practice, affiliation, or national origin. So that I am available for questions.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Miss Tang. Councilman, that you said you wanted to go to the public. Yes, please. Okay. So we're going to go and take public comment now for the motion on the floor, which is to support SB 54 and SB 31. And so please make sure that you come forward, make sure you say your name, and we'll go through the public comments.
Speaker 13: So please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. That honored mayor and City Council. My name is Tarek Muhammad, the chairman of Long Beach Islamic Center and may be have and Muslim community in Long Beach and over than 1000 a student in is a state college state university in Long.
Speaker 11: Beach.
Speaker 4: And over than 1000 family in Long Beach. Muslim Muslim community in Long Beach. We support you strongly to vote yes for SPF 54 and 31. And when you do, that really isn't a lot of messages. One of the message is tapping back our in the top of the back of our community. The people who this fellow those getting fear, the feeling threating by the the white power I'm sorry the white people in the tub of the power in our country right now. Also, you sent a very beautiful, beautiful and strong message for the people having the power that is the source of law and source of source of law and of the rule and regulation and build this great nation, people with the freedom excuse me, people of the freedom and justice. People the knows whether they mean freedom and they never going to give it away. A My community sent the message with me that that message of hope that that this is could change a little bit of the position and the things as a muslim community facing that day. So thank you for it. Really encourage you to vote yes with with with with P 54 and 31. And you are the champion and Long.
Speaker 11: Beach.
Speaker 4: City Council can lead the lead the city and the city can lead another city to say yes and all the city can lead all California and California can lead the whole United States to best this beautiful belt. Thank you very much.
Speaker 11: And I want.
Speaker 4: To.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir, and thank you for all of your all of your work and want to I want to thank you for inviting us to to the Islamic Center as well. It was a wonderful opportunity for us. And I loved meeting you and the community. So, you know, we support you. So thank you very much, sir. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Yes, Robert. Better housing from Long Beach. I hear what Mohamed saying. That's all fine and dandy, but if it's legal. Hey, no problem. Hey. True that whatever illegal voting so illegal could be illegal. No, I have a California penal colony. I got a few said, well, let me go. 834 B says, basically, if they're arrested, all the authorities have to go along with ICE officers. Now it says if they are arrested. So that's what all these things about. Don't arrest them. No. If I have to organize somebody and put all of them under citizen's arrest and then you got to and then we get the lawsuit. No, black folks ain't got nothing needs. And I know the brothers. You know this straight up. We ain't got nothing yet. Now, when Clinton was in and he called us super predators, he put us all away on three strikes. Okay? And half the time, you know how many times I'm sitting on the curb in the back of a car because I'm walking while black. Driving while black. And just because I'm a Negro, I got to go through all this being laid on the ground with guns on me. Now, you got people who are here with Muhammad saying, but I was just at the airport going against and they talking about killing us ten down the wall. If we if that would be federal money, if it was built. I don't want them taking my tax dollars till now. And then you have people with foreign flags at the airport. I'm not with none of this. I don't want $0.01 of my tax dollars. We the people, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare of Americans. Secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, not Muhammad and his posterity. That's cool, Muhammad. I'm glad you want it.
Speaker 0: Sir. Let's please continue your comments directed at me. I'm going.
Speaker 4: On. Directed at you. Thank you. Americans and that posterity. So, listen, my people ain't got nothing too much other than that dude that was just in office. He ain't did Jack. So. That being said, I'm not for putting no money out there. Put it towards Americans. Vote towards Americans. Because I'm going to remember everybody. That's going to be my thing, man to man. See, this? Got all this political correctness selling all this socialism? No, this is this is free world. Free market. Let's keep it like that. This is all mumbo jumbo. No America for all Americans. Let's start thinking about that. You know, I know. I know your people from somewhere else. My people from Cuba. Okay. But I'm not for Castro and none of that. I'm for capitalism, American system, not socialism. Because my people ain't got nothing. So we ain't going to communism for my people. Get them. We're got to stay right in the free market. And capitalism. Black folks going to get something and and then maybe. But some hundreds of years up the road, we'll talk about maybe a little social, whatever. But right now, no, we need to get black folks pay and stop trying to get everybody else money. I don't ever hear you talking about black issues. I'm through.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening, everyone. My name is Julio Perez.
Speaker 10: Grew up in the ninth district. Graduated from Cabrillo High School. Cal State Fullerton.
Speaker 13: Alumni.
Speaker 10: Currently work at Central CHA. And I'm here to speak on behalf of these issues. In support of SB 54 and 31. Personally, I'm an immigrant myself, and I'd just like to say that with a few opportunities right now I'm on my road to go to law school becoming an attorney. And, you know, I'm just one of many stories. Thank you. So, you know, with that being said, you know, it's it's sad to hear the the the divisive rhetoric. And, you know, it's one of the problems that we have here is that, you know, we get someone dividing us and, you know, then we're fighting for the very few resources that we have. So, you know, with that being said, I really commend all of the council members that are supporting these bills. Mayor, thank you for all of your support and thank you for your time.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 0: I'm proud of you, brother. Congratulations. Next speaker.
Speaker 13: Stephanie. Awesome to a democratic socialists of America and a district two resident. I'm going to start off with a small anecdote for my second year of law school when I was working as an intern for the Orange County District Attorney's Office. We had a I was we had a juvenile assault and we had one witness, an eyewitness to the particular crime of a rather vicious assault where they say, I needed to go to jail. In my opinion, the gentleman was of upstanding character, you know, perfect eyewitness of his. Ms.. Price we can imagine that's the perfect person you want to put on the stand to be able to testify to what happened. The only problem is that his immigration status was not to where you were, not to where the position where he would want to be in an open courtroom and surrounded by officers. The attorney who was leading the case tried his best to be able to convince the person to come in. But when facing deportation and separation from his family, the individual probably within his best interest, chose to not not respond to that subpoena that day. These sorts of laws are an attack on our community. The president that the president is in office right now is a malignant fascist who is using these regulations not because of any particular apparent threat to our but to our country, but rather because he's never stepped outside of his own home. This is these rules are going to be these rules, as are that are being coming from the federal government, are going to be targeted specifically against Long Beach residents and against a type of collective progressive community that we have built. They serve no legitimate purpose. And I'm very grateful for for Councilwoman Gonzales to bring this measure forth. They can have a good day.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, mayor garcia and council members. I'm the reverend melinda teeter dodge i co-pastor the Los Altos United Methodist Church in East Long Beach. It's located in the Fifth District, and I also reside in that district. Tonight, I bring to you the collective and diverse voices of my faith, tradition and community. I speak in support of Bill 31 and 54. I encourage the Council's recommendation of this important work being done by our California state legislature. And while I offer strong support to the Council for these bills, I would ask that our Council consider taking even bolder steps to designate our city as a sanctuary city. And to work and work with local organizations and community members to define what that means and looks like. I speak to you as a Christian leader of a very diverse community that is united by the love of God through many interfaith relationships and united through our scriptural narrative with the major Abrahamic faith traditions. I want to share two quick images for you. This past Wednesday, our church welcomed three other churches from the LDS tradition, and after a shared meal, we made 200 blankets and 200 cards. Each of those blankets this week is being delivered to persons in need throughout the city of Long Beach. A few weeks ago, our faith community wrote love letters. To our brothers and sisters at the Long Beach Islamic Center. In response to the hate mail that they had received, you see it as an inherent, indivisible, part of who we are as a faith community that this work in caring with and for one another, this work to open our hearts and resources to learn from and serve alongside one another so that all may prosper. It is an inherent tenet of our faith and how we live our daily lives, welcoming and honoring all peoples. This is who we are as a faith community, and I would say who we strive to be as the great American city of Long Beach and state of California. We welcome all we care for one another. We steward our resources so that all may thrive. And we work to protect the vulnerable. As you continue your work tonight in the days ahead, I implore the Council to be resolute in its efforts to ensure that Long Beach is a true place of welcome for all peoples. We must ensure that our city is not complicit in the establishment or enforcement of a muslim registry or the return of the national security entry exit registration system. Our city should prohibit the use of resources to enforce a federal program requiring registration of individuals on the basis of race, gender, sexual orientation , religion, or national or ethnic origin. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Hi. I'm Zoe Nicholson. Rose Park. Beautiful. Rose Park. Where I actually have a green lawn now. Um, Mr. Mayor, Vice Mayor, City Council, and members of this beautiful community. Last week, I had the immeasurable good fortune of hearing Reverend Dr. William Barber speak. He was here from North Carolina to receive an honorary degree from Occidental College. He is the founder of Moral Mondays, the Forward Together Gathering Movement and Repairs to the Breach. He lives and breathes on the acute intersection of social justice and examined Christianity. He told us many things that night. He actually got me to sing and clap. He is irresistible. First, he captured my mind with his deep understanding of how this particular moment in history predictably unfurled. He nourished my soul with a call to care for the poor, the disenfranchized and marginalized. Most importantly, he lifted me from a spiritual, dark despair I had been in since November when he explained, This is not Democrats versus GOP. This is not conservatives versus liberals. This is actually not about thugs versus righteous people. We are in a crisis. We are in a moral crisis. We are called to rise to the light. We are called to mind the light. This is an ultimate call to be a moral society. A moral people beginning with a moral person. So besides asking you to be a more sanctuary city, I believe that is the least we can do. Let us rise together and say, I am a sanctuary person. You are safe with me. I live in a sanctuary community. You are safe with us. And finally, that we actually become a sanctuary city so we can proudly be on the record where our hearts and souls reside. Let us be a light to the rest of the country. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, members of the city council. City Manager Pat West. It's an honor and a privilege to be here today. My name is Jessica Quintana, and I'm the executive director of Central Cha and a long time resident of the city of Long Beach for over 52 years. So, as you can tell, I love this city, have the privilege to work here. And for the past 16 years, our organization has been a leader in delivering immigration services and integration services to our constituents here in the city of Long Beach.
Speaker 8: And we've helped.
Speaker 1: Thousands of people become new naturalized citizens and helping them to stay united with families and boost their economic upward mobility and contribute to the city's economy. So today, we're just really proud of our city council to be the first across the state of California to support this initiative. Because what I could tell you about Long Beach is we're into building bridges and not walls. And so this is the kind of leadership we have. Absolutely. So what I'd like to do is just applaud you for your leadership. Councilwoman Gonzalez, thank you so much. Councilwoman Pierce, thank you for supporting this initiative. Vice Mayor Brett Richardson and of course, our councilman from from the West Side from the seventh District. Thank you so much. And I would just like to urge the rest of our city council members to support this. My councilman from the eighth District, Councilman Austin, truly would appreciate your support on this initiative, because what I can tell you is not only does Long Beach, the Center Cha, have a leadership here in our local community, but we belong to statewide one California Networks and L.A. County Immigration North American Initiative. And that works. And it's the same thing what we're hearing across the state. And so folks are very much in fear. And so it is up to our elected officials to really take the the leadership and ensure that our communities are safe, that that they're responding to their their fears, and that this is this is a public safety issue.
Speaker 8: This is a quality of life.
Speaker 1: Public safety issue. And if you can imagine, never should we be coming to council and be divided and asking for equity and equality for certain groups that should never be. And so I just, you know, encourage your leadership and support this. And thank everybody.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hey, my name's Andrew Guy. I live in Bluff Heights and Councilwoman Pearce's district and councilwoman here. And you speak in the lobby this hour, earlier this evening, I'm even more proud than I was to have voted for you. So thanks for the work that you're doing. This issue affects my family. My husband is undocumented, so we're a gay immigrant, socialist household. So apologies to the sensibilities of some in the room today. And on election night, we were just stunned in front of our television, you know, actually crying, thinking about the talk of deportation forces that we'd heard during the campaign and wondering what the future held for us. So I'm happy to see that the councilmembers are supporting the state bills that their senators, Laura and DeLeon, are proposing. But I want to emphasize that this should only be a start. The people of Long Beach's immigrant community know that the state of California will stand up for them, but they need to know that their city will, too. Cities like Santa Ana are ahead of Long Beach in drafting actual ordinances, not just resolutions of support to protect their immigrant residents. There are steps that Long Beach needs to take separately from the proposed state bills to do the same. With respect, many of us do not agree that criminal offenses should be grounds for deportation, and the city should take steps to help ensure that low level offenses do not lead to ICE actions, specifically offering alternatives to incarceration and prohibiting the use of any city resources, including entry to the Long Beach Jail, to ICE agents without a criminal warrant. So in short, I'm happy to see that the council is taking a step in the right direction today, and I hope it's only the first. I know that there's a dedicated community in our city that's committed to making sure that it is. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker, please. Yeah. Next speaker, please. Thank you.
Speaker 8: Good afternoon. My name is Patty and I'm a member of Echo District nine, affiliated with Pico, California. I just got to say, I love Long Beach and I love the people, and that's why I'm here. I'm also a voter, a long term Long Beach resident. We are proud to be sponsors of the California Values Act Bill. We applaud the city for taking steps and supporting of this statewide bill that would increase the protection of our immigrant community. However, we see this is only the first step regardless of Trump's threats. We and I want to emphasize this regardless of Trump's threats, we need to know that our city leaders will stand behind our immigrants community over any federal money with. With that being said, we are asking for our city leaders to support Long Beach as a sanctuary city. We also ask staff agents and especially the Long Beach Police Department to have the maximum sensitivity and discretion on our low level offenses. In Long Beach, we have a clear example of a family being thrown apart. I'm referring to the Jose Alvarez case being pulled over and deported for a broken taillight. Our immigrants communities fear and are intimidated by the police department due to the fact that their union endorsed Trump. Finally, we are asking you to support on this vote and looking forward to see the city of Long Beach walk with us in protecting our immigrants and community in officially becoming a sanctuary city.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Thank you.
Speaker 5: Hi, my name is Ashley Thomas and I'm also with the Democratic Socialists of America Long Beach chapter. I just want to start by acknowledging that we're living in frightening times. Trump's Muslim ban and his wall makes me ashamed to be an American. Thankfully, California is leading the fight against this xenophobic administration, and this fight is important. So I urge you to vote to support SB 54 and SB 31. But Long Beach can do more. I urge the City Council to show the rest of the country what it truly means to be a sanctuary. Show them how much stronger a community can be.
Speaker 1: When we as a city.
Speaker 5: Refuse to use the resource to use our resources to facilitate deportations. When we refuse to book low level offenders in county jail where they will risk deportation, whether they're guilty or not. Tell the rest of California and the rest of the country that Long Beach will never cooperate with any type of registry. Muslim or not. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hello, Honorable Council and mayor. My name is Giovanni Rodriguez Leiva, and I'm here as a member of the Long Beach Immigrants Rights Coalition and Fuel at Cal State Long Beach. I'm also here as an undocumented immigrant. Directly impacted by Trump's executive orders on immigration. I have been living as an undocumented immigrants in this country for over 27 years, and I have never felt more concerned for my safety or the safety of my community as I do today. I have had the opportunity to serve as a middle school teacher for the Long Beach Unified School District. This has been my lifelong dream. But recently I have noticed the fear and through the eyes of some of my students, either they're afraid of what may happen to them or they're afraid of what may happen to their parents under this administration. We can't let this happen. We need to make sure that they and their families are safe. I need my students to come into the classroom focused and ready to learn. We need to take a stand. That is why I'm here today. I am thankful to Councilwoman Gonzalez for introducing this resolution in support of SB 54 and SB 31. And in an era when Trump is attacking the most vulnerable in our community. We. We need further action. We need to declare Long Beach a sanctuary city now. We need to ensure that local resources will not facilitate the threat of mass deportations. We need to ensure that when we enter a state or local agency, our information will not be used against us. We need a local policy to ensure accountability. I welcome this first step and I hope we can create we can move towards an ordinance and ensure the safety of this community. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you for your time and work. Next speaker.
Speaker 7: Please. Oh.
Speaker 8: Good afternoon, council members and mayor. My name's Marie de Soto, and I live in the ninth district. I was born and raised in Long Beach and also work in the local hospitality industry. Recently, I have been at the forefront fighting for women's rights, working in the hospitality industry all over L.A. County. I am here today concerned about my sisters who are without status. I am concerned my sisters will not be able to call the paramedics in case of an emergency because of the fear of being deported. They should have they should not have to choose between their children's lives and the ability to stay in this country. I am here because working immigrant women deserve the right to call police when they when they are victims of mental and physical abuse at their home or their workplace. Women should not fear the police that are supposed to protect them. I am here because no matter. Because no mother should walk into a school with the fear of being deported. A woman, regardless of background or immigration status or religion, deserve to deserve respect. I am here today standing in solidarity with the community, asking council to take a bold stance and take our city into being a sanctuary city through the act of infrastructure. I want a policy that will ensure that my sisters, my family and my home and my workplace are safe here in Long Beach. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Thanks, Speaker, please.
Speaker 11: Hello. My name is Myron Wolin. I am the president of the Long Beach Gray Panthers and an official with the California Alliance for Retired Americans. I want to thank the council members who have promoted the support for SB 54 and SB 31. Thank you very much. These are measures that need to be supported and approved on the state level. We are a country of immigrants. We are a nation of immigrants. We are a city of immigrants. Our mayor is from Peru. He is an.
Speaker 7: Immigrant.
Speaker 11: My my mother. My father were immigrants to this country. We should be.
Speaker 7: Welcoming. Welcoming. And we've known as a welcoming nation.
Speaker 11: What we are seeing today in the current political climate is a fear of the stranger, fear of the immigrant. We hurt. We we are hurtful. We we hate the fact that politicians will use fear. Fear of the stranger to gather votes to make a political statement in this way. The Great Panthers have come out in support of making Long Beach a sanctuary city. We we feel that our our city should be open to immigrants, should be open to the stranger. We as a Jew, I remember how we were discriminated against, how at certain times we were forced not to be allowed to come into this country . I remember a a reading in history about a ship called the St Louis that had a bunch of Jewish immigrants that were trying to come into this country. They were refused to come here. And the charge against it was, we don't know if there are Nazi spies. That could be invested in this ship, and therefore we won't allow.
Speaker 7: Anybody to come aboard and to come.
Speaker 11: Here. And this was in 1939. And one quarter of those Jews were then were killed in the Holocaust as a result of not being allowed to come to this country. So this is very personal to me. This is very personal to the Jewish community. And we urge you to make. Long Beach a sanctuary city.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir.
Speaker 8: Speaker Honorable mayor and council members. And my name is Maria. And in a time where everyone's living in fear, I say I'm.
Speaker 5: Undocumented, unafraid and unapologetic. I came here at the age of three.
Speaker 8: I have that guy just in case, you know, I'm protected. So I came here at the age of three, not having seen my dad since birth. Birth? Okay. I got reunited with my dad. I've been living here. I've been contributing. I, I many of you here, sitting here. I have volunteered in your campaigns. I have been.
Speaker 5: A productive citizen of the city of Long Beach for as long as I can remember. I graduated from HLB CC with an associate's in social sciences. I graduated from Cal State Long Beach with a bachelor's in Chicano Latino Studies.
Speaker 8: I, I have worked hard for where I am standing right now. I'm not going to let down. I'm not going to.
Speaker 5: Let no one take that from me.
Speaker 8: Because that's not what. That's not what we do. We don't take things from our neighbors. We give them help.
Speaker 5: If our neighbors dealing with with the rent increases, she can't afford it.
Speaker 8: Cooperative. Come on, everybody turn. You know you want to. You don't want this family to become homeless. We all help each other out because that's what we do. That's where our roots come from. I don't just come here to make my life better. I come here to make my community better.
Speaker 5: To make my state.
Speaker 8: Better, to make my country better. So all this. All this hate of illegal and decriminalizing and dehumanizing people.
Speaker 5: I left that in, like.
Speaker 8: Senior grade in high school.
Speaker 5: Why? Because I knew there was bigger.
Speaker 8: And better goals. So today you are all on fire. Measure H. Sanctuary City. Come on. If you're here for support of undocumented community, stand up.
Speaker 5: Let me see the side. We are here with you. We are going to take a stab with you.
Speaker 8: Thank you for standing up for undocumented communities.
Speaker 5: And thank you for serving in a major, major way today.
Speaker 8: Thank you.
Speaker 0: All. Oh. Next speaker. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 8: Hi. Good evening.
Speaker 12: My name is Africa ARTIM and I'm. I'm a junior at Millikan High School, the Quest program. I am actually a first generation going to college. I've had an unweighted 4.0 since my freshman year, and I really hope I really aspire to go to UCLA, majoring in molecular biology and eventually start my career for pathology. And none of that would have happened if my parents, well, my family then decided to immigrate to the United States. And my grandpa came as a bracero, and they let me have these dreams. These dreams. And I really wish they.
Speaker 3: Could be here.
Speaker 8: Today.
Speaker 12: But I really have friends. Friends and really close friends of my people that I love. And some of them can even kind of play to become darker students or some of them are really afraid of that their parents are going to be deported. So I really hope that you guys support SB 31 and SB 54. Because their dreams matter, too. I've had an undocumented friend of mine. He really tried to get into the community college so he can start as a high school student concurrent enrollment, so he can start getting out ahead of his classes. But most community colleges.
Speaker 8: Asked him for papers.
Speaker 12: And he couldn't provide any because he's not eligible for DECA or he I mean, he just doesn't have papers. And so how can you just turn away people like that? That's to me. If you want to learn, you come to this country wanting to learn and wanting to contribute, wanting to be your lawyers, your teachers, or maybe even one of them wants to be sitting in a chair that you're sitting in right now. And I really hope one of them does. So I really hope SPF 31 and SPF 54 will eventually promote inclusivity of the undocumented students in the classroom now, not just at the high school level, but for higher education, because in the end, in this competitive workforce.
Speaker 3: You need.
Speaker 12: A bachelor's.
Speaker 8: Master's or a doctorate degree.
Speaker 12: To even survive. So I'm really thankful that you guys are taking into consideration this, but I also really hope.
Speaker 8: That you.
Speaker 12: Create a sanctuary city. Because to prevent to make sure students go to school safely, to make sure they're assured.
Speaker 3: That their.
Speaker 12: That one day their families are still going to be they're not going to be gone.
Speaker 8: So I think you.
Speaker 0: You you're you're in a high school. You're at Milliken, you said.
Speaker 12: Yeah, I'm a student.
Speaker 0: Amazing, amazing words from a high school student. Just a very inspiring for for the future. So thank you very much.
Speaker 12: Mayor. I would actually like to think I have a lot of my friends, my teammates are here.
Speaker 8: A couple of my friends over here. And so I really want to thank.
Speaker 12: You because to them, this is really important.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: My name is U.S.A. Party and I'm the leadership development coordinator at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a member of the Shura Council of Southern California, a muslim organization that represents over half a million Muslims in SoCal alone. We urge the City Council to support SB 31, the California Religious Freedoms Act, and SB 54. The California Values Act. SB 31 provides robust state action to protect vulnerable communities from ineffective and harmful programs that undermine public safety and diminish public trust in law enforcement, while also fulfilling California's duty to ensure equal treatment under the law. A database, a registry based on religion, ethnicity or national origin would go against the principles this country was founded on by prohibiting state and local law enforcement agencies from participating in federal immigration enforcement efforts. SB 54 protects immigrants from detention, deportation, and, most importantly, the separation of families. When local law enforcement enforces federal immigration laws, it reduces community trust in cooperation with police, thus jeopardizing the public safety of all residents. People are afraid and they need to be able to trust and rely on local law enforcement and elected officials such as yourselves. Now more than ever, we implore you to support these two critical pieces of legislation and protect and defend the rights of all residents of California, regardless of their national origin, their immigration status, or their religious beliefs. In light of the controversy that has spread following President Trump's executive orders, bills such as SB 31 and SB 54 are essential in protecting marginalized communities. Lastly, I would like to share a personal story with you. A few days ago, I participated in the Alex protests in order to pressure the CPS to follow the newest protocol when executing the Muslim ban. When I was there, I saw folks of all walks of life come together to support the Muslims community. Truly, this bothered me and warmed my heart. But one woman, bless her heart, I'm sure she had the best of intentions. She told me something that really made me reflect. She told me that I was welcome here. I'm sure she had the purest intentions. I'm sure. But I couldn't help but ponder on her words. How could someone welcome me to the country that I was born in for country that I the only country that I've ever known? It's like telling me I'm welcome into my own house. It's my house. And how could I ever hurt anyone or anything in my house? And how could I be surveillance in my own house? I'll. I'll enter my house and leave it as I please without fear of getting kicked out or of being monitored. And that goes for the country that I live in and the country that I'm born in as well. I tell you this story to put things in perspective. You weren't doing me a favor by voting in support in support of these measures. Rather, you're confirming the rights that I already have. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hello. My name is Destiny and I didn't plan on speaking because I'm new here to Long Beach. But I felt compelled to speak.
Speaker 1: Because I used to be in a relationship with a guy who was undocumented.
Speaker 3: And he ended up getting caught with marijuana and going to.
Speaker 1: Jail for.
Speaker 3: A small amount. And while in jail, they told him that they asked him.
Speaker 1: For his Social Security.
Speaker 3: Number and he told them that he didn't have one. So they called ice and within a month later, he was deported. When they deported him, they didn't care how many nights he stayed. How many nights he stayed up.
Speaker 1: Thinking of ways to better the community.
Speaker 3: That he was forced to leave, leaving care that he had no family and no friends in Mexico. He didn't know anybody. He came here to the United States as a two year old, and they didn't care that he he would end up going days without food. They didn't care that he struggled with bipolar disorder. And that would and that would go on because of.
Speaker 1: Not being treated.
Speaker 3: They he within three years later, committed suicide. When he got deported, his mom.
Speaker 1: Started marking his calendars, how many days it had been since she had last seen him. And the last day.
Speaker 3: Was less than nine. It was less than a thousand days. And she will now never see him again.
Speaker 1: And obviously, everyone who gets deported.
Speaker 3: Is doesn't meet that fate. But it's a risk. And I just I just want to thank you all for having this on the agenda. And I want to thank you for caring.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Josh Butler housing Long Beach. Good evening once again. Remember the city council. And first, I want to say, you want to give it up to our community organizer, Maria Lopez for her comments. I know that from working with her that these have been trying times for her and even just trying to fly to Sacramento with colleagues in our community has become something that was a challenge to us to be able to do as a group. I also want to echo the comments of Mr. Wilson and the Gray Panthers, as I am also from the Jewish faith, and I like him, know that when you smell trouble, there's trouble. You don't wait. And housing. Long Beach is in full support of making Long Beach a sanctuary city. Long Beach. Long Beach is the international city and we celebrate diversity and we welcome all people. So let's live up to that. We need to send a message that our city has your back. As you've heard, or as you may or may not know, the anti tenant group Better Housing for Long Beach has called our city's inspection program a violation of human rights. They have stated that the city inspectors are demanding ID from tenants. We have heard stories that tenants have been chased out of their units within three days. The threat of ice hanging over their heads. You heard attempts at intimidation directed at me this evening. Imagine what our low income tenants, our immigrant communities, undocumented citizens feel from their from landlords like this and folks like that. So we asked you to stand up to that kind of aggression, to stand up to that kind of intimidation so that our citizens know that Long Beach is a sanctuary for them and that we're not going to support these kind of tactics and we're not going to support these kind of efforts, and we're going to support people here in Long Beach. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hi folks. My name is Salvador Sarmiento with the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. We've been working on these policies for a long time, and I think it's important to mention right off, right off the bat, you know, this is about immigration. This is about immigrants and refugees. But not not only I think folks that have been paying attention for a while know that sanctuary cities were really a revolt over the last eight years over the massive expansion of the federal program known as Secure Communities. Right. And it's not. When I say also it's not just about immigrant, it's not just an issue of immigration. Secure Communities is probably the best, most emblematic of the fusion between mass deportation and mass incarceration. Right. That's that's what that's what the revolt against Secure Communities really was about. And that's what being a sanctuary city, sanctuary policy, sanctuary state, whatever you want to call it, is really about and I don't know if you know, when when we've worked on these issues. I remember the mayor is an old like an old civil rights fighter in Tuskegee, Alabama, when they passed their their policy about three or four years ago, this guy, he you know, he he confronted what is white terrorism. Right. And really call it what it is. The folks that we have in the White House are being conduits to white supremacist groups and leaders. And and they are now in control of that massive deportation mechanism that was built over the last 20 years. And so I think, first of all, I want to say, I mean, if you all saw the O'Reilly interview of Donald Trump right before the game, that terrible game on Sunday. But, you know, Trump says California is out of control. California Values Act means that California is out of his control to use as part of his that deportation force. And so it's it's incredibly powerful that you support SB 54 and SB 31, but in particular, it's important that you support it in its current form, that the way it's drafted currently is that ensures it escapes the trap of picking winners and losers. Good immigrants, bad immigrants, you know, throwing out the folks with any prior conviction, which I think Long Beach in particular knows that that's B.S. And that's a pretense to scapegoat immigrants and folks with convictions, and that folks have been doing that since the nineties, and we won't accept that anymore. So to support the Values Act as it is, that's incredibly important and everybody in the room could be a voice for that. The last thing I'll say around the funding issue, the federal funding issues, it's there's a really good piece by Chemerinsky out of UCI Law School, which really breaks it down if there's concerns about that. The last thing I'll say is the most powerful thing that this council could do and the mayor and the city could do to support 54 is to make sure, because we don't know how or when that's going to be enacted at the state level. And there's a lot of conservative pockets in the state that they're going to try to carve out pieces, pass a local policy here, make it good, make the standard high. Let's make it happen here. There's no reason that Long Beach has to wait for this. We can have it. This can happen now.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening. My name is Nicole Kabob.
Speaker 8: I'm a Lumbee resident and an organizer with the Filipino Migrant Center. You've heard from many of us today. Given the recent executive orders, the rhetoric that has really stirred immense fear and anxiety in our community and the threats of deportation and hate crimes that loom over us. But across the city and across the United States, people are standing up against hate. They're standing up against xenophobia. They're standing up against Islamophobia. We applaud the.
Speaker 5: City leaders.
Speaker 8: For starting this discussion to support SB 54 and SB 31. But like many have mentioned earlier, this is only the beginning and we can't wait for the state to do the right thing. Santa Ana, the second largest city of Orange County, recently passed a local resolution and a local policy to protect all undocumented immigrants in their city . That's Orange County. We. As Long Beach, the second largest city in Los Angeles County, should join Santa Ana, should join San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley and all across the state and Los Angeles in making sure that our city becomes a sanctuary city for all. We, together with the Long Beach Immigrant Rights Coalition, the greater echo clue Building Healthy Communities and Lane want the city of Long Beach to become a sanctuary in five particular ways. One prohibit the use of local Long Beach resources that would facilitate deportations. This includes prohibiting those local resources, facilities or personnel to assist in federal immigration enforcement. Two, we want to provide diversion and alternatives to incarceration for low level offenses. That means that we want to make sure that city staff agents and the Long Beach Police Department are appropriately trained and encouraged to exercise maximum discretion for low level offenses . There should be alternatives that promote the goal of rehabilitation and not incarceration. The Long Beach Police Department should also adopt a policy of siting and releasing individuals charged with low level offenses in lieu of booking them into county jails. Third, we want to defend pro-immigrant policies from any attacks by the federal government. We've already heard from this new administration. The attacks and threats that would impose limits on federal government's authority. But we want to make sure that the city of Long Beach stands up and acts to protect our immigrant population against these and proper threats. The fourth, we want to oppose any registry based on religious identity and protect other protected characteristics. This includes ensuring that city personnel are prohibited from responding to civil immigration warrants, that city personnel do not cooperate with federal agents to enforce any sort of registry, and that city databases and information are not used for the purposes of building a registry or even enforcing it. And lastly, we want the city of Long Beach to ensure the protection of sensitive and confidential information. Without this robust confidentiality protections, immigrant members will be afraid of coming to the city of Long Beach. And we want to make sure that the city does the right thing. We invite you to be on the right side of history. We invite you to be a part of making the city of Long Beach a sanctuary city for all. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next speaker.
Speaker 5: Good evening, Mayor Garcia and council members. Thank you, Lina, for introducing this resolution. It's very much needed. My name is Jane Wilson Barbosa. I'm a resident of District four for 38 years past, president of the.
Speaker 8: United Methodist Women Los Altos Methodist Church and a member of CLU. I've been an educator and administrator for 40 years and I now direct the ESL Breakfast Club. But most.
Speaker 5: Importantly, I am the grandmother of a new little seven.
Speaker 8: Week old baby. His name is Martin, and he's named after Martin Luther King.
Speaker 5: And I woke this morning at 4:00.
Speaker 8: Really wanting to rock him by the fireplace. But I'm here tonight because fear clawed my heart about the quality of life.
Speaker 5: That Martin may have to face. And I'll tell you why.
Speaker 14: There's a woman.
Speaker 5: In the Breakfast Club whose name I've changed. Her name is Christina. She came across the border without papers in order to earn money for her father, who lay dying in Mexico. She suffered.
Speaker 8: Much abuse.
Speaker 5: She found a man here in the.
Speaker 8: United States whom she loves and who loves.
Speaker 5: Her so much that he's adopted her son.
Speaker 8: She's learning English so that.
Speaker 5: She can take a citizenship test and speak to her son's.
Speaker 8: Teachers.
Speaker 5: And she she's applying for legal permanent residence. And for some reason, which I don't understand, her request has been.
Speaker 8: Denied.
Speaker 5: And she's been ordered back to Juarez, Mexico.
Speaker 8: To wait for six.
Speaker 5: Months and reapply for entry to the United States. We know those doors are slamming shut. Her husband is terrified that he'll never see her again.
Speaker 8: And this I know, Christina, is.
Speaker 5: A wonderful, creative, generous person who teaches children.
Speaker 8: Here in Long Beach. And as long as I draw breath.
Speaker 5: I will never cooperate with any federal agent.
Speaker 8: That asks for any identification or.
Speaker 5: Is trying to track her down. And I'm asking you, the members of the council to stand with me.
Speaker 8: Tonight to make Long Beach a sanctuary city so that.
Speaker 5: My grandson, Martin, can grow up surrounded.
Speaker 8: By people who have the courage to stand with the people who are most vulnerable in our society, the Bible says. Indeed, I tell you in so much as you do.
Speaker 5: This, for the least of these members of my family, you do it for me. So I'm asking you to stand for the most vulnerable people and make Long Beach a sanctuary city. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 8: Please. Thank you very much for. For this amendment. I really like it. My name.
Speaker 3: Is Marlene Alvarado.
Speaker 8: And I am the proud daughter of an undocumented worker. He fought in World War Two. Right. He worked for Harold Washington in Chicago, because I'm a Chicana from Chicago, but I've been living here. I've been living here for the last 15 years. I produced a television program called Soy the Pueblo, and it talks about all of the other undocumented people. I talks about homeless people. It talks about health care. It talks about antiwar. I belong to Long Beach Area Peace Network. I belong to military family. Speak out. I have a son who is who is in the Navy. I have.
Speaker 3: Taught undocumented.
Speaker 8: Workers. I'm a retired teacher, ESL teacher. As far as this gentleman over here is concerned, I have worked in systems and supported Central Americans who are coming over to this country because the United States had set up military dictatorships in their country right now in front of their and for and our borders are women and children who are suffering right now. Meanwhile, we're allowing this man from Cuba because he comes from a communist country to come in here. And we gave him Social Security. We gave all kinds of stuff. But the but the victims of our wars in Central America can't even cross the border. And there are women and their children, and they're suffering from violence, from the military dictators we have set up, as far as I'm concerned, is this is a great idea. We should be a sanctuary city. And the other thing I want to tell you about is that according to Mendel, right, Mendelian law, in order for the species to survive, it is best that we are diverse. He proved it. I mean, if you're just if you're the genetics of interracial and crossed right. You know racial marriage is really important in my family. We have Poles, we have Italians, we have African-Americans, we have the United Nations. So in my third generation, we are totally American. And we started from an undocumented worker.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker Newt.
Speaker 7: Good afternoon. My name is Barcelos Chavez.
Speaker 11: And I've been.
Speaker 7: Around immigrants all my life because my grandpa was an immigrant. He was back.
Speaker 11: On the seventies is to pick up apples.
Speaker 7: On Washington. You know, that's hard work building up on the ladders. And for people of, you know, I come from a long way. You know, I was born here and I was raised in Mexico.
Speaker 4: I can see all their.
Speaker 9: Life over there.
Speaker 4: I came back when I was, you know.
Speaker 11: Like ten years old.
Speaker 4: And all my life. Been living here in Long Beach. I care for Long Beach or work Long Beach. And I can see.
Speaker 11: All the hard work the people has done.
Speaker 7: Like, you know.
Speaker 4: You know, I have a lot of relatives, but they work hard.
Speaker 11: And, you know, I've been working since I was like 15, you know, since I was a kid. I used to like.
Speaker 4: You know, take you know, we raised cows would take them back home, you know walking at eight years old. I got here when I got here. I was working. I don't even care if I get paid. I just did it because I liked it. I had friends. I work on a restaurant by a neighborhood alliance for Lambic.
Speaker 11: And you know, I worked on the I used to work on this company as a roofing company. And, you know, things got you know, I was 15. I was working. You know, I can see I've been working with people that, you know, they don't have papers, but they come here for one reason. They come to work. You know, all those matches you see over there by Orange County, you know who did them?
Speaker 7: Immigrants. Immigrants.
Speaker 11: They're don't you know, I work with my cousins. They're dry cleaners. They get high on those buildings. They're building million dollar homes. You know who did them?
Speaker 7: Immigrants. My mom.
Speaker 11: She was an immigrant before. She used to pick cherries.
Speaker 4: Pick strawberries when she was pretty. There's only one thing, you know, I take pride in my.
Speaker 11: Work, you know? You know, I.
Speaker 4: Come from a long way. You know, one thing, I'm here for the people.
Speaker 11: That can make it here. But I've been all around, you know, I've been on Stockton. I used to work with the immigrants. They build homes over there, tracks, drywall, stucco ceilings, all that kind of work, you know? And, you know, I'm just here. One thing I think, I believe on 54 and 31.
Speaker 7: I truly believe in that, you know, and then people are here not to take anything away from no one. There's people that cut grass is who you know.
Speaker 11: You know those people. They wake up early in the morning and do their job. That's the only thing they come here, you know, just provide for their families.
Speaker 4: You're I'm saying, you know, I.
Speaker 11: Believe on 54 and 31.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Uh, good evening. Uh, my name is Thomas. Like, I belong to the second district. I have to say that the current administration's rhetoric, the executive orders, reverberate throughout my soul. I'm rattled by the sense of urgency to port to support these measures. I would just like to ask everyone to focus on the fact that this just isn't a matter of discovering who's undocumented, who's a criminal, and who isn't. This is about resisting, resisting legislation that is not only divisive, it's deeply invasive and human. It's an inhuman way of sending a message to those who are different from us. The message is regardless to whether or not you're a drug dealer. Have a few outstanding parking tickets. None of that really matters. It's your religion, your culture, your existence. That isn't normal. It isn't accepted. And we're telling people that it's shameful and evil. And that's not the message that I want to get behind, and it's not the message that I want my cities to support. That being said, support for SB 54 and SB 31 is a wonderful foundation for a safe, prosperous community. I mean, clearly, we have so many people that are coming from all walks of life that are excelling and striving for to live up to the very best of what they can be. So I hope we can build on this foundation and soon become a sanctuary city. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Hi. My name is running for the fifth district. I wasn't intending on talking today. I didn't even know this was going to be on the the menu for this evening. And so everybody talking here is completely educated me in many ways. And so I want to thank the very impassioned pleas that especially that lady who whose friend had passed away. One of the things that that my parents are from India and they immigrated legally. So the undocumented folks don't really fit in. When I was a kid. I woke up, I was like five an hour. Garage was burned down. Somebody had burn it down because my parents were. We know who it was. Had had burned down our garage. Now, that's a hate crime. It doesn't necessarily fit in here. But one of the things that that has come to me is that as I've grown up, I really haven't been discriminated that much. But one of the things that I know is that there is a lot of information, a lot of data that's being collected out there. And a lot of people don't have any idea the depth of the information that's out there in some cases. The ship has already sailed and trying to stop something from occurring is going to be very difficult. If you get pulled over, chances are they can get all the information they can they want from you regarding your immigration status right there. Pretty much, you know, and that may be an exaggeration, but it can come very quickly. That's my fear is not necessarily all of the information gathering just on your origin, but in every other aspect of your life you want to if people want to know what you. Any phone call that you've made in your entire life, they can pick up the phone and they can they can they can do it. They can play a recording any day of the time that you've ever been on the phone. It's there. Whether it's accessible to the police, I don't know. But it's all there. My main point that I'm trying to make is, though that that. The immigrants have become a an important part of our community. You go to schools when I was going. Many of them. The whole composition has changed. And I don't know how teachers could keep on teaching without the number of, you know, undocumented people that are in our schools. We'd have to change the whole system. I'm not sure what the answer is at all. I have no idea. But it's very difficult to unwind all of this stuff and I don't know how we're going to manage all of this stuff. That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next, bigger, please.
Speaker 10: Hello, Mr. Mayor. And members of the council. My name is Angela Logan, and I am a resident of the fourth District.
Speaker 13: I want to urge the Council to pass a resolution supporting SB 54 and SB 31.
Speaker 7: I think that that's a threshold that's like where we start, right? Over the years.
Speaker 10: I've heard a number of folks.
Speaker 13: Behind the dais describe the city of Long Beach.
Speaker 7: As a progressive city. A progressive city doesn't stop at.
Speaker 13: Passing resolutions supporting state legislation.
Speaker 7: But progressive city.
Speaker 10: Moves towards measures.
Speaker 13: That are going to protect their residents and their communities.
Speaker 10: Progressive City works diligently to get over those barriers.
Speaker 7: Those challenges not recoil.
Speaker 10: But be bold and move.
Speaker 7: Towards measures such as sanctuary cities. I want to encourage you.
Speaker 10: I want to urge you. I want to support you. I think you have your.
Speaker 13: Whole city behind you, all of your residents behind you in passing and working towards a sanctuary city policy. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Hello, everyone. City Council members.
Speaker 3: Mayor, I am a Long Beach resident of the First District and an active member in my community. I have been fighting for immigrant rights for over 15 years.
Speaker 8: And I'm very proud of all the.
Speaker 3: Work that we've done. But there's still a lot to be done. I am a neighborhood leadership program alumni and most recently, a city employee. We are all here before you, the city council members and the mayor. Of our beautiful city of Long Beach.
Speaker 8: Asking you to support.
Speaker 1: SB 54.
Speaker 2: Excuse me.
Speaker 3: And we. 31 And to also make Long Beach a sanctuary city for immigrants. As a sanctuary city, we can stand up for immigrants rights and remind the rest of this country that the United States of America has been, is and will always be a nation of immigrants. We are all immigrants.
Speaker 8: We need to stop racism now.
Speaker 3: We cannot wait till more lives are lost and more lives. More families are separated by heat for loss.
Speaker 8: We need to.
Speaker 3: Stand together in solidarity and protect our immigrant brothers and sisters. We need to act now before it is too late. In the audience.
Speaker 8: My mother is here. Mom.
Speaker 3: My mother came here as an immigrant. And I have seen her struggles.
Speaker 5: As a single.
Speaker 8: Mother taking care of her.
Speaker 3: Children. But I have also seen how opportunities have changed for us, how our lives have changed as being part of the U.S..
Speaker 8: So I'm really nervous. But it's been such a change to see.
Speaker 5: My mother struggle to put food on our table. Till now.
Speaker 8: I'm a university graduate working for the city, and I'm very proud of everything.
Speaker 5: That we've done. And I feel that.
Speaker 3: As Long Beach, I'm very proud to be here. It's a very diverse city, and I love that we are here discussing the making Long Beach, a sanctuary city.
Speaker 5: And I really hope.
Speaker 3: That our city council members decide to take that stand. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Hi. My name is Wayne Marchant. You can call me Wayne Second District. You've heard pretty much from everybody that we support SB 54 and 31. However, you've heard from many people that the language we are looking for is declaring Long Beach a sanctuary city. You know, these are extraordinary times and this room is full of extraordinary people. There are many more out there. For everyone that's here, there's 20 more extraordinary people out there and they've got friends as well. So we're looking for extraordinary action and thinking from you, our city council, in these extraordinary times.
Speaker 0: You. Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 11: Larry. Good clerk as the address. About 15 minutes ago, somebody made a very interesting comment in a well-reasoned comment saying they deserve respect. He was an advocate of the sanctuary city. But yet. A great many people that spoke tonight. And Legions More out there. Showed no disrespect. And give a little finger. To the legions, legions of people that follow the law, stand in line and wait for their turn. Period. No ex, no arms, no bucks. No. There's no question that the Twitter in chief, who was not my first choice for president, I would rather have Ryan . But I think he is. And he jumped the gun or it was poorly intimate, implemented, and he'll die back. No reason person. Would take a stance against. An immigrant in this country if they're here illegally, period. As they point out, most of us, our ancestors came from other countries. But it's the law that you have to follow. Don't you know if you try not to? What happens in other countries when you don't follow the law? That's why our lines are so long. But you follow the law. Period.
Speaker 0: Okay. I just want make sure that we're. If the audience can just the speaker should be the only one speaking to continue. Mr. Good. You appreciate that.
Speaker 11: And I don't see in this council and I haven't yet met any person. That supports a concept of going after and checking what religion.
Speaker 7: People are in, period.
Speaker 11: And I don't see that coming out of Washington. I think, as I said, I think it was poorly implemented. Whoever the commander in chief is, his responsibility is to protect this country, period. And we've got a lot of people that want to nuke this country. Or send over terrorist. There's no question there was a lot of confusion in the airports, but. If you think about it, it wasn't much more than with exception of the individuals who, if I were the president, I would have it. I would reimburse them for their expense, so forth or hotel rooms. Caught up in that because quite frankly, the mask was essentially not much more of a mess. And you'd find on any holiday weekend, when the computer systems went down or weather was down and so forth, it was absolute chaos. But again, it goes back to respect, respect the law. The law says get in line. Wait.
Speaker 0: Q Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Put.
Speaker 8: My name is Nadir Tushnet, and.
Speaker 5: I live in the third district. I'm a member of a lot of organizations, but.
Speaker 8: Tonight I'm representing the Long Beach Area Peace.
Speaker 5: Network.
Speaker 8: We are in favor of Long Beach becoming a sister city, a sanctuary city. I'm sorry. I was about to quote my brother is what this is about. And the quote that we in my family always say is the pastor nee miler vote quote and what my brother says when they came for you. Not today. Not today.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Next speaker and just I know we're reaching the end here. I just want make sure I get it cut off the speakers less if there's anyone else that's not in line. I see someone at the end there. Okay. Is there someone else? Okay, so be our last speaker. Is the. Okay. Well, actually. Okay, that's okay. Well, let me wait till this folks get in line and then I'm anchored. Cut off the speaker's list. So we have everyone in line. Okay. And the gentleman there will be the last speaker. The gentleman at the end is the last speaker. Okay. Thank you very much. Yes, sir.
Speaker 11: Hi.
Speaker 4: My name is Mansur Saba and I'm in fourth district. Mr. Super Nice, Councilman. Super. And unfortunately, I think I got to be compelled to be here to make comments. I really didn't have anything extra to say than what's already been said. But just because the the.
Speaker 11: The name or.
Speaker 4: The law was used.
Speaker 11: That they are.
Speaker 4: Laws that we are supposed to follow. And I want to compel the council members that there is a higher law that we need to follow, and that is a humanity law that we need to have that doesn't recognize borders, doesn't recognize hunger, doesn't recognize homelessness. And that's why I'm here to.
Speaker 11: Encourage you to pass.
Speaker 4: SB 40, 54 and 31. And please follow it up with a policy for the city that we need to have. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 7: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, and good evening, council members. My name is George Acosta and I have lived in Long Beach my entire life. I'm here speaking for those who are afraid to speak. I am absolutely terrified of public speaking. But at this moment, I don't care if my fear of my fear of speaking up because I'm more terrified of losing my mother. I'm currently a high school junior at polling high school, and I want my mother to go to my high school graduation. I plan to go to see. She will be. And I want to have a I want to have our my college graduation. I want to see I want her to see me succeed and thrive in the city which I've lived my entire life in and plan to stay for much longer. My sister is months away from graduating from CSU will be. And I know she's scared to speak tonight. So I'm here doing this for her. She is part of the BRC and when she said she was coming, I wanted to show my support, but I do not plan to speak. Once I heard all these stories and began thinking of my loved ones. I felt the need to speak up. I don't want to lose. I want I don't want us or anyone to have to lose so much that they've grown up with that they've lived in. I'm speaking for my best friend who is undocumented.
Speaker 9: Who I've known for since my first week in high school as a.
Speaker 7: Freshman. He is terrified. He doesn't want to leave. He's lived here his entire life. He doesn't deserve to leave. He. But that's. I ask. I'm sorry. So I ask you not solely on my behalf, but for everyone when I ask you to protect your citizens. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Council members I support SB 54 SB 31. My name is was De Soto. I am an immigrant from Michael. Was able to become a citizen when I was 18 and I work with Unite Here Local 11 things to guard things for that immigration system that is still intact that we can still save. I'm here. I hear all this talk about being free in America. Liberty, life, liberty and property. We come here and we work to death. We get hurt on the job and we push with lifelong injuries. Immigrants are free to come here and work to death, making purchases which the city, state and federal employees as well as Americans people benefit from on a daily basis living free while we immigrants can reach that same level of quality as others dehumanize us. We contribute to into these systems such as the Social Security system, Medicare, Medicaid, either through helping those who do have Social Security numbers or don't, just by helping we are here contributing to a system we collect no benefits from. We're free to pay taxes every purchase, every you know, we pay, but we pay taxes on every purchase to help the police force and immigrant and immigration system, which intimidates us as we work day to day to pay them and to to contribute to the system. We're free to come and contribute, but not free to collect benefits from the funds that we contribute to on a day to day basis. That in itself is criminal injustice on a daily basis.
Speaker 0: Next speaker. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Mayor Garcia and City Council for staying here late with all of us, for the police force, for our security officers, for giving us all of this time to voice our opinions as public citizens of Long Beach. My name is Connor Locke. I'm a member of the fourth District. I grew up in Southern California. I went to Georgetown University, where I studied, studied international political economy, organizational development, and the failure of states. What we have here is an opportunity to show members of other states in our union that we do not stand by idly while they persecute, demonize and harm our citizens. Our soon to be citizens and those who hope to be citizens of this country. My grandfather is a Native American, so I think I have a long view on what it means to be a citizen of a country in which you reside. My other grandfather would nowadays be termed as an anchor baby from the Netherlands, of all places. I come from a family of immigrants and non-immigrants. I have no recent past in my family, in my own life that matches any of the stories you've heard here today. I can't think of one bad thing that's happened to me because of who I am and the lucky, unbelievably fortunate life I've been born into. So I ask all of you in the hard work you've done to reach the positions you're in, in the lucky or unlucky lives into which you were born. To say to the rest of the union that voted for the Commander in Chief because he is the Commander in chief. He can have tax dollars, federal tax dollars, support any of these harmful initiatives he wants. But he's not going to be able to use Long Beach tax revenues. He's not going to be able to use California tax revenues. He's not going to be able to use the products of our labor and our effort to remove people from our cities and from the lives they work hard to build. I don't think that's partizan. I don't think that's left or right. I think that's there. Our local resources. And we can choose whether or not we share the product of those resources with the federal government. So he can use those resources to do what he wants to do. But please support both of these bills. Make Long Beach a sanctuary city. These people have worked hard to be here. Anything that says anything to the contrary is demeaning to their work ethic and what they believe they are. The huddled masses who yearn to breathe free. And they're here. Let's keep them here. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 5: Good evening, everyone. My name is Maribel Cruz.
Speaker 8: And I have with me my goddaughter.
Speaker 5: Natalie Cuevas. She's about to be five.
Speaker 8: I am here. I work with the Long Beach Immigrant Rights Coalition. But tonight I'm here on a personal note. I am a resident of District four, and I have personally seen the fear that not only my family has, but my community has. And I just want to not only fight for them, but also for her. She's so small right now, she doesn't realize what's happening. But her mom is undocumented. She should not grow up in a place where she might not see her mom when she comes back from school. And I'm sorry. I really I feel for her because she is so young and she doesn't know what's going on. And if you have the if you have the power to push policies that protect families and prevent family separations, I urge you to take that step. Long Beach needs to be a sanctuary city, not only for us adults, but for little kids who don't want to be and should be separated from their families. And so that's why I urge you and I thank you for pass for supporting SB 54 and SB 31. But I strongly urge you to think about making Long Beach a sanctuary city. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 7: Good evening. Thank you for taking your time to hear everyone. And thank you, everyone for for speaking on my coming here in support of both these resolutions. And I hope we will make Long Beach a sanctuary city and let's it. Excuse me. Immigrants contribute enormous amounts of value to the country and to the world and to our community. It's just insane. California has some of the most productive farms on earth, and I wonder why that is. The idea that Donald Trump thinks he can wave a few drops in the bucket of federal funds to try to make us capitulate to his racism is, I think, insane and insulting. We have some of the most productive people in the world. I'm sure we can find a couple more million dollars of tax money if it comes down to it. I think, again, I think that's a breach of the way the federal government should be behaving, using its privilege and its state power to come down on small councils and state governments. Immigrants contribute value and they don't just and that's not just in my heart or in my mind. Value is a real thing and has economic worth. Everybody who's in this room tonight, if they move to Long Beach or if they chose do like I did, they probably came here because of its diversity, which means that diversity shows itself in higher property values, which means immigrants contribute to high property values because people want to live in a city that's diverse. Of course, those property values end up getting privatized by the landlord class, which is very unfortunate. It's a lie to say also that immigrants don't pay taxes. Anyone who has studied economics will tell you that the incidence of taxation can rest largely on consumers, depending on the tax. And our immigrant communities definitely are consuming their share of the goods that we produce, and they're producing more than their share of the goods that we consume. I think it's very insulting to our immigrant communities who have contributed so much. And who have risked so much to get here with no promise of reward. For us to not even take the very small step that these resolutions demand, which is a small step and a reasonable step, in my opinion. We should be taking and I think a lot of people in this room would back me up. We should be taking more radical steps to ensure that our immigrant communities have greater access to health care and greater access to education and greater access to services and greater access to housing. We? We should be. Giving back to these people who give us so much. Rather than joining in one great American tradition which is taking from immigrants whether they were forced here or not. America also has a different tradition that we all share and we all know, and that is the tradition of giving American people are some of the most generous people on earth. And this is a generous resolution and long reaches of generosity. And I hope that you will support it. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hold on 1/2. Just make sure you know. Just make sure that. Please. Let's be respectful. Sir, I know of everyone. That speaking. Yes. How are you?
Speaker 8: Major Robert Garcia, honorable city council member. Thank you so much for your attention for this led to a lesson to all of us to express and why our opinion. To protect the refugee and immigration. My name is Chen Hobson. I'm a resident of Second District, so my councilmember Jeanine Pearce, and I was here since 1980 as a refugee when I fled the communist Khmer Rouge from Cambodia alone. Because all of my family already gone. I had hope that I came here and I take this city as my home forever for my permanent home. But I came here from the killing field to Lumbee Theory to the city that full of diverse people, full of generosity, compassion, caring, understanding. I educate myself. I become a successful citizen, a productive citizen. I invest my skill, my talent, my time, my soul and my heart to educate the kid after school program, to give them to leadership development, to provide scholarship annually so they can go to college and get the bachelor degree and have a bright future. And then that aside, I vote in gay and very active in the civic and the city function. I'm here tonight because a lot already and a lot of people already online. I would like to ask all of you to support and declare the all below city alone to be a sanctuary city now to protect the interests of all people, refugee immigrants.
Speaker 6: So please, right here. And why?
Speaker 8: My support and I fully support. The city. I support the mayor and I support all the city council who worked so hard and that heart to make the city along be a heaven city for all of us. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: And Christensen. I'd just like everybody to notice that. Oh, what a beautiful struggle this is. In this moment, I hear these voices of these young people and it's so powerful. We do have a future. We we do have hope. And yes, we have to struggle. But when we struggle, we get to see each other and all you people at home come on down. This is this is a great center of of spiritual and power right now. And I just am so grateful to be here as a witness to history, but also in the hopes that we will make history tonight more good history like the city council made when we when we had our different heritage days. I don't remember our first Hispanic Heritage Day, but we had our first Native American Heritage Day. We followed it up with support for Standing Rock and a recognition of the first and now maybe the most recent people to to be in our community. As far as the law goes, I would like to point out that higher power that was referred to has been codified by the United Nations as the right of the Human Rights and United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, a treaty that we signed. The highest law of the land is treaty law. So while Donald Trump apparently is prepared to make it a criminal act to take a school lunch if you are undocumented. Literally two, that will be a crime. Now, if your your child is in the school lunch program. And we we know that everything Hitler did was legal. We don't know the future. We don't want to be overly dramatic. Or maybe I'm being overly dramatic. I hope. I hope I am. But we must realize that we choose and pick what laws we we enforce. And that goes down to our own police department. And I would very much like our police department to be able to have some kind of a position that is open and to comment or somehow to rethink and make very, very clear how our our police department is going to respond not only to the child who ate the lunch or that child's parent, but to those of us who will be on the streets and are already on the streets, in and by and peacefully standing up for the human rights of all of us. Oh, 13 seconds left. Oh, yeah. I saw a great T-shirt. What would Chemerinsky do now for those at home? We might not know. Or you don't know? He's a lawyer. He's a really very, very famous lawyer and a famous human rights activist. Ask yourself, what would Chemerinsky do?
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker for.
Speaker 5: Hi. Good evening. My name is Amy BARTOLONE. I reside in District seven. I am a Long Beach native, born and raised here in Long Beach. And I actually work in Long Beach at the Hyatt Regency, downtown Long Beach at the front desk. So I welcome guests all the time. And I've seen a couple of you guys in the lobby before, so I'm well aware of everyone here. And I honestly wasn't going to say anything. I wasn't going to speak tonight because I felt so I was actually coming out of class from Long Beach City College because I'm taking classes now. I'm a single mother, I'm going to school Long Beach native, and I felt the need to come here to support everyone as a student, as a mother, as a working native here in Long Beach, I need to be here to tell you guys that Long Beach needs to be a sanctuary city. My parents are immigrants. My parents and my daughter. Imagine for my parents not to help me to go to school and not for them to be there for my little one. I want to be here. I want to show her that Long Beach is a humble place to be and it is home for me. And I want you guys to take deep consideration of all these other cities trying to make these actions. We must take a step forward and become in unison. And I love my Long Beach. I even want to work here some day and try to move mountains for these people and for my people, for the people that I have been born and raised here in Long Beach. And I just wanted to say, please consider everyone here in this room, working students, people who have all of these beautiful roles that can strike Long Beach to who we are today. And I love these streets, and I want these streets to still be welcoming and to still keep these immigrants and keep my parents here. Thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, there are last two speakers.
Speaker 4: Here, Mr. Mayor, members of the city council. My name is Steve Downey and I'm a resident of the third district. I'm also a retired deputy chief from the Los Angeles Police Department. I'm on a national board of 10,000 criminal justice professionals that support criminal justice reform and initiatives of this sort. When I read about the introduction of this legislation by the two senators, I said, we have two very courageous heroes and Sacramento. And I would like to say to you that if you find the courage to pass a especially a unanimous resolution to make Long Beach a sanctuary city, I would celebrate you as heroes as well. But I think that there is more than just the support of this legislation. It's going to take a while for it to pass. And I think that there is more than just declaring ourselves a sanctuary city. I think that we need to be involved with implementing policy that truly makes us a sanctuary city. As a senior command officer in the Los Angeles Police Department in the 1970s. I was involved in initiating, drafting and implementing what is known today as special order number 40. It was the genesis of making the City of Los Angeles a sanctuary city. We told our police officers how to treat the immigrant population, what kind of questions to ask of them, what kind of questions not to ask of them, and how to approach our enforcement policies in the city. That special order was our guiding light. But it has to be reinforced. It has to be reinforced through supervision and training. And as the years passed after I retired under some weak chiefs, I saw it dwindle a little bit. And as a result, we saw. The Rampart scandal. Very, very nasty scandal. But it was strengthened again under Chief Bratton when he came in. And it remains a document that should be live by by all cities across this nation. And you can really show an example by in your resolution saying, let's get that document. Let's see how it works for Long Beach. Let's implement it. Let's put it into training at our police academy and our roll call rooms, and we'll be a better city for it. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And. And our final speaker.
Speaker 8: Don't boomy Robert Council. Mr. Mayor, my name is Johnny Weir and I am from Better Housing for Long Beach. We are a property owners in Long Beach. And I do want to I really appreciate the passion in the room here. It's quite a group. I actually recognize a lot of people I recognize since your show because I actually work with them and I had some issues with the tenant of the building. I recognized Porter here from the Gay and Lesbian Center. I recognize that there is what Leon is here building healthy communities and better house and housing. Long Beach. Josh Butlers Housing. Long Beach Now. In fact, a lot of you were involved in pushing an ordinance called Prep, which was very, very unnerving to a lot of the undocumented community. So, you know, you got to remember that some of these things that you guys push have unintended consequences. And so we don't. Better housing for Long Beach is a bipartisan group. We don't have a dog in the fight in this in this situation. But we share a lot of the same things that you share. We share fear. There's fear in the room. Housing providers are in fear because there's ordinances that are being pushed on us that are putting a lot of us out of business. Excuse me. Did you say something? Oh, I'm sorry. I thought I heard a voice. VOICEOVER It must be Robert. Anyway, so I just want to say that that raising fees, more taxes drives rents up. Ordinances that stop redevelopment creates less affordable housing. So we're in the we're in the business of creating affordable housing. We, you know, we see ordinances coming through and being pushed in these kind of forms, and they are not really supporting the community. And I think it's important that we look at the same groups come every time when there's an issue that's being presented. And I wonder why they come. Because housing Long Beach is supposed to be about housing. Why are they here focusing on this ordinance right now? So, again, you know, we support good renters, whether they're documented or undocumented. I have some tenants. They may be undocumented. I have some incredible people that work with me. And, you know, we are not a racist group, which Rob Josh Butler is telling a lot of people that we're about. We want to bring a community together and this is not our issue, but we're being brought into this issue. So I will say this better housing for Long Beach supports good renters and good property owners. And Robert, the gentleman is booing. He's a renter. He's not a property owner. So I just want to make that clear. And he just joined our group. So we have a lot of colorful people that we support and we encourage to get involved and give give their perspective. You know, hey, there's room at the table for everybody. There's room at the table for everybody and all differences.
Speaker 0: So, Danielle.
Speaker 8: Thank you so much. And I'm sorry it's been a crazy night, but I do really appreciate everybody's passion. Thank you. Bye bye.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Okay. Thank you. That's it. Okay. Thank you. Let let this gentleman speak real quick.
Speaker 2: I swear to God. I swear. I swear.
Speaker 0: Okay. All right, guys. I got. I've got to get start. We got to start. Go ahead. So, listen, we're going to we're going to go into the get go meeting, so. So what? I, I cut out the speakers. Listen, I'm going to let you speak, okay? So it'll be the last one. I had cut it off earlier, but you got in line, so I will let you have your 3 minutes. Okay, sir. And then we're going to go back to the Councilman Gonzales. Go ahead, sir.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And you all great in the city council meeting. And Jack Kim of. You know, very well known in Long Beach, German people shouldn't be bullied. And speaking of Darren or Drew, legally, they write the book, not the Bull, but Darren or Drew. He wants everybody to think. When I'm thanking them, then they're.
Speaker 2: Having.
Speaker 4: The support of immigration. You're more than a drain. You don't have no respect for people in the laws of the land. You know, people illegally can accuse or.
Speaker 0: Sir. That's that's very rude. Okay, sir. So if you keep doing that, I'm going have to ask you to leave. So please stop that. Please continue, sir.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Don't drink or have no respect for people and the law. Because he. He beat Davis, Barenboim, all five of the Jews for defending people that. There. He says he let go, but there was legal. And so right now they're going to go to the Supreme Court. So if he may have dead was bad for them all to move on to the Supreme Court and married and get. Who could give. And Pete I'm supposed to be helping people with job they say everybody is is illegal in California all legally where 22 year old burn burned by. We love. So he say everybody is illegal in California. He needs to know who's legally illegal. The American. I think God speak the truth to. To help to help a lot of people understand to.
Speaker 0: Thank you for always coming down. We appreciate.
Speaker 4: Your birthday. Thank you.
Speaker 0: You have a good night.
Speaker 4: Keep up the good work. We're doing great.
Speaker 0: Thank you, sir, for coming.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 0: You too. Thank you. We're going to go ahead. Now, I'm a turn this back over to Councilwoman Gonzalez, who has the floor. Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you. I want to thank everybody for their comments and all of their great discussions around this issue. I think it's very important that we're hearing all voices from all over the city and even some of you that have supported this item for many, many years now. I want to thank you for your advocacy and your hard work. And so as one of the largest cities in the state of California, the fifth largest economy, as we've heard, we cannot and I believe we cannot stay silent on this issue. We have to take a stand. We have to remain committed to ensure that we are known as a city that supports its diversity and inclusiveness, supports people that have positivity, has positively I'm sorry, contributed to our city and country as students, service workers, engineers, lawyers, entrepreneurs. The list goes on. SB 54 and SB 31 will reaffirm that immigration enforcement collection of religious information is not a state or local issue. Specifically, SB 54, carried by Kevin DeLeon, sets a statewide standard for protection so that immigrants are not only safe in Long Beach because of course, we want them to be safe here in Long Beach, but that they're safe statewide. And I think as we think about our neighbors and our brothers and sisters in different cities, this will reaffirm that protection for all of us, which I think is very important and key. So I have a few questions for Diana. Just to clear up the process and what has been done so far. Diana.
Speaker 1: I can barely see you.
Speaker 0: Councilwoman, I think these things are right.
Speaker 12: Okay. Yes, I'm here.
Speaker 3: Great. Yes.
Speaker 12: These two bills are currently in the Senate where they were introduced earlier this year. They were heard in the first policy committee. And now both have been referred to the Appropriations Committee. So both have passed the first policy committee. They're in appropriations. There's no hearing date yet that we're still pretty early on in the legislative session. So it's not very common right now for there to be many appropriation committee hearings. If the bills do pass the appropriation committees and they would be heard on the Senate floor if the bills receive a two thirds vote because they're both urgency bills. If they receive a two thirds vote on the Senate floor, then the bills would go over to the state assembly and the Rules Committee. They would be referred to a policy committee or two, and then also the Appropriations Committee and then on to the assembly floor for a two thirds vote there as well. If the bills pass each of those milestones, then they would be eligible to be sent to the governor's desk for his consideration.
Speaker 3: Great. Thank you. The legislative process is, you know, definitely important to to learn as we go through this process. I also have another question related to the amendments that have already been discussed by Senate Pro Tem Kevin de Leon, respective to SB 54. So what has he amended already? Because I know as it stands, there are some questions related to violent and serious crimes committed by individuals. So can you explain and clarify what has been done so far?
Speaker 12: Councilmember when SB 54 was heard in the Senate Public Safety Committee on January 31st, there was testimony by some law enforcement agencies requesting clarification on their ability to partner with federal law enforcement agencies when it comes to serious and violent crimes. Currently, that is allowable. And the question is, is that going to be allowable into the future? Because I think the bill in its original form, it has not been amended, but there are some areas that could be clarified. And so that in particular is is one that they are working on together.
Speaker 3: Okay. And have any thank you and have any items already been stricken from this bill at this point?
Speaker 12: SB 54 is still currently in the original form that it was introduced in on December 5th. So there have been no adopted amendments thus far.
Speaker 3: Okay. I was under the impression that something related to human trafficking might have been taken out. Is that correct or no?
Speaker 12: No. So in in the bill as it was introduced, there are amendments that are being proposed to existing law. And I, I can't speak specifically to human trafficking, but I think that one of the issues that law enforcement agencies have requested is the ability to continue to work with federal law enforcement agencies to combat organized crime, such as human trafficking. But that issue specifically is not in any of the amendments in the bill right now.
Speaker 3: Okay. So at this time, with that said.
Speaker 0: Councilman, can I add one thing to that? I want to also add that I know that Mr. Tang has been speaking with with staff at the Times office, and I spoke with Senator DeLeo and pro tem today as well. And so just the the two areas in which he's trying to work with and not just are I know are some of our folks in our police department, but with other law enforcement and the two that he mentioned to me today and certainly said that it was I should mention was one is he's working with the State Police Chiefs Association to ensure that there is the ability for there to be multi-agency conversations around a variety of issues so that interagency issues, particularly around human trafficking and other issues, are able to be worked on in multi-agency and in multi-agency task force. He also had mentioned mentioned to me that he was looking at and supports changes so that the for serious and violent crimes that there would still be access for law enforcement agencies to have discretion with local agencies. And so that hasn't been completely vetted out. But he is working with state law enforcement and advocates across the state on that issue. And so as bills come forward, as you all know, these things move and have amendments can come back and forth. But those are the areas of which there is discussion. So I just want to make sure that I mentioned that I spoke with him today directly, as well as with Senator Lora, and those are the two areas that are being discussed for four amendments as of today.
Speaker 3: Great. So with that said, and I'm glad that our Senate pro tem, de Leon is discussing having discussions with the Police Chiefs Association. I've personally spoken with our police chief about this very issue. I've spoken with many of you about this issue. And I feel that it is certainly important that we support SB 31, the California Religious Freedom Act, and SB 54 the California Values Act. However, I'd like to include an amendment to the letter bill, SB 54, similar to what Kevin DeLeon is already doing to ensure that local law enforcement agencies have clear discretion to partner with federal law enforcement agencies to combat serious and violent crimes. So I'd like us to also include the participation in multiagency federal task force operations with the intention of fighting organized crime, such as human and drug trafficking, which I think needs to be clear and disclosed. With that said, I'd like to move forward with these items and support with these amendments solely. It's important that we support the spirit of our immigrant and faith based communities, but also that we are making sure that these two amendments are supported as the bill goes through with its through its state legislative process as well. And then I'll conclude by saying that there are tons of supporters for these items. I think Long Beach making a statement being the first city to support this effort is very important. We have supporters from the ACLU, California Faculty Association, the AFL-CIO, the South Bay Islamic Council, even my own soon to be alma mater, Loyola Immigrant Center , LGBT centers across the nation and ACP chapters across the nation. And I understand that SB 54 is intended to protect the safety and well-being of all Californians and believe amendments addressing those two issues I just referenced are important and remain in the spirit of the bill, which is to protect immigrant communities and religious faiths who are positively contributing to our communities and our economy. I've been in contact as well with our Senate pro tem office and I know they are actively working with the Police Chiefs Association. As we discussed, discussed and I understand the Police Chiefs Association is currently, you know, looking at the bill as well with us, Long Beach's support for SB 31 is also important and I believe it is equally important that we are involved and engage with. SB With both of these efforts in support of legislation and with the amendments we are seeking. It's imperative that we extend our support to both of these items now to ensure that we are not proactively engaging in any type of action that would prohibit immigrants or people of religious faith from coming here. And we cannot vilify the bad actions of a few, but instead we must support and stand committed to the incredible actions of many immigrants in our city. And so to clarify, those amendments again will just be amendments already supported by Senate pro-tem Kevin DeLeon. They're already working on these issues. However, I don't want this to be misconstrued as not supporting immigrants and people of religious faith. This is a support. Now we want to make sure that our local resources are supporting our immigrants now that we as a council are supporting them now. And I ask for my council colleagues support in this. I think these amendments are reasonable. They tackle issues of public safety that are important to all of us, but they also are all encompassing of of this spirit and effort. So I look forward to hearing dialog from my council colleagues. And thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Gonzales, Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Thank you, everybody, for your passion and for your courage for those that are undocumented to come out and speak tonight. I know how hard that must be. And I just really want to say I've never been prouder being up here on council chambers to see you guys speak from your heart and really push us to do what you feel is the right thing for your communities. And so thank you for that. I want to thank you to the colleagues who brought this forward and asked us to endorse this. And I have a couple of of comments and then a couple of questions. I want to say that I think it's really fitting tonight that Long Beach takes a stand as a council. We voted on a resolution in November urging the federal government to provide Jose Alvarez with humanitarian parole after he was pulled over for a broken headlight at Cal State Long Beach. And it was Jose Alvarez's son, Victor Alvarez, who gave moving testimony on his father's deportation to the Senate Public Safety Committee, which approved the California Values Bill just last week. Long Beach is a city of immigrants. We've we've been a refuge for those escaping war. For those seeking a better life. Over a quarter Long Beach, its population is foreign born, with 40% Latino, 12% Asian. And we are believed to have the largest Cambodian community outside of Cambodia. Many of who came here as refugees like Jose, many immigrants in Long Beach. On their businesses, they work at our hotels, our restaurants that contribute greatly to local economies workers, consumers, business owners and taxpayers. In a study Dhaka found and a study on Dhaka, recipients found that 43% were in school and 83% were fully employed working to advance their lives in this country. The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy has estimated that undocumented immigrants pay 11.6 billion in taxes, and other data from Pew Research and Public Policy Institute say the undocumented that are part of sanctuary cities are less likely to commit crimes, not more. Finally, we know from police chiefs that a relationship of trust between police and community is critical to making sure that crimes are reported and that we can ensure safer communities as a state, as a city, we've come too far and we will not go back. I asked my colleagues to join me tonight in supporting this item. As city leaders, we have a moral obligation to stand up for our diverse communities. With that being said, I've had a lot of questions around what does it mean to be a sanctuary state and what does it mean to be a sanctuary city? And so I want to ask a couple of questions to kind of make sure that we are on the same page, because I really appreciate the community coming forward with your list that you want to make sure that Long Beach is really diverting enough resources away from this. So if this state bill 54 passes, it says that we will not use city, we will not use resources to aid in the deportation. And so I want to be really clear that it's not at the state level, but that also means that locally our city police, our schools, our universities and our hospitals will not participate in that. So a mustang, if you could. Diana, if you could. Sorry.
Speaker 12: Go ahead, Councilman. I am. Well, can. I'll just say that the bill is in its infancy. It was just introduced about a month ago. It just had its first policy committee hearing, as we heard. Thus, the author is working with stakeholder groups on amendments and so without it being enacted legislation, I do believe that it would be too early to speculate on how it would impact Long Beach and what changes we might make.
Speaker 8: Okay. I mean, in my my reading of it and. It would make sense to me that this would mean that our police, just as they already are, would not support that. So let me let me ask another question. For the trust act right now, and I'm not sure if it's you or if it's our police chief that could answer this question right now with the Trust Act. What are we doing locally? No.
Speaker 12: Sorry, guys. We have officers in Chief Beckman who can answer the questions about the Trust Act.
Speaker 8: Thank you. Just trying to get some clarity on what if we do this at the state level? What does it mean for us to come back to a conversation around your request tonight, which was obviously very loudly heard?
Speaker 7: Council member, Honorable Mayor Mike Beckman, and the deputy chief of the Support Bureau and police chief Robert Luna cannot be here tonight. He sends us his regrets. He's traveling on city business. I'm going to give you an answer that's probably shorter than it took me to get out of that aisle. But basically, the Long Beach Police Department complies with the California Trust Act, or Assembly Bill four. And I can provide some specifics with regard to people that we have in custody, if you wish. But generally speaking, we do comply with the Trust Act.
Speaker 8: And can you clarify for those in the audience what the Trust Act is?
Speaker 7: The. The Trust Act. Well, what I'd rather do if it's okay, is go through how we handle people who are in our custody with regard to the Trust Act. If that would be okay, that's fine.
Speaker 8: Yes.
Speaker 7: When we arrest a person and upon processing, there might be an occasion where immigration would send to us a immigration detainer, where ICE would send us an immigration detainer. And upon receipt of that detainer, our booking staff would then assess a person based on criteria provided in California. Government Code 7 to 8 2.5 a. And at that particular point. If the criteria is met and the criteria is quite extensive. So I won't get into detail about that. But if that criteria is met, then the Long Beach Police Department fax is a form that we've created back to ICE that states we will not hold an affected inmate unless ICE provides a signed court order commanding the Long Beach Police Department to further detain that individual. If we do not receive that signed order, then the release of that individual takes place as any other release would. If a signed court order is received, a no bond holders in placed and ICE is notified to pick the individual up. And I will close with this. I will tell you, to our knowledge, since the Trust Act was implemented, ICE has never provided the Long Beach Police Department a signed court order and or has traveled to the Long Beach Police Department to take custody of an undocumented immigrant.
Speaker 8: Thank you for that. I appreciate that. To be clear, in the SB 54 or how it's drafted now, that is the essentially the same language in SB 54, from what I understand. So. From calling the office today and going through their policy that essentially says that they would have to have a judicial warrant to come after and ask for us to detain. And so I just want to clarify that when we talk about using city resources to do deportation for providing diversion alternatives to our incarceration for low level offenses. Is Kelly here? Kelly Colby, we. Kelly. We had talked a little bit earlier today with my staff around just clarifying what the city is already doing in these matters, because I think we have the health department, our city prosecutors that have done a lot of great work on this. And so when I take the opportunity to talk about we're already doing.
Speaker 14: Good evening. Our primary focus for diversion for a low level offense is around mental health diversion. Our work there, as we've been in conversation and planning for the past two years, is a partnership with the city prosecutor's office, the police department, the health department and a number of community providers, as well as L.A. County. We we participate in the Permanent Diversion Committee for the for L.A. County as well. In those plans, we are applying for Prop 47 to resource those efforts. So we'll be looking at different ways to divert from custody at different sort of different places to divert. In terms of where in the process into mental health and also substance use treatment through the Prop 47 fund if those funds become available.
Speaker 8: Great. Thank you so much. One of the requests in here is a policy of siting and releasing individuals charged with low level offenses. That is something that, as you just said, we are already doing in Long Beach.
Speaker 11: Yes.
Speaker 8: Thank you. I want to number three on this list says defend pro-immigrant policies from attacks from the federal government. I think that this is something that definitely is not already included in SB 54 and obviously has a lot of discussion that needs to be included in that. I would like to ask if it's appropriate to send that section to the Fed led Committee for you guys to discuss in further detail. Is that something you would be open to?
Speaker 3: Yes. So absolutely, I'd be open to that.
Speaker 8: Great. Thank you. And then the opposing any registry based on religious identity or other protected characteristics. This is included in SB 54 or not, NESBY 54. Yes, it's only 31. And the only part that is in there, that's the only part of your request that is not included in that is the sexual orientation, which I'm not sure is something that's come up yet. But I think it's worth the conversation down the road about how do we you know, right now we're talking about immigration status down the road. We might be talking about how policies that come forward around the LGBT community. And I think we need to have that discussion when when the time is appropriate. But that obviously Long Beach has been a champion on this issue. And so we want to work with you guys to make sure that it's not just around immigration, that we're working on it, but that it's a bigger policy. So this is I think what I'm getting to is the fact that at the state level, if we pass this and we support this, which we need to urgently do, because we know that families right now are living in fear and are already torn apart. So I want to urge us to vote yes today on this and to have some good conversations following around the legislation piece or on the Fed ledge and the LGBT component and maybe come back with some clarity down the road around exactly how this would implement once the policy's completely fleshed out. So, again, urging my colleagues to vote yes tonight and sending that one section of what the community requested to the Fed lunch time. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilwoman, I want to go to councilman and before we go, because I had to just go clarify with Mr. Hank, which I want to make sure I had heard it correctly. But just to clarify, the Councilman Pierce's initial question on whether her, her or her comments were included in the current bill. They're part of the current bill. But I'm correct. I'm wrong here mistaking. But any bill, of course, is never final until the very end.
Speaker 12: Absolutely.
Speaker 0: But they are. But what she said is part of the current bill. Correct? Okay. I just want to make sure because I that's why I had it over, just to make sure it was hearing that part. Correct. Okay, great. Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 9: And I can live with that. I had prepared statements, but hearing. The wonderful testimony tonight, hearing it earlier and having them having dealt with the Jose Alvarez situation back in November. You'll make my total thinking of this is is different. In a good way. I. I don't want anybody to misunderstand what I'm trying to say. It's you know, I reflect on this. I'm the son of immigrant parents. If they were around the time today of this president. I think that they would be in complete fear of being here in this country. And I would be in complete fear for my mom and dad. Because they came here. All they came here with with a green card and a visa, and they would renew it every year. And every year my dad would say, what's this green card? I'm not an alien. I'm a human being. And every year he would have to fill that out to re read reality. His his humanity to the country, to the United States. My brother was also an immigrant. I was the first one born here. I was the last of six. I was born here. So my brothers and sisters were also immigrants to this country. They were educated here. My one brother served in the U.S. military, honorably discharged what he had been living in fear of being in this country. And would he have wanted to serve his country even though he was not a U.S. citizen? And so I reflect on that right now in terms of what that what are we saying to families now here who are immigrants and they're validation of who they are and where they want to be. It's interesting that, you know, history goes in cycles and we're we're experiencing a cycle right now that's not very, very good. Not only that, we're experiencing a president who is a thug. Who's a blackmailer. And who is potentially an extortionist. He is threatening to withhold federal funds. To not only the states at state of California, but to the city of Long Beach as well. So what we're doing here today with this support of SB 54 and SB 31. It's preemptive. It's a preemptive measure. We're saying to the to the president, you threaten us. We've got things in place to stop you. From threatening us. It's like preempting a blackmailer. If you can do that. You're blackmailing me. But I'm going to. I'm going to hide my money before you get to me. So what we're doing here today is a is a step in that process of stopping this president from making those kinds of threats to us, to our immigrants. To people who come here to. Get away from oppression. To get to exercise your religious freedom. To exercise the their own abilities to want to live. A greater and better life in this country, in the U.S., just like my mom and dad did, though, so many years ago. So I want to reinforce what my colleagues have already done, and I want to thank my colleagues who who signed off on this as well. Councilor Gonzalez Pearce and Vice Mayor Richardson. Because it's it's that type of courage that we need to take to ensure that our residents in Long Beach, our immigrant families in Long Beach. I protect it. And it can live here safely without any fear of having a simple encounter with any of our agent agents, whether it be police. Fire. Housing inspector, animal control officer, anybody that that would be a prelude to endangering their status in this country or their status here in Long Beach. So I want to thank you guys for that kind of of exhibiting that kind of courage. And I want to especially especially thank our senators, President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon and our Senator Ricardo Lara, for bringing this forward because that is courage. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember. Thank you, Councilmember. Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much. I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this important discussion to the council chamber. I really enjoyed the comments that I heard from the audience tonight. As many of you know and I have shared, I am a descendant of immigrants from one of the countries where there is currently the non ban. And and it has been a very scary time for people in my community as well. And I actually had the opportunity to meet with them on Sunday. We had a great conversation with Congressman Lowenthal. And I explained to the people in that community my concerns with sanctuary city. And really it does come down to a financial concern for the city. I don't know if the city manager might know off the top of his head, you know, how much money we rely on in federal funding for our homeless programs and our law enforcement programs and things like that.
Speaker 7: I'm going to give that to Diana Tang.
Speaker 12: Councilwoman in terms of the total amount of federal funding that we receive. That amount inclusive of what is provided to the port, is in the range of $224 million, and that is just a number that we were able to pull off of financial reporting or financial reporting system. But I would also like to caveat that the executive order that was issued. Is unclear how much and of what pots of money would be vulnerable. And so that is the total that it's we don't yet know what is actually at risk.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much. So I mean, that that answer alone demonstrates kind of what I want to share is that we're living in very uncertain times and there is a lot at stake for many members of our community. Immigrants? Well, we're all immigrants. We're all descendants of immigrants. But everybody is living in uncertain times right now. And so I think for me, I know the item tonight is and I appreciate it almost. You know, I was trying to count the comments. Almost all of them were about sanctuary city. And I really I took some time to read through the agenda item again. And I don't that's not an item that's on the agenda tonight. And I, I want everyone to be clear about that, that that is not an item that anybody that was on this council had on the agenda tonight or prepared for. It's item 23. You guys are welcome to read the agenda. There's no there's nothing on there about Sanctuary City. So that's not a conversation that I think we're going to have this evening, because that's not and I know that's what I'm listening to the audience and that's what you guys were asking us to do. And so I want to make sure you understand, if we don't do that, it's because it's not on the agenda tonight, among other things. But there are a lot of considerations in regards to what we do in these uncertain times as a city and how we go forward. I have a friendly amendment that I would like to propose, and I'd like to articulate why I think we need to do that. And then I'll I'll ask Councilwoman Gonzalez if she's open to this. I have no issues with Senate Bill 31. My I have a hesitation about both of these bills, and they're both recently introduced, which means they're just undergoing the process. And we know that there's going to be a lot of modifications and changes that happen through the process. We don't know yet what amendments might be added by virtue of a compromise that legislators might get involved in. Similar to what we sometimes do as a body, we don't know what form the bill is ultimately going to take. What I do know is that we here, all of us in this room, support the idea of not splitting up families, support the idea of inclusion, support the idea of people not being discriminated against based on their national origin, their gender, their religion, all of the things that are so important to this body. So the intent behind both bills is is I think is a very, very honorable intent. But my recommendation would be to go ahead and support Senate Bill 31, because I think that that particular Senate bill has minimal amendments in terms of what it would need to become satisfactory. And I don't think there's going to be anything on there that's going to surprise us.
Speaker 5: I did go through.
Speaker 3: And read the legislative history, which is very minimal on both bills today on Senate Bill 54, my recommendation or my my friendly amendment would be to send that particular item to the state legislative committee and the Public Safety Committee so we can track the bill as it goes through the Senate process so that we can see if the changes that we're recommending. By the way, we can't amend the bills because they're they're not our bills. We're not the author of the bill. We can recommend that the author of the bill add these to his bill. But then the item asks us to support the bill and the bill as written. We can't amend we can't amend the bill. So that's my understanding. So one of the few things that I have concerns with in Senate Bill 54 is that I think we need clarification on before we would vote to support it is and again , it's very preliminary written and I'm sure just with any piece of legislation, the author hasn't gone through and made the necessary tweaks. But if you look at it, for example, in the Public Safety Committee analysis, they talk about the database, but it's not clear, for example, in 54 that the database relates only to immigration and not to other databases that would be maintained by law enforcement, such as a gang database or human trafficking database.
Speaker 5: Also talks about.
Speaker 3: Educational institutions, and they talk about the University of California being encouraged to adopt a policy. But they don't mention the California State University, which I'm sure we would want included as well. They talk about partnerships with other task forces. And although I know that the personal conversation that our mayor had with Senator De Leone indicates that he's looking to amend.
Speaker 8: That the bill.
Speaker 3: As written prohibits our law enforcement officers from working with federal. Ortiz They work together all the time, and they have a great partnership that helps make public safety a priority for our city and our state. They work together on drug task forces. They work together on human trafficking task forces. They work together on gang task forces. And so it's very important that that language be amended to allow that collaboration to continue. There's also the intent of this legislation.
Speaker 5: Initially that's.
Speaker 3: Being changed.
Speaker 5: Was that people.
Speaker 8: Who.
Speaker 3: Were witnesses and victims in a crime and Stefan spoke to it should not be afraid to come forward to the police because they are an illegal immigrant. And that is absolutely true. But what 54 doesn't do currently, and I'm happy to hear that Senator De Leon is working on that, but it doesn't currently address what happens to serious and violent offenders, people who have been convicted of a serious or violent felony as defined in the penal code. There's no provision in this code for whether or not those individuals can be. Their information can be shared with law enforcement. Those individuals are actually not contributing to the economy as the item that was submitted by my colleagues would like us to support. Those individuals are actually taxing our economy in our system. So those individuals, in my opinion, should not be covered by the protections of the intent of SB 74. And so I think there's a few areas here where. And drug sales activity, for example, that one of the main this this particular SB 54 seeks to change a section of the Health and Safety Code 11 369 which dealt with drug activity. The Senate Bill 54 doesn't address drug dealing activity at all. So people who are convicted of drug dealing, selling drugs are not addressed. And SB 54 and certainly we can all agree that the intent of the comments tonight was not to protect people who aren't following the law, who are committing serious and violent felonies, but rather to protect people who are hard working, who live in our our community. So my recommendation would be that we send 54 to the state ledge and Public Safety Committee to have them evaluate and track the bill.
Speaker 5: Because.
Speaker 3: Right now we are adopting support for a bill that's in its infancy and we know is already going to be amended, and we don't know how it's going to be amended. There may be amendments that are made to it that we don't like. There may be amendments to it that we didn't think of that we really like. And I would just recommend that we forward it to the Committee for review. And that would be my friendly.
Speaker 0: Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 3: So I appreciate the discussion. Councilwoman Pryce I do. I have to respectfully disagree and say that, and perhaps I was. Not clear. And perhaps I was not very clear, and that is certainly my thought. I'll take the blame for that. But when I created the amendments, what I said was I wanted to support SB 31 and 54. I know 54 still has a lot of work to be done. Being the vice chair of both the state and federal legislative committee, the immigration issues have been at both committees, and I know we have a meeting scheduled very, very soon to talk about these very issues. And I assume if this passes, we will add those to both the state and federal legislative committees anyhow. However, what I had mentioned is that I would like us as a council to support these items, however, support as amended. And so, Diana, can you clarify what that means, support as amended? Because I understand that as it's going through its amendments, we will support it as amended. And that includes amendments such as local law enforcement agencies having clear discretion to partner with federal law enforcement agencies to combat serious and violent crimes, participate in multiagency federal task force operations with the intention of fighting organized crime such as human and drug trafficking, which I think is a point that Councilwoman Pryce brings up very clearly. And I think we need to make that distinction so support as amended. What does that mean? Diana, can you just clarify that for us?
Speaker 12: Sure. And if I may also clarify, we are supporting SB 31 and then take a break. We are supporting or the proposal is to support SB 54 as amended with the two amendments that you had described. Correct. Okay. So the term support as amended or support with amendments is something that is used when there's interest in supporting legislation. However, with the condition that there be additional components added to the bill or taken out of the bill, whichever it is that the amendments that we're asking for and in this case as support, as amended position on SB 54, would mean that we would support SB 54 on the condition that the bill also include the amendments that you had described as they relate to partnering with federal law enforcement agencies on combating serious and violent crime as well as organized. Organized crime.
Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. So we would not we would want to support this with those conditions. And I think that that puts us in a really good place because it speaks to both of those issues of support for immigrant communities. Also with these conditions as amended, as described as we described. So and then also, I know that Senate pro-tem Kevin de Leon also had suggested that we could be we could have a seat at the table. Since he is meeting with the Police Chiefs Association, he wants to hear from Long Beach to see what the issues are with this bill as he's amending them. As this bill is evolving, I think it's important that we have a seat at the table, that we contact him directly, whether it's you in the audience or ourselves, myself as a state legislative committee member and also federal legislative committee member, we're going to have to take these at both levels . And so I think it's important that we all provide an opportunity to speak to our senators and describe these amendments, because we also want to make sure that we're taking care of our public safety here at home. So I hope that clears it up. And I thank you again for discussion.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman. Next up is Councilman Austin.
Speaker 4: Thank you. And I have a I'm really want to just say the public comment today has really moved me this evening. I've listened attentively and tried to be respectful to to everybody's point of view this evening. I mean, my colleagues, the back and forth has been very, very helpful when I'm asked about what democracy look like looks like. I look around Long Beach. I look at this council chamber tonight. I look at this dais and this is what democracy looks like today. Thank you. I wanted to spare you the chant tonight. Today, millions of residents and American citizens are living in disgust and fear due to impulsive and reckless and mean spirited executive orders from the current occupant of the White House. I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this item forward. Somebody brought up and called me out and asked me to support this item. This is a no brainer for me to support in concert. This is a no brainer for me to support it. If you know me, you know this is a no brainer for me to support. When you bring up forth an item you can only bring for the maximum amount of supporters you can bring on is for and I'm support. I'm very, very sure that this is going to get more and more people to support at the end of the night. And so and as chair of the city's state legislative committee, I look forward to working to get both of these Assembly bills or Senate bills passed with my colleagues. I think Council member Lena Gonzalez's amendments are considerate and responsible, but I'm going to be offering some more advice. Obviously, California cannot condone profiling or discrimination of any kind. That's not who we are as a state, and I don't believe that's who we are as a city. I know for a fact that's not who we are as a city and as elected officials. It's our responsibility to protect families and oppose injustice. And Dr. Martin Luther King, his famous quote was An injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere I was raised to. And this is a political slogan nowadays to be my brother's keeper. Right. And gentlemen, the first speaker referred to me as his brother. And yes, I'm your brother, but I'm his brother as well. Right. His brother as well. I'm his brother as well. My brothers are black, Latino. They're white. They're Cambodian. The Filipino. They're all what's. My brothers are Christians and Muslims and Buddhists. This is a diverse city and I love this city and I wish that the rest of the nation could experience the life and the community and the sense of community that we have here. Councilmember Gonzalez, I do appreciate the conversation between you and a. Councilmember Price regarding the bill. And we do know that in Sacramento. Bills do go through machinations. Right. And today, this language is something I think we can support in concept. And so my my my advice for friendly amendment or my friendly amendment would be to support this bill, this bill, SB 31 and SB 54 and any other bills that may be introduced. Right. Because there may be a few bills out there that we may want to have the flexibility as a city to support in concept that that that accomplishes the same same thing here. And and again, I think you said where we're stuck right now is support with amendments. We can take support and concept. I think we can we can bring everybody along. So that would be my recommendation.
Speaker 3: Thank you. I appreciate that and I'll gladly accept. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Oh. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 10: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And so I've particularly enjoyed this conversation. I think this is, you know, occasionally it's our job to to lean in and better understand these issues and take positions on them when appropriate. And these bills on the table, they demonstrate some very critical values, religious freedom and trust. And I personally believe in both of those things. But this goes a long way in terms of having an impact on community policing, which is entirely built on trust. The tone in Washington is quickly eroding that trust. And local communities should take a position and particular interest in protecting that trust and congruence and respect with our community . Now, despite the fact that these bills are not signed, it may still change. I think something makes sense to lending our support to a bill while it's being crafted and add to that momentum to help it to get across the finish line. It's important. It's important. Thanks. It's important that know that residents know and understand that we understand and acknowledge their plight. And we prioritize that as we serve them. I'm concerned about the moment we're in in our country, because, frankly, we've seen this before. Let's just say the great majority of us that immigrate to this country were not under ideal circumstances. When we got here, we were all forced with opposition oppression, second class citizenship. Jim Crow laws. Mass and carceral internment. Deportment. But deportation. Intimidation. And that's why we have to protect values like checks and balances. Separation of church and state. States rights and democracy. And so comments like wait in line are incredibly insensitive and privileged. And to me, this means as a. So to me, this means as a city, we should be patriots and take a position on federal issues based on what we feel is right. Now, history has always looked favorably on those who have served as havens or sanctuaries to those who are oppressed. And and we should consider that as we address this threat, this this threat on cities in California who have taken positions or the state of California who has taken a position to serve as a sanctuary or a haven. And so I you know, I do serve as chair of our federal legislation committee, which is particularly interested in the impacts of federal policy. I serve as chair of our housing authority, which use federal dollars to protect and to house our needy individuals. And my position is not that we should sit back and wait to see what the see what these policies or these laws should become. I think we should go get a seat at the table now, take a position early, help craft that. And I believe Councilman Gonzalez said get a seat at the table so that when these are are adopted, we can say we had a hand in that and it was crafted for Long Beach. So that said, I do believe that we should take a position early, but should also engage our committees to make sure that legislation that comes down federally and on the state side, we are at the table for that legislation. So that said, I do strongly support this motion.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Then we have we have Councilmember Supernova, and then I'm going to make some comments and we're going to go to a vote council for Superman.
Speaker 13: Okay. I too would like to thank everyone for attending tonight. Being here a long time and speaking and you spoke with a lot of passion. And I'd just like to reiterate, because I still see the signs about Sanctuary City, and that is not the agenda item tonight. And the city clerk can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I'm not even allowed to talk about it. It would be a Brownback violation. Is that accurate? Mr. City Attorney.
Speaker 7: That's correct. You can't engage in dialog or conversation about an item which has not been placed on the agenda according to the bar.
Speaker 13: Okay. Thank you. But and that's troublesome to me in that so many of the speakers, that is what you felt you were here for tonight. And we're here on to state legislative items and and also like to thank Diana Tang for speaking. There was no staff report tonight. Do we know when this item came to us on the supplemental agenda? What day and time?
Speaker 0: I mean, I guess it'd be a question for the clerk.
Speaker 1: It arrived in the city clerk's office on Friday.
Speaker 13: Okay. So my weekly newsletter goes out at 1:30 p.m. every Friday. So I didn't even get the message to my constituents. And I appreciate everyone being here tonight, but that's one duty I always feel. I have to let the folks know what is on the agenda and give people a chance to contact my office. The other thing I'm troubled by, and that is what Councilman Pryce brought up. And I would just call it a vetting process that, well, the Fed Pledge Committee was mentioned and my colleague mentioned the state committee. I can think of half a dozen committees or commissions that could take part in the vetting process for this. And I'm concerned in the process, and I don't want to hang the item up tonight on process, but we're kind of getting a habit here. I hope it's not a habit, but we tend to pass stuff and then go back and reverse engineer and make sure it's right after the fact. And I think the purpose of our committees and commissions is to vet the items first so we get all the facts here to make a reasonable, rational decision. Also, I think that dollar amount, that's also what we have to weigh of two state legislative items. And then this issue of the dollars. And one of the speakers said, you know, a couple or a few million dollars. And while the 224 million may not be accurate, it's still a substantial amount of money here we're talking about and all of us as as voters here tonight have to consider that. I think I think the ideas for the amendments that Councilwoman Pryce made were reasonable. But if that's not accepted moving forward, I guess what we're being asked to do is to sign onto an item. And I'll use Dinah Tang's language items that are in their infancy. And even a phone call from the mayor to Senator De Leone could not sort this out today. So that's we all want to do our fiduciary responsibility here and vote the right way. But we're really kind of flying blind. And let's hope that this council has that influence at the state level because we have no guarantee of that and and we can sort it out in committee after the fact. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. I'm going to wrap up. Councilwoman Pryce.
Speaker 3: I just have just one more possible friendly. Is it possible that we can bring it back and it's amended form and again vote to support it just in case there's any amendments that we didn't already? I know that we listed two areas, but there could be other amendments that are added. Is it possible that we can bring it back to council once all the amendments have been added so that we can again vote to support the completed legislation? So after we know what all the different amendments were, I think what we're doing is we're supporting as amended. That's what it states. So in the amendments are included and that's okay. But what if what if there's another city council somewhere that has a different amendments they want to include and the senator listens to a group or other groups and adds amendments in there that we don't like or we don't. Then if we if we're firmly opposed to something, we're not going to support it. Okay. So we're not voting to support it tonight. We are voting to support as amended. So the amendments that include the local law enforcement participation and multi-agency federal task force. But I also think yeah, so I'll just leave it there. We'll support as amended. I think that it's very important that we we do this and we support it today and. Continue discussions with our state legislative committee and federal legislative committee.
Speaker 0: Okay. Let me just make some comments and then we're going to go to a vote. Well, first of all, I just want to say to everyone that came out, you all made me very proud to be an American tonight. And I wasn't always an American. And so to see so many folks just come out and support people that are undocumented, people that are may have a different religious background than the majority of the country, I think is very inspiring. We should all be inspired by all of your words. I especially want to thank the people that were here, the young people that were in high school or younger that came out really, really proud of you for being vocal. I think it's important to note that Long Beach is a city of not just immigrants, but refugees. And in fact, this city's history, if you're a student of the city's history, is a story of refugees from Cambodia of of incredible pain through an immigration from our Filipino Americans throughout Long Beach and the county, including their incredible service to our military, which is literally they literally built much of the military economy that was in throughout Long Beach. It's a story, of course, of all sorts of people from different religious face coming to the city of Long Beach. And as you know, is now a city of an incredibly large and robust Latino community, both Latino-Americans and and Latinos that would love the honor and privilege of one day being an American. And so I think in my conversations with our both the president of the Senate and our state senator, I'm really proud of them of stepping forward and bringing forward these pieces of legislation. I do want to say a couple of things we think are important. There are already there are already about 40 cities across the state of California, including the largest city, the largest cities in the state, whether it's San Francisco or whether it's San Diego or Los Angeles, San Jose, that essentially follow or have codified what is currently already in the California Act that's been proposed by Pro Tem DeLeon. So those cities are most of those cities are either close or have already codified the work that's happening. What the intention of of this bill in part is to ensure that if you are a citizen and so is Long Beach. By the way, I have personally worked with our police department, our chief and other folks to ensure that we are also a city that is supportive of everyone. And but what is important is if you are a citizen of Los Angeles or of Long Beach or of San Jose, I want to make sure that you are being treated the same when you go to Fresno or when you go to Newport Beach or when you go to any other city that may not have the same protections. And so I think having a statewide standard and a statewide protections is important. And so I think that's that's what I think is important about these bills. The other thing is and Councilmember Austin knows this because he's very involved with me, the two of us in a lot of the state bills is bills.
Speaker 7: Change.
Speaker 0: And they adapt through the legislative process. What we're doing tonight is no different than many of the other bills that we've passed years before. We support a bill, we may recommend amendments, and then the bill moves forward in the process. And of course, at any time if a bill got to a point where we didn't support it, the council can step in and pull their support for a bill. But today it's possible to move forward. We support four bills and that's something that is that the council does in common. So I want to just begin by saying that I support both bills. I have supported them from the day that they were presented. And and I certainly support Councilwoman Gonzalez tonight as well. I want to say that. Long Beach. And this is I think it's important to say as much as possible. And if we're connected on social media, you know that I actively and consistently trying to bring voice to our values. And Long Beach will always be a place that supports all people. That's what that's what Long Beach is about. Long Beach is about everyone. And everyone includes people that are undocumented, that are Muslim-Americans and that need our support. We should not at any point as a community feel threatened. Or bullied by anyone, whether it's another governor of another state, a U.S. senator or the president of the United States . We have to always stick up for the values that we believe in. And so I will say that I think I would encourage us all to stay active in this conversation as the bill moves forward. I think there have been some good ideas brought forward tonight, and I also believe that everyone on this council, every single person on this council, believes in supporting immigrants and wants to see people protected. I do believe every single person on this council believes that. And so I want to think again, the makers of the motion, I want to thank our two senators. And and hopefully tonight will be an important step in ensuring that there are statewide protections that include Long Beach, of course, but statewide protections across the state of California. And so with that members, I'm going to call for a vote.
Speaker 1: Motion passes seven zero.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you all. I'm I'm going to go ahead I'm going to go ahead and take a just a few minute recess because we have an agenda that's still very long tonight. So thank you for coming. We're going to take a two minute recess and we'll be back in 2 minutes. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. We're going to if I can have everyone please exit the council meeting if or if you're going to stay. I need to start the meeting. The meeting again. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very.
Speaker 0: Okay, guys, I need to start the council meeting, so I need everyone to take a seat or exit, please.
Speaker 2: Thank you again. Yeah.
Speaker 0: Okay. Rock roll call, please.
Speaker 1: Councilwoman Gonzalez. Councilmember Pierce. Councilwoman Price, council member. Super Now. Councilwoman Mongo. Councilman Andrew's Council member. Your UNGA. Councilman Austin. Vice Mayor Richardson. Mayor Garcia.
Speaker 0: Hey, guys. Everyone hear that staff hash? We have we have a meeting. We're running right now. So if you're talking, you need to be. Thank you very much. Especially Pat West. Take a seat, sir. Thank you. Okay, we got to we have to finish our meeting, so we're going to. I think we have. Item number. Hold on 1/2. 19. I don't even. We still have. I think we have two members of public comment so that we haven't done. So let me let me do. We're going to do. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to Support SB 54 (De Leon), The California Values Act, and SB 31 (Lara), the California Religious Freedom Act. These two legislative proposals protect the safety and well-being of all Californians by ensuring State and local resources are not used to support deportations, separate families, collect information about an individual's religious beliefs or affiliations, and ultimately hurt California's economy. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02072017_17-0065 | Speaker 10: Thank you, Mr. Goodyear. Thank you. Yeah. So, Madam Clerk, I think that concludes public comment. And we're going to take up item number 19 next.
Speaker 11: I am sitting down and I'm not barging in.
Speaker 7: Ahead of line and breaking the rules and taking more time. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Report from Public Works, Park Recreation and Marine. Recommendation to Award Contract to Los Angeles Engineering for the Seaside Park Artificial Turf Field Project for a total contract amount not to exceed 850,435. The Admiral Kidd Artificial Turf Field Project four Total contract amount not to exceed $1,559,949 and authorize the city manager to approve expenditures to design and construct athletic field improvements at Eldorado Park West in the amount of $800,000. District one, five and seven.
Speaker 10: Thank you. Let's have a staff report, please.
Speaker 7: Mr. Reisner, council members. These are some items that have been in the budget for some time dealing with the artificial turf issues. I going to turn this over to our public works director, Craig Beck and our Parks Rec and Marine Director Mary Knight.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Vice Mayor, and members of the city council tonight. You have.
Speaker 11: Before you an item that would bring forward renovated.
Speaker 0: Sports fields at Seaside Admiral Kidd in Eldorado Park. The combined project total is roughly.
Speaker 11: $4.1 million of investment into.
Speaker 0: These parks. Seaside Park is a park that is highly utilized, and it's difficult to.
Speaker 7: Maintain.
Speaker 11: The green grass field there in the sports field.
Speaker 0: And so we're proposing to put in.
Speaker 11: Artificial turf, sports field, pedestrian walkways, fencing guardrails and infrastructure for future lighting when.
Speaker 0: Funding becomes available.
Speaker 11: This project also includes.
Speaker 0: Admiral Kidd Park for similar reasons. Again, high utilized sports field there.
Speaker 7: And Admiral Kidd, that site is much larger. It's about a two acre site.
Speaker 4: Includes artificial turf, sports field, pedestrian.
Speaker 0: Walkways, fencing guardrails and again, lighting infrastructure.
Speaker 11: For future field lighting.
Speaker 7: Also includes El Dorado, where we want to.
Speaker 0: Look at enhancing the current fields that we have there and explore opportunities to adding new sports fields at El Dorado West. As you recall, there was an item that came before council some months ago to move.
Speaker 7: Forward with installing artificial.
Speaker 0: Turf field at Drake Chavez. I'm here.
Speaker 11: To share with you this evening that.
Speaker 4: That project.
Speaker 7: Is moving forward on schedule and is close to its conclusion.
Speaker 0: We do have the field lead and look forward to having that ribbon cutting ceremony in Council District one. So some of the.
Speaker 7: Beneficial.
Speaker 0: Benefits of artificial turf is that it reduces the amount of water utilized.
Speaker 7: To maintain the fields. It increases of.
Speaker 0: Playable hours because you don't have to take the field offline for maintenance like you do with a grass field. Certainly lowers maintenance costs and improves the usability. What we mean by that is it's a very even playing surface.
Speaker 11: So when you have.
Speaker 0: Incidents of turf fields, sometimes either through.
Speaker 11: Drought or other reasons, the fields can become unusable for periods of time. As you.
Speaker 0: Know, this item was.
Speaker 11: Discussed thoroughly.
Speaker 7: And ultimately went to.
Speaker 0: The Parks and Recreation Commission in June of 2015, where there was a move to transition some of our.
Speaker 7: Our.
Speaker 0: Grass fields, artificial turf fields. And in that meeting, the Parks.
Speaker 7: And Rec Commission took action to only.
Speaker 0: Use organic.
Speaker 11: Materials or organic infill materials and not crumb rubber. Staff spent some.
Speaker 7: Time analyzing.
Speaker 0: What options we had available to us, and coconut fiber matrix and caulking sand were the two organic alternatives that seemed to be most used in the industry. There was a decision made to move forward with caulk and sand, and that.
Speaker 11: Material is the one that was installed at the.
Speaker 0: Field at Drake Chavez and is the material that we're.
Speaker 7: Planning to install.
Speaker 11: On these fields as well.
Speaker 0: So just as a reminder, part of the maintenance agreement that we have with the contractors for installation is that they will maintain.
Speaker 11: These fields for eight years.
Speaker 0: So they will remain in a top quality condition over that term.
Speaker 7: Again, doing.
Speaker 0: Regular.
Speaker 7: Brushing, aerating, raking, sweeping.
Speaker 11: As needed to maintain the playing surfaces. That concludes.
Speaker 0: Staff report and we're available.
Speaker 11: For questions.
Speaker 10: Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 5: Yes. I want to thank Parks and Rec staff and Public Works staff for all the outreach into the community. I know this originally started as a motion from the City Council to allocate artificial grass soccer fields at three parks. And now the time it took grew and grew and grew. And it got to the point where we would not be able to afford artificial turf soccer fields at all three parks. And so now I'm proud to stand with Councilmember Durango and Councilmember Gonzalez and that they will have artificial turf in their fields. But that in Eldorado Park, we'll be spending our share of the funding to restore grass fields and then potentially look at an option of another sports space that would not cause us to remove any grass, which was the request of the community. So I appreciate the hard work and determination that's been taken on this. I know we have a lot more projects to do. We have a lot more restoration. The quality and condition of our parks had segregated through the years. I think that the committee that our fearless leader and of the Parks and Rec Department has put together of all of our organizations that are 501 seat threes and rent space coming together to come up with a plan to ensure that the quality of the fields is maintained and accessible to residents, not just to our our sports aficionados and players, but that there are days of rest and that the community can also engage and go out to a baseball field and throw a ball around with their kids is a really, really important part of living in a community with the best parks in the country. So I think this has been a immense lift, especially for a department had we've only had on board for 11 months. Congratulations. I appreciate my colleagues for their patience. I know that the decision of picking two would would be difficult, but I think that we came up with the solution where the needs were most and the community will be best served. So I appreciate everyone for all the hard work on this and especially on public works, who has to do all the project management and design and implementation while also managing all of Measure A and the other crumbling infrastructure and most recently leaking infrastructure. So thank you for what you're doing and keeping everything afloat.
Speaker 10: Thank you. Councilmember here again.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. Richardson. I want to echo the comments made by Councilmember Mongo. This is a great opportunity for us to activate some fields, and not only that, but to make them available year round because of the the less maintenance that there is. And it's also a public safety issue as well. I mean, there's many times when you have overwatering or you have heavy rains, as we've had this last couple of weeks, where overuse of a park can really create divots and potholes in the fields and kids can break their ankles. And anybody who uses the for for for recreation as a whole. So I want to again, also commend staff for their efforts and the and the Parks Recreation Commission for doing their diligence in reviewing all of the available. Options that we have for turf and choosing what I think would be the best one that works for Long Beach. So I want to commend everybody involved in this project. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 3: Yes, I, too, just want to say thank you to Marie and Craig for sticking with this. I know this was a bit of a process as we've described, but I know for Seaside and District one, we're really excited to finally have the opportunity to have some sort of greenery there. And so a lot of the kids and students at Washington Middle School are excited to start playing soccer again and, you know, just allow that park to come alive and really that neighborhood to come alive. So thanks so much.
Speaker 0: Okay. Any public comment on item 19? Please come forward.
Speaker 8: Good evening in Cantrell. And I want to thank Council Mongo for. Going with. Natural grass in El Dorado. I hope that this will be a. Prepared field with leveling and gopher prevention. Such as you're using for the artificial turf fields, and you'll notice that it can be done for $800,000, whereas the total cost for seaside is 1.5 million and the total cost for. Admiral Kidd is even more than that. Think of what 1.5 million could have done for the homeless tonight. I think. Children in Long Beach deserve soccer fields that are as well-maintained as golf courses, and I think it is possible to have it with natural grass. You were given the benefits of artificial turf, but none of the disadvantages were mentioned, such as it's hotter. It can get up to 160 degrees on a warm day. It's more abrasive. It needs greater maintenance. Your warranty includes brushing and aerating, which means watering and breaking. It doesn't include disinfecting, which you need to do with artificial turf because it can harbor staph infections. Another thing that I find out from my soccer playing grandchildren is when they play on artificial turf, they need special soccer shoes. The shoes that they use are natural grass aren't allowed on artificial turf. So I'm thinking of the children in your neighborhoods that are getting this artificial turf, whether they're going to be able to afford special shoes to be on here. These fields have to be fenced off. From the rest of the community because you can't have soft drinks on it, you can't have spiked heels, you can't have bicycles. It's not going to be open for the use of the public. So I urge you to take a look at what happens with Drake Park. It was supposed to be a pilot program and it's supposed to open in June. Look at it. See if all these problems that I'm saying are going to happen, happen. If they don't, then go ahead with this. But I would postpone making any contracts until you see the Drake. You so.
Speaker 0: Much.
Speaker 8: Success.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Next picture, please.
Speaker 8: I'm so sorry to be here again, but I need to support. I mean it. You tired of me? I'm tired of me anyway. I need to support my friend and Cantrell and. And. Absolutely. Beg you to listen to this elder who has spent her life fighting and trying to convince endless numbers of city councils to do the right thing for the environment and in a natural way to preserve nature. Now, artificial turf. I mean, I guess it's made out of stuff. It sounds kind of natural. But I do believe there's even a question of the contractors being sued. So I would just ask you also to slow down on this, but then again, to speed up on stopping spraying roundup in our parks. If we're concerned about safety, where all we are is concerned about safety, that from beginning to end the whole night, everybody wants to be saved. Who doesn't want to be safe? Sometimes convenience or something shiny and pretty like, you know, a plastic lawn. Maybe it saves water in the in the first, but then if it seals off the ability of the of our runoff to soak into our aquifer, where are we? I'm going to cut this off early. Just listen. Please listen to an Cantrell. She doesn't have any other interest than our our future generations. We love her.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: I wanted to actually commend the Council for going with the Natural Grass at Eldorado Park because I mean, I, I've had many pleasant experiences at that park and I really appreciate that it's one of the better maintained parks that kind of resembles a more natural setting. With that, I wanted to raise a couple issues with artificial turf as the production of oxygen is kind of inhibited because, you know, you don't have organic material that kind of AIDS in that process as well as the rainwater runoff, because artificial turf tends to kind of just keep it at surface where grass actually kind of absorbs it and puts it back in the soil. So it serves more of a purpose to maintain as much as possible grass or natural sort of settings, especially when you are dealing with children in inner city that normally don't have exposure to natural resources or, you know, outings, if you will, because most of the kids in the city are surrounded day by day with, you know, asphalt and sidewalks and all these things. So the ability to be still surrounded by something that's very natural, very I mean, I have memories of growing up and running on field. So I mean, I'm allergic to grass, but I still love it. So I think I think it's a thing that we should and especially in bigger cities and cities with more development preserve to keep. It might not seem as a sound investment, but I think there could be ways and to looking to better use natural resources to do efficient you know green preservation of parks that are in fact efficient in water use as well as giving back to the environment and not as abrasive like some of the previous points.
Speaker 0: Thanks so much. Next week, last speaker.
Speaker 7: Hello again. I just wanted to point out a few things and stress a few things when I initially hearing Astroturf. Be a strategist inside me jumped, my skin crawled and then I started getting itchy. But I do appreciate the exploration of the best possible ways we could implement using Astroturf, including a formula that is organic. However, as someone that admires good design and also strong urban design, one of the tenants of urban design is creating environments that enliven and enrich the community in ways that they didn't know they need. Things like art, murals, benches that art you wouldn't think are necessities, and also green spaces that are real and not abrasive and artificial . I just think about, for me, living in an urban environment, the most exotic places that I would visit as a kid would be Eldorado, Park and Disneyland. And I would really hate or not hate, but I think it would be unfortunate for young kids who don't get to come out and experience nature, to experience Astroturf and that be a hallmark of their childhood. I also think that while it's tantalizing to look at this as a way to mitigate climate change, I feel like in the long run, Astroturf only works in seriously contained environments like theme parks or private residences. The speakers before me have explained how it sort of cuts off water runoff. There's more maintenance involved, especially when it comes to sanitary issues. So I just ask everyone to consider those points as well. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Please come forward.
Speaker 7: Good evening. My name is Abraham Bashagha, and I had I just felt a little compelled to speak on this this issue, just because I'm a former intern at the water department and I was working with the conservation unit and we were doing lawn garden conversions and synthetic turf conversions as well. And I was working with this program very closely and notice that there are two major differences. So it almost was almost like night and day. We had a lot more people signed up for the turf removal as opposed to synthetic turf. But working with the synthetic turf, there was a lot more detail behind it. I don't have an issue per se, if there will be synthetic turf parks and of course, grass parks. I think the balance is actually very good. The only thing with synthetic turf is that there must be an adequate amount of research done and just information as far as maintenance and safety is concerned. I just think it'd be smart to educate the public on the difference between the both. As lady mentioned earlier, that there are there are certain requirements based on the turf who's manufacturing it and who's implementing it as far as special spikes, special equipment that does exist. However, as long as the public's educated on it, I think there shouldn't be a problem. As well as the heat island effect on the synthetic turf in the summer, it does tend to get a bit hot, and sometimes it did. In one instance, I did see the turf melt on home. Well, I was doing an inspection for the water department, but that was just one instance. And that was because he went to a retailer that that was not on our approved list. So maybe I like I said, research would be great. If you guys need information from the water department, I'm pretty sure they would not hesitate to help. And that's all. Okay.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And our last speaker. And then we got to go to a vote, sir.
Speaker 7: Hi. My name is Ramon. I'm in the fifth district. I'd like to compliment Stacy Mango for at least giving us the grass soccer fields. I do have some objections to the artificial turf that's being put in the other parks. Before I go any further, I'd like you to know that I'm also been given permission to represent the air. So one one for which has 2250 people, plus the residents that I have that are about 3000. Okay. This is the same group of people that I got to sign a petition during the budgetary meeting. Okay. Um, the water savings for the. That we receive for the. For the artificial turf to remove and install the grass is actually less than the cost of install. I mean, the installation and all that stuff for artificial turf is cost more than the savings for maintenance and water. That's what I've gotten the. There's a lot of problems with the with the health aspects, the the biological issues that are involved, some of the cancer stuff that's still there. This is a new surface that nobody's ever tried before. And we're now rolling it out in full blast that we're that we're doing so. To me, it doesn't make a lot of sense. There's three times as many injuries and artificial turf as there is on on. Grass. The residents prefer grass. So do the all the soccer players and all the teams. I did survey in Roberto Urunga area for Admiral Keter, and I spoke with the people using the soccer fields, which incidentally already have light. And they they don't have any problems with the field. I'm sure you did. I don't know if you did or not. So I'm letting you know that the residents and the the soccer player teams, they prefer having grass themselves. I think it's important that you know that because we don't know why you're doing it. That's why it's only the guys behind the desk, I guess. So the Long Lobby School District also has done a study on the different uses on soccer. And what they've discovered is they've got a 2% loss in students that. Excuse me. Well, I guess you don't want to hear me. It doesn't matter that.
Speaker 2: You don't want to. I don't you know, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 7: These guys are so rude. They don't even want to hear me.
Speaker 0: So, you.
Speaker 7: Know.
Speaker 8: Sir Ramon.
Speaker 5: I actually called you today to talk about this specific matter.
Speaker 7: You know what?
Speaker 0: Well, let's let's not. That's not that's not going to here.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 0: All right, sir. Okay. So let's let's go ahead and. Okay. Thank you, sir. So anybody anybody else who would have comment on this item? Okay. See the public comment on the item. Mr. Boland.
Speaker 11: Hi, Larry. Roland, I had come forward. I had an opportunity to spend time at City College. The dean and the grass out in front of the between two large buildings was just a terrible mess. And the flower beds weren't taken up with all the gardeners who were being paid to do it. So I met with the head groundskeeper and I said, because I work for a company that did turf management. And I said, Look, why don't you do this? Grass will hold up. It doesn't have to look like that with all these holes in it. If you do one thing and that is you assign one person to that spot and you hold them accountable. That it looks like it's supposed to look. And guess what? Next year, the grass was just beautiful. But the grass next to it, where they had another guy, it was the same way. So it got down to people keeping it as it supposed to be. Now, we'll have to say this. I think you have to put a little more money into real grass. But there's also the human element of who's going to take care of it, who's going to fertilize it? Who's going to cut it? Who's going to make fix the patches? And I just say this and I'll make it short. I think everybody prefers real grass. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Mr. Bowlen. Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 5: Yes. I wanted to point out two clarifying questions to answer some of the questions that were brought by the community tonight to the first part. Who's going to take care of it? I appreciate your comments because that is a very important component of the entire process. And Parks, Rec, Parks, Rec and Marine has brought on a specific field and grass maintenance expert. So we now have someone who knows the difference between a piece of grass that has two goalposts and an actual field. And the things that Ms.. Cantrell mentioned, which is irrigation and all the different components that make grass durable for play. The second component to Ms.. Cantrell's question, 800,000 is not enough for the projects that we will be doing at Eldorado Park. However, we're bringing forth a community item, a follow up to a council agenda item I had several months ago where we have talked with Parks Rec and Marine about sponsorship and partnership opportunities so that the organizations that are going to be utilizing these fields will make up the variance or hopefully will make up the variance. They have said that they're interested in doing that. So while it is 800,000, there are three fields and the potential sports space that we're looking at and what that looks like, I mean, it would exceed the 800,000. But if these community groups would step up in the way that they think they can, we would be able to pull in another hundred thousand dollars from that community and make everything possible. Otherwise the project would have to be reduced slightly. But and we're giving that discretion to Parks Rec and Marine and public works to make that all happen for us without any more delay. So I'm excited for this to move forward. Thank you. And I hope my colleagues will support this item.
Speaker 0: Okay, there's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Motion carries eight zero.
Speaker 0: Okay, that concludes the items that were requested to be moved up. So now we're going back to the beginning of the agenda and we have two hearings, believe it or not, and important ones, actually. So I'm going to start with hearing number one, Madam Clerk. | Contract | Recommendation to adopt Plans and Specifications No. R-7022 for the Seaside Park Artificial Turf Field Project; award the contract to Los Angeles Engineering, Inc., of Covina, CA, in the amount of $773,123, authorize a 10 percent contingency in the amount of $77,312, for a total contract amount not to exceed $850,435; authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to enter into the contract, including any necessary amendments thereto;
Adopt Plans and Specifications No. R-7024 for the Admiral Kidd Artificial Turf Field Project; award the contract to Los Angeles Engineering, Inc., of Covina, CA, in the amount of $1,418,136, authorize a 10 percent contingency in the amount of $141,813, for a total contract amount not to exceed $1,559,949; authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to enter into the contract, including any necessary amendments thereto;
Authorize City Manager, or designee, to approve expenditures through the City's approved As-Needed Services Contract to design and construct athletic field improvements at EI Dorado | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02072017_17-0048 | Speaker 0: Okay, that concludes the items that were requested to be moved up. So now we're going back to the beginning of the agenda and we have two hearings, believe it or not, and important ones, actually. So I'm going to start with hearing number one, Madam Clerk.
Speaker 1: Report from Development Services and Health and Human Services recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing and adopt resolution approving the six three pedestrian plan as a technical appendix to the mobility element of the Long Beach General Plan and accept category or categorical exemption. Number c-6-268 citywide.
Speaker 0: Okay. Mr.. West or Morocco.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Members of the Council. The staff report would be given by Amy Burdick and her team. Thank you.
Speaker 5: Mr. Mayor. Members of the City Council. Part of my team tonight includes Kelly Collopy, the director of Health and Human Services, and then Laura Turnbull, who is the program coordinator for the Healthy Active Long Beach program. We are pleased to present this to you tonight. This is a public hearing because this will be a technical appendices to the mobility element, and therefore that's why we needed the public hearing portion of it. So for those of you who might not know what six three is, it is the communities of excellence in nutrition, physical activity and obesity prevention. And the Health Department has been working for quite a number of years on the healthy, active language program. And then that has evolved into the the Sea X Initiative. So what this plan represents is focusing on ten specific neighborhoods that met certain criteria and focusing on opportunities for change to improve those areas, both from a food desert perspective and then also from a safety walkability and livability perspective. Clearly improving walkability is important for us as we move towards being a more mobile city and then clearly access to healthy foods fall into those two program components. These are the ten neighborhoods that we're focused upon as part of this effort. The ones that are in the dark shaded area, you will see the top graphic is a graphic of the city. And then the six three neighborhoods are made up of ten neighborhoods in west and central Long Beach. We recently brought to you a pedestrian plan for the metro areas around the metro blue line stations. So those areas were exempted out of this plan. But but you can see between the lower left hand corner, the mob and the pink, those are the areas where we now have certified pedestrian plans. That will be a technical appendices to the mobility element. Here are the guiding principles that we're focused on in these ten neighborhoods. Clearly, our streets and sidewalks need to be safe and accessible and the environment needs to be livable. And it needs to be a an environment that is reducing pollution, is reusing rainwater through bio swales and then focuses on recycling. We do want to support the economic development of these neighborhoods, the social life of the neighborhoods, provide recreation and health opportunities, and then also enhance the esthetics and beauty of these neighborhoods as well. And so part of the plan format was that there was an assessment of existing conditions in these neighborhoods, and then there were neighborhood snapshots that include demographic analysis and then then survey intercepts, focus groups and then walk audits in some of these neighborhoods as well. That helped us prioritize what those pedestrian priorities should be for these neighborhoods. So I'm going to give you a number of examples for two of the areas of what the plan involves. But it it resulted in 76 concrete recommendations in the plan that would them, as I said, become part of the mobility element. So, for example, in the Washington neighborhood, we did focus quite a bit on what the snapshot of health looked like, the number of schools, the number of physical assets that were either publicly owned or owned by other institutional stakeholders, and then focused on the accessibility to healthy stores and recreations, recreation opportunities to see what sort of improvements we could make to either improve access to healthy foods or improve access to recreation opportunities. And so that resulted in some suggestions for priorities on how to enhance the 14th Street greenbelt, focusing on getting the folks in the neighborhood to utilize the park to an even greater extent, particularly where the the park is not being used because there are a couple of blocks on the park that are heavily used, but others that are underutilized potentially focusing on ways to increase circulation and safety for those neighborhoods as well for the Lafayette neighborhoods. Similarly, this we went through this exercise for all ten neighborhoods focused on the healthy snapshot, the numbers of stores, those sorts of things as well. And then potential improvements that we could make in the Lafayette neighborhood that would enhance public safety, enhance the pedestrian safety, and then also add add amenities to those neighborhoods as well. So the Planning Commission approved this back in late 2016. We are asking for your recommendation and then if you do approve this, we would then seek implementation grants and incorporate planning efforts into future infrastructure projects. If you have any specific questions about the six three program, since it has been going on for quite a while, I would turn those over to health to Kelly and Laura. Otherwise, we're here to answer any questions you might have.
Speaker 0: Any public comment on that item?
Speaker 9: Evening, Mayor. Hello. City Council. How you guys doing? Am I? My name is Steve Gerhart. I'm with Long Beach. We are your pedestrian safety and walkable communities advocate, and I'm also a proud board member of City Fabric. First, may I say what a great night this is for active transportation and democracy, as he pointed out, what you have before you in the six three plan is absolutely a labor of love. I want to thank Laura Turnbull and her healthy, active Long Beach team and Neil Chesky and the Cityfibre team for all their efforts. They really set a high bar with this plan, both in terms of process and in terms of content. This pedestrian plan was prepared with substantial and meaningful engagement. And it was not just one of those efforts that was one and done. There were repeated consultations, the outreach with the community, and the plan was evolved and continued to be developed. The plan reflects this extensive input and provides a viable and detailed plan for the city to move forward on pedestrian. Work. Long Beach wholeheartedly supports the plan's adoption and its incorporation into the mobility element. While we're talking about pedestrian planning, let me mention.
Speaker 7: A few other things that are important.
Speaker 9: The first, of course, is Vision Zero. On May 24th last year, the city council took the critical first step. To begin the hard work of comprehensively assessing our roadway network and to figure out where the collisions. And remember, we call them don't call them accidents. We call them collisions because they're predictable where collisions occur for all modes of travel. More and more cities are moving ahead with Vision Zero, and we need to keep the momentum moving forward on this effort here in Long Beach. The second item is expanding the content from the fabulous six three plan and the downtown interior master plan. Pedestrian masterplan into a citywide pedestrian masterplan. Not unlike the bicycle master plan we'll be discussing soon. We stand ready to partner with the city to reach out into the community and bring this back to life. Six plan has a robust tool kit, which, by the way, has been translated into both Spanish and Combi. And interestingly, Appendix A of the Bicycle Master Plan in the Next Agenda item provides best practices for design guidelines for bicycle facilities. I would like to remind everyone that the very first implementation in the mobility element. Is to develop a street design manual. This is a vital step for creating streets that we want consistently and in.
Speaker 7: All parts of town.
Speaker 9: Ensuring consistent engineering design practices. Improving safety and economic vitality and reducing air emissions from mobility. It's the everyday decisions that we make that will build the city that we say we all want. Our third goal policy priority this year is to get the city to start working on a comprehensive street assignment. After tonight, we will have two major chapters completed for the design manual and can look forward to seeing the Complete Street Design Manual with a full range of complete streets, complete streets design policies and detailed guidance about how we rebuild our future.
Speaker 0: Thank you very.
Speaker 9: Much. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Any other public comment? You know, the public comment were going back then to council and council comments. Councilor Mungo.
Speaker 5: I just wanted to ask a quick question related to implementation of the program and the care that it took. I know that sometimes I've read some of the comments related to the emails we've received and the questions that some in some community members have put forward. And I just wanted to ask Amy to take a moment to talk a little bit about the best practices. There were some comments about council members dreaming up ideas that they think are fun pet projects versus I know you mentioned the safety, but if you could just give a little look into the professionalism and credentials of the staff that are gathering this information and data. Certainly, we do look at all of the best practices that exist both at the state level and the nation at national level. And those are really coming into play. We do focus on, you know, the I forget the acronym for Eric's group, the APA. The active transportation group that is a huge proponent of a lot of these efforts that we're doing. We are embarking on a huge mobility effort, and this falls under those mobility efforts which this city council adopted in 2013. So we do have professionals both on staff and our consultants are professionals who work in these fields for their at their daily jobs, who provide us advice and guidance as we go forward on these plans. I'm glad you mentioned the consultants, one of the public comments sent in. Actually, I looked at their online post because it didn't fit all in the public comment section of the post and they specifically talked about the consultants. But we go through a bid process for that. There's no handing out bids to people who are going to do it the council's way. It's done through a professional standard without much influence from the council at all. Is that accurate? That is correct. We do go have to go through a purchasing process and there are purchasing guidelines that the city, the CFO of the city establishes and that we are all obligated to follow as departments. And in this case, the consultants were selected through that process, as well as the Mobility Element Consultants and that the development services and public works, if better systems come in play over the years, we can always modify these plans. Absolutely. Thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Okay. There's a in a second.
Speaker 3: I just wanted to say yes. Thank you to our staff here. Um, and I just wanted to briefly mention that I remember almost, you know, five or six years ago when I had walked with Laura Turnbull's team and did an assessment in the, I think it was the Edison Drake Park area. And now to see this these items actually come to fruition visually is is wonderful. So I just want to thank you for your work. And I know Brian's work as well and I see so me here. And so it's it's just incredible to see that we're putting this into a plan. And it's also nice because as we sit on many boards like Skog and state and federal legislative committees and we have to go and pitch these plans for money, it really helps us to do that a little bit better. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. Vice Mayor.
Speaker 10: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to chime in and say this is really creative. It's good work and we're paying attention. And, you know, L.A. just went through a process with the Prevention Institute and looking at the social determinants of health and how they can use that as a lens for land use. And we're already wrapping up something like that. And that says a lot about the fact that we're forward thinking and sort of connecting health and planning. So I like seeing these two people together. Our health director and our planning director. And so I would my question for you would be, how can we take what we've learned from this and integrate it into our general plan across the city? And I think it's great that you were able to target and go in depth in some of those neighborhoods. And so that's that's my first question. How can we sort of take what we've learned and spread it or put it into future planning efforts? This approach that was taken.
Speaker 5: That's actually one of the long range efforts under the land use element is to create a more livable, walkable city. But specifically, these two are related to the mobility element, which specifically calls for the idea of a pedestrian master plan for the entire city. So that's on our work list. It's on our dream list as well, because that's that's critically important for everything that we've been doing. You probably do remember that these two departments collaborated a number of years ago to come up with the healthy, active living policies. We put those in place early on with a grant from the county health department. And those really led to these efforts as well. So those sorts of coordination efforts have been, you know, growing routes over the last few years. And these documents really establish that. And to Councilmember Gonzalez, at this point, it does put us in a position to seek grant funding. So these planning efforts are critically important for that purpose.
Speaker 0: Okay. Great. Motion in a second. Please cast your votes. | Resolution | Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, and adopt resolution approving the Communities of Excellence in Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity Prevention (CX3) Pedestrian Plan as a technical appendix to the Mobility Element of the Long Beach General Plan; and
Accept Categorical Exemption No. CE-16-268. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_02072017_17-0023 | Speaker 1: That's it. Motion passes five zero 14. Report from economic and property development. Recommendation Execute all necessary documents with We work to provide a workspace for the city's business navigators program citywide wide.
Speaker 0: Any public comment? Please cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Motion carries five zero.
Speaker 0: Okay. And that is all the agenda is over. We will do is their second public comment on items not on the agenda. Anyone. Mr. Bolen. Go ahead. That's where we want to go. Go ahead.
Speaker 11: I wanted to come here tonight and. Thank all eight of you who supported the. Vote on the f i. S at the airport. I've been coming here for 40 years, I think, on airport issues, and I've never seen such a an incredible getting together of all of the. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all necessary documents and technical amendments with WeWork, a privately-held real estate and office share company based in New York City, NY, to provide a work space for the City’s Business Navigators Program, for a period from January 1, 2017 through December 31, 2019, at no cost. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_01242017_17-0041 | Speaker 8: Thank you. I hope that I see you all there because it's going to be a very exciting time. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. And just also, Madam Cricket, I know that the timer is not appearing for some reason on our screens, just as we as we start the hearing. Okay, I can fix that. Thank you very much. Okay. We're going to go we're now going on to item seven. We're going to just kind of start over. So I'm going to have the clerk read item seven again and Mr. Romo, pretend like we're starting from the beginning. Okay.
Speaker 0: Madam Court report from Long Beach Airport. Recommendation to authorize the city manager to negotiate a financial agreement for the development of a Customs and Border Protection facility. And execute and submit all documents necessary to Homeland Security for designation of the Long Beach Airport as a United States Customs and Border Protection User Fee Airport Citywide.
Speaker 2: Mr. West.
Speaker 9: Mr. Romo.
Speaker 7: Honorable mayor, honorable city council members. Just Roemer Airport director. I'm here to provide an update and overview of the Federal Inspection Service feasibility study that has come before the City Council prior. And we're here to present a full and complete debriefing of the study itself. I would like to mention that this was commissioned and performed by Jacobs Engineering under a contract with the airport. But this is also a project that has required an inordinate amount of city support staff, primarily out at the airport, although we have received some significant assistance from staff here at City Hall. We've had a number of of employees in particular who've done a lot of heavy lifting. And I did want to at least give some recognition to one person in particular who acted as the contract manager throughout this project. Mr. Dale Worsham The Airport's Administrative Officer. So again, I want to acknowledge and thank him for his great, tireless and excellent work on this project. And. So with that I'll get into the presentation. So I wanted to start out by sharing with the mayor and council and members of the public who are here tonight as well as those watching online or on MLB.TV. The study, again, it is as a recap, looked at particular elements or items related to the feasibility of having an f i. S sited at the airport. And it was again a commission to provide a comprehensive and full evaluation of what interface would would mean for the for Long Beach Airport and . The items that were examined. If you've looked at the study, reviewed the study, these would be familiar. But we looked at both or we looked at market demand, which is do air carriers see a market here in the Long Beach Basin and in Long Beach to provide that service? What would the economic impact be as a result of construction and operation of an office? This in the report was done primarily on a regional basis. That's how impact studies are normally done. But at the request of one of the council members, we did a analysis looking at a more localized or Long Beach centric impact. We also looked at environmental compliance issues specifically related to the previously completed Environmental Impact Report. And if this project were to be approved, what additional environmental requirements to do due diligence would have to be done before a project would start. Next we have facility concepts. If you'll recall, there were three concepts that were put forth. These were very high level ideas or designs. They were not based on anything that was done with discussion, with any stakeholders per se. It was really done based on what Customs and Border Protection has as its requirements for functions of an app. Yes. We also looked at the airport itself, specifically on the airfield side in terms of what with the existing geometry and series of taxiways and runways support international operations. And last sorry, the second to last item was financial feasibility. If we were to construct an F, I guess, how would it be funded? Who would pay for it? Not only for the initial construction, but how it would be operated. And those costs would be recouped over time. And then, last but not least, examining any potential security risks, as they might be related to the introduction of international service at Long Beach Airport. In addition to the study itself, which again, it's been available since October, for everybody to read and review as well as attend study sessions. It also is accompanied by extensive community outreach. People will recall that at the front end of the study there were two community meetings that were held, later followed after the study was completed by three study sessions. The finished product itself is really comprised of the summary study as well as a fairly robust and thick series of appendices that support the information that's contained in the base study. Because there has been concern about what an has in terms of its operation might might mean to the city's noise ordinance. The city did outreach and sent a letter to the Federal Aviation Administration to get some guidance on any potential impact to the noise ordinance. So overall, the staff's position in assessment of this, after looking at all all the information, all relevant facts, are that the study findings provide a very solid framework for which to base a decision on possible next steps. This is where this slide here really just talks about some of the key elements and reminders to the greater audience about what Long Beach is and kind of how it fits in the rest of the air transportation system in our region. As a reminder, you know, Long Beach Airport is one of five commercial airports in the greater Los Angeles region. I may have mentioned it at a previous presentation that, you know, the L.A. region is actually pretty unique in that we've got five airports that support the travel needs of about 20 million folks that live in the greater L.A. region. That includes L.A. County, Orange County, San Bernardino, Riverside Counties. So it's one of the few places in the country that has this number of airports at a fairly small region. Long Beach Airport itself. We did get our statistics for 2016 and ended the year with 2.8 million passengers, a slight increase from 2015 where we had two and a half million passengers. And of course, in one of the first and foremost things that we always look at at the airport and I think from the city standpoint, is that Long Beach Airport itself has a long standing, almost 22 years now and a robust noise ordinance that protects the surrounding neighborhoods. And some of the specifics or key elements of the noise ordinance that at present no more than 50 air carrier flights are permitted to operate at Long Beach on a daily basis. The commercial carry operations from a schedule standpoint are restricted to occur between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. in the evening. And there's an imposition of fines on operators outside these hours with few exemptions. And specifically, I want to talk about the exemptions. The only time that there can be an exemption is that one hour window between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m.. And those typically are waived in the instance of whether or a bona fide mechanical reasons that are beyond the control of an airline. Any any violations occurring from 11 p.m. until 7 a.m. in the morning. Those are subject to fines, regardless of the reason. Legal considerations here this we want to just talk about something that some history because part of this was in addition to doing the feasibility study itself, we wanted to get some reaffirmation from the FAA. So on September 8th, 2016, the city attorney requested of the FAA to reaffirm its legal opinion on the effect of international service and that effect on airport grant assurances specifically as they relate to the noise ordinance. Oh. And the slot I'm sorry, the allocation. Resolution for those that may not be aware that in addition to limiting the operations within the noise budget is as it's calculated in the OR as stated in the noise ordinance, the allocation resolution speaks to the the number of times or the frequency by which an airline must exercise or use its allotment of flight slots. So the response from the FAA was received on October 18th, and their response indicated that their conclusions that were reached in 2015 were the same. So and the net effect was that the consideration of a potential out by US facility would would not have an impact on the city's noise ordinance or allocation resolution. And again, something else for for the benefit of the public out there. That Long Beach Airport's noise ordinance is grandfathered under anchor or the Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990. But again, the FAA conclusion was that the FAA US will not impact the city's noise ordinance. This is just a copy of the letter that we made up there. The tape is much too small, but this was all and this is available online. This was something that was published so that the public could review this letter themselves. And again, that was that was received by or there was it was dated on October 18th, 2016. So this is a high level restatement of the facts relative to the project. And that, you know, providing international air service will not impact the noise ordinance. And this is based on the FAA is opinion that was made at the request of the city attorney. Nationally, and this is part of the study as well. International service itself comprises about 20% of all air travel in this country. Locally. Regional airports that are similar to Long Beach that have international traffic levels except for L.A.X., are at about actually they're under 5%. So the two other airports, not counting L.A.X. that have international service or John Wayne and Ontario, and again, both those airports have international traffic at under 5%. The study did also find that Long Beach, you know, that international flights would range somewhere between six and eight flights or 12 to 16%. If you convert those flights into percentages of our total slot allocation after a 3 to 5 year period. The other thing that we looked at, in fact, this was an important component when the council authorized staff to engage with JetBlue and Customs and Border Protection on some concept of what FISA could look like, because the information that was contained in the study was very much based on a formulaic set of instructions. So it was simply said the the consultant looked at what FISA typically looks for, and that's why they had the three scenarios and the square footage of the FISA ranging I think anywhere from, I think, 28000 to 30000 square feet. So staff met with CBP and JetBlue in early January to get a little bit more guidance based on what this facility could conceivably come in at from a square footage standpoint. Vital to the project is that we wanted to make sure that a facility would meet the operational need, but they would not create any expansion potential. That it would also place limitations on the operating hours so that we could have an effective buffer between the last arriving international flight and against the curfew. So giving you an example, what we'd want to do is make sure that Customs and Border Protection officers who would have to clear those international flights, that they would leave the time certain so that if a flight came in after that timeframe, so let's say 10:00 at night, that's that's the curfew they would have to divert to a nearby airport. Additional considerations of right sizing. Again, with the discussions we had with CBP and JetBlue really yielded the possibility that an IFRS could be sized at about 15,000 square feet, which represents about a 30% reduction from what the study had estimated. And the square footage itself because it's at 15,000 square feet. And the larger it does place a constraint on the number of flights that could be handled. So we would want to make sure that it's designed that it would accommodate no more than two flights at at the same time. And again, restating what I said earlier about the operating hours, that we would restrict it to a single eight hour CBP shift and that we would want to make sure that it's operating within the permissible hours of the noise ordinance. And again, any flights that would arrive after that time certain would not be able to land here at Long Beach. And instead they would have to divert most likely to LAX. But they would they would obviously they could not land it and clear at Long Beach. I want to talk about again on a high level, some of the benefits that the study showed about an F, I guess, at Long Beach Airport. First is choices. Local travelers would be able to have a choice to opt to use Long Beach as a launching point at a much more convenient, much less congested airport. It's much as folks know that use the airport. It's a much friendlier campus and a nicer experience for for people who are taking flights out of Long Beach. Stability, you know, having a relatively small international component, as we said, 12 to 16% or 6 to 8 flights. It really does strengthen the airport's financial position because it diversifies routes in the airport business in general, having a diversification of your routes really tends to strengthen and bolster the airport's position and protect it during natural economic cycles where you might otherwise see a downturn. Connection. Although Long Beach is what you call an origination and destination airport. And so the vast majority of people who are using Long Beach are either traveling from Long Beach someplace else or from someplace else to Long Beach. Having an international component does provide a better connection throughout an airline's network. So again, it's a small incremental piece. But again, this kind of goes to helping to diversify and strengthen an airport's business model in terms of protecting itself against economic downturns. And then lastly, the economic impact and this has been discussed, I think at length here as well as other study sessions. There are positive impacts that accrue both during construction of the project and once it's operational. So staff's recommendation tonight for the council to consider or we recommend moving forward. This independent study has fully reviewed concerns related to noise, security, the environment and has provided for a lot of public input. So through a series of these study sessions and community meetings as well as Q&A opportunities where we have responded, I think in every event to questions that have come up. We want to make sure that all questions go answered. The FAA has provided written confirmation that the noise ordinance would not be impacted if this project were to move forward. The study also verified that it's a fairly small component in the scheme of things. It's obviously less than the 20% average nationwide, but 12 to 16 flights were identified as potential international routes were again 6 to 8 flights out of the 50. And staff has. And I really want to back this up that, you know, your staff has really gone above and beyond at our community meetings, as well as responding to email requests and requests from council. We've listened to the residential residents concerns. We've addressed questions. But this study, you know, it.
Speaker 9: Did not.
Speaker 7: Reveal any impacts to the quality of life with the introduction of international service. So in addition and as we get to the close of this presentation. Restating that the size of the facility limits. The amount of international service capacity in the size itself has been reduced by 30% from what was initially estimated in the Jacobs report. The proposed facility size fits within Long Beach, the previously outlined environmental impact report that said it will comply with any additionally required environmental work that might be that would have to be done as part of this project. And that staff would negotiate with CBP to shift hours of enough hours so that all international flights would have to operate within our operating hours and that they could not arrive after hours. Instead, they would be rerouted to nearby airports. And that is it. With that, we're open for questions.
Speaker 2: Okay. We're going to start the next section of this. And so thank you staff for the presentation couple announcement as well. So for the folks that are outside, because I know there's a lot in the waiting room, if they're interested in doing public comment, we will allow you to do public comment. So I think the fire marshal, Mr. City attorney, will work with getting folks in and out. So once folks in this room do their public comment, if there's folks outside who also want to do public comment, I know they're watching right now, you will be allowed to make your public comment as well. And so we'll have a process for those folks to come in as well. And so I just want to make sure that they that they knew that the folks that are that are outside. In addition, a couple other things that I have, a couple of councilmembers and they're going to turn it over. There's a couple of council comments. We're going to open it up to public comment and then we'll come back to the council for more, I think discussion and and deliberation. A couple comments, opening comments I want to make. The first is I do want to I know there's been a lot of people involved. I think they're going to be great comments tonight. I just also want to make sure, just to get through this, that we're all respectful to each other in the comment period. I know that there's neighbors that are here tonight that have serious concerns about their homes and about their neighborhoods. I want to make sure respectful to them when they're when they're when they're speaking and they're giving their their concerns. I also know that there's a lot of other folks here that are supportive of the terminal. And particularly I want to point out there's a lot of JetBlue employees, and I'm talking about the rank and file employees that are there picking up their handling baggage, that are working hard, that live in our community, that and they also deserve our respect because they're a part of our community as well. And so to the JetBlue employees that are checking in people's bags and they're handling people's luggage as as all of us fly, your work is also valid. And I and I want to make sure that people also know that this discussion tonight and debate is not about those employees. And so this is about a larger issue of whether we should have an Air Force terminal at the airport and so to the JetBlue rank and file employees. I also want to thank you for your work for and for being a part of our community as well. So hopefully we can all be. Hopefully this is a this is a serious discussion. It's going to require serious conversation and a lot of questions. And so I'm hopeful that we're able to do this in a way that's respectful and and and that we're able to have a process that respects each other. So, please, we're all part of this community, so let's be respectful to each other as we start this. So I got to turn this over to to start with with Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 10: Thank you. I want each and every one of you to know how personal this is to me. I have knocked on many of your doors. I have talked to you personally. I appreciate your input. I know that sometimes the things that I say confuse you on where I stand. And that's because I often did not know. I think that it is important to have. The ability to debate important things so that we escalate the discussion, both from the standpoint of your own neighbors, whose points that I bring forward regularly, and and of those I hear in the community and my colleagues. I have read the reports, but more importantly, I have read your emails and taking your calls and talk to you at community meetings, whether they were intended to be airport community meetings or not, and. I have reached out to people who are typically quiet on matters to gauge their sense of their neighborhoods and their communities, because I really do want to best understand the factors that lead each person to their profile. Yes or no FISA stance. I, too, want to thank the staff for for listening and taking the time to come to what can often be very, very contentious and quite honestly, impolite meetings. And I appreciate you for continuing to show up with a smile. And to be so professional, despite the negativity on both sides of the issue. I want to thank those of you who have given me your patience to let me decide on my own without threats of what you will do to me if I don't do what you want to do. Respecting that the person that lives next door to you may not agree with you. And with that, I want to thank the JetBlue team, especially Lou, who attended a community meeting and took the brunt of many comments from the neighbors. He is the man that's actually at the JetBlue facility on a daily basis managing the staff who may be your next door neighbor. Recently, they did a hiring where almost 40 of their employees were all from Long Beach neighborhoods. Those are people who were either underemployed or not employed at all before and now have money to pay their car payments and pay their rent. And those are important jobs like any other. And so I appreciate that no matter which way the vote goes tonight. I want to be respectful of all of you. And so I think it's important to though I am aware of the answers to some of these questions, I think it's important for you to hear them. I'm going to ask the city staff to respond to a couple of quick financial questions that have helped me down the path of my decision making process. And then I will put a motion out on the floor so that when you make your public comment, you can make comments based on what what is out there. Because I see a lot of familiar faces that I've seen at many meetings, and I know that the dialogs have progressed in many different ways. And so with that. I just want to thank you all for being respectful of each other and hopefully those of us that are here on the dais. City staff. Would you please outline who would pay for the new FISA facility under the current information you have.
Speaker 7: So well, based on what the discussions of the study, what they revealed is that this would be a partnership between at present JetBlue Airways and the city of Long Beach, Long Beach Airport, in particular the city of Long Beach, or I should say the airport has capacity to contribute up to $3 million in passenger facility charges, as has its contribution to that project. And the balance would come from JetBlue.
Speaker 10: And how much would passengers have to pay to utilize the facility?
Speaker 7: There would not be a direct assessment to passengers itself. I know the study talks about a per passenger fee that would strictly be a financial model. The way the airport would handle it is that we would calculate the costs both for the capital. So to do the construction of the facility as well as the ongoing expenses that would be passed through to all users or any users or if it's a single user. So there would be those costs would be passed through to that entity. They would make the decision to build it into the ticket price or absorb it within their system.
Speaker 10: And how much does the airport currently impose and collect through those fees?
Speaker 7: Currently, the airport's collection level is $4.50 for each implement or each departure from Long Beach Airport. So based on a I'm going to say last year's numbers of about one 1.4 million in payments. Multiply that by the 450, you get your your PNC collection for the year.
Speaker 10: And something that's really important to me, and this is a dialog that we've had on many other issues when it comes to funds that are not unlimited. Similarly to the dialog we had a few weeks ago about Tide lines. Are you able to discuss a few of the other projects that are in the pipeline that are currently using those fees that we are charging?
Speaker 7: Yes. So I mean, I think we've got a number of projects, but I'd say four in particular, there are two on the airfield or runway reconstruction project, 4 to 5 left, which is the short case. Runway, which will be rebuilt later this year, has a portion of its kind of its of its cost covered by PFC as well as another taxiway project. And then on the land side are there, you know, on the non-security side of the airport, what we would envision for follow on phases of terminal improvements. So for a new ticketing area, new baggage areas.
Speaker 10: Much needed baggage.
Speaker 8: Area.
Speaker 4: Yes.
Speaker 10: And what is the current outstanding debt at the airport?
Speaker 7: It's approximately $100 million.
Speaker 10: I think it's a bit more than that. It's 134.
Speaker 7: 110.
Speaker 10: Okay. Just checking. Thank you. You know, plus or -10%. Just 10 million extra. With any of the money generated from what, would there be any money generated from the facility?
Speaker 7: No. This is an international arrivals facility. So it's it it in and of itself does not generate any revenue. It does generate a cost recovery for the airport so that it's not paying for the cost to operate it, though that would be, you know, extracted from from users of the facility.
Speaker 10: So so just to be clear, the revenue that it does generate, because there is a revenue that comes for those fees, it is directly proportionate to the exact amount of the expenses. So there would be no additional financial revenue separate and apart from cost recovery.
Speaker 7: Other than in the first. I think I think it's modeled the first year or the first few years where the recovery of the capital to construct it would also be recovered.
Speaker 10: Perfect. And. What is the city's potential financial contribution that is being requested of us?
Speaker 7: The study outlined that we have PFC capacity of up to $3 million. I don't think a specific dollar amount had been identified, but there was capacity for up to 3 million.
Speaker 10: But that is 3 million that. If it does not go to this, it goes to other very important projects, including the baggage claim area and the structure and all those others. It's not like there's $3 million lying around.
Speaker 7: Well, I would say this. I believe that the projects that I mentioned, the PFC collections, those have already been set aside for those projects. That said, there are always projects that can come up that, you know, that this could be reprogramed and used for.
Speaker 10: And what other types of projects could be completed at the airport using those passenger facility funds that you mentioned?
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, typically.
Speaker 7: We don't have any identified as of today again. But we will always be looking at different ways to improve the experience at Long Beach Airport in general, the types of projects that are that are that qualify for PSC funding or those that are approved by FAA but not fully funded by FAA. It's also can be used to cover debt service, which we've got as part of the previous development or that was done for the terminal improvement as well as the parking structure and then other projects related to safety, security or capacity.
Speaker 10: Thank you. I believe that the information provided, especially since our last time together, has been very eye opening and important to the discussion. I think that there were.
Speaker 0: A lot of.
Speaker 10: Thoughts on what it could be, but I think we have something more concrete now. In thinking through what I was deliberating, did we get to the point at which we discussed the new cost and size of the facility? In the presentation. Yes, ten, $10 million and 15,000 square feet. Was that in the presentation?
Speaker 7: We didn't talk. We talked about the smaller size. I mean, we could give an estimate that, yeah, we're looking more in the neighborhood of about $10 million.
Speaker 10: Okay. So in the discussions and dialogs and all of that, we've listened to the experts. We've listened to the applicant. We've listened. I've listened to the residents. And. I've heard a lot of concern from the community, from a number of aspects about FISA. So for a starting point for this evening, I hope that whether you're supportive or not supportive, that you will hold your boos or applause no matter which side you're on. But I would like to make a motion to receive and file. And with that, I'd like to ask the mayor to go to public comment. I'm open to a dialog with neighbors. There are a lot of you here. Many of you have participated in several meetings, and I appreciate that. I see some inquisitive faces I receive and file means that we would not be progressing down the path any longer. Sleep. Please. Please. And with that, I know there's a lot to be said and I'm open to continuing to hear it. I think in the last. Six days, I've probably received 45 calls from people who are very, very, very passionate on their side of the issue. And this is where I stand at this moment in time, and I look forward to hearing from the community.
Speaker 2: Know, we have a we have emotion and there is a second as well. Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 11: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I have some comments that I'd like to make after I hear from the residents. But before going to public comment, I think it's important to acknowledge a few things. This has been a very educational process for all of us on this council, regardless of what district we represent. This is an issue that we have all taken to heart. Every single one of us. It's an issue that we've studied with, studied. It's an issue that has kept many of us up at night. Trying to think about. It has been by far the most difficult decision that we have had to make as council members. I say that for myself. I know some of my colleagues feel the same way because of the various interests and the passions that the the item has. There have been a couple of council members who have demonstrated incredible leadership, and I think it's important to acknowledge them as we start to undertake the public comment process. I want to thank Councilman Austin. Councilman Austin is my colleague. But above and beyond that, he is a friend. And early on when this discussion happened, when the item came up, I pulled him aside and I probably asked them this question several times and I've said, Look, I know you live under the flight path. Be honest with me. Your position on this issue, is it political or do you really, in your heart of hearts, believe it? And on numerous occasions he has said to me, I want you to come and have coffee with me in my back yard. I want you to understand what I go through. And his feelings and his beliefs on this item are real. They are real fears and concerns that he has and he has conveyed that. Just so you all know, just so you all know, he has conveyed that to his colleagues on a very personal level, which has an impact on me, because I can't do anything to separate me and my family from him and his family or for those of you who have families who live in the area. So those words mean something to me. Beyond that, he has put forth a few council items that I have been very happy to sign on to and support . Not because I was not in favor of moving forward with a study, because I was absolutely in favor of moving forward with a study. And I don't regret that decision at all. It's been very educational. I've learned a lot. Historically, I think the information that we've received is going to serve us well as a city for decades. But he wanted to make sure we had a full council before we voted on the issue, which I supported. He wanted he has on a couple of occasions tried to start the discussion of a master plan, which I have supported. He cares about his community and he's shown incredible leadership on this council. Councilman Ranga similarly has showed tremendous leadership on this issue. I was very happy to support his request for a study session that we had in December, and I was very grateful that he brought that item forward. And I made it very clear when he brought the item forward that I didn't want it to delay the process at all, because I would rather we go through the exercise and make the decision, as opposed to continuing to punt things out so that people are living with this uncertainty. I'd rather we have certainty. And and so I said to him that I was more than happy to support the study session, but that I didn't want it to delay things. And he was very gracious and I think we reached a great place on that. But his vision to have a study session and allow us to all be educated at the same time in the same consistent fashion, because when you're getting a briefing, you're not sure that the briefing that you're getting is in the same tone and as the same content as your colleagues. Staff does an amazing job, but we all have individual different relationships with staff and they may make some assumptions in regards to where you might be leaning based on how you voted in the past, which is a very, very dangerous thing to do because we should approach each item on a case by case basis, which I know that we've done on this case. So Councilman Miranda, bringing that forward was fantastic. Councilman Supernormal has been a tremendous advocate for all of you. I will say the one thing that I absolutely respect and value about Councilman Supernanny is that he analyzes things in a way that I understand. You know, sometimes people around you make decisions and you're scratching your head like, I have no idea how that happened or how they got. From A to Z. I don't understand the thought process. I always understand Councilman Supernova's thought process. In many ways, I think we think the same. We analyze the same. And the presentation that he did at the study session was phenomenal. It really got me thinking for the first time about things I had never thought about before. And I can tell you, I've read every page of that study. It is tabbed and highlighted, as you would expect a lawyer to do with any document they read. It is something I've taken very personally, and yet the issues that he raised in his presentation were things that I thought about for the very first time from hearing him talk about it, and I told him that that night. So I appreciate these three gentlemen because they've been exceptional leaders. I also want to take a moment to acknowledge the hard work and the sheer heart and genuine energy that Councilwoman Mango has put into this effort. She has people don't know this. You know, we all know our colleagues in a way that the public may not know our colleagues. Councilman Mungo has a tremendous heart for the city. She cares deeply about her community and she tries to do something that perhaps isn't as easy to do for someone who it's their first time in public office as it is for seasoned politicians. She tries to listen to all sides, and she's not good at being fake. She's genuinely very, very honest when she hears something and she says what she's thinking as she's interpreting that. I value that about her. And in this process, I think she has been really, really open to hearing from all sides. And if you tell her something that she she's her brain works faster than most people that I know. And when you're telling her something, she's already thinking about what her response is going to be because of something that you've said that's triggered a response from her. And so in this situation, she has analyzed this and studied this issue so much that her response is always processing. If she hears something, she's processing it. She's processing it always from the other side. And I love that because she has the ability to look at things from all angles. And in this vote, she has been a tremendous leader. She has not been afraid, not even once, to change her position based on what she's been presented with and how that information makes sense or resonates with her. And I respect that about her. And she should be given a lot of credit for how far we've come on this issue and her analysis. This was a very difficult decision for her in terms of how she was going to land. And I'm I'm extremely honored to work with these four colleagues who have all shown exceptional leadership in regards to the airport issue. I have learned from each and every one of them. And and I think it's important that we acknowledge them and show them respect, because this is not easy work to do. I also want to acknowledge and thank our staff. Our staff has been amazing, regardless of whether you agree with them or you don't agree with them. I have felt.
Speaker 0: Completely.
Speaker 11: Able to make whatever decision I want on this issue with their support. They have not pushed us in one way or the other. They have not advocated for or against. They've been giving us the facts and they have been doing the work of the people and analyzing information and giving it to us in a way that we can process it. So I want to thank our staff for that. The airport staff, city manager staff, the city attorney's staff. Thank you. This was a very difficult position. And in many Scituate, for many of us, you were educating first time council members right off the bat about a very important issue. I want to say that JetBlue is a tremendous partner to the city. I fly JetBlue. My family flies JetBlue. I love the contribution that they make in the city. And the motion that the councilwoman has made that I am supporting as a second year of is no reflection whatsoever on JetBlue. And if they try to take it that way and think this is somehow a disrespect to them, that's their choice. You can't really control how people interpret your words or actions. But all I can say is this is a decision about the residents of the city of Long Beach. It's not a decision about a particular company. And that I just I want them to take that to heart. I also want to thank all the residents who have educated us through this process. Honestly, when you come up to the podium and you talk and you share.
Speaker 0: What you're.
Speaker 11: Afraid of. We could sit back here, as we often do as council members often do, and we can sit back and say, you know what, that fear is unfounded or that fear won't materialize. We can do that. I'm going to talk a little bit later about what I think about that fear in regards to this decision. But it's difficult for you to do that. It's difficult for you to put yourselves out there. Take time away from your families to be here. But it's really important because your words and your heart with which you have spoken through this entire process is the thing that I think about when I'm analyzing this issue. I could be reading a study and I will immediately flash to somebody that was at the podium. Those are the images that resonate with me is the people who are at the podium, the people who talk to me or talked to us about using their hard earned dollars to buy a house, trying to raise their kids in that house, just like my husband and I are trying to do with our family to give their kids a better life, and fearing genuinely in their heart of hearts that this decision is going to impact them in a negative way. That fear resonates. So thank you to the residents and to those of you who have been respectful in your comments, have not alleged a conspiracy theory or not alleged corruption because someone is looking at things from all sides. Thank you. You have credibility with us. We are your public servants, but we live in the city too. So to those of you who have respected the process and respected the difficult. Process that we have to go through. Thank you. So with that, I support this motion wholeheartedly.
Speaker 10: Mr. Mayor, if I may.
Speaker 2: Sure. And then Councilman Mongo. And then I know we're going to go to the city attorney just to clarify the motion, and they're going to begin public comment.
Speaker 10: I think that I should probably go through my thought process that got me to where I am. I think it's an important part of the dialog related to where I stand. I might repeat a sentence or two because I, I wasn't sure if I was going to go into the full detail, but I will. I mentioned that we've heard a lot of concern from the community about a number of aspects related to the office and that the neighbors and their concerns are important to me. I do appreciate Jacobson and the diligence that they had in completing the report. They are a nationally acclaimed organization who put a lot of experts to work for us in a short amount of time to answer anything but the kitchen sink that the council added in to the motion that was here almost a year ago. I mean, we have listened to those experts, we've listened to the applicant and we've listened to the residents. And I think that that's worth saying twice. But after significant deliberation and study, I just don't believe it's the right time to proceed with an IFRS facility. And here are some reasons why. While this is at home. For those who are at home, you don't know. But you can hear the other room on a delay. This is an investment the city would make if it felt it were in the best interests of the airport financially. Many of you know, I take the financial considerations of each of our decisions very seriously, and after taking into consideration a full review of the associated issues, assets, liabilities, revenues, and that that is a big part of my decision making process. The financial investment the city would make in this endeavor does not outweigh the potential benefits at this time, the potential economic impacts to the region and more importantly, the city of Long Beach and the airport itself. Just don't justify in my mind, setting aside all our other priorities or reorganizing. I just feel that the potential economic impacts. Don't justify the investment. The airport is one of our largest economic drivers. I really hope that even though you stand on one side, pro or notifiés, that you get to know the diversity of our airport tenants. Many people do not know that on our airport property we have so many diverse tenants. And when I say tenants, they are our renters. The city of Long Beach is their landlord. And and we have to discuss and understand what what it looks like in each and every one of their eyes. We need to ensure that the airport remains financially sound for us and for our neighbors and for the jobs that are there. The investment the city would make into this facility. In my opinion. Could be better used for other projects, providing additional benefit to the airport and to the community. And while I have discussed several times that revenue generated at the airport does stay at the airport, those ripples are felt in our neighborhoods because when those neighbors when those businesses do well, they employ our neighbors. And these include enhancements to the parking lot, which are good construction jobs, new rental car facilities which I recently visited and really need an upgrade. Our ground transportation center. Our baggage claim improvements. Something that's near and dear to many of our hearts, and especially to the volunteers that are at the airport regularly giving the tours, the historic preservation projects of the gem that we have today. And of course, for the safety and future of each and every one of us that use this airport, the runway rehabilitations that are crucial to our future. We must be mindful of the current outstanding debt at the airport. As Mr. Romo stated, we have over $110 million of debt to fund the new parking garage, the terminal concourse and the related infrastructure and airfield improvements that I feel are a priority. Our airport is functioning well today. I love it. We love it. I hear that over and over again. We are winning national awards. And the city should not proceed with a new project while we have so many other important airport priorities. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And we're going to go to and right before we go to public comment, we're going to go to Mr. City Attorney, just to clarify what receiving file means for the record, and then we're going to open it up for public comment.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mayor. Members of the Council.
Speaker 6: For the Audience. The motion to receive and file will direct the city manager and the airport staff to take no further action with respect to the establishment or construction of the Federal Inspection Services at the Long Beach Airport.
Speaker 9: If that's correct, Councilmember Mongo.
Speaker 0: Yes.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. So at this time, we have public comment. There is a motion on the floor. If you have a public comment, please come forward and make sure you state your name for the record. Thank you.
Speaker 9: Very good. You click as the address. I fully support the measure that has been put forward. I think it makes eminent sense to me. The biggest red flag that was raised was relative to the statement from staff from the report was provided to staff. Is that the a the FAA would not change its position. As you know, we have an a new administration in Washington. And I think in the long run, that administration will prove to be a tremendous asset to this city. And indeed they have already funded and increased funding to the U.S. Department of Justice to fund to increase the funding to go after corruption within the city. Not only this city, but the entire state of California to address the epidemic of corruption that was engendered per the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal by the former attorney general of the state. No, I do not. But I think in the long run, it will be a good, good for the city. The current president is, in fact, a businessperson. And so I think it's uncertain as to what he would do. So hence I think we should support this motion here. And look at it maybe ten years from now when we have a very firm understanding of what the issues are. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor Garcia. City Council people. My name is Dan Lipton and I'm an excuse me. My wife and I are homeowners in Bixby Knolls, and we lived in a take off pattern for ten years. I don't believe my comments to you now will be terribly popular with most of my neighbors. I don't find the existing traffic as a detriment to my way of life. Our way of life in Bixby Knolls and I office from my home. Even as an occasional inconvenience when we're entertaining out back. I believe that comes with the territory when you choose to live in 90807 and beyond. I don't think as a resident I could tell the difference between a domestic flight and an international flight. Hearing from its sound or its flight pattern. And with no net change to the noise ordinance and the number of flights per day, I can't find objection to the measure. Creating a gateway to Mexico and beyond can only add a positive economic benefit to Long Beach, not unlike pre and post cruises have done already for our local hotels, restaurant tours and retailers. I love our airport. It's one of the best in the world. So selfishly, why would I ever want to make that horrendous trip back and forth to LAX when we have a first class airport in literally our own backyard? Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, mayor and council staff. My name is Sam Patel. I don't live directly in.
Speaker 5: The district, but we watched the planes go over and I like watching the old planes go over in the military planes, too.
Speaker 4: I really enjoy using this airport when I get the opportunities. And even before.
Speaker 5: This issue came up, I always thought, why is it we can't get international flights out of here now that opportunities there, even though granted it would be limited, but it's still something. And I find that one of the things that I'm concerned with is that I understand this affects the council districts that attend, but it also affects everybody in Long Beach. It's not just about a couple of council districts, just like all our council districts sometimes have to take on things we don't want to, but we know it's for the betterment of the city. So we all have to share in what makes this city better, not just for ourselves, but for the rest of us as well. I've looked at what they're presenting for this study and stuff, and I see where there's really not going to be any major increase in this. Like they said, with the flights out of it, the noise pattern that's going to be protected.
Speaker 4: The plane, the noise that comes down from it really isn't going to make a difference whether it's international or regional or if it's local, it's still going to be the same noise. And I understand some of the concerns, and I do know that the airport.
Speaker 5: Is there, but it's been there and it's still there. And if they increase these 50 flights just to domestic flights, it would still be the same amount of flights, the same amount of impact. The difference being that we would have international. Now.
Speaker 4: One of the things that.
Speaker 5: We would provide is a.
Speaker 4: Stimulus for we are expanding the cruise area. And one of the things.
Speaker 5: That it does do is allow for people to access.
Speaker 4: Long Beach directly from other parts of the world. And in Canada, especially, the snowbirds come down here to take the cruises. That's one comment I've heard from a lot of friends of mine. So basically I'd like.
Speaker 5: To support this for all the residents of Long Beach, and I understand.
Speaker 4: There's concerns.
Speaker 5: On both sides. But I myself, I travel a lot domestically and internationally, and I really do enjoy using the Long Beach airports, one of the easiest ones for us to use. So if it can all be done and made a win win situation.
Speaker 4: Which most things can be done.
Speaker 5: If we can do that and provide the international service, that would be great.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Please. Denny Kagasoff Kagasoff, resident of Long Beach homeowner. Shame on me for not having gotten involved earlier, but I'm here to say I do not support the expansion of our airport, which I think is perfect the way that it is. I think anyone that is a resident here obviously has concerns about noise and pollution. I'm raising my family here and we just do not support any expansion. And as far as the study that was done and saying that there's not going to be a negative impact on the residents, I think that in and of itself should invalidate the study. And then as far as an exemption for whether or a mechanical failure, that's absurd. So. Is there anything else I can say? I apologize to the people that are here to support. The expansion. I know you all have reasons to want it. And you have economic interests and. Breaks my heart that we're in conflict here. But as a resident of Long Beach, we have a great city. I do not want any expansion to an international airport. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: My name is Robert Ward. I live at 1166 Clayburn Drive since 1964. Before that, I grew up in Bixby Knolls, a 3848 Linden. Our families had a store in this town for 75 years. My dad started in 1941. I taught it poorly for a while, but then I decided I would go to work with my brothers at Ward's Furniture, which was basically on PCH and Pacific for all those years. And now my son owns it, who is in North Long Beach.
Speaker 9: Off of Victoria. We volunteered for many things.
Speaker 3: In this city to try to make.
Speaker 9: It better. From Boy Scouts to my son being the chairman of.
Speaker 3: Goodwill twice and still was on the board.
Speaker 9: There. My brother and I have served as I personally served as president of the LDS Church. I had about 5000 people.
Speaker 3: In this town. My brother, who served at Long Beach Eastlake, had about the same number when we were called to serve as volunteers. I volunteered at Poly High School to coach a water.
Speaker 9: Polo team a couple of years, which was fun. These left his older brother and I. Ran track together at Poly High School.
Speaker 3: We bought the house in 64. My wife and I, just as you were about to give birth to our first son with a little two bedroom house. And as our family grew to six children, we eventually I wanted to move. To be honest, my wife said, no, I love the schools. Our kids are going to the same schools. I went to Longfellow Hughes Poly, and our kids got a great education. It was wonderful when they went off to college because of that PACE program at Poly. I have two doctors, his sons, and they studied hard.
Speaker 9: I'm grateful.
Speaker 3: In 1991, Mayor Ernie Kell gave me a key to this city that still hangs on my wall because of the work we had done remodeling that church that I was in charge of it 37 to name her 37th and Long Beach Boulevard.
Speaker 9: I'm here today to say that planes we've seen at all.
Speaker 3: What's happened to the airport first 20 years. I wouldn't fly out of there. Now I am. It is a beautiful little airport. It goes right over my house. Yesterday, for the first time in a good while in the rain, the planes were landing over my house. I don't know how those people in the East End do this. Yeah. My wife was scared the first time and a long time because the house shook. That plane was so low to be able, I guess, to get to the airport. I'll conclude with this. For many years, I've watched our council make Long Beach a great place to visit, and I don't have a problem with that. I hope it's time that you will think, let's make Long Beach a great place to live.
Speaker 9: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Good evening, Councilman. Mayor. First of all, I wanted to thank Ms.. Price for her comments. I agree with most of them, but because of this new development, I think I'll leave those comments for another time. One of the things that I was concerned about during some of the meetings that took place, it was implied that JetBlue might sue if and I say implied that they might sue if we didn't go forward. And I say, if that's the attitude that they want to take, then we should just boycott them. I mean, this is not this is not being friends. This is not this is not being a good neighbor. And they had a huge amount of violations in their violating the noise ordinance. You know, if they if they want to have something good, they need to be a good neighbor first. Then people might think about a different consideration. But when someone has to be frightened in their own home because of the noise, I don't think that's being a good neighbor. I also would like to mention something that has not seemed to have been mentioned, but have you ever heard, has anyone in this room ever heard of a terrorist attack on a municipal airport? I don't think so. Okay. So we're talking about international. And even if it's only a few flights, it makes it international and it makes it a target. And we are already stretched with police. Are we going to add another security consideration here? I don't think we need to do that. So what I want to do is and I do want to thank Ms.. Mango for her change of heart here. I do appreciate that. And I also want to thank Long Beach Neighborhoods first for their huge effort. Thank this group and the many people who have attended the meetings, who have passed out fliers who have worked to arrive at this place. They're a good group of people. They really care about the neighborhood and I think they should be thanked also. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Hi, my name is Carmen Lopez.
Speaker 0: I live in Bay one six. One is.
Speaker 8: Lila Street. And I just want to thank you, everybody. I really happy because I was one of the ones passing those fliers. And they just like you and Mr. Mango. I support you. You came to my house for my board when you wanted to be a city council, and I really wanted you to support us.
Speaker 0: So my house is my life.
Speaker 8: And I really appreciate this. And I just want to say thank you to everybody. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: My name's Fred Asch. I live on Rose Avenue and California Heights. First of all, I want to thank Councilwoman Pryce and Councilwoman Mongo for joining our Councilman Supernova, Durango and Austin and supporting them on voting no against expansion for the.
Speaker 4: Office facility in Long Beach.
Speaker 5: I just want to make three points. I just want to make sure.
Speaker 4: That we know with a new administration, a simple executive order can turn things around pretty quickly in Washington. So any assurances from the.
Speaker 5: Previous administration and the FAA may not hold any water. And so I'd like to make sure that once.
Speaker 4: When Secretary Chao is approved and.
Speaker 5: The new FAA directors.
Speaker 4: Installed, that we may.
Speaker 5: Take another.
Speaker 4: Another request for their opinion on any changes. Most of all, I just want to point.
Speaker 5: Out that the most important thing for us in districts four, seven and eight is our quality of life. And that can be exchanged for any any sum of money. And we're not prepared to let it get away that easily. I just want to make sure that also the airport in their construction of fees, landing fees, penalties, make sure that it's commensurate with L.A.X., because.
Speaker 4: I don't think we want to inadvertently offer financial incentives.
Speaker 5: For other airlines to want to operate out of Long Beach for international flights. I think right now there's a lot of violations on curfew because it ends up being cheaper to pay the fee for the fine than it is to pay cancelation fees or hotel bills.
Speaker 4: Or to.
Speaker 5: Reposition aircraft. So I want to make sure that whatever.
Speaker 4: Fines and fees.
Speaker 5: We have offset the the the lower cost.
Speaker 4: Of violating the curfews.
Speaker 5: As well as the PSC. I want to make sure that international flight.
Speaker 4: Packs are equivalent.
Speaker 5: To those charged at LAX.
Speaker 4: Or Santa Ana. So there's no financial incentive.
Speaker 5: In that way. We know the airlines, obviously.
Speaker 4: If I'm a stockholder.
Speaker 5: In JetBlue, their number one incentive is profit, not necessarily quality of life of the community that they operate in, and that rightly so. They have a they have a.
Speaker 4: Responsibility to their shareholders. So we must understand.
Speaker 5: That as a fact. But most of all, I want to thank those other councilmen who support our three council members in support of not allowing the FAA facility in Long Beach Airport. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor. Members of city council. I'm Randy Gordon, president and CEO of the Long Beach Area Chamber of Commerce. On behalf of the Chamber leadership and the many businesses that we represent, we support this agenda item tonight and move forward in the process of obtaining a customs facility at our airport. The Chamber further supports this customs facility at the airport due to the multiple economic benefits for Long Beach in the region. Many have been outlined in the feasibility study, as you know, and presented by staff as back as far as December.
Speaker 4: Construction of a customs facility.
Speaker 1: Would create approximately 250 jobs and generate a financial one time regional output of 38 million. Sustained employment by the airport, air carriers, government and businesses supporting the operation of international flights and the custom facility would create approximately 350 jobs. Jobs in $36 million of annual regional output. International travelers spending estimated, would create another 179 jobs and $31 million in annual local output. These are other factors. These and other factors is why the Chamber weighed in to support such that such a facility as this. These benefits are not only part of our equation, but also helps us with our economic benefit for this facility. We are encouraged by other benefits, as well as noncommercial aviation businesses that find their airport convenient. Again, with the constraints of the noise ordinance, all within the constraints of the noise ordinance, they are Gulfstream, Mercedes Benz, Virgin Galactic and Ross Aviation and many others that Long Beach call home. And undoubtedly, they employ many Long Beach residents because of such companies. Long Beach is seen as a regional economic driver. The Long Beach Airport needs to have its full potential realized and is not. Not allowing a custom facility will not allow us to reach that full facility and this international city become an international airport as well. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: John Slattery eighth district addresses on file thank you to Austin, Turanga and Supernormal for the work you guys have done on this. Councilman Mongo, I know you've taken a lot from a lot of different people. I've been to a lot of your meetings and you've taken a lot. So I know this has not been an easy decision for you, and I'm just kind of happy you guys have come here. I've said a lot in the past. This is to two key things. Always economic doesn't make economic sense. And the noise ordinance, because I still feel that it's going to put it at risk. If you listen to Mr. Gordon there. A lot of the stuff he's talking about we can do with the domestic flights.
Speaker 4: There's no reason that it would need to be international.
Speaker 1: We can fully utilize it. We got in Mercedes Benz, who had a mercedes Benz who he just mentioned, Virgin Atlantic. Them knowing that this is a domestic airport.
Speaker 4: One gentleman said he moved in.
Speaker 1: Lives on the flight path. No problem with it. I've lived under it since when we had 18 flights and that was the limit. There was no noise bucket. There was no going higher. And if you look historically again and again, we give a little bit and the residents are the ones who end up suffering. So, again.
Speaker 4: Please, no on the FISA.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next week, please.
Speaker 8: Good evening, Mr. Mayor and City Council. I'm Dan Cannon. I live in the fifth district. My husband, I are homeowners. I'd like to thank Councilwoman Mungo for her change of heart this evening. Her decision and the concern that I had had mainly was that the cost to US residents is something that people weren't really talking about, is the health issues from emissions from the jets. I could point you to a very scary article in Wired magazine in 2011 called Sunlight May Turn Jet Exhaust Into Toxic Particles May. However, there's also a 2010 National Geographic article. This claims that 10,000 people per year die as an end result of inhaling jet fumes, which is more than dying. All the aircraft is during that year. That was one of my main concerns about this one. I am very thankful to the Councilwoman for having changed her vote on this one. I suggest that we all support you as much as we possibly can. I would have to agree with you that we have a wonderful little airport here in Long Beach. And incidentally, anybody that's concerned about international flights 19 miles away from Eldorado Park, John Wayne, we can fly out of there. We can support. Thank you. We can support however we possibly can if this vote should happen to go through and be passed that we do not do this. I'm going to be in touch with Councilwoman Workers office tomorrow to find out how we can support you in supporting our airport. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: My name is Willie Quinonez, and I'm a resident of Bixby North, but I'm here in support of our Long Beach residents, not just the residents in my community. When I first heard about this project, the first question that came to my mind is, Are you crazy?
Speaker 1: I believe that if this measure was put before the voters of Long Beach instead of just the city council, this measure would fail. I believe that opening up this international flight is just like opening a Pandora's box. It was just the beginning. And if the other airlines see the concessions that JetBlue is getting, they would be wanting some to. Long Beach does not need any more traffic, pollution, noise and wear and tear on our already overburdened streets. In conclusion, I would say that the creation of a few more jobs does not trump the people's tranquility and thousands of Long Beach residents. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please. Evening. My name is Dave Walker and I live in the eighth.
Speaker 9: District in lost readers in. I'm here too. And also been.
Speaker 2: Active in the nonprofit community for 25 years. And I want to say that there's been.
Speaker 4: Absolutely JetBlue coming. This town has been absolutely fantastic for us in our nonprofits and great support. And I don't think that they'd be turning around and suing the city for any decision.
Speaker 5: But I'll let that happen.
Speaker 4: It may.
Speaker 2: I'm I'm here to say that I'm in support of this.
Speaker 4: And one of my main reasons is it is a fiscal responsibility.
Speaker 9: What I've heard here is that we are looking.
Speaker 4: At a $10 million project and we have a corporate citizen, absolutely phenomenal, willing to pay 70, 75%.
Speaker 2: For this project. And that adds to the balance sheet for the city.
Speaker 4: It helps me as a taxpayer as well. When I bought my home.
Speaker 5: I knew I was.
Speaker 2: In the flight.
Speaker 4: Path.
Speaker 9: And I knew what was taking place when I came.
Speaker 2: Here. I don't know if there's been any discussion to say if.
Speaker 4: It's a fiscal fiscal.
Speaker 2: Matter that you.
Speaker 9: Are here.
Speaker 4: Tonight, maybe there's room for discussion to see if JetBlue would be willing to help the city out.
Speaker 2: Even more and make this.
Speaker 9: Potentially become a win win for this city. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Good evening, Mayor Garcia and council members, thank you very much for your vote today on this item. Councilwoman Pryce, you did an excellent job of thanking everyone here. Councilwoman Super and all. Councilwoman Mongo, Councilman Robert U ringa and L Austin, my councilperson person. I live under the flight path and I don't usually speak in front of groups, but I had to stand today to thank you and to also present an apology to Councilwoman Mongo. Several days ago, I sent her an email in which I accused her of predisposing this issue. And at the end of that email I said, if I'm wrong, I will apologize and I do apologize. Thank you again.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hello. I'm Shannon and CarMax is Ad Lo and I live in the fifth district. I love Long Beach. I love it here so much. And I love the airport. I make all my friends family come out of Long Beach. I won't pick them up in L.A.X.. I don't go get a cab, call Uber. I'm not kidding you. So everybody I know comes into Long Beach Airport. I support it wholeheartedly. I relate to Councilwoman Mango last night, my reservations about the office. I won't go into that again, but I will say thank you from the bottom of my heart. This is so important to so many people. So you have a new cheerleader tonight. I got your back, girl. With that. I just want to say it'll JetBlue. I love you guys. I hope you stay I hope you don't leave and I hope you.
Speaker 8: Don't sue.
Speaker 0: Us. So please stay.
Speaker 8: Here.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 4: Next speaker, please. Hello. I'm Sarah Jones. I live in North Long Beach off Atlantic. I'm here to.
Speaker 1: Support local hire and unions. I mean, this project would generate 250 jobs over the course of about 2 to 3 years to build the build the expansion.
Speaker 4: And that's all local hire. That's all construction jobs. That's all union jobs. Before I was in the union trade, I worked as an air traffic controller up in Monterey, California. We had these same noise ordinance problems and it always came back to this airport has been here for so long.
Speaker 1: That if you move into the flight path, it's your choice to move into that area with that flight path, with that noise, and therefore you sacrifice your right to.
Speaker 4: Complain about it. When you move into an area.
Speaker 1: You accept that all the different conditions of that move.
Speaker 4: In at the time of purchase. You willingly moved in knowing that the airport, the flight path is there, that the noise is there. And personally, I don't see it as an issue. You know.
Speaker 1: Whether it's international travel, it's local travel. The runways is as big as it is.
Speaker 4: It can handle most size of aircrafts that are in the system right now. As far as the noise difference, the newer, bigger jets are actually using more efficient, cleaner and quieter engines. And the only way we get those newer, better planes is by offering longer jumps and international travel. So if you're worried about the.
Speaker 1: Fumes to the aircraft. The local hops are actually an older aircraft, older engines. They pollute more.
Speaker 4: So this idea of bringing in this international travel with the better planes, the newer planes, the newer engines will actually reduce the emissions in Long Beach. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: My name's Roy. I hate to care.
Speaker 4: I'm a 47 year resident of the city.
Speaker 5: I first moved here in 1969. I've been a registered voter in this city since 1985. Generations of my family call this city home. My mother's buried here. Okay, now I'm in my 34th year in aviation inspired by that airport. My mom retired from Boeing. Okay.
Speaker 4: I know you have history there, too. With that said, the purpose of an airport. Is to drive commerce. You have a port in an airport.
Speaker 5: To the main things every city want to drive commerce, jobs and tax revenue. Okay.
Speaker 4: Pushing a port and not the airport.
Speaker 5: Is like developing one arm and tiny government behind your back. Approximately 20% of this city lives below the poverty line.
Speaker 4: Last year we spent, what, $59 million keep a6400 families in their homes, the renters assistance. Okay.
Speaker 5: We can't get $3 million to. That's the airport's going to pay for. Itself.
Speaker 4: To push commerce.
Speaker 5: Companies like Mercedes Benz, who would definitely replace a Boeing and others like it could replace a Boeing. Boeing is not coming back. You need more Mercedes Benz, companies like that. You solidify their desire to stay here when you make it convenient for them to flatter executives there without having to make a.
Speaker 4: Second stop somewhere to clear customers before they get here. You want to you want to.
Speaker 5: Inspire.
Speaker 4: Business to come here. And you can't do that if you don't inspire.
Speaker 5: I was inspired.
Speaker 4: To get into aviation because of that airport job down Lakewood Boulevard in 1978. I was 13 years old with my mom. She was pointing out airplanes that she had worked on that week at Boeing. I looked across the street.
Speaker 5: Saw at Douglas at the time.
Speaker 4: I saw a small plane taking off too far right. And I said.
Speaker 5: One day I'd like to work right there.
Speaker 4: That was 1978. I didn't see JetBlue coming.
Speaker 5: Now make over $200,000 a year. Employed by JetBlue. I live in this city. I live in a sixth district.
Speaker 4: Your district, Mr. Andrews. My children. Thank you for the college promise. But they don't get. Any other.
Speaker 5: Assistance I pay out of.
Speaker 4: Pocket. We can either spend a lot of money in poverty programs or we can help put those people to work. And save some.
Speaker 5: Of that hard earned.
Speaker 4: Taxpayer money to pay for more police officers, firefighters, water treatment plants, power grids. Or we can just keep.
Speaker 5: Doing the same and not.
Speaker 4: Invest in the city, invest in the citizens. Okay, look, I understand about the noise ordinance. The noise ordinance protects.
Speaker 5: The rights of the vocal minority. Don't let them demagog over the needs of the majority as a half million people.
Speaker 4: In the city. All rights are protected. Their rights. Thank you so much. Hello. My name is Peter Perez. Before I speak to the airport issue, I do want to bring to the council's attention that I read in the I think it was a Long Beach Post, an article where Long Beach was identified as one of only seven cities west of the Mississippi River. That has, if you take their assets and liabilities, assets out weighing the liabilities, we're not bankrupt. That has a lot to do. And your article pointed out that has a lot to do with you guys the way the city is run. The city has opened books they made. They commented on the openness and the honesty of the books the city keeps. And I think we need to give you all credit. I really emailed the mayor a little while ago about that and center and then. Councilman super off, but I wanted to thank you all and past members and past mayors for taking care of our hard earned money. And it's a big responsibility and guys do a great job. So thank you very much. As to the airport issue. The vote hasn't been taken, as I understand. So I do really urge you all to vote against it. You know, we speak a lot about JetBlue, about businesses creating jobs. Well, we're I'm a homeowner here in Long Beach. I have spent I have put a large part of my net worth into the house I own. I have invested in one beach. I moved here about three years ago. It has a large investment to come here. Okay. Besides investing in Long Beach by purchasing a home, we pay property taxes, we eat here, we shop here. We pay sales taxes. We create a lot of revenue as homeowners. All of the homeowners in this in this building pay a large amounts of money to the city. We also create quite a few jobs. We have people to maintain our house. A lot of houses in Long Beach have been expanded. We have craftsmen coming in, fixing, fixing things, expanding homes, tile, you know, building on rooms, taking care of gardens. We create a lot of jobs and homeowners here create a lot of jobs, a lot of commerce in this city. It's not just one company or a group of companies that does that. So I want to thank you for the proposals put before the council. I want to thank you for. Entertaining a vote to not create the Customs facility. And I also like to point out one other option item, which is we're relying on his feasibility study quite a bit. And just tonight, out of the blue, we hear that this facilities feasibility study, which is supposed to be so elaborate and so perfect, overestimated the cost of the the customs facility by 200% and the size of the for customs facility. So what else has missed or misrepresented? Not misrepresented, but is not correct in the study that we will pay for later. So again, I thank you. I thank you for your no vote on the facility and for your stewardship of our funds. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And thank you for your email. Appreciate that as well. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Hi. My name is Chris Osborne. I'm live in the fifth District 5401 Canton. I'm a homeowner and I am against the office facility. There are plenty of reasons to vote no. We've talked about decreasing property values, challenge to the noise ordinance, financial risk to the city. But I want to talk about our health. I work as a physician assistant and I see lung disease such as asthma, COPD and cancer frequently. There's no question that environmental pollutants like those found in airplane exhaust worsen and in many cases cause these lung conditions. I have three epidemiological studies that shed light on this problem. One study in particular was done by the Massachusetts Department of Health and it showed there is a statistically significant increase in COPD for those living within the vicinity, which was defined as five miles of the of the original airport. The study also showed that children within this five mile radius were 3 to 4 times more likely to have respiratory disease. Now, five miles, this airport was was bigger than Long Beach, but five miles includes pretty much all one beach. Every district is within five miles of the airport and everyone is affected. If the FAA facility is approved, the number of flights will inevitably increase much faster than they would without the FAA facility. Already without international travel. We have seen several days this year already with 100% flight slot utilization. That's unprecedented according to the FAA. The noise ordinance is open for challenge if any party feels it places unreasonable burden on them, as would be felt by, say, Southwest or Alaska if they wanted more flights to fly, more slots to fly domestic or international. And if I ask, facility would be opening the door for more air traffic and it would subject us more to more exhaust and more pollution. Our overall health is not supported by by an FAA facility, and FISA facility just supports the corporations and it neglects the health and safety of the residents.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. My name is Anthony Brown. I live at 3870 Gundry Avenue in Bixby Terrace in Councilmember Yolanda's district. I live there with my wife and my three children. We've been there for 12 years and we're homeowners. I just want to go on record as being another Long Beach citizen who's against the international airport. And I want to encourage you all to vote for the motion tonight. I probably can't speak as well as my other eloquent neighbors have in favor of the motion. But I do want to thank every one of the council members for going forward with a study arming all of the citizens of Long Beach with the facts that are necessary to make an intelligent, informed decision about this issue. Thank you all for doing that, and thank you all for your consideration.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: And my name is Franz Neumann. I'm in the seventh district as well, under the flight path. I came here, was going to have a lot of angry words because we've lived there for about 13 years. We've had to deal with lots and lots of late flights. The idea of the noise ordinance is great and we'd fully support it, but it feels like it's broken very, very often. And that is something that affects us because we also work from home. We're also raising two kids at home and having them constantly wake up or having us wake up. You feel a little bit like you're still raising an infant. You're just not getting enough sleep. But I'm very happy to hear that the vote seems to be going the way we want it to go. And the one thing I haven't heard is just the fear that I have that this would lead to litigation and possibly, you know, the loss of the noise ordinance and the very idea that we could have possibly have 24 hour flights just kind of scares me to my core. So that's kind of the fears that we have as homeowners, as business people who work from home and as parents.
Speaker 6: So we're very happy.
Speaker 4: That the actions have been taken today by Mongo.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the City Council, Craig Koch of the downtown Long Beach Alliance, a DVA, is on record. It has submitted a letter supporting staff's recommendation this evening based on the economic impact as well as job creation for this project. And while we respect the maker's motion as well as a second motion, we feel as though that this project is beneficial not only to the city overall, but also to the economic vitality of our downtown. Thank you very much for your consideration.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hi. Linda Sopko, fifth District.
Speaker 11: My address is on file. I'm quite heartened tonight. It's really nice to come and see.
Speaker 0: That.
Speaker 11: It's, you know, a city council meeting about something so.
Speaker 0: Important and not having, you know, everybody being upset and throwing.
Speaker 11: Things and rancor and bad names and bad words and everything else. I had a lot of things to say, man. I was writing stuff out all day today. And I you know.
Speaker 0: Quite honestly, I was amazed after we went through this about.
Speaker 11: Expanding the airport.
Speaker 0: Just a few short years ago that we were jumping right back into bed with another huge project that was going to be controversial about the airport. Can we take a break from it for a while, guys? It would really be nice. I love the idea about the long term.
Speaker 11: Plan because to me that made sense.
Speaker 0: It was like.
Speaker 11: Okay, let's look at doing everything we can to keep that airport vital.
Speaker 0: Which we are. It's gorgeous. I flew out of there a couple of weeks ago. I flew JetBlue. I love JetBlue.
Speaker 11: I got to tell you, you know what's nice about JetBlue? I got to tell you, guys are airline stewardesses are great. They were cracking jokes. They made it fun. And it was a short flight.
Speaker 0: I was a little disturbed because my daughter flew up there a couple of weeks ago, went to San Francisco, and I had to go pick her.
Speaker 11: Up and she sent me her information. And when it said what terminal she was coming in.
Speaker 0: For JetBlue, it said the Long Beach International Terminal.
Speaker 11: And I got to tell you, every hair on the back of my neck went up and I went, oh, well, is that a mistake.
Speaker 0: Somewhere or is there a.
Speaker 11: Done deal? My question, you know.
Speaker 0: To all of you, first of all, to thank you for all the people who don't live directly under the flight path.
Speaker 11: For being here as well and caring.
Speaker 0: About those of us that have or do.
Speaker 11: And and in response to the someone about you move where the airport is a lot of people in this you know room moved in there when it was 18 flights. Okay. And it was never meant to be a big, huge airport. But anyway, going back to that, I would really think I think this took so much longer than it needed to. I think we knew a lot of this stuff up front and I know you needed to do studies and everything else. Is there a way that next time something of this immense meaning to so many.
Speaker 0: That we could work to create.
Speaker 11: A better community connection? Because, you know, when you got staff telling you you can't speak and when you've got, you know, your friends that are on the council can't talk to you.
Speaker 0: And quite honestly.
Speaker 11: You know, many of you are my friends and I have.
Speaker 0: Had personal experiences with a.
Speaker 11: Lot of you and enjoyed fine dining and have mutual friends.
Speaker 0: And it's really kind.
Speaker 11: Of a sad thing that it becomes the city against her.
Speaker 0: People who elected all of you guys. I mean, you guys were elected by we the people. You weren't elected by the staff, you weren't elected by JetBlue, you were elected by the people in this room.
Speaker 11: And, you know, Stacy is my representative.
Speaker 0: But quite honestly, so.
Speaker 11: Is Darrell and so is Susie and so is Janine and so is Lina and so is Dr. Garcia and Dee and Robert and Al.
Speaker 0: And Rex. You guys represent all of us. So just because, you know, your district.
Speaker 11: You know, voted you in, you know.
Speaker 0: What you guys do affects everybody.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir.
Speaker 11: All right. My time is up, but thank you again.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Good evening.
Speaker 4: Council members and Mayor Garcia. My name is James Stoke. I'm a residents.
Speaker 9: Of Long Beach. My home is in Long Beach. I have rental.
Speaker 5: Properties in Long Beach and our our family has properties all around this community. We have friends that live all around Long Beach going all the way down to Newport Beach.
Speaker 9: But you're going to decide tonight impacts everyone.
Speaker 4: It impacts the residents.
Speaker 9: It impacts JetBlue and it will impact our businesses. I was going.
Speaker 5: To have a different presentation.
Speaker 4: Tonight. Things kind.
Speaker 5: Of changed.
Speaker 9: I commend Stacie Mango on her decision. In motion to recede going forward as well. Suzy Pryce.
Speaker 4: Your second of the motion.
Speaker 9: For all of those that are going to vote to oppose.
Speaker 5: This idea.
Speaker 9: I'm going forward and that's the way you vote. I think it's going to be a very wise decision, not only for JetBlue ultimately.
Speaker 4: But for all of the residents.
Speaker 5: The residents around.
Speaker 9: This city of.
Speaker 4: Long Beach and their residents and business owners throughout Long Beach. There's a lot of reasons not to go forward on this.
Speaker 5: I just want to make one comment.
Speaker 4: That I haven't heard tonight.
Speaker 9: And I was going to suggest that a moratorium be proposed until we find the result. What the next couple phases of next.
Speaker 5: Gen are going to do to the city of Long Beach. The phases haven't even been fully implemented.
Speaker 9: And we already know and see new flights.
Speaker 4: Going over our airspace. What's particularly troubling.
Speaker 5: Is the fact that LAX.
Speaker 9: Is now using their Long Beach.
Speaker 4: Air. Air.
Speaker 9: Runway, the Long Beach runway.
Speaker 5: And that's.
Speaker 4: Causing an awful lot of extra traffic.
Speaker 9: That we've never had before. So, again, thank you for your wise decision tonight. If you're voting to oppose it.
Speaker 4: And I do like JetBlue, I've flown it many times.
Speaker 5: Matter of fact, you almost kicked me off.
Speaker 9: Of a flight. I just had a few too.
Speaker 5: Many before I got on the plane.
Speaker 9: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Mr. Mayor. Council and staff. My name is Roland Scott, and I'm here today as a concerned citizen in favor of the firehouse facility. I'm presently serving on the Airport Advisory Commission and have been serving for approximately six years. I'm also a 45 year resident of Long Beach. My comments tonight are as a private citizen and do not necessarily represent those of the commission. I realize that the citizens most affected by the airport have a legitimate concerns regarding noise and frequency of flights and other issues regarding the airport in its operations. The problem we're having is a constant fear mongering, half truths and innuendo perpetuated by those who do not support the airport. The primary fear out put out there is that they will allow the FISA facility, that our noise ordinance will likely be challenged in court. Really, this is pure speculation. And really, I personally would like to have the ordinance challenged in court because I believe it would withstand a court challenge due to its scope, maturity, workability and success. Then we could put a stop to this issue and put it to bed once and for all. There's a flier out touting the assertion that there is no significant economic benefit from the up air facility to our airport in our city. For the past year, our revenues at the airport have been declining and we've cut to our reserves. At the Commission, we're tasked with the responsibility of making sure that the airport is economically viable and that we have varied sources of revenue to support the airport. This is one of those sources. There are those who contend that there will not be many jobs provided at our place, and that is taken in comparison with all the jobs in Long Beach. This might be true, except if one of these jobs is yours. And one or one of your family members. By the way, those assertions are just guesses on the part of those that oppose the pass and are in direct conflict with the Jacobs study. There are four regional airports that serve international travelers, but they don't serve Long Beach. And it's unique situation that allows our citizens to have a pleasant, expedited travel experience. And the majority of the people I have talked with at length support our customs facility. And I would venture to say categorically that the majority of Long Beach citizens support the facility at Long Beach. There are those who have raised issues pertaining to the next gen next generation. The FAA has sponsored redoing it our airspace and how it will be utilized in future for the Los Angeles area area. As a former airline captain, I can tell you that there are concerns as to how the airspace is utilized, but it has nothing to do with the FISA facility, although there are persons trying to connect the two together and obfuscate the issue. As an example, what is the noise, impact and pollution of jetliners passing overhead Long Beach at 10,000 or 13,000 feet? The noise sensors in Long Beach can't even measure that because it's so slight and the noise equals the sound of your fan motor on your heater at home or the noise your hybrid makes when the engine comes on. Finally, I would like to add that we elected all of you to make decisions, some of them tough ones, some of them possibly not popular. This isn't really that tough. Approving the up ass facility is the right thing. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. Respected mayor, respected council members. My name is Imran Ahmed. I'm the corporate resident of Airport Plaza Drive. I manage a hotel over there by the name of Marriott and I do support.
Speaker 3: The international terminal at.
Speaker 9: The airport.
Speaker 4: We believe that it will bring substantial economic progress into our city. If not anything else, we need to understand there are two additional hotels coming up in the area, which is approximately 250 rooms which.
Speaker 9: Need to be accommodated, which need to be supported.
Speaker 4: Airport is one of the the venues that we we expect business coming out of. I understand the noise ordinance, which is not going to be touched as far as the the the flights are concerned. Therefore, I.
Speaker 9: Do support it.
Speaker 4: Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor Garcia. Council and city managers and staff. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name is Mark Helmick. I'm a property owner in the seventh District. My wife and I reside at 3952 Rose Avenue. We are directly under the flight path as planes leave the airport. I want to personally thank Councilman Turanga for making it his priority to continue to protect the quality of life for the neighborhood and to preserve the noise ordinance. That's a quote from the January 20 press-gazette. As I said, my home is directly underneath the outbound flight path. I, too, would invite anyone in the room to have coffee or a barbecue at my patio. It's not a slight intrusion. And in fact. Gatherings frequently are put on pause. The conversations have to stop because the noise.
Speaker 9: Is an issue for us.
Speaker 4: That said, it's hard to believe our neighborhood was chosen by me and my wife because it is a step up neighborhood. I moved from Lakewood. It was a nice neighborhood and remains a nice neighborhood. I'd like to maintain the mix of retirees being replaced by young owners and families who are dedicated to renovating the property and improving the value and therefore being reassessed for tax purposes. We contribute all the way around even if we don't work here. As I said, our neighborhood is is nice. It's desirable. It's step up. It's not elite. But it's not ramshackle, cramped it operations, you might imagine, exist under a flight path. I'm not a tree hugging anti-capitalist. I'm very late to the house party. I believe the intrusion of an FCC will threaten the progression that is going on with home improvement in our neighborhood. I believe the increased noise. Will threaten the desirability of the neighborhood. In the blogs and editorials. And here tonight, I and others like me are vilified by supporters of the FCC for choosing such a neighborhood in which to live. We should have known somehow the airport would only get bigger, conditions would only get worse. How could we not have predicted such an argument? Actually makes my point that conditions are slowly eroding unless we stop pause like I did with the TV, pause like we do with the conversations and think before we act. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Honorable Mayor Garcia and members of the City Council. I want to thank Council members Austin, Turanga, Supernormal and Mongo and praised for your diligent study of the issue.
Speaker 11: And your.
Speaker 0: Your position. I sincerely hope that the rest of the members of council vote this down. We've heard all.
Speaker 11: The reasons I can't think of any that are.
Speaker 0: More eloquent or compelling to say than what others have stepped up here to say before me. But we've heard about the noise violations. They keep going up. Late night arrivals threaten to get worse with international traffic. And JetBlue, of course, builds the fines into their operating costs. I think the environmental impacts that we've.
Speaker 11: Heard about from.
Speaker 0: People are as real a concern as noise and the the environmental impact report upon which the Jacobs report was built. Supporting the FTA FISA construction is over a decade old. It just.
Speaker 11: Doesn't make good business sense.
Speaker 0: To have all our eggs in the basket of one carrier. And again, we've heard that other carriers could cry unfair.
Speaker 11: Competitive advantage and truly challenge the noise ordinance. And when.
Speaker 0: And if the noise ordinance is eliminated, we could see multiple phases of expansion and increased flights as other carriers.
Speaker 11: Demand and.
Speaker 0: Receive slots. We only get 70 local non construction jobs out of the expansion and our property values could decrease in the neighborhoods we enjoy so much and Long Beach would become much less pleasant places to live. So I think that given the market.
Speaker 11: Demand that.
Speaker 0: The collapse of the noise.
Speaker 11: Ordinance is not a.
Speaker 0: Fantasy, it could be a true threat.
Speaker 11: And we we.
Speaker 0: Really greatly appreciate you studying this issue, and.
Speaker 11: We hope that you all vote it down this evening. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 8: Hi. My name is Laura Lewis and I have lived in the eighth District for 20 years and I am against the international flights at Long Beach Airport because if we keep the noise ordinance and the flight limitations, the more international flights we have, the fewer regional flights we will have. And I am a frequent user of the regional flights. Last week I flew on JetBlue from Long Beach to Salt Lake City. Next week I'm going to San Jose on JetBlue again. I love JetBlue, but I really like the regional flights.
Speaker 0: Use them a lot, and I.
Speaker 8: Don't want to lose those. And if we have international flights, we'll lose some of the slots to the regional flights.
Speaker 0: My coworkers who also live in Long Beach. Fly out of Long Beach this week.
Speaker 8: The guy who sits in the next cubicle from me flew out of Long Beach to Phenix. My boss flew out of Long Beach to Oakland this week. I don't want to lose those local flights. Second point is, I don't think passengers.
Speaker 0: From international flights will bring in any more revenue from local from the regional flights. They will mostly be Southern California based leisure travelers. So the only.
Speaker 10: Money they're likely to spend in.
Speaker 8: Long Beach will be. They'll maybe buy a meal and either parking or cab fare, but that's it. And guess what?
Speaker 0: When people fly.
Speaker 8: To San Jose, same thing. I'll probably buy.
Speaker 0: Breakfast and either parking.
Speaker 8: Or cab fare depending on what works.
Speaker 0: And the construction.
Speaker 8: Jobs in building this thing.
Speaker 0: Will not be permanent. They will be temporary.
Speaker 8: They'll go on for a year or two while.
Speaker 0: The thing is being built.
Speaker 8: But then they'll be over. So they're not a permanent solution, is it? I mean, yes, it's nice to have it.
Speaker 0: Work for a couple of years, but it wouldn't be nicer to work for something that provides.
Speaker 8: Permanent jobs. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, City Council and staff. I'm Myron Campbell, and I'm a JetBlue crew member. I'm a ground operations leader. And Mayor Garcia, I want to talk to you directly, but I just want to thank you for the recognition earlier and thank you for allowing us the opportunity and spotting us. I'm the guy that does this. I bring your aircraft in. I'm the baggage guy. But I'm also the guy that welcomes many, many Long Beach passengers and residents back home. I'm the doormat, along with a lot of other frontline crew members that we have here in the audience. I'm going to deviate just a bit from what I had prepared, but I just wanted to talk to you about a time in 2008, 2009. A lot of you can remember that time, the economic downturn and a lot of folks weren't hiring there. Mass layoffs, mom and pop shops were falling and small communities were disappearing. There was a company hiring. They were right here in Long Beach, and that was JetBlue Airways. They were still hiring. I joined them in 2009 and on my way to training. And I was in Orlando for the meeting that we we have there, JetBlue University. It's a room just like this. And there are people lined up along the walls. Wall to wall. So what are these people doing standing up here? Maybe they should have a seat. There's plenty of seating. But lo and behold, a portable cordless microphone went around the room and a lot of them began to speak. And they were the vice presidents and directors and managers and things like that. Embracing us, circling us, welcoming us, his family members to the JetBlue family. I want to mention this because a lot of folks have come up. They've mentioned that. They've mentioned things like corporate greed. I've been all these meetings, big pockets. Another gentleman mentioned shareholder, shareholder profit. It's all about the money. But JetBlue, it's it's not always about the money. It's nice to be able to turn a profit at the end, but it's not always about the money. Our culture is service, and that's evident through what we've done in many of the communities, not only the ones we fly to, but right here in Long Beach. This community very important. And so council members, I just I just urge you for your yes vote on FISA. I'm not going to mention the speculation and things about health and jobs and things like that. But we have the the Jacobs survey. We have the Jacobs report. They are the professionals. As councilman, Mongo, councilwoman, as you've mentioned. And it's very, very clear that it needs to be a yes on SARS. So I thank you for what you all do. You don't do it for fame, for fortune, not even for your own personal recognition, but for so that the city of Long Beach can continue to grow. We love the use and enjoyment and we want to keep it here and welcome international passengers. I want to say bienvenidos a long beach the next time in about a few years when the next plane arrives. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hi, my name is Rita Nayak, and I'm here to talk about social capital. I've been a resident of Long Beach since 1984. I went to Prisk Hughes Poly Cal for college. I lived in L.A. for seven years. I hated L.A. there was traffic and noise everywhere. It was congested. There was no community. People rushed in. They were angry. It was hard to make friends. I told my husband that Long Beach is the city to raise kids, so me and my brother right behind me slowly convinced him. And we moved back here with our two little ones and we bought a house in Bixby Knolls nine months ago. And our intention was that that's going to be our forever house. And I'm so happy that you guys have decided that you care about the people of Long Beach. And I'm not the only person that's moved back here. Long Beach is special. People move, they get multiple degrees. They can live in L.A., they can live in Redondo Beach, they can live in Orange County, and they are all coming back here. I was on Facebook talking about this issue, people from fifth grade, sixth grade, my softball coach, I you know, I played at it in the third District, Eldorado Park, and people come back here and they do it for community. We all want to be involved and be a part of a place. We want to make lifelong friends and invest in everybody who lives here. And I can get one in from the other in 17 minutes. There's no traffic. The diversity is amazing. The parks are plentiful. There's no stress added stress for me. And that means I can do more, more here, not just for me. I'm a privileged person. I own a home, and I hope that everybody here invests in Long Beach and the people here, because we can because we have the opportunity to do so. We don't we don't have the added stresses of trying to get to one place or another quickly and the traffic and I'm going to do that this weekend. I'll be volunteering in somewhere in honor of you guys for choosing us. I really appreciate your choice today. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next picture.
Speaker 4: Please. Hi. I'm British Sampat. I live in the seventh district. That was my sister. And I'm happy she's here in Long Beach. She enjoyed. What she saw when she came to visit my house, when she came to visit me. And she wanted that place for her kids and her family. And I want the same to raise my family. I hope I can have one. I was raised here and I moved back because I wanted those things. I didn't want to move to L.A., El Segundo, cities like West Chester that are inundated by the noise from L.A.X. . And I've always the same environmental concerns, noise issues, traffic potential for exceeding the flight window that other residents have mentioned. Um, you know, I enjoy the efficiency of our airport and I don't want to lose that for the sake of occasional vacation destinations or trips. As I mentioned, there are already five airports in the greater L.A. area. And so there's plenty of choices out there for international trips. You know, we should be different and maintain our quality of service for domestic flights. That's what actually brings people to Long Beach and makes them willing to pay and maybe the fractional higher ticket price to get that good service. You know, allocating slots for international flights does not promote the fiscal progress of Long Beach as much as returning domestic flights does. The chance of losing 12 to 16% of the slots dedicated to international flights will mean that we lose flights to cities that actually bring in consumers and people for conventions, conferences which bring in a lot of income during the week. And that also attracts future investment. So let's use our development opportunities consciously to maintain and showcase the quality of life that we have here and share that with others. So thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you very.
Speaker 4: Much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Hello. My name is Ramon. I'm from the fifth District. This has been a very interesting journey, to say the least.
Speaker 4: I got to really know.
Speaker 9: Darryl Supernova.
Speaker 6: And Stacey Mongo quite.
Speaker 9: Well and some of these other folks.
Speaker 6: Uh, it's been very, very interesting.
Speaker 4: I was going.
Speaker 6: To just try to crack a joke. I was talking to Lou over there from Jet Blue. I still got 50 questions that.
Speaker 9: Haven't been answered. I'm just joking.
Speaker 6: But one of the questions, one of the things that I'd like to say is that I've got this noise audience in my head. I memorized everything. I know where the sensors are. I know I've taught people how to look at the airport and and check it out themselves and the flight paths and everything. I got all this mental lint in my head and I don't know what to do with it. Thanks to our airport director who has just been fabulous. So I mean, I don't know. I sometimes try to get information out and next thing I know, I get flooded with things and I get things kind of wrong sometimes. And Stacey Mungo can testify, right?
Speaker 4: Um.
Speaker 9: Well, will or whatever.
Speaker 6: But I try to do my best. And when someone says, Look, you screwed up, fix it, I do my best to fix it.
Speaker 9: I don't I don't say I always do it right or whatever.
Speaker 6: But I try my best to do some of this stuff. And I'd really like to thank Stacy for really kind of hanging in there. And she has really been battered.
Speaker 9: For a.
Speaker 6: Lot of reasons that really aren't fair, I think. And so I hope that everyone can can kind of get together. And indeed, if there's some people that you'd like to kind of. You know, work with. Somehow I somehow be a focal point because some of the the JetBlue employees I know when I talk to you, I try to get some of the information right by all three groups. And they say, yeah, that's right. And then when I post, it just goes crazy. You know, people, I don't know how they take some of this stuff, but at any rate, I just want to say thanks, Stacy, for for your effort. I know that you've you've tried your best. And I really want to thank your chief of staff, Christine, who originally gave me this stuff, and also Gerald Supernova, the Mr. Atherton tip, you know, very good. And that's you got to know that. And then also the all these other folks that are there. I was kind of a neutral person, but I just want to thank, especially in the mayor's office, all those folks there. I got to know so many people. It's just crazy. I'm going to give you 15 more seconds. All right. Thanks.
Speaker 10: Thank you for taking the correction.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you very much. Please come forward. Next speaker, please. Just come down a little bit, everyone. We're going to. And then Mr. Perkin.
Speaker 0: Said, evening council members, thank you for Miss Mongo, for your position and thank you, Ms.. Price for supporting the position as well. My name is Nancy Lopez. I'm part of the fifth District. My mother spoke earlier and she so fervently expressed the importance of this issue to us. I grew up in West Long Beach in the 1990s, which is was not easy. There were a lot of gangs. There was a lot of drugs. And like somebody else said, this house was a step up for my family. They moved us out of there because they knew that the future there was slim. It was. I'm proud to say that I moved on. I did get my degree. I went to UCLA and like somebody else said, I came back. I received my master's degree at Cal State, Long Beach, and I'm here. I work at Cal State, Long Beach as well. Thanks to the move, we no longer had to deal with the lot of the. A lot of the violence and a lot of the drugs and the gangs. And when my parents moved to that neighborhood, they didn't sign up for an increase in flights or for a constant violation of the noise ordinance. They wanted a better life for us. Time and time again. I've heard from Mr. Roman, the district attorney, and from Jacobs, about the noise ordinance, how it will not be violated. However, myself, my mom and the other residents of Long Beach not only disagree, we have evidence. Just last night at 11:35 p.m., a plane passed over our house.
Speaker 11: I worked two jobs.
Speaker 0: I work as a program coordinator for an educational outreach program, and I'm a social worker on the weekends. And sleep is precious to me. So I really appreciate you not moving forward with this. Not only that, there are other concerns that we had, and I hope that these are taken into account in the future. We do not have a research team to pay to support our fears. As somebody said, we cannot corroborate them because we don't have anybody to do so. Nobody has looked at how housing will be impacted. Nobody has looked at how security will be impacted in the surrounding neighborhood. And that's nothing that can be proven because we don't we don't have anybody that can do it. I hope that you take this into consideration for any future plans to expand the airport or to make it international, to really think about what the issues that the community members are bringing forward, not just the noise ordinance, not just the number of flights. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. That's speaker piece.
Speaker 0: Good evening. My name is Andrea Philo. Good evening, counsel and neighbors. I just want to say that Long Beach is a city of neighborhoods. It's not an industrialized city. The vision that I hear sounds like an industrialized city is what, you know, the expansion, the FARC and then Mercedes Benz. And I think the Jacobs report clearly did say that there would be a regional economic benefit, not specifically to Long Beach, except during the construction. But we're a neighborhood of we're a city of neighborhoods, and our neighborhoods matter. And there are new people moving into these neighborhoods, young families moving in. Their kids are in the schools, the local schools. The teachers have to stop talking. Everybody says, oh, it's just 50 flights. It's not going to change. We're going to trade one for the other. Well, the reason people are concerned, the residents, is that the noise ordinance is a fragile thing and other airlines are going to want a piece of it. They will. This is how you run a business. If they have another venue to fly out of, then they will ask for it and then they will challenge and will have to fight them. So it's not something we don't want to go down the slippery slope. There's no reason to go down this slippery slope. We have a beautiful airport. And people do come here from other areas to fly because municipally, it's a good airport for domestic flights. And they the cutting down of the domestic flights, which would be also happening, which is already happening to a degree. Would not be favorable for our city, for our conventions, and also for people that live here that want to fly domestically. We don't fly to Mexico or the Caribbean as much as we might fly to New York, Phenix, Texas. So the other interesting thing is the health issues, the environmental impact, the traffic congestion. All of these things, the security issues. I think we have a beautiful airport and I'm a JetBlue fan. I fly JetBlue. I'm one of their favorite customers I hate. I hope they still love me. But. You know, they're doing well. They got the flight to Cuba from Fort Lauderdale. They ought to be happy. They're one of the airlines that got that. So, you know, they're doing okay and we're doing okay. And we'd like to leave it that way. All right. Thank you all. Have a good night.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Miscavige.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 6: I can't get the words mental lint out of my head. First, I.
Speaker 8: Want to say, Stacy.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much. I know that this was a very difficult process for you, that you wanted to honor the business that you businesses that you represent. But you also are defending and honoring the residents from around the entire city that are impacted by it. And I thank you for that. Susie, your.
Speaker 0: Words.
Speaker 6: In support of Stacey and the road that she's traveled on this and the seconding of the motion also say a lot for the type of leader that you are. And I know you read everything you told me that when you first came on board.
Speaker 0: So I know you do your homework.
Speaker 6: And I appreciate that. So thank you. And Daryl and Roberto and Al. Thanks for keeping this in the light. I know it wasn't always easy because there is many sides to issues and so thank you for that. But now I almost feel like a council person. I'm thanking everybody for everything.
Speaker 0: But and Robert and the other council members that actually reached out to me and communicated with me personally.
Speaker 6: During this time. I appreciate that time because I know your time is valuable. It means it means a lot. So thank you. Thank you for that. And I hope that everyone is.
Speaker 0: Supportive that all nine of you are supportive.
Speaker 6: Of the motion that Stacey made. Seconded by Susie. But I also want to take just a second to say we love JetBlue.
Speaker 0: I love.
Speaker 6: JetBlue. I hope they add back New York flights and Boston flights and Washington, D.C. flights.
Speaker 0: And and for the.
Speaker 6: Crew.
Speaker 0: For the crew members, I was a crew member for.
Speaker 6: United for 35 years.
Speaker 0: I understand the job that you do.
Speaker 6: And the service that you provide, whether on the ground or in the air. And so we're very supportive of JetBlue as a as a corporate neighbor. And we hope that you understand what our concerns are during this. During this event, I guess I can call it an event.
Speaker 8: But on behalf of Joe.
Speaker 6: Sopko, who is not going to speak.
Speaker 0: Tonight and L.B. hush.
Speaker 6: Board members and Long Beach neighborhoods, first, we thank you all for keeping this to be open and civil process, and we look forward to working with you on other issues.
Speaker 0: And I actually would like to start my retirement, if that's okay with you.
Speaker 8: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Brian Muir, eighth district.
Speaker 4: You know, I just I've lived in Long Beach for 40 years, the last 14 of which have been in the eighth District. And I just want to address my neighbor here who says that the noise doesn't bother him. It's kind of funny because I am on the steering committee for our neighborhood watch meeting and we have this huge block party every year.
Speaker 2: It's a great, great turnout. And every meeting that we have, it's kind of become.
Speaker 4: A running joke that we have to stop and pause. Wait for the plane to pass.
Speaker 2: We all cheers each other.
Speaker 4: Which with whatever adult libation we happen to be drinking at the time. And then we go on with our meeting. And we.
Speaker 2: Have to do this 3 to 5.
Speaker 4: Times during the meeting whenever we have this.
Speaker 5: The noise is.
Speaker 2: There. Trust me. In the summertime, you.
Speaker 4: Open your windows. And one of the gentlemen was talking about having to pause. Yes. You have to sit down. You have to pause whatever program you're watching. Did did it? Did you? Did it. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. And then you can play again. You can't have your windows open.
Speaker 1: It's that.
Speaker 4: Loud.
Speaker 2: All right. And I also don't know.
Speaker 4: What with the no noise ordinance says about larger planes, but any international flight that I've been on has not been a small plane. It's a larger plane. Last time I checked, larger planes make more noise. So if you're talking international flights, I'm assuming the planes.
Speaker 1: Will get bigger unless I'm.
Speaker 4: Mistaken. They won't. Okay, perfect. Thank you. That I misspoke. But that being said, I want to I wanted to thank Councilwoman Mango. I was not going to go to your gala fundraiser that you are putting on. My kids go to Newark specifically because I thought you were in the pocket of JetBlue. I am horribly mistaken. And I will now be attending your gala.
Speaker 10: And just for the record, none of the money goes to me at all. No, no, no. That's tomorrow.
Speaker 1: No, I know. I know. But but.
Speaker 2: I want. I wanted to say this to the other council members.
Speaker 4: Think about that. When you make your decision because it.
Speaker 2: Will affect you and how the rest of the community.
Speaker 4: Sees you.
Speaker 2: And how we think.
Speaker 4: You see us. And ultimately, that's what it's about. It's about our community. All right. That being said.
Speaker 2: Go to first Fridays.
Speaker 4: It's awesome if you haven't been. Let's keep that up. Our community is great with thriving in Bixby Knolls. Let's keep it that way. All right. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hi, everybody. My name is Tony Cadmus. I live in the seventh District. I've lived in my wonderful home for 30 years. I appreciate all the time and attention that you have all given to this matter, and I certainly appreciate my calcium. And your ranga is awesome. I appreciate. Councilwoman Mongo, your yours and Councilwoman Price's comments tonight. This is so serious for all of us. I appreciate all of you for listening to us. It's so important to me. Well, everybody really that spoke ahead of me and I am against the expansion. Those that spoke against the expansion pretty much said what I think needed to be said. So I'll move on here if people want to speak. But for me, this is a quality of life issue that that's just that's got to be one of the major things to consider for the residents of Long Beach. So thank you for your time and let's see how the vote goes.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Please.
Speaker 0: Yes. My name is Laura Selma. My address is on file. Hello. Hi. I've been a resident of District four for 25 years. I've also lived in one. Two and seven. I've asked the city clerk to distribute these little pages, so you should be getting those. This is my poster of the airport. Airport impact, because it shows how wide, you know, the airport is not just in that little area. It affects all of us in the city. I did this on purpose. If you if you could show that to other crowd, because I just noticed when I was sitting up there, it'd be so nice if all of our residents, if we had a little desk over there with a microphone and PowerPoint and we had $350,000 to spend on a report and PowerPoints, we could make a presentation to you. But all I got is a poster. We care deeply about this. I had a prepared statement. I'm going to just cut it down to when I heard the annex overflow and their cheer because they weren't we were well-behaved in here. They cheered and they cheered in a way that brought me so much joy, the joy from them, because you're voting to you're making a motion to protect residents. I read the JetBlue annual reports. I have an MBA and I know they're a good airline. But I also know that every business it has. One purpose in it is to make money. And I don't want you to lose sight of that. So there are good airline, but your job. Is to protect the residents. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker what I'm going to unless there's unless there's council objection. I know we shall folks coming in. What I'm going to do is I'm going to set the timer for 2 minutes. However, if you're at two and you really need to finish what you're saying, I'm going to let you keep going. But if we can just try to limit it as best possible. That would be great. We still have a lot of comments, so please, sir.
Speaker 1: Challenge accepted. Mr. Mayor. Council. My name is Mike Mangan. I'm a resident of the eighth district, 42 years old, which means I've been a 42 year resident of the city. I've lived in District three, four, five, seven and eight. I have a five year old daughter and a two year old son, and I am here for them more than anything else. I want to commend Councilwoman Mongeau for her motion. I want to commend Councilwoman Price for her support. And I want to acknowledge the political courage that it took to offer that motion and verbalize that support. Because I'm sure you've been on the receiving end of feedback, including mine, that's been intense and vociferous. And I know it took a lot of guts because I know you're getting it from both ends, too, that there's tremendous, powerful interests leaning on everybody here. Right. And I want to thank Councilman Supernormal, Councilman Turanga. My man, Alan the eighth. We're going to miss you. You're a one man argument against term limits, but keep up the good work as long as you're still there for their steadfast support. And beyond the political courage I want to offer. I also think it's political intelligence as well, because anybody who comes out in support of keeping the airport the way it is is doing their own political futures a tremendous favor in both the near-term and the mid-term. And I want to address a couple of the arguments I heard tonight. One is, if you live near the airport, you can't complain. That is ridiculous. That argument is absurd. I live near Atlantic Avenue. I don't want to turn into a ten lane highway. I mean, give me a break. Right. And secondly, the second argument is the economic impacts. I've read the Jacobs study, 250 jobs. Sounds like a lot, too. You have to realize how many of those are temporary construction jobs may be done in a week or two. And how much is 250 jobs measured against hundreds of thousands of Long Beach residents who are going to have their standard of living and their quality of life, potentially their health impacted. The smart choice is to say no to this. I appreciate how the dialog is going tonight and I hope you continue to support Councilwoman Mango's motion.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: My name is Judith Anderson. I live in the seventh District. I live in Castle Heights, and I like the airport. I moved here. I knew the airport was going to be there. I like it. I like the DC threes.
Speaker 6: They make a lot of noise and they're polluting, but they don't fly out all the time.
Speaker 0: I don't want the airport expanded and I do want to know that the city council cares more about people than money. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thanks, Speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Hi. My name is George Correa. I'm a long time resident of Long Beach. I lived in the second district, the third district, the fourth district and the eighth District. I want to thank the mayor, Al Austin, and the rest of the council members for listening to all of us. I'll try to keep it under a minute. Since I believe in Shakespeare's quote that brevity is the soul of wit. There have been arguments for and against, and they've both been eloquent. I really think that a lawyer could make an argument for either case. And I actually took a little tally of the people that spoke for and against. There's about ten that have spoke for the FISA facility. And about 28 against, I think with a subject that's so controversial, it would not hurt to err on the side of the constituents that voted you into office and vote against the FISA facility . The other thing that I wanted to mention, which someone else already mentioned, is that knowing full well that you moved into a area that has a airport isn't reason to give up your First Amendment right to speak and convince the city council members that represent you to change their minds. And I think everyone. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Good evening. Hi. My name is Melinda Cotton. I live in the third district in Belmont Shore. I was part of the group that was plotting and cheering outside. We're very grateful that the council has recognized council member Franco and Pryce especially have recognized that it's best for Long Beach, the quality of life, the residents, the business community , really, and the economics of the city to not bring in the FISA and protect the noise ordinance. What I would like your attention to tonight, there have been mentions of NexGen. What it is, as we know, is the FAA is rearranging the airplanes over our area. Basically, there's going to be a meeting next week. I wish I knew the date. I hope that the council members will get the information out here in Long Beach at the adult school. I'd Willow and the FAA is sponsoring that to learn more about it. And as my council member has heard already, we're experiencing that overflights from L.A.X. and elsewhere over our homes. They're probably pretty high. A lot of people may not hear them. I heard one, about three in the morning last night. So even in our older home with double windows, we're still hearing them. So I do hope you'll have to pay attention to that. And thank you very much, Councilmember Super Nine and Austin and your rank. You did a great job in bringing out the information and bringing forward all of us holding the study session. So we're grateful. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: My name is Carol McElwee, and I'd like to thank Mayor Garcia and the council members for considering livability. I was born in Long Beach. I was raised in Bixby Knolls, and I live now in District three. My mother, Joyce McElwee, would be here tonight, but for health reasons she couldn't make it. But she asked me to speak on her behalf. I was three when my parents bought the big signals home on Sirius Avenue, which is now under the flight path of the commercial aircraft. She wanted to let have you know that when she's on the phone, if a fly when a plane flies over all conversation, stop and only commence when the plane passes. Also, when her TV is.
Speaker 11: On, she has to place it on pause.
Speaker 0: Because nothing can be heard. She finds oil oil droplets on her car. And she's concerned about breathing very bad air and has respiratory problems at this point and heart problems. And that's why she's not here tonight. I'm also very concerned because I've seen how the city has changed with the commerce and the pollution and the noise. And I did live in L.A., but choose to move back to Long Beach because of that problem. I'm an attorney. And I did see the. Or at least reference to the FAA letter from last October 2016, where they have reserved the right to investigate further complaints from any carrier that believes the ordinance is a barrier to their entry into, I guess, the L.A. or Long Beach market. I look at as an invitation for litigation, and I'm so happy that the council is putting its residents first. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Believe me, I am not from Long Beach originally. I am from Los Angeles, born and raised. After college I moved to Long Beach and I did not know why I had come here. I was taught religiously that when you arrive in a destination and you have no idea why you're there, you need to pray and ask God , why am I here? After several years living in District nine, I received a calling. And when you receive a calling, you have two choices. Either you answer the phone and hang up, or you answer the phone and pay attention. I understood that my reason for coming here was to assist the homeless. And in order to do so, I had to become familiar with what that felt like to the homeless. Not one homeless person that I have met in any of these districts have ever complained. That the airplanes are too loud. I can't sleep. Because the airplanes are too loud. I'm sure you've never received a phone call from one homeless person complaining that the airplanes are too loud. There's this statement ringing in my head about society and we, the heroes that push society forward, those heroes that make us count our tracks and look forward and push. We're in that time now. Something's going to come and push us forward, whether we like it or not. What you fail to realize is without being religious on you. You being given an invitation to push forward by air. And from what I'm hearing, many of your constituents are saying no by choice now. Next the next time the push comes, it may not come with an invitation and you will be pushed forward.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Miller.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Council Members. I'm Ron Miller, executive secretary of the L.A. Orange County Building and Construction Trades Council. And I'm here tonight to talk about careers, not temporary construction jobs, as some people have framed it. But I've made a career out of 38 years worth of those temporary construction jobs because that's what construction workers do . Now, whether this this project gets built or gets voted on gets approved tonight, it's really neither here nor there. You guys have done a hell of a job in the city helping the building trades with a partnership. To do work at the port, do work at the city, do work at the city college. We've got an apprenticeship readiness program at the City College. We're partnering with you guys on. And we're putting many members that live in the city of Long Beach into careers in construction. So we're doing about $8 billion worth of work at the airport in Los Angeles right now. And I know the. The airport in Long Beach does work every year. So I'm looking for a champion or as many as you guys want to stand up. And talk to me about doing an agreement at the airport for the work that's done there under a local hire agreement. There's no reason we can't have the port, the city, the community college and the airport under a local hire agreement to put local folks here to work in a good construction trade, middle class career. So that they can prosper here in the city. You know, you need economic. You guys are the second largest economic engine in the in L.A. County. It can't be just all homeowners. It has to be some economic development. So I want to thank you for everything you've done. But we have more to do. So let's do it. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Ron. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Good evening. My name is Dr. Tony Mazzeo. I've lived in Long Beach for 29 years and I've been registered voter for 29 years here. I love my city. I went to Cal State Long Beach for my undergrad, and I've lived here ever since. I'm in health care and I've cared for our elderly in post-acute care settings for 20 years now. This is the first time I felt compelled to speak at a city council meeting as a Long Beach resident. I wanted to urge you to vote no no on the airport expansion for several reasons. There are many peer reviewed health studies showing a strong association between pulmonary disease and living in close proximity to large airports. I personally have asthma and I'm intimately familiar with the research findings on my disease and environmental factors that. Would affect asthma and respiratory illness. We can't deny the studies regarding environmental repercussions will experience. I purchased my home this summer in Long Beach. I invested over $700,000 on my property. My fear is the decrease in home value due to the proximity of my home to a large international airport on a weekly basis. I fly JetBlue for work out of Long Beach Airport. I'm very familiar with the airport and with JetBlue services. I love the airport. I love the remodel and I love the charm of our airports and the small size. I don't want to lose our local flights that I use weekly. I understand the draw that large corporations with deep pockets have. But once large corporations are here in our city, our voices would not be heard as much in terms of expanded flight patterns and further expansion once they're established. Noise ordinance ordinances are broken all the time. Larger corporations would easily be able to pay the fines associated with any violations, as they do now when they break the ordinance.
Speaker 1: Thank you, ma'am. If you could go ahead. Thanks. Okay.
Speaker 0: In conclusion, I just want to say thank you. I voted for you. I posted your signs on my lawns, and I want to thank you for representing us on this vital issue. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Good evening, city leaders. I'll try to speak into the mic this time. I want to thank you for listening. Listening to all the people and really studying the numbers. I asked you to do that a couple of times, and it looks like you did so. Thank you. I wanted to touch on a few things because I've heard some different numbers tonight about the jobs. And to the gentleman before me. I don't think the question is about short term jobs just in general and construction being disregarded. It's that the the big push for this with revenue in jobs and there's really not a lot. Long term I had counted five in operations and management and ten inspectors and two agricultural inspectors and one supervisor. That's not a lot. Not for whatever the building costs now. The thing is that any job brought to Long Beach will generate revenue. Right. So it doesn't need to be based on being international. And that's what's so great. The things that are being done now are fantastic. Revitalization of downtown, the embracing of technology by our mayor. The businesses that you're bringing here as big as Mercedes and as small as steel craft, which just opened in my neighborhood. Those things are fantastic. Those things make community. Those give people reasons to move here. Like I did, I moved from San Francisco. Long Beach offered me the most diversity and quality of life that I could get outside of San Francisco and in the Southern California area. And I love it. The houses have charm. There's a great downtown. There's an art scene. There's music. It's fantastic. So those in favor of thinking that that international airport is the way to go, there's there's much better opportunities out there. So I just thank you for your efforts. I thank you for listening. I encourage you every time these things come up to really scrutinize numbers because they're easy to swing many different ways. And thank you for representing us so well.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thanks for moving here.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Hi. My name is Dick Wynn and I'm proud resident here at Long Beach. I'm here to speak for myself and on behalf of my six year old son who doesn't have a voice in the community yet. I just want to touch on two points. Our children and our community, if you can imagine, would me for just a moment, the face, the frightful face of a four or five or six year old boy playing in a park as a giant jet plane flying overhead. Or imagine, again, 200 elementary schoolchildren saluting the Star Spangled Banner in their early morning as again, a jet engine roars overhead and disrupt their flag ceremony. Being a physician myself, I know of the deleterious effect of noise on our children. The World Health Organization has scientifically proven that noise negatively negatively affect our children, your airports and highways. They effect decreased their learning, decreased their memory, affect their sleep, increased their stress hormones.
Speaker 8: Blood pressure.
Speaker 6: And as adults, this can lead into tinnitus, the chronic ringing in the ears. The only solution is controlling the noise at the source and expanding the airport internationally. I doubt will do that. My second point is that language is establishing itself as a community, a family with pristine parks, historic homes and great schools. A friend of mine recently visited from Washington and she she said how much she admired the Long Beach Airport, its history, its uniqueness, its small town appeal. Having an international flight would disrupt the fabric of the hometown feel, where neighbors look out for each other, their family and their families, children's health of their future.
Speaker 8: We need to continue.
Speaker 6: To sustain that image for years to come without adding noise, pollution, pollution and traffic. Thank you so much, council members.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. So please come on down. I also want to just take it just 1/2, please. I want to make sure that I have everyone that's in line that wants to speak so I will know where that ends. Is everyone in Mr. West that on the fire marshal's side that want to make a public comment? Rich. Oh, you know, let me let this let me let this lady over here at the mic up here. Go. Yes. I can't even see who if that is a.
Speaker 8: Good evening. My name is Luis Pago, and I'm here because I live in the seventh District. I prepared myself a speech and I would like to read it. I'm here tonight to ask the Council to reconsider the enlargement and developing an international airport here in Long Beach. The city has been a sleepy town away from the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles and a place where I can feel a sense of safety in our neighborhood and some nostalgic surrounding not found in L.A. or any big cities. If anyone has visited small towns like George Towns in D.C. or Santa Barbara, California, it has had airports surrounding it. But not in the town itself. But it is a tourist town where tourism generates financial income to business people in the town. It was an international airport, his place in the city. We can never return back and we will create a city of more expanding roads in road to the airport, just like the ones you see in John Wayne and Alex. Government agency will be asking people in the surrounding area to buy their homes called eminent domain and the expansion will result in decrease of property value in the face of Long Beach will become an area along Central Boulevard, Inglewood and the surrounding area. I live in an area where aircraft circles the airspace. However, if the planes leave the airspace, the noise they bring lingers and don't leave with them as they pass me. So while the noise lingers, another aircraft follows. And this continues throughout the entire day. Well, overnight until 1 a.m. or 2 to 2 a.m. begins around 4:30 a.m. depending on the noise, it can be thundering and can shake walls and window. And a public meeting held in December. The presentation strong enough to convince the council that having an international airport was good for the community because it would bring jobs. That was also stated when they built L.A. in John Wayne, but the result only brought neighborhood flight because the environment created difficult to access to homes of people who lived in that area.
Speaker 2: And we're going to try to wrap it up, ma'am, but please continue, if you could just close up.
Speaker 8: Thank you very much for letting me speak.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much for being patient. Is there anyone else up there, Mr. Marshall Marshal, that need to speak at one of the mikes on the top? Are we okay up there? Here. Okay. And then is everyone in already that needs to speak? Okay. Well, I'm going to because I'm going to I'm going to close the speakers list with no one else on the outside. I think we're I think we're good. So who's the last person in this line? Okay, so the gentleman you just raise your hand. You're the last speaker. Okay. All right, great. Please continue.
Speaker 4: Mayor Garcia, members of the City Council and staff. Thank you for this opportunity to address you this evening on an issue which obviously has a lot of gravity and is a test of both the community's patience as well as your stamina. So thank you so much for giving so much attention to this issue and for all of your hard work and study for this particular issue. I'm here tonight. My name is James Silva. I live in the fifth District. My wife and I are the owners of a real estate company, A.T..
Speaker 9: And I'm here in no small part.
Speaker 4: On behalf of the hundreds of people that I have talked to over the last several months who still don't even really understand or know what's going on at the airport. And I am pleased to be able to go back to them tonight and tell them, at least not tonight, will there be a yes vote? So I want to thank Councilwoman Mongeau for her courage in in her motion and Councilman Price for second on that, as well as all the council people for all of your your hard work and leadership. We have celebrated good times with you. We have mourned through hard times with you. And we appreciate all that you do for our city. So with that, I would just simply say we look forward to your strong leadership in the future, and thank you for putting our citizens first.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mr. Mayor, and members of Council. My name is Rafael Reyes. I'm the vice president of Operation for Ready Gen Inc. Ready Gen Inc. handles all the aircraft appearance for JetBlue Airways. We've been operating out of Long Beach for the past 16 years. The day one, once JetBlue started that, it was operating out of a trailer. We support them coming in with the office terminal because it's going to create more jobs, not just for the airport, but also for the car rental facilities, taxi drivers and the port. So please just take this ownership and take my word. Give us this vote. Just for jobs creation, economic growth and looking into the future for the.
Speaker 9: City of Long Beach.
Speaker 4: Thanks again for your time.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir, very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, councilman and women and Long Beach residents. My name's Rosie MATTHEWS. I come here today having grown up in Southern California and as an airline pilot of nine years who is well aware of the technicalities and formalities regarding office. With all that being said, I'm still 100% in favor of customs facility being built and urge you all to vote accordingly. Your political careers aside. A no vote would essentially be cutting off the city's nose to spite its face. Urge you to not let a vocal minority influence the needs of a greater majority. I've reviewed the various concerns presented by area residents throughout the feasibility study and I must say that all my questions and concerns before were fully and properly answered, using facts and logic instead of emotion. There's a reason that the Jacobs study didn't show any negative impacts and that simply because there aren't any negative impacts to fires. I understand that implementing FISA has changed, and for the most part we have we as humans have issues with change. The current noise ordinance caps the number of commercial flights serving Long Beach. Building FISA doesn't change that. The current noise ordinance sets curfew times and monetary penalties for violations. Building FISA doesn't change that either. We all make decisions on where we live. Choosing to live in a flight path is just one of those. Let's go over a few things that FISA does do. Construction alone will bring in millions to the local economy and hundreds of jobs for you. As a traveler, the ability to fly out of Long Beach internationally gives you the ability to join much cheaper airfares based on an airline's historical impact when starting service. If there's one thing in this room that everyone in this room can actually probably agree on is that LAX is an operational disaster. Why would anyone want to choose to travel in and out of there when they can do so easily and comfortably out of Long Beach? I'm here because FISA and Long Beach absolutely needs to happen. Don't cut off the city's nose to spite its face. I encourage you all to vote yes on FISA. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Mayor, Councilmembers Robert Land with JetBlue Airways Corp.. The Jacobs study that you commissioned and it's taken two years to get to this vote tonight speaks for itself. The cost to the city, as you've heard from staff, is zero. The one time benefit on construction is tremendous. You've heard from the building construction trades folks tonight and other labor leaders. The ongoing economic benefit to the city is hundreds of millions of dollars annually. And the only thing the Jacobs study misrepresented to the benefit of the city is that the facility is smaller and less expensive to construct than they suggested. Should the council approve this tonight? JetBlue, I want to reiterate, I've mentioned in the past, will not cut or eliminate any domestic routes. So every market we serve will continue to serve. JetBlue has been a strong corporate citizen up till now, working in the community, active in the community. And as such, we urge your favorable vote on this. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr. Land. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Council members and may of our city. I mean, Mayor Garcia. I'm sorry. I apologize. Garcia but my name is Manny Solis. I'm a longtime resident of Long Beach. 30 years. I live in the. 90815 area, which is also known as Los Altos. Stacey Wolf knows that. And I've raised my three children here. They've gone to schools locally. They've all attended Long Beach State. My last youngest is graduating this spring, so I'm very proud to be a Long Beach resident, very proud to have raised my children here. My wife works at Boeing, which used to be McDonnell Douglas. She's worked there 30 years. And I think we may be forgetting that all the homes that surround this area were built originally to support the manufacturing of aircraft. And and we need to keep jobs as they're leaving. You all know the C-17 is no longer. Other programs have been cut. So we need jobs here in Long Beach. I am also a journeyman electrician. I'm also an instructor at the Electrical Training Institute. So all of our apprentices are trained to be journeyman workmen. They are trained with safety. They are trained for all the laws and regulations that go with construction. So I'm sure that this job, if passed, will be built with all the local standards and national electrical standards. Like I said, this apprenticeship houses about 1600 apprentice electricians. And as you know, all the shop classes have less the high schools. So we want these jobs and we want to continue our training here. And this project is vital to our success.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you very much, sir.
Speaker 4: Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Council member. Mayor Thank you. My name is Daniel Toots. I'm a resident in the city of Long Beach, and also I'm a proud member of the IBEW Local 11. Second Year Apprentice. There is many reason I became a union electrician. I want to mention a few of those reasons tonight. Um, solidarity, pay, equality, safety, training, respect on the job and join in the working class. The job created by the Federal Inspection Facility will help me continue my career as an electrician. Now here is one of the main reason to be working in the city of Long Beach is a short commute. I rather be working nearer home and I not have to drive miles away to another city. As a Long Beach resident, I ask you to support this project. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Like Speaker.
Speaker 1: Thank you, council members and mayor. My name is Freddy Pickett and I'm a Long Beach resident. I'm also a proud IBEW local 11 member second year apprentice. I've learned a trade out in the field and in the classroom. Both are important to my job. The jobs created by the Federal Inspection Facility Project will keep the men and women apprentices like me to continue to earn and learn in the trade. It's not enough to teach apprentices electrical trade in the classroom. A lot of our learning comes on the job. And it's projects like Federal Inspection Facility that feel the need. As a Long Beach resident, I ask that you support this project. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much.
Speaker 4: Speaker, please. Mayor Councilmembers I'll be brief. This council has always been progressive, and you can start with the place and local hire. It's it's great. I personally can say that I put 40 members of this community into a career that will change their lives. So it's it's nothing to, you know, slack it. Ms.. Mongeau, I know she stated her reasons for not supporting it and she was the only one that said that not one person in the audience mentioned that the fiscal impact was why they were not supporting it. It was all about noise. Everything they said was about noise. Even if you guys vote no, even if you vote no, it will not change the noise. There'll still be the same amount of flights.
Speaker 2: All right, let's let's. Everyone gets respect to be able to give their comments.
Speaker 4: So, please, flights are flights. Weather to Sacramento, weather to Cancun. You cannot tell the difference where the flight goes. The Olympics will be here hopefully in 2024. You know, Long Beach will be a destination. It would be nice to be able to fly people directly to the airport. I live directly right up the street from the airport. It's a great place. I fly out there next week to Sacramento. It is great for regionals. It would also be great to fly internationally as well. We're debating a what is issue right now. You know what? Not not nothing in that feasibility study said anything that the noise is going to change. Everything was going to stay the same same amount of flights that are changing where they're going. I would hate to stop progress on a what if issue because we can always say, what if the airline leaves? Right. You know what if they stay? You know, why are we going stop progress on a what if issue? Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Please.
Speaker 0: Hi. Hi. My name is Katie Class. I live in District five. I live right where the small planes fly. I'm obviously a mother of three young children, and our neighborhood is a really special place. And I'm really fear that the know. I really fear that the international expansion is just going to bring a lot less security to the neighborhood. It'll lower my my home value, which is really important since I just bought my house a year ago. And I do plan on spending probably the rest of my life in that house and raising my children there. I just really would like you to consider the fact that it really affects all the families in the neighborhood. And there are many families like mine in our small on our small street and any other street near ours. So we say no.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: My name is Steve Fry. I'm in District five and I want to thank you all for being here and for thoughtfully hearing everyone. I'll keep this short. I have to go to the bathroom.
Speaker 2: But how do you think we feel?
Speaker 6: We're all right. I came down here. I went to Cal State, Long Beach. I did my undergraduate and my graduate work here. Go Beach. I moved away after living in Burbank for a while, and in other parts of L.A., I decided that Long Beach was where I wanted to come back to. I moved to your district, Councilwoman Mungo, and I thank you for your change of heart. I am obviously against this proposal. I purchased a home down here not far from where she lives, and it is a very special community. I mean, it's magical and we're in the process. We've renovated our house exterior. We're in the process of obtaining an architect right now who's going to be doing a major remodel on the home, adding square footage, etc.. I'm also doing work in Glendale, where another property is that I have. So I'm kind of comparing the two cities. But what I want to say is I'm putting that project on hold because of this. I have a lot of concern about it. And initially, when I purchased the home, knowing that I was in near the airport, I asked a lot of questions and the people that I purchased it from were worked in the aircraft industry and they said, Oh, the little aircrafts are kind of quaint. We've grown to love them too. We have these small flat planes flying through. It inspires my kids, but we just don't want to see anything change on that. So I urge you to just consider it seriously.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Mayor. Members of the council. My name is Rob Mitchell. I'm the manager of airport affairs for JetBlue. I don't want to go through all the facts laid out by the city's Jacobs study, because I think they're they're well known at this point. But I do want to say that the council can vote yes on customs today, causing no risk to the noise ordinance, no additional noise or flights, because there are only allowed 50 flights a day. And voting yes on customs would mean that the city gets a facility at zero cost to taxpayers. No risk that those taxpayers would ever be on the hook because JetBlue is making is willing to make a commitment to do that and that the facility would provide thousands of jobs and hundreds of millions of economic stimulus year after year if it were built environmentally. The Jacobs study actually cited that there would be some reduction in emissions because general aviation flights that come from international origins today to Long Beach now need to make an unnecessary landing and takeoff to clear customs before it comes here. Moreover, as my colleagues mentioned, JetBlue would be committing that no domestic routes that are served today would be canceled. So, yes, JetBlue certainly wants to see this project move forward after, I think, what is a thorough two year process. But I do want to underline that our company and our amazing 700 passionate and incredible crew members here in Long Beach care deeply about this city. We've been here for over 15 years. And with that, we truly. With that said, we truly, truly believe that this project is in the best interest of not just customers at Long Beach Airport, but the community of Long Beach as well. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hi. Good evening, council members. Thank you for being here. My name is Hilary Hagler and I am a first time homeowner in Bixby Knolls. I live directly underneath the flight path. I thought it was really important that I came here tonight because I am also a crew member of JetBlue and very happy. So I am on both sides of this issue. I hear the issues coming from everyone, all the residents saying that they're concerned primarily from what I've heard, about noise and pollution, and I understand their fears. So I want to address you as well as them in saying that we're not here to discuss the closure of the airport noise and pollution, what happened last week with with violations. That's that's unfortunate. And that's going to happen. The pollution is still going to be there with an airport as it would in existence anywhere. We're here to discuss FISA, and I am vehemently in favor of this passing as both a resident and a homeowner and someone who cares deeply about City of Long Beach and JetBlue. We're simply rerouting the flights that we're going to be taking. We're not impacting the noise. We're not going to increase it. We're not going to increase the pollution that is coming to our city. And as someone who cares deeply about my. My home, the value of my home, the pollution, the noise. I'm effective. I hear it as well. I do live directly on the flight path. I, I want to say that I care about JetBlue. I care about this company. I care about this city. And I trust them. And I and I care that you have done the research. I have done the research. And I hope that you make the right decision and vote in favor of this passing. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, members of the city council. Mr. Romo. My name is Alex Kurtzman. I'm director of airports and ground infrastructure at the National Business Aviation Association. I am speaking on behalf of the association.
Speaker 2: Which represents the interests.
Speaker 4: Of over 11,000 member companies that rely on general aviation aircraft. Those members include numerous tenants and users of the Long Beach Airport who continue to be strongly interested in the airport's future accessibility and viability. And Bay supports the efforts to restore CBP services to users of Long Beach Airport. The facility would be an asset to the airport with positive effects propagating beyond the city of Long Beach. In addition to presenting the airlines at the Long Beach with the ability to service a more diverse set of originating cities, the CBP services will allow Long Beach's vital general aviation component to operate more efficiently and with less impact on the environment while benefiting the local economy. Statistics from numerous airports, such as the neighboring Van Nuys Airport that have recently introduced the CBP facility, consistently prove that the addition of CBP does not result in a dramatic increase in general aviation activity. There would also be no change in the generation fleet mix for aircraft utilizing Long Beach. As a result, the majority of aircraft that would be utilizing the facility are already arriving at Long Beach as their final destination. However, because of CBP services are not currently available, these aircraft must interrupt their return to Long Beach in order to clear customs at another airport. The environmentally sensitive and safety conscious vote to bring customers to Long Beach would benefit local businesses and based aircraft returning home. Voting yes would reduce the risk associated with additional operations, improve efficiency and reduce environmental impacts while bringing income and economic benefits to Long Beach. The additional fuel sales deliver services, business growth and local job opportunities.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Hi, I'm Marshall Teskey, and I wanted to thank the mayor and the city council for all the work that you've done on this. I know that you're only part time. You're only getting part time salaries. Most of you. And I think you should be a full time council, but that's a whole other issue. So I'm a resident of Bixby Knolls and I'm on the steering committee of the Long Beach Area Peace Network. We do not usually take issue pick take positions on neighborhood issues like this. We're interested in stopping the endless wars. We have vigils on our in Belmont Shore on the weekends. And we want to control military recruiters who convince schoolchildren to join the military without knowledge of their parents. We also believe we believe that the customs facility and the international flights at the airport will open the door to changing the noise ordinance. And every time there's been a change in the noise ordinance at the airport, the airlines have gone to federal court and they've had expensive lawyers and they've defeated us. Although Bixby Knolls is a upscale neighborhood, given the economic decline of 2008, the slow recovery, my neighbors depend on this retirement for their own, this money, which is in their homes for their retirement. So Long Beach Area Peace Network believes that this is just another attack by corporations on working people and middle class people. And the unintended consequences of this proposed facility will be the loss of property values in a stable and desirable area of Long Beach. So that's pretty much why we're we opposed it. And I just wanted to thank the council for for what they've done. And thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Please.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Council Mayor Garcia, Vice Mayor Richardson for letting us speak. I'm going to keep this a little brief. I have a pre-written speech. And if you're a Bernie supporter or you know about Bernie, this is going to sound a little repetitive, but I think it's important. Let me begin by saying that this country is moving rapidly towards an oligarchic form of society in which the lives and decisions of so many are made by the few at the top. And one of the things that's tough love to preach is the trickle down theory, you know, where we all try and help out the very rich so they will turn in turn trickle down benefits to us. And if you think that ideology has no place in modern day discussion, you'll be quite surprised to hear that it's far from the truth. Case in point, this discussion today. Think about it. A huge, wealthy multinational corporation, JetBlue, which makes millions of dollars in profits a year, comes on down to our local government and demands that we construct an f i f f i s facility, which mostly benefits JetBlue all so that the benefits trickle down to us. And we decided to take them so seriously that we spent hundreds of thousands of dollars. Hosted many discussions. Spent hundreds of hours calculating data here and assessing success rates there. And over a year of mulling over a decision and all that time and all that money got spent over one single question Is it wise for us to get involved getting to to turn international? And the reason we did all that wasn't because we were having an issue about it not being international. We didn't have a big outrage. In fact, we have an outrage because it's even being talked about. The only reason this is being brought up is because a big giant corporation decided to to talk about it. And I think that's a big testament to our political system right now, that the fact that the only reason really we're talking about this is because a big giant corporation tells us that we need to talk about it . Let's focus on actual issues like pushing for more infrastructure reform, pushing for prison system reform, where we can actually work with prisoners and not, you know, ostracizing them. There are so many issues we should be certainly discussing, but a multinational corporation says no thank you. So please do not let the airport happen.
Speaker 4: Next speaker, please. That was Sterling.
Speaker 6: Raichlen, folks. I'm David Raichlen, and I'm a long time resident of Long Beach. I'm a business owner here. I'm a physician. I volunteer and do a lot of things to help the local community. And I was truly heartened that.
Speaker 4: Councilwoman Mongeau made a motion that's before the council. And I truly.
Speaker 6: Commend her and the rest of the council for considering that motion. And I hope that it passes. I think that that will, at least for now, set this issue to rest.
Speaker 3: But I also wanted to comment on an observation I made that.
Speaker 6: A few days ago, Mayor Garcia gave this wonderful state of the city speech, and I was there, and maybe some of you were there, too. And it was full of progressive.
Speaker 4: Policies and programs that were already in motion, as well as ones that.
Speaker 3: Are happening as we, as we.
Speaker 6: Speak, are in the near future that benefit the.
Speaker 4: Whole city.
Speaker 6: And as I was sitting there listening to his wonderful presentation with all the graphics, etc..
Speaker 8: The FISA facility just.
Speaker 4: Kept popping up in my mind. Why are we even considering something so regressive where the benefits go.
Speaker 6: To a few? While the risk and harms that are certain.
Speaker 4: To happen are going to be borne by the entire.
Speaker 8: City.
Speaker 6: So I urge you to vote for the benefit of the entire city. And I think that the simple way to do that is to vote yes on the motion before you. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hi. My name is Tony Pearson.
Speaker 8: I'm in the District five.
Speaker 0: I've lived in.
Speaker 10: Long Beach since.
Speaker 8: 1980.
Speaker 10: My daughters.
Speaker 8: Went to school here and all of.
Speaker 10: That stuff.
Speaker 8: I'm not really concerned with the noise because of where I live. I feel sorry for anyone that has that problem. But looking at the Jacobs feasibility study, we were looking at it and it says here that the.
Speaker 10: Study describes the area surrounding areas as businesses, multi business, parks.
Speaker 8: Warehousing and hospitality.
Speaker 10: Now I don't know, but I.
Speaker 8: Live two blocks.
Speaker 0: Over from.
Speaker 8: The airport and I live in a.
Speaker 0: Housing track. And if you go two blocks.
Speaker 10: On almost any area in or around the airport, you're in housing. You are not in any of these businesses or multi parks or whatever.
Speaker 8: Okay. So all of us, we don't have any.
Speaker 0: Type of security.
Speaker 8: If you look at.
Speaker 10: L.A.X., if you look at John.
Speaker 8: Wayne, they all have a lot of these businesses and everything with them, which has security or they have gated communities. Now those people have a.
Speaker 0: Security force.
Speaker 8: That protects their.
Speaker 0: Property. Who is going to protect us.
Speaker 8: When we.
Speaker 10: Have international people? And I see.
Speaker 8: JetBlue is going to be going to Mexico and Central America.
Speaker 10: That's their first.
Speaker 0: Choice.
Speaker 8: Who is going to protect our people? Are you going to add more Long Beach.
Speaker 0: Police to patrol our areas.
Speaker 8: So that we don't have to worry about our property and our lives? That's a question that I.
Speaker 0: Would like answered. Okay. And I see.
Speaker 10: Everybody looking at me like, oh, that's not a problem.
Speaker 8: But it is to me. Okay.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, ma'am. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hi. I am a student at Long Beach. And, um. Sorry. Um, I actually have some concerns because, um, residents also were from Lakewood and they had no idea about this meeting. Um, so in the Jacobs study, they do say that the Long Beach Airport borders the city of Lakewood. Yet I do not know if any public outreach was done to residents beyond the city of Long Beach. Um, also in addition, um, we did see some of the students and I, we did see that there was a comment with, for this agenda and it closed at 4:00 today. How are those comments being interpreted in your guys's decisions? Um. Another, um. Another aspect that some of the students are concerned about is that Long Beach City is an open access area. It is patrolled by campus police. But if you have international airports coming in and you have the FAA. Yes, but the Jacobs study, it was saying that some of the exposure is a minimal risk and that some quantities is basically okay because it's kind of. Um, it's much lower than the ports. But for us, the safety of the community, even a minor risk is a risk and it's too much. Also, um. We also are concerned about. Um. The districts, even though the routes for the Lakes and the Ontario and John Wayne are international, we do not see the benefits of having another international airport. Why are not the airports? Why are not JetBlue considering destinations that are in the United States? Some of us actually come from other states to go to school. So we would like to visit our families during the holidays more often.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Just to wrap it up, thank you so much.
Speaker 0: And also, L.A.X. has a benefit of having the Metro Transit for the Green Line. And I know the Jacobs study was talking about some of the bus routes, but it's a more convenience and it's a better avenue through the green line. So we do not believe that residents and people would be using LA Long Beach more than L.A.X. or John Wayne. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. And just so you know, that the the the comments that you're referring to, so everyone everyone everyone gets some. So when they close, they get sent over to the city council. So we are a copy of the comments. Oh no. Yeah. Before the meeting we had comes before the meeting starts.
Speaker 3: Before.
Speaker 0: Was really quick in an.
Speaker 2: Hour. We get them all place on our desk. Thank you. And we get them, by the way, as they come in. So it's not all just set one. A lot of them are done as they come in. Next.
Speaker 1: Next speaker is mayor, members of the city council. Good evening and thank you for enduring this tonight. I appreciate the fact that you're willing to to face these tough decisions. My name is Perry Bannerman. Residents of the Los Altos area. The one thing that I appreciate most about this city, more so than the diverse neighborhoods, more so than Second Street or the beach or the port, is the civic pride that that people have in the communities willingness to engage in matters like this, as evidenced really tonight. And and as a community, I think we all understand that. We have the best interests of the city in mind and we want to see the airport succeed and we want to see a major employer succeed as well. But what I would like in this project, too, is what Metro might face when you're considering expanding light rail into a built out community or a built out city. People live here. They're entrenched here. They've they've lived here for generations. And as members of the city council, I think that you need to remember that when you're faced with this difficult decision. You have the responsibility to maintain the quality of life of the residents. We're the first to be approved tonight. I think that in the short term, you might not notice that much of a difference, maybe some rejiggering of schedules, maybe some added flights, but all still staying within the thresholds in the noise ordinance. But I think there's far too much emphasis being placed on the protective abilities of the noise ordinance. And really that's as evidenced by the conclusion of the FAA and the city attorney's office. One successful challenge to the noise ordinance by a competing airline claiming barriers to entry could absolutely collapse the noise ordinance. Is that speculation? No, I don't think so. I think it's just natural progression. What I would call the approval of the FISA court is the thin edge of the wedge. It's a seemingly minor.
Speaker 4: Change.
Speaker 1: That begins a major development and a potentially undesirable one. I urge you to vote no tonight. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Please.
Speaker 2: We've got our final three speakers, which I know we cut off the speaker's list with the last gentleman. Four speakers. I'm sorry about that. Please go.
Speaker 0: Ahead. I'd like to urge all I would like to urge you to please vote no on the airport. International expansion. I reside on 5215 East Eagle Street District four, which is directly under the Long Beach dissent flight path. There have been numerous, numerous times on the airlines have violated the noise ordinance. And I'm a homeowner, I'm home owner, and I have a son with autism. And the noise has consistently affected our evenings past 10 p.m., which is detrimental to our family life. We have lived in our neighborhood for the diversity community and so that my son can attend the autism program at Bixby Elementary. We love our neighborhood and understand the financial benefit of the airport, but I also find it unacceptable for airlines to violate the noise ordinance, which affects the relationship between the residents and the businesses. The international flights will bring more planes and more instances of possibly breaking the flight ordinance. And although they say the room might be a dramatic difference, it's still a difference that negatively affects me and my family. Please vote no for the benefit of my family and the families in the neighborhood.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Mr. Scopo.
Speaker 3: Sir Joe Soper, Fifth District. I wanted to thank all of the volunteers, all the neighbors that came out tonight to let you know how they felt about this issue. Many of them took off from work early. Some of them even called in sick to be here on time. And this is the way we do things. It's real important. Democracy in action. There is a elephant in the room, though. One, there is a JetBlue violates our noise ordinance frequently. JetBlue is a wonderful organization. I take it all the time. Every time I can fly out. But. Last year in the last 12 months they that they violated the noise between 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. 133 times. That means a young lady who just spoke in front of me with the children that went over the top of her house 133 times last year, between 11 p.m. and seven in the morning. If you all said when you were elected that you were going to protect the noise ordinance, I believe that that's part of your protecting the noise ordinance. Just because they pay a fine doesn't mean you're protecting the noise ordinance. They really ought to stop doing that. And quite frankly, had they stopped doing that, if if JetBlue actually fought for the noise ordinance or protected or didn't violate the noise ordinance, we may have a different outcome here tonight. But but that that's not a you wouldn't award a child, one of your children, for doing something badly. You wouldn't give them something positive. And they really that's what it comes down to. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Your next speaker, please.
Speaker 0: Hello, Mayor and City Council. My name's Laurie Smith. I'm a longtime resident and homeowner in Long Beach. I'd like to thank the city council members for their wisdom tonight, as I do not support a customs facility or making our airport into an international facility. I'm grateful to my third district councilwoman, Susie Price, as well as to Councilman Supernormal Durango and Austin, who represents our L, represents the district of which my in-laws live, who are directly under the flight path. When we speak about fiscal responsibility, we need to always speak first about property values. As someone else mentioned earlier, property taxes are the main moneymaker for the city of Long Beach. So if we are ever to speak about the economic development for Long Beach, it's important to understand that bad development decisions are what bring down property values which will bring down Long Beach economy. I wanted to speak about the decision to even higher Jacobs Engineering, who produced the fire study. There are frightening number of lawsuits against Jacobs engineering in recent years. Here's just 2nd May 2015. San Bernardino County High sued Jacobs Engineering for their Desert Detention Center expansion project. They're seeking 13.6 million in damages. And this is in violation of their duty of care. They were negligent and carelessly perform their work under the agreement and caused delays and setbacks. In 2016, an article about the toxic waste cleanup crews in Tennessee who were led to believe that their the ash sites were safe. JACOBS Engineering was accused of misleading workers about the safety, air monitoring and safety safety training, among other allegations. Is this the type of company our city entrusts with providing accurate information regarding such important decisions? I like to ask that the City Council ask for monies back as they did not fulfill their contract in presenting at the City Council study session. Part of their city council study session was to present the study, and I was confused and disappointed with the city's decision to have the airport director, our airport director, a city staff person, give the customs field facility presentation. It was not appropriate and Jacobs did not have a representative in the audience. I would need another minute. As you said, they had their representative in the audience and he had previously given this presentation. So the next time we're here at City Council discussing the airport, I'd like it to be when City Council brings an airport community roundtable to the vote. Having a community roundtable will help with the ongoing questions and concerns that we have. We, your constituents have regarding the airport that you manage, as we have experienced here, this issue the community has no ability to discuss with staff's airport staff or city staff unless it's here in front of you. The current Airport Advisory Commission only discusses operations and does not address community concerns. Not to mention, they're under investigation for conflict of interest issues. Tonight I was asked by city. Tonight I asked city manager staff about the airport master plan, which I thought was going to be made in a presentation to City Council, but it was merely filed. So please, may I suggest to City Council that we make this airport master plan available via via your city council newsletters next door or place on a future. Thank you. Council meeting. Thank you so much.
Speaker 4: Thank you. No final speaker, please. Okay. Down to the last one. Mary Garcia, council folks. First, I want to thank Al Austin for being one of the first to support the opposition of the terminal and all the other council members who have opposed it. As time has gone on. Now, a couple of things. I want to regurgitate what others have said, but I was a little confused. And a JetBlue pilot this evening said that there'd be no loss of domestic flights. But earlier somebody said that the utilization had hit full capacity recently. So those two comments don't agree. So I'm not sure who's correct there. JetBlue wants to increase jobs, bring jobs to us. Maybe they should buy Boeing airplanes. JetBlue only flies Airbus aircraft. Just wanted to point that out. And then a gentleman from the Chamber of Commerce stated the jobs will come from international with the international terminal and flights. But when those jobs just be taken away from the other airports, I can't see that we're bringing any other folks in internationally, maybe just taking them from other airports. I live on on all of Avenue and Al's district there. I have a recording studio, so the sound and the noise affect me greatly. Well, thank you all for your patience, for listening to all 45,000 of us this evening. And I'm sure you're going to all do the right thing if you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you very much. And thank you all for. For being respectful of all the speakers and everyone's points of view. That's really important in these discussions. So I'm going to take this back now to the city council, because we do have some comments in discussion and I want to make sure that we do these fairly . So let me just go and go down the speakers list and then we will go back around first. First round gets everyone that hasn't had a chance to speak yet and then we'll go back around to those that have had a chance already. So let me start with that list. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 5: Well, thank you, Mr. Mayor. And wow, I just want to thank all of the residents who came out and worked very, very hard, contacted my office, contacted the other council members, but really, really made your voice heard over the last couple of weeks and over the last two years over this process. And particularly, I'd like to turn to first say that I'm speaking in support of the receive and file motion. I think it's the right thing to do. I want to thank Councilmember Mongo and Price for bringing forth this motion, for being very thoughtful and getting to the right decision, which I believe. I want to thank council members Virunga and Supernova for being steadfast partners throughout this two year process. These gentleman stood solid and never wavered. And so for that, I very much appreciate your. We reached a smart decision. Our hope we're going to reach a smart decision tonight due in large part to a very measured and transparent process . I've always talked about the process, and the process has to be right, making sure that we're transparent, making sure that our residents are engaged and know all that we know that goes into the decision making. These residents, in my opinion, have shown that and shown that big time. When you have come forth and spoke, spoken, you know, as much as most of the staff knows about airport issues, I was speaking to somebody earlier today and I talked about the residents in my district. Right. I said I've knocked on every just about every door in the district and talked to many of my voters and residents throughout the eighth district. And generally, I can find several airport experts on every block. Right. Folks know this issue. They know it inside out. They've studied it. And they've they've lived with it for for many years. And that's something that, as a council, I'm glad tonight that we are we're showing some respect for. I want to thank the airport staff for their diligence and professionalism throughout this process, although I don't agree with the staff recommendation this evening. I do appreciate their efforts. I've worked and had the opportunity to work with five airport directors since being elected to the city council four and a half years ago, and that includes two interim directors. But this at this point, I want to just just say I'm very impressed with Mr. Jess Romo, our airport director. And I really hope that he enjoys a long career here in Long Beach. I think we can do a lot of great work together. He was hired during a very chaotic time. He has navigate it, I think, admirably. Admirably. So. Let's give him a big hand as well. We heard a lot from our JetBlue employees who certainly have an interest in the future of their company. And I appreciate really what JetBlue represents. And I think most of our residents here in the city are proud that you choose to call Long Beach home and you operate from our city. Our municipal airport is a thriving airport at capacity. All 50 flights slots are being utilized today, and that's largely because of JetBlue's commitment to Long Beach. A Through I flew through into Long Beach on on Long Beach Airport on Saturday, this past Saturday. And the terminal was completely full when I came in. That is a testament and it tells me more than anything that that it's working today. Right. The airport is working today. And if we're at capacity and we're talking about capacity that go into international flights or an F, I guess what would actually just invite more chaos in the future? And I'd be remiss if I did not take my eight district staff. Jonathan, Melody, Monique, Heather. They they have been there for my residents. They have endured it. They have. They've taken it on the chin because they pick up the phone. And I don't. They've responded to the residents. And I think they should be. We owe them a great deal of gratitude for their excellent service to the eighth District, but to the city of Long Beach as well. This has been a very tough and rocky road. When I assumed office four and a half years ago, I was good on the airport front. I did not see this coming, but I think we as a city council, I can certainly tell say that me as a city council member, I'm stronger because of this process. I'm more attuned to my district as a result of this process. And, you know, I'm I don't want to see it happen again. I can tell you I don't think we can we can go another decade or two without dealing with this type of turmoil. And drama. But but I think it was a great exercise for our community to see the hundreds of people who have turned out here over the last couple of years. I started small and it's grown and grown. And this crescendoed to standing room only crowd here this evening. I want to commend you for your work and your your your dedication. The fact that it shows that the eighth District, the fourth District at Long Beach is a community. You know, our residents are talking to one another and our residents are pretty well organized. So I salute you all for your efforts. Ray Gavlak. You know, we had to go take a process here to get there. Here. I do appreciate your your leadership and your efforts on this and your many years of leadership on the issue. I mean, some of you guys are get this, but I owe you a box of chocolate. Less. That's it. I think this this council is going to get to a good place this evening. I want to also recognize the steady leadership and the steady hand of Mayor Garcia in this regard. He has he has he. You know, I didn't know where he was on this, quite frankly. And I still don't know where he is. But he has led this council in a manner that that has allowed us to get to a place. And I think this council as a whole also has grown up over this this process as well. And so I want to salute my colleagues for for really, really taking this issue to heart. You know, it was very frustrating early on. I mean, I was the individual that called for the very first study session about the the noise ordinance. Right. Because none of us on this council were here when that that noise ordinance came manifested when none of us were here in 1989 and 1991. And so it's been a steady process. I do appreciate everyone's patience. I haven't been the easiest person to live with over the last year, year and a half, because of this issue. But I can tell you that I will be celebrating, hopefully with my residents tonight and the rest of the eighth District will be celebrating, hopefully a decision made this evening. So thank you very much. I'll hold my comments for now.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilmember.
Speaker 9: Councilmember Gringo Councilmember Austin whispered to me a little while ago. I don't know what I'm going to say. He wrote all that in 15 minutes. Guess I should bring my laptop with me. I still don't know what I was going to say, but I will say this. I came armed tonight with the Jacobs study, the Airport Advisory Committee study, with the Economic Development Commission study, with the staff presentations, including the one made tonight. I came here prepared with a number of questions and and a statement. All of that done. I don't need it tonight because I think that the courage that was expressed tonight by Councilmember Mongeau and Price in making this motion set it off for me. Many people who follow the city council know that when I talk about study sessions, I'm pretty much against them. I think they're a waste of money. I think that the conversations take away from from the activity and the actions that we need to take. However, I did strongly encourage that we make this study available and accessible to everybody because we all needed to hear what the feasibility study was going to bring forward. We all needed to evaluate it. We all needed to process it. We all needed to really understand what a fierce facility would mean to Long Beach. And that came out. And I'm very happy that we were able to do that because we were able to now come together and look at that study with under the same microscope and come up with the same conclusions. I want to thank the audience, the residents of Long Beach and, of course, the Jet Blue, the representatives who are here, labor who's here. They brought their perspectives and we needed to hear that. We need to hear all of those perspectives, because without that, we have no basis upon which to make a decision, because we need to bring all that together in order to come up with a decision that will be not only right for the city, but right for the region. And I think this is right for for what we have to do tonight. And I will be supporting the motion, because I think it's one that has the most impact for our city. You know, when we look we talk about Long Beach, we talk about neighborhoods, we talk about Bixby Rose Highlands, Bixby Terrace, Wrigley West, Long Beach . Those are my district. But then there's Los Altos and Naples and El Dorado Estates, and there's many, many Hellman over here. So, I mean, there's I could go through every district and point out neighborhoods that are that are important there and how important it is for the residents in those neighborhoods to come out and express their views and express their their likes and dislikes as well as to what's happening in their district. And many of us here in the council, myself included, I came up through the neighborhood associations. I learned about my city through the neighborhood association. So those of you who are here, I want to thank you for your participation there and those of you out there in the audience. If you're not a member of your neighborhood association, get to be a member. That's how you learn a lot about Long Beach. We might be half a million people. 483,000 or whatever. And and change. But we are what we call an international hometown. And we're going to stay that way. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember. Next up is council member supernova.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mayor Garcia. My comments will be very brief tonight. I say it's time to move our trays up to the upright in lock position. But actually, I'm going to be brief because of that wonderful speech Councilwoman Pryce gave me. I know. Two quick one on my head. So thank you for that. And also, I don't want to speak too long because this is your night, folks in the audience and all those who email list and and persevered over this long period of time. As they say, it's great to win one once in a while. And this a great night. I'll be supporting this motion. If I hadn't communicated that yet. And. And like my colleagues mentioned, I really want to thank Councilwoman Pryce and especially Councilmember Mongo. It just took a lot of courage to do what she did over the past weeks. And we really appreciate her support tonight. I also want to thank staff and Jess Romo. You mentioned Dale Worsham and thank him for his work, but you didn't mention he's a fourth District resident, so I wanted to add that too. And also, I see Ron Reeves up there. For those you don't know Ron Reeves or Ryan McMullen, they email me nightly to tell me when the late flights are coming in. And that's, I think, above and beyond the call of duty. But, Ron, you better take off pretty soon. You're going to have to check those flights and send me an email. So, again, thank you very much. If you have time, we have a community meeting tomorrow at 5 p.m. at Los Altos Library and we'll go over this. I won't be going to Councilmember Mungo's gay club for that reason, but you can head over there after my community meeting. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Councilmember. Thank you, Councilmember. Next up is Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. I want to really say how much I respect and honor my colleagues on the council for having this process be meaningful for them, for their constituents, for everybody is a part of the process. And so I know that this is a item that has been really important to people long before I got on this council. And I have to say that in my six months on council, it is the toughest vote that I have had to take and that it has been a coming to this council with an idea where I felt like I was with the airport to taking a almost four hour tour of the airport and learning about all of the small businesses that operate out of there and the impacts that that airport has on our greater economy was eye opening for me. I have received many of your emails, some of them nice, some of them, you know, exciting. And I also wanted to comment that the the emails that we received, the comments that we received, I did go through and read each one of them. There are 56 and there are 29 of them in support of the FISA facility. I know that it is really difficult for you all that live in the flight path. And so I want you guys to know that I heard you tonight. I appreciate all of your efforts in really making sure that you push your council members to be the best representative for you. Whichever way I vote tonight, I just wanted to reiterate that I feel like there's a lot of information that's been provided. I do have a lot of questions, and I was hopeful that we would be able to get a lot of those questions answered in a meaningful way that would allow us to have vision as a great city. There are few times that we have a vote like tonight where we send a direction to where we want to go. So whatever happens tonight, I hope that we come back to a conversation about what kind of city we want to be. And to me, that is not about an international airport or not an international airport. It's about the process and the time that we take to get the facts straight. It's about a process and the time that it takes to make sure that we really get our questions answered before we bring something to a vote if it if we still have questions. And so those are a little bit of my comments. I definitely had a much longer thing around how we used to be an international airport and some questions around that. I had a lot of other questions about how many flights, you know, we are circling other airports, how many we divert, how many we don't. But I wanted to just say, I really appreciate being a part of this process, and I'm really honored to be able to take this vote tonight and really respect all of my colleagues and their leadership on this. So thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman. Next up, I have Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you. My first of all time. I'm here because I'm not going to try to be brief. I'm not going to try to be long. I'm just going to try to be to the point and being that is, I just want to sit here and say that as I listen to a lot of all of you individuals here tonight, I went upstairs, I went to sleep. I woke up, came back down. Because the fact that I think this is a very important, you know, item, and I really want to commend Mrs. Mango because the fact that I sit and watch her being snubbed the first time she came up with this, but she was steadfast. And that's one thing I like about this is price. I definitely want to commend you for supporting that agenda. But me, myself, I think there's times in the community which I live in, I think of jobs. Jobs in me is the most important thing in my district because I always said a job will stop a bullet . And this is one thing. When I look at JetBlue, when they talk about jobs, I think they talk. Going by the community which I live in, I probably will be the only one who will vote against this because the fact that I feel like what I'm doing, I'm doing it for the betterment of my district. And not only that, but I think JetBlue is doing things where a lot of you think, well, you know, the f f aside, they you know, when they talk about what they're doing, that could be or that could not be. But I would just hope that if that ever comes back to this, because you already have the votes, I know and would be the only one to do that. But tonight I'm going to stand on what I believe in. And I just hope that JetBlue will really take some time. If you are going to be here, don't leave. Stick around. One day this will come to fruition for you and for all of us. So I want to thank every one of you. And that's it. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilmember. Next up, we have Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 0: Yes. I want to thank everybody for the fruitful discussion. I know we all been here for not just a few hours, but just for the past couple of years that we've been discussing this and as a resident, but also a representative of downtown. I'll be very honest, I think I've said this in the past, and a lot of our residents in downtown, they're not directly impacted. They were supportive of looking at the office study facility and looking at what the possibilities might be. However, I know personally that if I were in your shoes, I'd feel very differently. I've listened to each and every one of you. I know how passionate each and every one of you are on this issue. And I haven't said much because I'm sitting back and I'm listening and observing what everyone has to say. And I completely realize that my my council colleagues have they've done a lot. They put in a lot of work. And many of us on the council, although I know I personally wasn't at meetings, I was certainly listening. I've met with many stakeholders to learn a little bit more about the issue, both on the JetBlue side and both in residents, and listening to my residents and hearing all of this and compiling the information together to make the best decision tonight. And so I will be supporting my colleagues and in supporting the residents as well, all of you, in ensuring that we, you know, can understand your needs. But I also know that, you know, JetBlue is an incredible business for us here in the city. Does that mean that, you know, it will go away tomorrow? I hope not. But I think that we have certainly a wonderful airport here in the city working for a private sector employer, one of the largest tech employers in the country, Microsoft. I actually tell a lot of our executives to come in to Long Beach. And so I know that in the future we will have opportunities for better businesses to be around the airport. I know we will have opportunities for jobs to be around the airport. And I just thank you all very much for your your time, your your passion, and just for allowing us to listen to you. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman. Next up is Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And this has been an interesting a really interesting last two years. And, you know, I've heard the word change of heart. And I didn't hear a change of heart tonight because for the most part, you know, I want to acknowledge, Stacey. And, you know, the second year, the motion and the council members who led this, you know, there's been a consistent request to sort of go through the process and keep an open mind until the appropriate time to make a decision. And that's come out numerous times along this campaign. And Stacey, I think I might need to rearrange my schedule to change your Gugulethu. Sounds like going to be a heck of a party. Sometimes you do want to allow discussion for process to develop so you can make a good decision. And I got to plot 2 to 3 council members really led this because the fact is, you know, I would like to liken this to Ali versus Foreman. These guys were on the ropes for a while. But I mean, this is this is a heck of a finish. I got to tell you, Staff, you guys have done a fantastic job reciting the questions, attending meetings as as recent as just this last Thursday with the Forest Park neighborhood. And like Leanna, in my conversations with the district, my residents really have seen very little impact. And, you know, they haven't expressed one way or the other. I literally heard one person shout out the ninth District tonight. But, you know, we do read what everybody said and look through it. And my residents haven't felt strongly one direction or the other. And so, you know, every time that the council has been proposed with an option to, you know, look at this or extend it so the fourth issue could be sat or explore the feasibility have typically taken the position to go ahead and advance and move to the next step so we can better understand this. And I want to thank my residents for allowing like giving me the cover to make a real value proposition discussion rather than a political or emotional discussion about the facts. And we did look at the facts in the Jacobs study, and I did evaluate it. And the impact there is minimal economic impact and a minimal a minimal impact to the neighborhoods. And so the question is, is that, you know, is that enough to really have a value proposition about where to go, you know, to, you know, JetBlue? They've answer my questions. They've been available to me, to the folks, the workers who have who have come up and spoken tonight. I think, you know, you make very good, very strong points. But I think we've demonstrated that we do support local hire. We do support infrastructure and investment, and we've demonstrated that over the last two years. And so to the residents who I spoken with as early as last night and this morning from, you know, allies, fraternity brothers, different people, I'll just say as a leader, sometimes there's a time to lean in. Sometimes there's a time to step back and listen. We step back, step back and listen. And the residents simply don't want this. And so that's going to be my vote tonight.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you very much, Vice Mayor. Everyone's had a had a chance to speak. So I'm going to I'm going to say a few comments and then we'll go back and there's some folks that want to speak again. And so we'll definitely go through that. So everyone gets a chance to to speak to. It's a big decision. So we want to make sure everyone gets a chance to to give their opinions. I think it's really important, first of all. And I want to make sure that I do this tonight, because I think it's really important to think a few key folks and some of which have not been been mentioned tonight, but their work should be recognized. Mr. WEST And to the airport staff and to Mr. Romo and to I see a few folks that actually work out at the airport work very hard as managers or as folks at work, either as affiliates with JetBlue or others that are just there working with our planes or we are in the retail division. I just want to thank all of them for consistently operating what is one of the best airports in the country. We love our airport. They do a great job. And and I think, like all of you, we love reading about how the Long Beach Airport has the best food or it has. It's always ranked one of the best airports it's easier to get in and out of. And I think that's all true. And so that when that wouldn't happen, it just doesn't happen overnight. It happens because you guys work so hard. It also happens because a lot of you. Many of them I've known for a long time have worked to make the airport what it is today. And so I want to thank all of you for doing that as well, because we have the airport we have today and the terminal that we had in the concourse that we have today, because a lot of you fought for it and a lot of you were vocal throughout many years to get us to the point where we are today. And so can we please give a round of applause to our airport staff because they deserve a round of applause. You know, I also to the to the 700 crewmembers of JetBlue. I said it before and I'll say it again. Thank you for working for a company that that came into Long Beach when it was a difficult time. I know I and I think hopefully everyone here wants to continue to support in your efforts here in the city in providing, as you know, great service to most of the folks here that use JetBlue as a as a great airline and a great and a great service. And we want to continue to work with you, particularly on on issues that matter to to our residents. But thank you to the 700 crew members that make Long Beach home or a place to work. We appreciate your your commitment to the city. But you know, the one of the unsung heroes that hasn't been mentioned yet and I don't know anyone that's put in more work, you know, and I know that not everyone agreed with him all the time, but him and his team worked incredibly hard. And that is our city attorney's office to guide this process for the last two years and try to provide advice to the council, to the community. And I know that Mr. Parkin and Mr. Mays and the entire team worked very hard on this as well. I just want to say thank you, Charlie, and your team for for working so hard on this process. That's very important. And and then finally and I'm going to say something about Miss Mango at the end, but I do want to say thank you to all the residents. There's some of you particular that have been relentless, and I appreciate that. I think and I want to say it's is it Mike? You know, Mike, you and I talk that a snow day like, gosh, two and a half years ago. And, you know, and I I've never forgotten that conversation. You know, I appreciate what you told me that day. And I just want you to know that that's all that stuck with me since we had that conversation. I know that I'm not sure that roofing that Rick and Bruce are still here. Bruce has been my most vocal, consistent call phone caller and emailer on this topic for for probably the last year and a half. And they're great people, and they've had me in their home. And I just want to thank them and appreciate them for being so consistent in their in their advocacy as as residents. And. And I also want to just all of you I think we've received this council has received and I don't know if I can speak for everyone. I think I've received more correspondence on this issue than I probably have on any other issue. And from all sides, I've received correspondence from all of you. I received correspondence from employees and supporters of the terminal. And I want to thank all of them for being engaged in the process. To my friends in the labor, the labor unions, IBEW workers and those, you know that we are committed to local higher. This council has a I think a sterling record on project labor agreements and local hire and will continue to do so on all on the many projects that we will also build in the future. I finally I want to say to Councilman Mongo, she knows tonight that she has my support and I want to say that. Her process. And this has been difficult. And but I admire that she has done her homework, done her research, and she knows that I support her. As of last night, she was engaged in talking to residents, talking to constituents, listening. She asked a lot of questions. I know a few folks said that they she had a change of heart. I'm going to be honest with you. Stacey's never had a firm position. She's wanted to get information. She's wanted to move the process forward. But she's always mentioned to me and others that she wanted to get to this point to actually make a final conclusion. And she has made, as you all know, a conclusion on this process. And so I just want to thank Councilwoman Mungo for a process I know has been very difficult for her. But but for, I think to be leading the way that she leads. And I want to thank her for that. And let me just say one, one one final thing to the rest of the council members. I hope that, you know, I pledge to you very early that I will try to lead this process in a way that was fair, open, where everyone got a chance to give their their opinions, that we'd have opportunity for public input. And I hope we've been able to to do that in a way that was fair. Lastly, let me just say that on the issue of the noise ordinance, I believe that everyone in this room are united interests is to protect our noise ordinance. That is the single most important thing that we have at our airport. It's something that it's something that I have. I mean, I know I've been in many of your homes. I've talked to many of you. I know a lot of your friends. And I've pledged that to you years ago. And I continue to pledge that to you. And I know that our friends in the airport community also believe that protecting our noise ordnance is what makes our Long Beach airport such a great airport and so beyond after what happens tonight. And I think you've heard from folks about where this is, this is going to end up tonight. We're going to wake up tomorrow and live in the best city in the country and have the best airport anywhere in the country. And we're all going to work together to continue to make our airport the great place it is today and what we love so much about it. And I hope to will continue to work with JetBlue. We're going to continue to work with all of you. And and hopefully tomorrow is just another another great day in our city. And so I just want to thank you for for being positive tonight and for allowing the council to have the ability to go through this process and make a decision on a very important issue that these kinds of issues don't come before this body often . And so I want to thank you for giving them the ability to make to make their decision to make the right decision. So thank you very much. And with that, I'm going to turn this over now back to Councilwoman Price, Councilman Mongo, and then we'll go to a vote.
Speaker 11: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I'm going to I'm going to try to be very quick. But just so we're clear, when I seconded the motion, I spent all my time thanking everyone. And I think that the residents of my district deserve to understand my reasoning. So and I spent a lot of time on this, so please bear with me. I'll try to be quick about it. I have the luxury in this issue of knowing that this project would have serious direct impacts.
Speaker 0: For.
Speaker 11: But would not have serious direct impacts from most of my residents. For the most part, we are not under the flight path. We don't have major roadways that would become a route to or from the airport. Many of my residents rarely hear the planes arriving or departing, and most of them will not benefit financially from the addition of an international terminal. In moments like this, I have the unique role that I need to play in weighing the speculative benefits of a financial interest that may present in my district and other districts against a much clearer and obvious potential harm or detriment that would be felt by residents. Not in my district. Harms felt by residents who are kept awake late at night. By flights, by families who depend on noise, the noise ordinance to preserve their quality of life, by people who commute past the airport daily, and children as well as the retired people who breathe the just jet exhaust and are concerned about the dangers of that are serious concerns. The fears are simple to understand, and although we might say that they are unfounded or without merit, they are the issues of concern around dinner tables as families grapple with quality of life, property values and not things that we're talking about here in terms of economic success of the tourism industry in Long Beach, or the convenience of flying to Cabo San Lucas or Mexico. I have a family, and the best way I can grapple with this difficult issue is to put myself in other people's shoes and consider how my family would be affected with even the fear of potential harm. Putting myself in that mindset makes the weighing process a lot clearer for me, and that is the process that I have undergone. As council members, each of us is no stranger to making decisions that are at times at odds with some of some or even the majority of the residents in our districts. This situation, however, is very different when faced with those decisions in our neighborhoods, such as with a traffic enhancement for those who live in my district. We can generally push through that decision, knowing that the positive impact that we believe will happen will be realized despite the fears in a matter of weeks or sometimes even months. The situation is very different. If we as a council were to push through tonight and approve this, approve the FISA facility with the belief that the economic benefits are real and that the residents concerns are unfounded. The best case scenario for the positives to be realized by the residents is a year and a half before the city can point to any facts to say that the benefits are real and the harms are not. During that time, all of these residents are worried about their futures, their quality of life, their health, and what this change will mean for their families. This stress would be putting the residents most affected by this in a very difficult situation, and that reality is really hard for me to accept. Residents most impacted by this plan have, honest to God, fears and pressing concerns about how this will impact their daily lives. These concerns are more urgent and pressing than the possible economic benefits that are speculative in regards to our local economy. And I just want to say, reiterate what the mayor said and many of my colleagues said, I want the one thing I would ask our community is when issues like this happen, give us the benefit of the doubt, give us the bent, allow us to.
Speaker 0: Go through.
Speaker 11: The process. I can't tell you how many times people have come to this podium and implied that there is some financial benefit that we're going to have as a result of voting one way or the other. That's it's so offensive. I don't even know how to say that. It's so often to those of us some of us here have two jobs. We're trying to raise a family. We're trying to do good for our community. I've. I met with JetBlue once, and that was today in regards to this vote. Never accepted any money from them. So when people come up to the podium and they make these implications of this conspiracy and these financial benefits, it's really hurtful. It's really hurtful. And similarly, when people say things like this is, you know, you're doing this, you know you're going to vote against JetBlue because you're concerned about, you know , the politics of it, the political vote. Most of the residents in this room are not my residents. They don't live in my district. But you're part of this city and I represent this entire city. I represent your families, even though you're not voting for me. So, please, when we have dialog like this, I'm just telling you, you can say whatever you want when you come to the podium. But I'm just telling you really honestly, that there are things you can say that are said and heard with credibility and things that you can say that are totally offensive to those of us who are trying our very best do the best job that we can. So just think about that, because we're your neighbors. We are your neighbors. Our kids are going to school with your kids. We go through the same things that you all go through. We are one community. So the only thing I would say is this has been a really stressful vote, but that's okay. We take that on. We just want to make sure that our community understands that we're working hard. We're not always going to agree. And finally, as an attorney, I know we've talked a lot about this noise ordinance. I would hate to be the counsel that sets something into motion. That causes litigation. In regards to our no noise ordinance, I think for me, when it comes to the law in this regard, status quo is a good thing and it's not a risk that I want to undertake. So I thank you all for being here.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Councilwoman. And close us out. Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 10: I want to thank all of you for being here today. I'm going to make a personal ask. I know that many people. Over this last six months, not just on the airport issue, but in our presidential election and other things have said some mean and hurtful things online. And I challenge you to go home tonight. And press the delete button. And I challenge you the next time someone makes an accusation and says that they know how. One of us feels when one of us hasn't said that themselves to challenge that. It's easy to say You should do it this way or you should do it that way. I appreciate what Vice Mayor Richardson said. It's been a growing process. There are some of you who were at my meeting last night who had attended a meeting when I was first elected and when I was first elected. I didn't know how to run a meeting. I'd been on your side at community meetings. I've never had a roomful of people all yelling at me at once. And it takes time to figure out how to manage that process in a respectful way that I get to hear everyone's point and they get to articulate it, whether it's on a note card or getting up to a microphone.
Speaker 0: Or.
Speaker 10: Being respectful of each and every one of your time. Because there are there are key people who have spent a large amount of time on the phone with me. I appreciate Corliss, but also Carmen and Nancy. I think we've spent hours on the phone together and still after an email and calls and then you follow up with a handwritten note and all of that back and forth is a development of ideas that I hope throughout the way you understood that I was open minded and I understood that you were open minded. And I think that that's valuable and important, and I appreciate you for that. I remember Mike and John at Snow Day at Darrell's for Snow Day and those dialogs by the snowman. And I thought that that was a very good step, but. With that. The people I've named were kind in that process, so I challenge each of you. The Internet has gotten so terrible, the accusations and the meanness doesn't produce anything, and all it does is take our neighbors offline and we need them online for the reasons that Councilmember Urunga talked about. We need our neighbors engaged in the community. So with that, I want to thank all of my colleagues. I appreciate the time that you've given me and the respect of the people who live in all the districts. I want to thank Councilmember Price and the mayor for pledging to meet me last night in the final hours until the wee hours of the morning after Councilmember Pryce had put her children to bed with their homework, I hope they woke up at seven and finished. And I want to thank all of you and I hope that you appreciate the way I appreciate our city attorney. I cannot tell you how much I have leaned on them in this process. How many questions I have asked. How many times I've called their cell phone at odd hours, including weekends and evenings, and no call is too early for them. I commute into work very early and they always take my call and I appreciate that because throughout the day I can think of the things that they said and compare them to the emails I'd read from residents the night before and really hash through in my mind that next step in my process. So thank you. Let's all make a commitment today that on every issue going forward we exemplify kindness. And I will do my best as well to do be as kind as I can, no matter what. And sometimes that means taking a step back. I hope that if you are available to celebrate tomorrow, we're supporting six local schools and charities at the Giving Gala that's on Facebook. I hope you'll consider it. I hope that in this discussion about the airport, you'll put a save the date on your calendar for the festival of flight, because this is a day that once a year we celebrate the airport as an asset. It is an asset and it's an important asset. And if it were ever at a point where it were running in the red, we we would be in a considerable amount of hurt. And so I hope that you'll mark down November 4th as the date that you will come. You will bring your family, you will eat from food trucks and go on bounce houses and admire the planes that are a big part of our community. And with that, I hope that my colleagues will. Oh, with one last plea to Dee Dee, that $3 million we would have spent, I promise will spend it on other construction at the airport and other jobs. So I hope you'll consider a vote yes, because it'll still be jobs. It'll just be different jobs. So with that, I hope that we'll get a full vote of.
Speaker 3: Council this week. Mayor. I appreciate that very much. Like I said, I love the way you. Like I say, you're steadfast and I like to say pray. You can't go in. You broke your vacation because they do have the votes. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. And with that members, please go ahead. The motion is on the Council on Mango motion to receive and file the FAA study and the the FAA proposal. Thank you.
Speaker 4: Oh.
Speaker 10: So a receiving file means that this matter is closed and no longer scheduled to be heard by this council. And we will not be moving forward on any plans to build or developed or plan or finance any part of an office facility at the Long Beach Airport.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that would.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 10: So you all want a yes vote?
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Sorry. Receiving follows like the legalese received from motion members. Please go and cast your votes.
Speaker 0: Motion passes.
Speaker 2: Caitlin from Paris. Thank you all.
Speaker 12: So much for. Oh.
Speaker 10: I moved to dismiss the meeting.
Speaker 2: We have almost done. Almost done. I just we're almost done with the meeting. I just need to do. If there's any new business announcements and then we'll go in and close after the.
Speaker 6: Public.
Speaker 2: Comment. Oh, I'm so sorry. You're absolutely.
Speaker 0: Right. Mayor. Item five.
Speaker 2: Oh, we're going to go back to the. Okay, then I'm just going to take a one minute recess to allow folks to exit, and then we're going to do the concert calendar item. The other public comment and the announcements. Thank you.
Speaker 3: All right. Bye, guys.
Speaker 4: Well, I think.
Speaker 3: They're.
Speaker 2: Okay. We're going to we need to continue the meeting. So I apologize if people can please just quietly, quietly exit so we can continue the meeting. And I'm going to do right now.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 2: Everyone can. Please quietly exit. I'm going to continue the meeting.
Speaker 3: You lose everybody. I think the.
Speaker 9: Worst thing you can do, you don't have a wife.
Speaker 2: We can go ahead and take the roll call, please.
Speaker 0: Councilwoman Gonzalez. Councilmember Pierce. Councilwoman Price. Councilmember Supernova. Councilwoman. Mango. Mongo. Councilman Andrews. Councilmember Ranga. Councilman Austin. Vice Mayor Richardson. Mayor Garcia.
Speaker 2: Here. If I can have the council, just take their seats. There's some folks have been waiting for a long time. We have. Mary. I believe it's Mary Gray. Manna manatees. Guadalupe Balderas are the first three speakers. I'm going to repeat those names. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to negotiate with interested Long Beach carriers or operators a financial agreement for the development of a Customs and Border Protection facility at the Long Beach Airport, subject to further City Council action approving the final terms and conditions of the agreement; and
Authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute and submit all documents necessary to the United States Department of Homeland Security for designation of the Long Beach Airport as a United States Customs and Border Protection User Fee Airport for the processing of aircraft, passengers and baggage arriving from outside the United States. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_01242017_17-0039 | Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you. Next is our. New business that was that was like, I'm going to do that more often. We have a number of oh, we have number five in the consent calendar, which we pulled. Councilman Price We can actually let's read the consent calendar item.
Speaker 0: Item five Report from Police Recommendation to receive and file the application of Tavern on two for an original ABC license at 5110 East Second Street, District three.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Councilman Price.
Speaker 11: Thank you. Commander LeBaron, can we just get a very brief staff report on this? Because this is an issue that's of concern to our residents and to our business community. Not concern, but you know what I mean. Interest.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm happy to do that. Honorable Mayor and City Council. Item five is an application for an original on sale. General ABC license for a restaurant. The police department. We've conducted the investigation. We do not anticipate any adverse impact with the issuance of the license. This business has already held a license, a different ABC license that allowed the sale of beer and wine since 2011. And that concludes my report and available for any questions.
Speaker 11: Thank you to my council colleagues. You'll note that we have filed several proposed conditions that we asked you to approve with this item. The conditions are really in line with the best practices that we have found to work in the Belmont Shore Business Corridor. And some of the highlights include patio dining has limited hours that are less than the time that the restaurant will be open and there are parameters in place in the conditions that will allow for a primary sale of food as opposed to alcohol or liquor. And so we wish this business all the best. They've been tremendous partners. And we we we hope that they succeed. And it's with a with a lot of positive hope for this particular business, thriving and expanding that. I ask my colleagues to support this item. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thank you. There's a motion and a second. Any public comment on this item? 39 Council Member Austin, do you have anything on your second? Nope. Council Member Mungo.
Speaker 10: I just want to say what a great business this is. They make the best hamburger on Second Street, according to the survey, and I strongly encourage everyone to go there and try roasting your own marshmallows on the dining room table with neighbors and kids. And it's just a great experience. It's the place we always go before the Belmont Shore Parade. So I hope that everyone will support this. It's a great business and they are just a very good group of people that work there.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Any public comment on this item saying none, please cast your votes.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Andrews. Motion carries eight zero.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And now we're out to new business council member Ringo. | ABC License | Recommendation to receive and file the application of Southern California Entertainment Group, LLC, dba Tavern On 2, for an original Alcoholic Beverage Control License, at 5110 East Second Street. (District 3) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_01172017_17-0028 | Speaker 4: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Thank you. We will have item number 13, please.
Speaker 0: Item 13 is a report from Parks Recreation, a marine and public works recommendation to adopt a resolution authorizing the city manager to submit to grant application to the California Youth Soccer and Recreation Development Grant Program for the Seaside Park Project and Phase two of the Davenport Park Project, District one and eight.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 4: Yes. Can we hear a staff report, please? Hi, Marie.
Speaker 3: Sure can.
Speaker 11: Marie Knight, our director of Parks, Recreation, Marine, will deliver a staff report.
Speaker 5: Good evening, Vice Mayor and members of the Council. The item before you tonight is to adopt resolutions authorizing staff to submit to grant applications to the California Youth Soccer and Recreation Development Grant Program, the California Youth Soccer and Recreation Event Development Grant Program, funded by the California Clean Water, Clean Air, Safe Neighborhood Parks and Coastal Protection Act of 2002 provides funds to acquire and develop neighborhood, community and regional parks and recreational areas for land, air and water conservation programs. The departments of Parks, Recreation, Marine and Public Works are requesting authorization to submit a grant application for $600,000 in grant funds to be used for Seaside Park Project and a grant application for $1 million in grant funds to be used for phase two of the Davenport Park Project. The Seaside and Davenport Park projects were identified as being the most competitive projects at this point for this grant funding source. Both of these projects meet the grant criteria of creating new opportunities for youth sports in underserved areas. They are both shovel ready.
Speaker 10: And have matching funds for non.
Speaker 5: Construction costs and include.
Speaker 10: A water conservation.
Speaker 5: Measure as part of the project. The Seaside Park Project.
Speaker 10: Well, convert.
Speaker 5: 0.4 acres of existing unsafe dirt sports fields.
Speaker 10: Into an artificial.
Speaker 5: Turf sports field.
Speaker 10: While the city council approved.
Speaker 5: Funding in the fiscal 2014 year and fiscal year, 15 adopted budgets is.
Speaker 10: Anticipated to be sufficient.
Speaker 5: The additional grant funding will supplement the Seaside Park project. Phase two of.
Speaker 10: The Davenport Park.
Speaker 5: Project.
Speaker 10: Includes a multi-use.
Speaker 5: Sports field perimeter walking path with exercise equipment.
Speaker 10: A shaded.
Speaker 5: Outdoor assembly area, space for necessary parking.
Speaker 10: And a new alignment and park entry off.
Speaker 5: Of 55th way. These two projects are in response to increased demand for soccer, football, baseball and softball programing in our community. And we're here to answer any questions.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 4: Yes. Thank you for the staff report, Marie. I have.
Speaker 10: A couple of questions and.
Speaker 5: I'm glad we are going.
Speaker 4: After as many grants as possible, especially in these two areas. So thank you for your work on that.
Speaker 5: Very quickly, I wanted to ask the supplement.
Speaker 4: This will supplement what has.
Speaker 10: Already been.
Speaker 4: Allocated. In what way will it supplement this scope of work?
Speaker 5: So we've had in the.
Speaker 10: 2014 fiscal year.
Speaker 5: There were a total of three soccer related projects that were.
Speaker 10: Partially funded. And so.
Speaker 5: As we look to build the first two, which.
Speaker 4: Are Seaside.
Speaker 10: And Admiral.
Speaker 5: Kidd, those will actually be coming to the council in a several weeks for award of that. Those projects.
Speaker 4: We looked at.
Speaker 5: Being more competitive with these grant funds. And so the funding.
Speaker 10: That is currently available, we utilize that as.
Speaker 4: Matching funds to supplement what the request was. Okay, great. I just wanted to make sure I was clear on that. And then the scope of work is just for the artificial turf. I know at some point we had.
Speaker 10: Talked about adding lighting. It's not for any of that.
Speaker 4: Would it just be the turf? Is that.
Speaker 10: Correct? Correct. The two grants themselves are for the fields, the athletic fields. They're not for anything.
Speaker 5: Else to do with either the two projects.
Speaker 10: Fields. Perfect. Thank you very much.
Speaker 4: Welcome.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman.
Speaker 9: Thank you. And I wholeheartedly support this this motion. I want to congratulate and thank Parks, Recreation and Marine for their efforts in identifying this grant. And Prop 40 has been very, very generous, particularly to urban areas throughout the state. I can recall working on that several years ago, phase two of Davenport Park. We're very excited about the possibilities there. I want to commend our city staff for their efforts to get us in a position that we are now shovel ready to to fulfill a promise that has been made for several years to the residents in a district in North Long Beach to complete phase two of Davenport Park. And so $1,000,000 will take us a long way, I think looking at Craig Beck, that will get us a park develop there. And we are now shovel ready, very close to getting there. And so this is very, very encouraging. So you have my full support and if I need to write a letter of recommendation or support, I'll be happy to do so as well.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I'll just add a comment that, you know, congratulations to both the council members on even embarking on this and to staff because both of these are in some of the most open space, disparate areas of town, and it's going to go a long way. Should these grants be awarded so best? Best of luck to both the council members and to the community. Is there any public comment on this item?
Speaker 4: Hmm.
Speaker 7: My name is Latoya Marcia.
Speaker 9: I come in as a concerned parent. I see a lot of funding going into these parks and recreation, all the grants to, you know, for the youth and none of the money gets spent the way that it's supposed to be spent. Yeah. I want $1,000,000 to do turf for a part. But you know, the.
Speaker 5: Community.
Speaker 9: The taxpayers, we all.
Speaker 4: Say, yeah, we want this.
Speaker 9: Because our kids are at these parks. But then when we go to these parks, we don't see new turf. We don't see new skyline. We don't see many of the things that the grants are supposed to be used for. I you know, I resided by Martin Luther King Park, and it was funding as opposed to went towards the Martin Luther King Day Parade all the way down to carnivals for the kids. And when Martin Luther Day Parade came, they didn't have anything at all for the youth or for the kids. So how is it that you guys, you know, make these suggestions every then you don't really even check in and see if these findings are going towards the place that they should be going. It seems like whoever is in his district. Is using the money or the finding for their own advantages, and it does not go to the community. So if we say, Oh yeah, go ahead and give these guys $1,000,000. What happens when the funding is not being placed in the parks, in the community like it's supposed to be done? Because you guys do not seem like you are being accountable for anything that I do. Regardless if you are covering the grants or not, it still should fall in your hands because you are supposed to be the ones that oversee the things and you do nothing about it. You are overlooking. They are just going on to the next agenda. If you are for the people, start being for the people, not for the money.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: I'd like I'd like to reintroduce Ms.. Marshall to you. She is a former Wilson High student, graduate of the Honor Roll two times honor roll student at Wilson High School. Before the tragedy struck, when she her mother passed and at a series of tragic events can happen. And you look up and you wonder if you can even remember your last name. So before we dismiss her, she is a Wilson High former student who is now speaking as a homeless citizen, still a part of Long Beach. And I agree. I didn't know what she was going to say, but I agree. If you can find money for the youth. The youth will one day be 30 years old and statistically speaking. A percentage of your youth will be homeless. How can you not have done more? To make sure that the city has an ongoing 24 hour a day, seven day a week, 2365 day a year homeless intervention program. How can you not have that when the money has been given since 2007 forwarding to 2000 to 2017? But the money, I understand it's coming from another grant program, but that same money that's coming from another place is similar to the money that you have received for the homeless for years. The Long Beach Rescue mission is no longer doing the services for the homeless that it used to do. Now you are without a standing hallmark that used to work for the homeless you have before you are proposing now. What is it about that proposal that does not allow you to see that we can implement this? Because the youth, some of the same youth that would be kicking the soccer balls are going to be homeless. These same youth are going to be homeless now. Some of them are wandering around that very park. Now unwelcomed. Several of the homeless people had children whose children were taken from them at MLK Park, at Lincoln Park. Taken from them and put into foster care. Because their parents had no homeless housing. So you took the children and left the parents on the street. I'm what I'm trying to do is just to get us to connect the dots. We have got to begin to connect the dots. And you may say this doesn't it's irrelevant. What you're saying is really relevant. Just connect the dots.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 8: My name is running.
Speaker 1: I'm okay. Go for it. Thank you. It's fine. Continue.
Speaker 8: Proceed, please. My name is Roman. I'm from District five, and I'd like to compliment Councilwoman Staci Mongo for her efforts in this area.
Speaker 1: Are you happy we're speaking to the grant application?
Speaker 8: I understand, but for El Dorado. Okay. With respect to the grant, the. With respect to the grant, there are three artifacts that I would like to address. One is the request for status that Councilwoman Mongeau issued on about a year ago and a staff report that was done by the Park and Recreation and approved audit report that was done a short time ago, not too long ago. One of the problems that we were having this this this issues of grants and everything has a lot of history behind it. Three city officials have been fired from their jobs because of this. And some of the information that residents have received has been incorrect, actually deliberately manufactured. And the city, the residents have known it for a long time. They brought it up to the city. We have a lot of mistrust, at least the residents have. And one of the purposes that, um, that the residents were trying to get when Stacy, when Councilwoman Mongo issued the request for status, was transparency. We're trying to get that. But one of the problems that we're seeing is we keep seeing the end around and people trying to go directly to adding more parks and getting more money . I have I really love the way that Maria is doing her work. Know what I trust more with the parks? Right now, I'm just nobody. And so all I'm trying to say is that one of the main things that that I'm concerned about is the funding that is necessary for for District five parks. We are about, what, $8 million under sustainability already? Right now, we can't even water our parks. And so I'm hoping that that whatever you end up doing here with with the city money, that's going to be I guess matching doesn't come out of the District five funds. Okay. If it doesn't, then I'm cool. You know, I'm actually like to have grass if I can. And I'm I'm working with the sir.
Speaker 1: We're talking about a grant application. I understand. District one in district eight.
Speaker 8: I understand. I prefer grass. Thank you. Okay. I prefer grass. I work with the. The soccer leagues, and they prefer grass as well. So you should know your audience as well, although you're trying to do these type of things. Understand that the players also prefer grass as well. We know where the statistics come from. 34%. Because I'm in touch with all of the the people. Thank you for we'd like to work more closely with the parks.
Speaker 1: Thank you for your time, Councilman Austin. Thank you. Is there any other speakers here on this item? Okay. Final speaker. Thank you. Okay.
Speaker 4: Karen reside. I reside in district one. And I also want to specify that I've been a volunteer for Partners of Parks for almost six years now, and I'm a part time staff person the last six months. I just want to.
Speaker 7: As I see.
Speaker 4: How hard the Parks and Rec staff and what a fabulous job Mary Knight has done to really move forward initiatives that the community wants in terms of park expansion. I came before the city council about four years ago and talked about grants and how the city didn't apply for nearly enough grants that they were qualified for. And I'll tell you, Department of Health and Parks and Recreation has really gone and put forth a tremendous effort to go after more grants, and we're beginning to see the fruits of that. When department applies for grants, that grant has to be specifically laid out how it is going to be spent. There's very little deviation from that process. There are also audits over in on any grants that are over a specific size. And I have not seen any ill conceived behavior from any city employee, and I've done.
Speaker 7: Work with several city departments.
Speaker 4: So I trust implicitly the city staff to handle and manage these grants really well. And I commend all the city departments and how they handle their grants. They do an excellent job.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 9: Yes. Oftentimes we sit quietly and we allow public comment, but I don't I think we need to address the misinformation out there from time to time as well. And I want to commend the last speaker, because I want to, first of all, say that our Parks and Recreation Department is is recognized nationally as one of the best in the nation. I think some of the comments were, we're misinformed about how park dollars are being spent for projects. There is accountability, as was stated, built in from the granting agencies. Oftentimes our public agencies, the state of California and the various departments or agencies within the state. Our city auditor audits our Parks and Recreation Department. Public information is there. You can research it on a comprehensive annual financial report to see how dollars are actually being spent. You pay attention to our budgeting process because we budget dollars that go specifically toward park projects and programs. And then I would invite you and encourage you to attend your parks, recreation and Marine Commission meetings, because the commissioners are working on parks issues all the time. Ask for phase two of Davenport Park. I can't speak about every project and every park in the city, but I know we have great professional staff that keeps each and every one of these council members very well informed and up to speed. And we're briefed sometimes monthly or twice, more than twice monthly on current projects that are going on. And I have quite a few going on in my district at this time. I know we have allocated or secured about $1.6 million prior to even discussing this grant for Davenport Park Phase two. And that money has been allocated toward planning and development and some environmental cleanup and also for accountability. Ms. Knight, can you explain how the money to be spent thus far specifically, or do I need to call public works down here for that?
Speaker 10: I'm going to ask my colleague.
Speaker 4: Craig Burke, who took.
Speaker 10: The lead on.
Speaker 5: That for the Phase.
Speaker 10: One project to explain that.
Speaker 9: Phase to.
Speaker 3: Two. Good evening. Council Member Austin and City Council. Specifically to your question this the city's been working to do a landfill closure at Davenport. So there's a couple of components to the Davenport, the overall Davenport effort. First, I guess we could call it phase one, which was a project completed by the redevelopment agency some years ago in advance of prepping the site for phase two, which is the subject of discussion tonight and is exactly what the proposed grant funds would be used for. The city has gone through a landfill closure process with the state. We are in the final stages of getting that certified, getting that closure certified and completed and once, once done will be, as you indicated earlier, shovel ready for the development of the park project to provide more space for the community in that area.
Speaker 9: Thank you. And have we all or spent the money, as was intended to spend the grant money that we received thus far?
Speaker 3: As with all our grants, as you mentioned, there is a lengthy financial process that we go through. And the short answer is yes, we have spent the money as indicated in the budget and and for the purpose identified.
Speaker 9: Thank you staff for that that clarification. And I just again wanted to clarify that misinformation out there. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And seeing no further public comment, members, please cast your vote. | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolutions authorizing City Manager, or designee, to submit two grant applications to the California Youth Soccer and Recreation Development Grant Program, offered by the State of California Department of Parks and Recreation, Office of Grants and Local Services, for the Seaside Park Artificial Turf Sports Field Conversion Project (Seaside Park Project), and Phase 2 of the Ed “Pops” Davenport Park Sports Field and Recreation Project (Davenport Park Project); accept, if awarded, California Youth Soccer and Recreation Development Grant Program grant funds for up to $600,000 for the Seaside Park Project, and up to $1,000,000 for the Davenport Park Project; and, execute all documents necessary to accept the funds and implement the projects. (Districts 1,8) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_01172017_17-0029 | Speaker 0: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Fantastic. We have item number 14, please.
Speaker 0: Item 14 is report from Public Works recommendation to execute an amendment to contract with Safeway Sign Company for the purpose for the purchase of additional signs specifically required for the street sweeping sign replacement project and to increase the contract amount by 800,000 citywide.
Speaker 1: That's pretty straightforward. Is there a second? Okay. Okay. Councilman Pryce, would you like to speak to this? No Council on the mango.
Speaker 4: Could the staff let us know what the cause of the increase was? That's a pretty significant increase from the original budgeted amount.
Speaker 11: It's for our streets. We've been signed, so.
Speaker 4: I'm familiar what it's for. But didn't we have a quote?
Speaker 11: We had a quote. I think this is to complete the rest of the signs. Here comes Mr. Beck.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Yes. Councilmember Mongo, this is part of our citywide contract. This is an ongoing, I guess, as needed contract that we asked council to approve. So when we need signs, we have them in place. As you know, we have started a citywide effort to eliminate all four E.M. sweeping times. And the majority of this contract has been used to purchase new street sweeping signs as we go through that updating process.
Speaker 4: So it's not. More money for the same number of signs of the second phase of the project.
Speaker 3: Correct. We have just finished what I've called. I mean, it's an ongoing project, but we kind of just finished phase two and we're now moving into phase three. So we started in our parking impacted neighborhoods and are kind of working our way clockwise around the city.
Speaker 4: Perfect. Thank you so much. Just making sure they didn't raise the price on us.
Speaker 8: That's correct.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item saying nonmembers, please cast your vote? | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute an amendment to Contract No. 34308 with Safeway Sign Company, of Adelanto, CA, for the purchase of additional signs specifically required for the Street Sweeping Sign Replacement project and to increase the contract amount by $800,000, for a revised total contract amount not to exceed $3,274,000, for a period ending June 30, 2018. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_01102017_17-0012 | Speaker 3: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So we'll move along to the regular agenda. Clerk Please read item number 12.
Speaker 3: Item 12. Report from Parks, Recreation and Marine Recommendation to award a contract to buy construction for the Willow Springs Park Wetlands Restoration Project. For a total contract amount not to exceed 1 million 101,577,000. District seven.
Speaker 1: Councilmember U ranga.
Speaker 0: Yeah. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'd like to have some public comment first before I make my comments though. They're here to support some individuals who are here to support this project. So like to hear from them first.
Speaker 1: Sure thing. Let's go ahead and hear from staff.
Speaker 0: Vice mayor, councilmembers, Parks, Recreation and Marine Development Officer Meredith Reynolds will walk us through this great project.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr. West. Good evening, Mayor. Member City Council. Tonight will provide a brief presentation on the Wetlands Restoration Project at Willis Springs Park. Willis Springs is a 48 acre undeveloped park bounded by Springs to the North, California to the West, Orange Avenue to the east and the municipal and Sunnyside cemeteries to the south. The project is in the direct result of the Willow Springs Master Plan adopted by the City Council in January 2013 after a substantial community engagement effort. The master plan included such natural elements as bio swales, a water treatment, wetland, public trails and sustainable planting areas. To start the planning process for these natural elements. The city applied and was awarded $50,000 from the Southern California Association of Governments for the development of a habitat creation plan. The Habitat Creation Plan was completed in August 2015 and was the basis for the design of the Willow Springs Wetland Restoration Project. The city also applied for and was awarded 924,000 Urban Greening Grant for the project in June 2014. The Urban Greening for Sustainable Communities Grant program was funded by the State of California Natural Resource Agency through Proposition 84, which provided funds to preserve, enhance, increase or establish urban forests, open space, wetlands and community spaces in the built out urban areas of California. The Wetlands Project is now ready for construction and is planned to be substantially complete by May 2017 when the grant funds expire. The Willow Springs Wetlands Restoration Project is an 11.5 acre project with the larger 48 acre Willow Springs Park. The project implements key components from the master plan, including removing non-native trees and exposed damaged piping. Planting approximately 200 native drought tolerant trees in approximately 6000 native drought tolerant plants. Installing 209,000 square feet of irrigation and mulch. Constructing approximately 43,000 square feet of ponding areas. 1700 square feet of bio swales and a connection to the flood basin. Constructing an outdoor classroom seating area and installing interpretive signage. And finally, converting the existing dirt access road to 2400 foot public pedestrian trail. The site playing on the left on the slide behind you shows the overall layout of the Wetlands Project. On the right or a few of the conceptual images used as inspiration for the design. The final design that depicts the design intent of the project is accessible from the long view point parking lot. Visitors will walk west down the baseline trail to the wetlands basin below, where interpretive signage will share the story of the arches that provided the Long Beach first water source. The history of past railroad, water and oil uses of the property and highlight important information about the site's restored seasonal wetlands. From the beginning, the project's philosophy was focused on sustainability, both to use the natural environment of the site as well to reuse as much as possible to maximize the project's funds. The project design uses the existing site topography to create a unique open space unlike any other in the city system. And as a result, the construction will exhibit a light touch on the land with the uses. Over the years, there are many interesting things found on the property, including large chunks of concrete, wood and pipe which have been incorporated into the design of the project to reuse as much on site as possible. The total project budget is $2,089,832, which is funded by a variety of sources, including the Urban Greening Grant and one time funds set aside for the park and A14. The project cost is listed on the side behind you and includes a construction which is part of your recommended actions this evening. Staff is recommending the City Council adopt plans and specifications and award a contract to biotech construction company Inc for the Willow Springs Wetlands Project and authorize the city manager to execute on necessary documents to also authorize the city manager to appropriate 924,000 and the Urban Greening Grant for sustainable communities to fund the project. And finally accept the categorical exemption. 16. Dash 194. That concludes my staff report, and I'm available to answer any questions.
Speaker 1: Thank you for that report. And as requested, we're going to take public comment before council remarks. Is there any public comment on this item? Okay. As in every other public coming in to line up, we should probably just line up now. Oh. Okay. Okay. Sir, you have 3 minutes. Please give us your name and receipt.
Speaker 0: Okay. My name is Leif Fukui. I'm a resident of sixth district. I'm also founder of Wrigley's Going Green and the Clean Team. And I also sit on the city's tree advisory committee. I just want to say thank you for all the hard work that city staff, the city manager's office and Sustainability Office, and particularly Councilmember Suranga and his staff for keeping this project alive and keeping it going. It's advice. It's vitally important for this for our area because we're very park deprived. And so I think this is a first step to getting this park established and getting it running. My one concern is about the security going forward. As you may have known that the the train station was that was moved there was, you know, destroyed in the fire. And also, I think last month, Sasha's farm locked, 59, was vandalized. So my concern is that we have adequate security there either. And also from the neighboring properties there. There's holes in the fences. There's a lot of homeless activity going in and out of there. So my concern is that going forward, the the the the new materials that are being utilized in this park get protected and safeguarded. But having said that, this is a great project, and I really hope you support this. It's important for Long Beach and it's important for all the residents. So thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you for your comments. So we'll take it back behind the rail. Councilmember, your anger.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And I do want to thank the Parks Recreation Department, the Office of Sustainability, Public Works and Department Development Services for their efforts in making this happen. I know that the Will Springs Park has gone. Site has gone through many iterations and plans and changes. And I think that this is one that is going to be one of the best workable ones that we be adequate for that park. It's a natural habitat and it will be an opportunity to activate it as a as a place where people can go and enjoy the the natural scenery and the quietness and enjoy the the the biosphere that will be restored there in that area. In regards to the depot, it was a very sad day, obviously, when it when it went under the flames. But I'm hoping that we can be able to either through restoring it or having some kind of other building there, that will provide information for visitors to learn about the history of Willow Springs, to learn about the history of Long Beach, and if not a deep oil restoration at all, but at least something that we can have there to provide visitors with with a place to to visit and learn more about the Little Springs Park area and Long Beach as a whole. We are going to be addressing the public safety issues I've spoken with with our city and city staff in regard to that raised. I raised the same questions in regard to those opportunities that people have to enter the site where there are holes in the fencing. We will be addressing that. So I'm hoping that once this project is completed that those areas of concern will be addressed. We're looking at possibly activating the site right around. August, September. And then taking it forward from there. So I want to thank everybody who has assisted with this project and of course, for the support of the community for having them come forward. And so I asked my contact. Colleagues, support the motion. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Next, we have Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 3: I want to thank the.
Speaker 2: Staff and the community for the work that they put into this. I think this is a project that.
Speaker 3: We will all be very proud of and a a good use of a step forward for Parks and Rec to the community. So thank you for your work on this.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: Yes. I, too, wanted to congratulate everybody that's worked on this, putting together the funding, the design and everything. I know that for a while we've had folks from the West Side or North Long Beach go and see our wetlands over on the east side of town. And so I think it's really fantastic that we're creating more spaces for people to walk and enjoy nature. And so congratulations.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 4: Thank you. And I just want to add my congratulations to Councilmember Urunga, but I also want to know salute our hardworking parks and rec staff who have done a remarkable job of, you know, making Long Beach a really green and cool city. Councilmember Pearce mentioned the wetlands on the east side of town, but there's wetlands now being under development on the west side of town, along the DeForest Wetlands, along with our our Dominguez Gap and Willow Springs will just be an addition to natural greenspace that that will provide great serenity and awesome views up there. So congratulations again.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilman Andrew.
Speaker 0: Yes. Also, I'd like to congratulate Councilman Durango for this magnificent park that we put in. And I just also like to give kudos to our Parks and Rec director, because, in fact, it seems like any place that there's a green or no green, they finding a place to do something for our city. Because the fact that you guys have to understand that, you know, we know that Park. Park is something that we all need and our kids and our families and everyone else, especially that would next to the sixth district. And we have a tree planters up here. They're going to make sure that everything goes well. And I want to thank you guys for coming out and supporting this. Thank you again and congratulations. See you later.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: Yes. Great job to our city staff as well as Councilmember Muranga and the community for this amazing project. I look forward to seeing more similar to this. And just again, congratulations. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilmember Super.
Speaker 5: Now I'll add my congratulations to the councilmember from the seventh District. And I also in particular want to mention Larry Rich, who's in the audience up there. But you can waived his Larry. Larry and I go back on this project a lot of years. I can't remember what year you brought forward, but I don't think it would have happened without Larry's efforts. So. Thank you, Larry.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. And I would just add that, you know, I remember following this and correct me if I'm wrong, Meredith, but is this one of the largest park expansions, you know, in recent history? Could you just elaborate just a moment for that?
Speaker 2: So will the Springs Park is a 40 acre parcel. This is about 12 acres, just under 12 acres. So some of the other comparable ones across the city include the Divorce Wetlands and Drake, Chavez, Greenbelt and some of the other green belts that are coming up here are comparable, but certainly one of the largest.
Speaker 1: Thank you and councilmember you Ranga as as we're pretty built out city these these interesting creative ways to develop and expand you know along rivers and rights of way that's how we're going to really change some of the inequities in terms of open space. So congratulations to you for bringing this forward and congratulations to Parks and Rec members. Please cast your vote. | Contract | Recommendation to adopt Plans and Specifications No. R-7063 for the Willow Springs Park Wetlands Restoration Project; award the contract to BiTech Construction Co., Inc., of Buena Park, CA, in the amount of $1,371,926, authorize a 15 percent contingency in the amount of $205,789, for a total contract amount not to exceed $1,577,715; and authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all documents necessary to enter into the contract, including any necessary amendments thereto;
Increase appropriations in the Capital Projects Fund (CP) in the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department (PR) by $924,000, offset by grant revenue from an award of funding under the Safe Drinking Water, Water Quality and Supply, Flood Control, River and Coastal Protection Act of 2006 (Proposition 84) Urban Greening for Sustainable Communities Grant Program; and
Accept Categorical Exemption No. 16-194. (District 7) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_01102017_17-0015 | Speaker 3: Motion carries.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Item number 13, please.
Speaker 3: Item 13 Communication from Council Member Tauranga. Recommendation to approve the use of the seventh Council District one time infrastructure funds in the amount of 10,000 to support beautification project.
Speaker 1: Councilmember Jauregui.
Speaker 0: The database where the Civic the seventh District Council Office will be partnering with the California Heights Neighborhood Association on a community mural near the corner of Orange Avenue and Bixby Road, and finally will provide a an opportunity from the district's at one time infrastructure funds. The mural design has a tribute to each of the main streets through the California History Heights, California Heights historic district and is going to be youth friendly. This could be an opportunity for our youth to get involved in this. I want to extend my my gratitude to the California Heights Neighborhood Association for this opportunity. I also want to extend my thank you to Christa Stitz, Mueller, Hugh Little and the rest of the board of the California Heights Association for their leadership in securing Emily Kua Kanaka, who is a local artist here in Long Beach, and she will be the one in charge of the mural project. And I hope looking forward to that partnership and to having a nice opportunity to have Art come to the seventh District. So I want to thank you all for that. Thank you. And I obviously wish my support to my colleagues on this item.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: I just wanted to say congratulations on adding a mural, engaging youth and obviously is the crazy one on the 14th that has a mural in her office. I of course, support you. So congrats.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: If I would have known Emily was a part of this, I would have supported this many, many years ago now. Congratulations, Councilmember Ranga, for this. Another amazing project. But Emily, also congratulations. She also designed the Willmore banners. And so her art kind of permeates throughout the city. But congratulations, and I'm glad to see you.
Speaker 1: Fantastic. Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item? Seeing them come on for.
Speaker 2: Hi. My name's Krista Stelzenmuller. I'm actually one of the community members who's worked on this particular project, so I just wanted to encourage you to support it because for our community, our goal is to encourage pedestrian traffic in the neighborhood and create points of interest to support our local small business. And it helps preserve the historical character of our neighborhood. So that's one of the reasons we focus on projects like this, which is why I asked you to support it.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Seeing no further public comment. Members, please cast your vote. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to approve the use of the Seventh Council District's one-time infrastructure funds transferred from the Capital Projects Fund (CP) in the Public Works Department (PW) into the Legislative Department (LD) operating budget in the amount of $10,000 to support these beautification projects; and
Increase appropriation in the General Fund (GF) in the Legislative Department (LD) by $10,000. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_12202016_16-1150 | Speaker 0: Thank you. Congratulations on the on the appointment as well. So the new Connie ZEEBLE. Thank you. With that, our public comment has concluded and we're going to go ahead and go into our next item, which is going to be item number 14. And then after right after 14, we're going to hear 13 and 24. So the order is Styrofoam copy open data for item 14.
Speaker 2: Communication from Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilmember Pearce, Councilmember, your recommendation to request the city attorney to draft an ordinance related to banning the sale and distribution of expanded polystyrene and other polystyrene disposable food service containers within the city of Long Beach, with exemptions for the Long Beach Unified School District. Request the city manager to work with the Office of Sustainability, the Sustainable City Commission and Community Stakeholders to develop a public education campaign related to the ban and to work with the Economic Development Committee to come up with financial incentives for local businesses to implement the ban before the implementation date of the ordinance.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. I'm going to turn this over to Councilwoman Gonzales.
Speaker 4: Okay. Thank you. I know we have quite a few folks here for this item, and so I'd actually like to turn it over to them to hear them first, and then I actually have a presentation and then we'll go forward. So if that's okay. Sure.
Speaker 0: She went to public comment for.
Speaker 4: Yes, please.
Speaker 0: Okay. So we're going to public comment first. So if you have public comment on this item, please line forward. Line up. But there is there is a motion in second on the floor. And so, just so you know, there is a there is a motion in a second which is the item is presented. Okay. Please begin.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Mayor and council members. My name is Kobe Sky. I'm a second district resident environmental engineer, and I'm an appointee of the Long Beach Sustainable City Commission. I want to say first, I support the motion and it's really great to see several council members coming together on this issue in a consensus way. There's really a lot of benefits that will come to the city of Long Beach by moving forward with this motion, especially for our environment and for tourism. That's really important for those two issues. But there are other benefits as well. I thought it was interesting that the motion points out that Conservative Council member and ocean lover Frank Colonna brought up this issue more than a decade ago, and it's been discussed thoroughly since then. Other cities, the County of Los Angeles, many other jurisdictions have studied this issue extensively. The federal government has as well, and 99 other cities or jurisdictions just in California have adopted similar ordinances. So it should be an easy decision after so many years of study and after these so many better alternatives that are easily available. This really is a nonpartisan issue, and I hope that the Council tonight will consider further directing the Sustainable City Commission and the Office of Sustainability to investigate options to make the ordinance even stronger. For example, promoting reusable food service where. Or connecting the ordinance to the new mandate for composting food waste. We have the expertize to bring these options forward to you and we hope that you'll make use of that. Long Beach can be a leader to other cities in the region. We can address our mandates for reducing pollution to our waterways and have a very positive impact for the whole region. I hope we're going to be jurisdiction number 100 tonight and adopt this motion. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much next week. Please.
Speaker 1: Hi there. My name is Gabrielle Weeks. I'm a resident of District two. I'd like to really thank the council people, the green leaders who have brought this to the agenda tonight. That's awesome. Tonight, I'm not really speaking as a Long Beach resident, though, but as one of the people who elected to run your Sierra Club for the Angeles chapter. That's all of L.A. County, all of Orange County. Out of those two counties. We've already had a whole lot of cities that have banned polystyrene as often as some of them, as often as seven or eight years ago. So we're not reinventing the wheel. As Coby mentioned, we would be the 100th in a city or county in just California. Just California. There's already 99. So this is nothing new, nothing scary. Let's do it. Because we care about human health and the health of our wildlife and clean beaches residents and tourists want. The Sierra Club asks Long Beach to join the 99 cities and county who have banned polystyrene packaging in California. Are you tired of expanded? Expanded polystyrene also called Styrofoam all over your beaches and sidewalks. It makes up 17% of our pollution. Just that. And these flimsy clamshells and cups are easily replaced with something that I got an Al Austin's district's. Are you? This is a coffeehouse in your district, right? Drink on Atlantic. I think they are. They are. Well, so there's a lot of our restaurants here that are already using no Styrofoam voluntarily because customers like it. And as Koby pointed out, this was started over a decade ago by Tonya Ray as a ranga being continued by her husband, as her husband should do, finish his wife's project when she's too busy and Frank Alona and your district. So over a decade of studying Styrofoam, that's how we know it's 17% of our pollution. That's how we know how much of is it inside birds and fish that show up dead on our beach because of them? So we've been studying it for a decade. And also, according to the U.S. EPA, numerous carcinogens are found in expanded polystyrene.
Speaker 4: Including formaldehyde.
Speaker 1: And benzene. These things have a lot of bad side effects, so even the US EPA is recommending people not use Styrofoam if they've got an alternative. You know, I love Long Beach and this is great. This this intersection of two of my favorite things eating out and the environment. So I'm really hoping we can pass this tonight because as it is, I just go to a bunch of the different restaurants in everybody's district that I know don't have expanded polystyrene because it makes your coffee taste gross, I think. But what if we ban it citywide? We're going to have all the restaurants open to all the people who want to be able to taste the food and the flavor, not the weird chemicals. And unfortunately, as the hours ticked by, a lot of our members had to go home. They had babysitters texting them, and the babysitters needed to get out of here. But we still have a bunch of signs out there. Going to take a moment to anybody. Yeah, we had a lot of people at the rally. A lot of people wanted to stay here longer, but their babysitters were hungry and angry. So with a lot of support for this. And thank you so much. Let's join those other 99 cities.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next Speaker.
Speaker 4: Hi, Mayor Garcia, members of the council and staff. I'm honored to be standing at the podium tonight. My name is Katie Allen. I'm the executive director at Al Goleta, Marine Research and Education. We're actually the world's leading research organization focused on ocean plastic pollution. And we're located right here in Long Beach, and we have been here 20 years. I'm here tonight to share the results of a nine month study our organization conducted in Long Beach and surrounding areas in collaboration with master's students from the Brand School of Environmental Science and Management. The overarching purpose of our investigation was to identify the types source fate of plastic debris in our region. The information was synthesized into action items ranked by their feasibility and effectiveness, so the full report can be found. We passed out some bamboo flash drives. If you guys got those from the Clark, the full report can be found on those drives. If you're interested in digging in. After nine months of digging into the problem here at home, our researchers determined that phasing out expanded polystyrene was actually the second most important action item to implement. Immediately through our investigation, we found that expanded polystyrene makes up roughly 26% of the litter on our streets. The material has low market value, especially when contaminated, so it's not recovered as frequently as other plastics, like polyethylene terephthalate or high density polyethylene. Since EPS breaks down easily, it has a higher chance of making its way through capture systems into our rivers and oceans. And EPS is also lightweight, making it transportable by wind and water. Once EPS enters our waterway, it continues breaking into smaller and smaller pieces at a rapid rate. So our organization has actually been monitoring plastic accumulation on the Long Beach Peninsula since fall 2015 and expanded polystyrene is identified as the most common type of microplastic. By count, we found over 2100 pieces of expanded polystyrene in ten liters of sand collected on the south side of the Long Beach Peninsula. We're literally changing the composition of our ocean and our beaches. These microplastics soak up toxicants and maybe entering our local food chain. They become bite sized morsels for the fish, turtles and other animals living in our local ecosystem. Beyond that, the individuals in our community feed their families fish collected from this highly polluted area. The issue is so bad here at home. Our Oregon organization invites stakeholders from around the world to visit us to experience the Microplastic issue up close and personal. Just last week we had over 35 plastic industry leaders and companies like Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Procter and Gamble. Simply sifting through sand on our beach, we're quickly becoming the city known for Microplastic.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Thank you so much for your work. Next beaker, please.
Speaker 6: Really? Hello. Try to keep this brief. Mayor Garcia, members of the council. My name is McDonald. I'm a freshman from Long Beach State University. Yeah. And today I'm here just to speak about my support to ban polyester, polystyrene and polyester in the city of Long Beach. So whether it be in the form of a single use cup or some kind of packaging material. Polyester, not polyester. Sorry. Polystyrene is one of the most littered pieces of debris found on our beaches. This is not without its consequences. Along with being labeled a possible carcinogen by the EPA and affecting functions of the human central nervous system. Polystyrene does not biodegrade meaning as these pieces of debris flow into the ocean and sit under the sun, they fracture into tiny bits called microplastics like stated. So once they're in the ocean, these microplastics absorb other toxic chemicals like DDT and PCBs, which aren't good, and fish and other animals mistake these tiny bits of plastic for food. And because they cannot digest these microparticles and the chemicals leaking into the animals bodies, they'll either die or pass on those chemicals to us once we consume them. So there are many other alternatives to polystyrene, such as biodegradable or even other recyclable plastics. And many other cities in this country, from SFO to New York, have already moved to ban this toxic plastic. And at a time when the issues of the environment are being targeted, we must do everything that we can to protect not only our environment, but also ourselves. And for these reasons, I hope that the Council supports this issue and bans polystyrene in the city of Long Beach. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Go Beach. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Mayor Garcia. Vice Mayor Richardson. My name is Steven Johnson and I'm the water resources policy analyst for Heal the Bay. Heal the Bay supports the Long Beach City Council's efforts to eliminate the use of a single use play siren from its business businesses within the City of Long Beach's Sustainable City Plan. The second paragraph of the Green Economy and Lifestyle section begins. Ecologically and socially responsible products can help reduce our resource use as well as reduce our harmful impact on the planet. Heal the Bay couldn't agree more. And in the same vein, eliminating products that are known to have a harmful impact on the environment will work exactly the same way. If council members truly want what's best for the health of the environment, they should bite the proverbial polystyrene bullet and ban single use polystyrene in any of its forms. Drafting this ordinance is an excellent first move in this endeavor. Last week, the city of Culver City followed in the footsteps of the city of Manhattan Beach, making it the 100th. So maybe I'll be 101. But they're in first and recently instructed their staff to include straws and coffee lids within their ordinance. This is sometimes the city of Long Beach. This is something that the City of Long Beach might want to consider when drafting the ordinance. Thank you for the opportunity to comment.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Love your bay. Good job. You guys do great work. Thank you for partnering with the city on so many things. Okay, next speaker.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much for including this on the agenda tonight. I was thrilled when I saw it and I've never been to a city council meeting, but I just had to come because this is the most important issue to me personally. I just bought a house. My husband and I just bought a house in Long Beach. And this has just been the issue that they held me back from loving Long Beach. So thank you so much for considering it. I bring my lunch to work because I don't want to consume things that are in polystyrene and we never go out for Chinese. There's so many things we don't do because they're going to be on polystyrene and this would just mean so much to me. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Welcome to Long Beach. We're glad to have you here. Next speaker.
Speaker 4: Hi. Just real quick. Student at Cal State, Long Beach. Same. Nice to meet you. Starring as primarily used in the production of polyester, polystyrene and plastics and resins.
Speaker 2: Now some exposures to human exposure.
Speaker 4: So these short term or acute would be results in mucous membrane irritation and eye irritation and gastrointestinal effects. Now, the National Bureau of Standards Centers for Fire Research did identify 57 chemicals that are byproducts of the released during the combustion of poly styrene. So a lot to consider. Hopefully we get your support. And I thank you very much.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. City Council and staff. My name is Seamus.
Speaker 0: And I'm a resident of the fourth District.
Speaker 6: Faro.
Speaker 0: And I'm the chairman of the Loomis chapter of the Surfrider Foundation. We have over 300.
Speaker 3: Members in Long Beach, and we've been working with you guys and your staff for many years.
Speaker 6: On this topic.
Speaker 0: In 2013, I ordered 2000.
Speaker 3: Of these postcards and we've been getting residents to fill them out and I've been putting stamps on them and hand-delivering them to you and giving them to you. And I know all.
Speaker 6: Of you have hundreds of them. I'm sure you never throw them away because they're so valuable. But I've heard from some of you.
Speaker 3: That you really appreciate hearing from your residents and your constituents and even tourists. I send all the tourist postcards to the mayor. So sorry, Robert, but you're happy to hear from your constituents about what they believe. And they've been telling you.
Speaker 6: Get rid of the foam in Long Beach. It's important.
Speaker 3: In addition to the postcards, we've been working on this program called Ocean Friendly Restaurants, where we go out and find restaurants in our community that have already gotten rid of Styrofoam and we give them a little plaque to put on the window, says.
Speaker 0: Ocean Friendly.
Speaker 3: Restaurants. We put their name on our website and we encourage members to go shop there because we think they're doing the right thing. And invariably, time and time again, I'll ask them, Why did you.
Speaker 0: Decide to get rid of Styrofoam? And they look at me like I just fell off a turnip truck.
Speaker 6: And they're like, Of course, you know why? It's because the ocean is because the environment. So they already have this figured out and they've done it on their own. And in that light, I want.
Speaker 3: To introduce you to the following figure, our Long Beach hero right here.
Speaker 1: My name is Carson. Countertenor. Honorable Council Members. And I'm Eric Garcia. I'm just here to speak out as a local Long Beach business. I own two small restaurants in town, a coffeehouse and a restaurant about to open my third one. And I voluntarily about 12 years ago decided not to use Styrofoam anymore. It is a little bit of a cost for a small business, but it's a penny per item. And if I can absorb it as a cafe, that really coffee is a business about pennies and every cup of coffee you really count every single penny. But I was able to do it and I'm still growing my business. So I really like for you to support this item and I fully stand behind it. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Speaker, please. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Hi. Good night. I counsel an honorable mayor. My name is Natasha Dyer. I live in the first district. I wear a lot of hats and belong to a number of organizations around town. But as an environmentalist, which I really think is just a survivalist these days, that's really the way I look at myself. I'm not really a tree hugger or anything like that. I'm just trying to try to make us aware of things that have to do with climate and environment, that type of thing. I'm here to say that it's time as a society to figure out ways to decrease our waste and really actually actually eradicate waste that doesn't biodegrade or is not able to be upcycled in some way. So I urge you to ban Styrofoam here in Long Beach. Styrofoam and plastic in general, as you all know, really doesn't go anywhere. It sits in landfills for 700 years or so, eventually leaching into our.
Speaker 2: Water tables, making drinking water toxic gets into our waterway waterways, where it is then.
Speaker 1: Mistaken for food by our marine life. We, in turn eat the seafood and the plastic ends up in us. And just for using polystyrene, when you get your take out, just you all know that that kind of leaches into the food. You can't even heat heat up in your microwave. We all know that already. So it's time to get rid of this stuff because it's actually it's just toxic. As a member of the Don't Waste Long Beach Coalition, a coalition that is campaigning to raise the standards of Long Beach's waste and recycling infrastructure, and we're also trying to get to zero waste. I also support a ban on polystyrene. I also work in the way I work for waste hauler and environmental complaints. So I work every day where I'm getting businesses to comply with state mandates that are getting us to recycle. And as you might know, California has wants us to be diverting most of our 75% of our waste by 2020. And Long Beach. I think this is low hanging fruit. I think there are some some types of waste that actually just should be eradicated and we can actually start to comply with mandates because Long Beach, it actually isn't recycling as much as we should be. And we can actually get some of it just out of the waste stream. And as this restaurant said, I was going to say that to Styrofoam. There are there are there are alternatives that are actually just price competitive. And I think once we become a zero wasting city and we're finding different ways to do with our waste, such as like composting eventually and we'll be getting these types of alternatives to serve foam that can be composted. That's actually just such a win win, because I know the mayor, you've signed on to the Compact of Mayors and you want us to be a climate resilient city. So I think things like actually doing things with waste are it's just it's just that low hanging fruit. And we've got to, as a society, begin to think what we're doing with the things we're making that are ending up in our landfill. So I think that was it. Yeah. Thank you. Please Ban sir from.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much.
Speaker 4: Next Speaker Good evening, Mr. Mayor and City Council. My name is Sona Coffee and I'm.
Speaker 1: A resident of the fourth district. Darryl and I also serve the city as a sustainable city commissioner. I'm here also wearing a few different hats.
Speaker 4: As some of you may know, I serve in the city of Manhattan Beach. Is there environmental programs manager? So I wanted to share just.
Speaker 1: Briefly some of the points that we went through when we adopted a polystyrene ordinance a few years ago. We went through actually pretty identical process that Long Beach is in right now. We had an initiative come forward many years ago. It was put on hold for a few years. We circled its way back with some community support and council leadership. That item came back, we did more research and we had an evening just like this one where we were at that juncture where we decided we talk about it now. Do we draft an ordinance, come back with an ordinance to ban this or do we not move forward? And the City Council decided to take action and direct staff to draft that ordinance. I highlight this as an example, just to show that this is not going to be a final process tonight. We're just asking for you to authorize your staff to move forward with drafting that ordinance that will give them the time to look at the different.
Speaker 4: Options, the different components that can go into a polystyrene ordinance, and then that will come.
Speaker 1: Back again for your review and approval and probably more public.
Speaker 4: Comment and discussion.
Speaker 1: When you do hopefully become that 100 or 101st city that bans polystyrene. There were a few things we did in the city that I think will be helpful for Long Beach. We had good support of our business districts. We worked with the districts, with our Chamber of Commerce outreach, with the community to understand what would work and what wouldn't for the businesses and the retailers in the city. We initially passed just a foam ordinance, a foam ban, put that in place for about six months and came back to council with amendments to the ordinance to include additional products such as straws, cup lids, utensils.
Speaker 4: And banning the retail sale of all polystyrene items in the.
Speaker 1: City. So this is a really good first step for the community, for the businesses to become aware and familiar with how they go about working a polystyrene ordinance. The other.
Speaker 4: Thing I wanted.
Speaker 1: To highlight was the outreach to the community. So while we agree that getting polystyrene out of the waste stream is important, it's a toxic material. Material.
Speaker 4: You've heard how it ends up on our beaches and our coasts.
Speaker 1: We want to protect our environment here in Long Beach, but we also wanted to help the retailers. And the biggest way to do that is encouraging individuals to take.
Speaker 4: Action.
Speaker 1: I see. Councilwoman Mango has a great sampling of products up there, but what we really want to do is get people to move away from disposables and be reusable. And so encouraging folks to bring their own tumblers, their mugs. Exactly. Things like that. When you're going out for your coffee, when you grabbing your drink and take out containers. So we did a giveaway in the city where we did take out containers and utensils. We had a bring your own campaign to educate people that it's not just reusable bags that you need to bring, but you need to bring your tumblers, your containers and your utensils when you go out to avoid that disposable waste. There's wanted to show that this is a very easy thing for people to do slip into your purse or your pocket and take that with you. So I hope that Long Beach does become the next city to do this.
Speaker 4: So we can help protect and preserve.
Speaker 1: Our natural resources.
Speaker 4: And our environment. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. Sure.
Speaker 6: Good afternoon, Mayor Garcia and members of the council. My name is Robert know tough. And I'm the director of Don't Waste Long Beach, which is a local coalition comprised of community, environmental and workers rights organizations looking to transform our commercial waste industry to provide recycling, composting and good green jobs for all Long Beach residents. And I'm here today to urge the council to move forward with an ordinance that to ban polystyrene in the city of Long Beach tantamount to don't waste Long Beach's mission is diverting waste from landfills, and that's through increased recycling and also through source reduction. So that makes today's vote of particular interest to our coalition. As you know, other cities have banned polystyrene from the recycling programs because once collected, it's difficult to sell and easily contaminated by other materials in recycling bins, which makes it difficult to store in our recycling facilities. Furthermore, food, soil, polystyrene is typically not accepted by recyclers by recycling companies. It's not compostable and as a result it ends up in our landfills. And the end result is the sobering reality which was documented in a report by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation. And this is really kind of key and mindblowing, but that found that if we do not divert the current stream of plastics ending up in our ocean by the year 2050, there were by wait. There will be more plastic in our oceans than fish again by 2050 by weight, more plastic in our oceans than fish. So we also know what polystyrene has to do in terms of like just beautifying our community or lack thereof, right? It pollutes our oceans, our beaches. We see it in our streets and on our in our parks. And I you know, it's kind of less desirable for our residents and also for residents, for those who visit us , like I have family coming this holiday season to visit me here, I'm proud to say. And lastly, given the in the political environment in Washington and given the fact that we have somebody who's proposed a climate change denier who may be the head of the EPA, we have to look to you one more than ever to kind of lead by example. And so, again, we are asking that you all take the stand for Long Beach residents to do this, to move forward with our community and to please pass a phone free LBC. Thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 1: Good evening. Mayor and council members. Thank you so much. Staff. My name is Kathleen Irvine and I am the president of one more City Heritage Association and also serve as vice chair for sustainability. Everybody's going to talk about the science behind this, and I think we're all very aware of the problem with the pollutants. I think that moving forward with this ban is really, really important because unfortunately, living in the first District, we see a lot of issues with trash, in particular Styrofoam, the food, a lot of the small food places use Styrofoam. And even though people know they're not supposed to, if for whatever reason, they don't seem to feel badly about throwing it in the ground. And of course, we all know where that ends up as well. The other thing that is important, I think for us is the first district is that we are right along the borders of the L.A. River and as it develops, all that stuff is going to come down the river. If we do not make a stand here, then they can certainly say, Oh, well, it's not our problem. If we make a stand here and say, it's your trash, take care of it, I think that's really important. So please support this study and I'll look forward to the ban. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker.
Speaker 1: Hi. Good evening. Thank you for hearing us out on this. My name is Donna Birch. I'm from the eighth District. I have a couple of things I want. First of all, I want to thank Al Goleta Marine Research for being here. I follow them like a puppy dog. They are doing seriously some of the greatest work of our time. So you guys, I mean, this is some serious, serious Marine research that they are doing and not just in Long Beach. And they've been doing it for a long time. Captain Charles Moore is like my hero. Anyway, I just wanted to bring up a couple of things that maybe didn't come to the surface. But these are the cities in California. These are just the coastal cities. Right. There's 99 cities just in California, but these are the coastal cities that already have a polystyrene ban. Carmel Carpinteria. Dana Point. Half Moon Bay. Hermosa Beach. Huntington Beach. Laguna Beach. San Francisco. Santa monica Seaside South. San Francisco. Malibu Manhattan Marina. Newport Beach Pacific Grove, Pacifica. San Clemente, Santa Cruz and Sausalito. That's compliments of the Surfrider from their website. Anyway, those are just the coastal cities that already have a ban in place. The counties are Ventura, Sonoma, Marin, Santa Clara, Monterey, San Mateo, Santa Cruz and Los Angeles counties. So there are some partial bans in place. So that's just kind of an overview. But the other thing I wanted to talk about or just to bring to your attention is what's happening in Long Beach. The Surfrider Association already has their own standards in place for restaurants, and they are as follows. They are the silver level, the gold level and the platinum level. And as the other speaker mentioned, the restaurants are given like a badge for adhering to these standards. So for the silver level, they have no Styrofoam takeout containers. Gold level, they achieve silver. And at least three of the following options plastic straws are provided only upon request. Takeout bags are provided only upon request. Take out beverage containers may not be plastic, including plastic bottles. Take out food containers may not be plastic. Disposable utensils for takeout food provided upon request only proper recycling. This is really important. Proper recycling and trash disposal practices are followed throughout the restaurant. Right. This is our big. One of our biggest sins, I think, in all of our restaurants. And for the platinum level. No plastic take out containers. This includes Styrofoam bags, tableware, straws, etc.. So the Surfrider Association has already set a great standard for restaurants, which I think could be considered when this does come up for a vote. In Long Beach, we have in those categories we have two platinum, we have eight gold, and we have 19 silver. We only have one in the eighth district. And that's there. Back there. That's Lola self. Think us. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Hi, I'm back.
Speaker 5: Okay.
Speaker 2: So again, my name is Dr..
Speaker 4: Eileen de Banal and I teach organic.
Speaker 2: Chemistry at Cathy at Long Beach. So one thing I have heard tonight after a couple of things.
Speaker 4: Is that at the end of the day, in the.
Speaker 1: Manufacture and synthesis of polystyrene, it makes us dependent on petroleum. You can't just, like, whip this up over the lab.
Speaker 4: And call it a day. Like you have to get the petroleum.
Speaker 1: And distill it and do all kinds of crazy things with it.
Speaker 4: But more chemicals in it, and then then becomes polystyrene. And then on top of that, to recycle.
Speaker 2: It requires also more.
Speaker 1: Energy. So if we're serious as a community about climate change, then we would really look into this study and go on with the ban. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 7: Please.
Speaker 3: Honorable Mayor Council. My name is Luis Navarro. We have three restaurants here in Long Beach.
Speaker 7: We're not in the business to tell people how to run their business. But about seven years ago, we decided.
Speaker 3: To cut out all Styrofoam from our restaurants and we were able to make it work. It literally is a game of pennies.
Speaker 7: And it's something that can be done to make a.
Speaker 3: Big change. And I think that if you're in the.
Speaker 7: Business of in the restaurant business, that is you do have that conscious choice to make a difference and leave a small footprint on the environment. And why not take that extra step and and become environmentally friendly?
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening. My name is Peter Hanna.
Speaker 3: I'm here wearing two hats. I'm I, I run clean OLB, which is a beach clean up at the base of one of Paro in the second district. I live in the second district. I'm also on the board of the Friends of Bixby Park, and we run a monthly beach cleanup, our monthly park cleanup. So I do lots of cleanups. And so any data I'm going to offer you is going to be entirely anecdotal. But I think it's a it's my anecdote. So I can tell you in the six and a half years that we've been doing beach cleanups at Cherry Beach, we've picked up over eight. Tons of trash from that beach. And that's not a terribly helpful measure, though, because weight isn't really what we're concerned about. If it really we're talking about volume and if we're talking about volume, by far the worst offender is Styrofoam. If you talked about just the they're all consistently and this is not just in our beach. This is in the beaches up and down the state of California. It's in the top five most found little pieces of things. And so that's what we find all the time. I want one of our volunteers. He likes to take a break and excavate one square meter along the wall by the parking lot, and he can regularly fill a bucket in one hour excavating underneath the sand full of Styrofoam. Now, the reason this is significant is that once Styrofoam enters the beach, the only way it can be cleaned up is by hand. When you try to clean up the beach, you can bring in those big earthmovers and you can sift through a lot of sifting. But you're only going to get the larger, heavier particles. Smaller things like Styrofoam can only be cleaned up by hand. And frankly, I don't think anyone has the budget to clean that, to really comb the beach, to get rid of that Styrofoam. The only way you can do it is by volunteers. And frankly, there aren't enough of us. So the only way to address this is to cut it out at the source. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you for organizing all those cleanups. Appreciate that. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Very much. My name is Robert Palmer. I live in the third district. There was a PowerPoint presentation emailed to city council. I don't know if that's available to load or what, but anyway, if it is, I'll continue on and tell it is. It's not loaded or can't get loaded.
Speaker 0: It's kind of loaded. Actually, why don't we go to the next speaker while we load that? Okay. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Hi. Good afternoon, Mayor. Members. City Council. My name's Dahlia Gonzalez. I sit on the Sustainability Commission. I just wanted to. To thank the council members who introduced this item for including the Sustainability Commission on this. I know that when the mayor first took office, one of one of his transition teams recommendations, something that council member Pierce at the time was on, was that we activate this commission, and I would like us to not only hear from the groups that we've heard from today, but I also want this to be a business friendly policy. I have a small business and I often hear in the environmental discussion that the business and environment don't go hand in hand. And I want us to get get rid of that mindset. I think business is important for for economic thriving. I think environment is obviously very important for for everything that we need to live. So that is one of the things that I'm looking forward to, to working with this council on, and I hope that we can have your support for this item. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. All right, Robert, I think we're basically we're good.
Speaker 7: My name is Robert Palmer. I'm with Surfrider Foundation. I've been representing Surfrider Beach cleanups for 17 years now. We currently have for a month. And I went out yesterday to Cherry Beach and I took pictures of the Styrofoam. And if I could. Yeah, okay. Here we go. It's it's all over the place. The problem with it is, you know, the regs come through. They do a good job, but you'll see pieces are cut there. But it just the breaks just break this stuff apart. And there's a cargo container and and I took some pictures in the planters around the parking are around the beach and the parking lot and you'll see what happened. I got to start over again. I don't know what's going on here. Pardon? Oh, that's all there is. Okay. But anyway, the bottom line on it is, it's it permeates our sand. And the only way we get rid of it is picking it up, like Peter said. So I definitely support the city council and hopefully you guys can come up with a plan to ban Styrofoam. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please. And then I'm going to cut the speaker's list off here. It looks like we're the gentleman. That gentleman at the end will be the last speaker. Okay. And then we're going to.
Speaker 3: Carry their council. My name is Mike Murchison. I apologize for being under the weather this evening. And I'll start off with a caveat of saying that I love Berlin and I love Lolas. I go to both places very often on behalf of the the industry and the business d'arte on behalf of a lot of restaurants here in Long Beach. I want to express some concern from the standpoint of expectations in initiating a band discussion tonight, directing the city attorney to draft that. It's not that we don't applaud the environmental industry. We all love Heal the Bay, the Surfrider Foundation. I think there's nobody in Long Beach that doesn't think the same way. What we're concerned about is process. And I noted way back because I represented 18 restaurants back then in the minimum wage discussion that there were a lot of restaurants. There's over 550 of them that are full service restaurants that were not involved in the minimum wage discussion because there was not the outreach that was done at that point in time, and yet there was already a process moving forward. So what I'm here tonight to express is we're all about getting the stakeholders together. We're all about sharing the dialog back and forth. I applaud having the environmental groups. I applaud having the industry, and I applaud having the restaurants all together at the same time. What I'm saying is take a step back before directing the city attorney's office to enact this ban and draft it. Move it forward. Set a time line that you want for the Commission, sustainability or the environmental committees of the city to get together. And we'll get behind that. But without that, you're missing a key component here. Tonight, you've heard from the environmental community. Terrific. How many restaurants did you hear from this evening? Again, love Berlin, love Lola's. But you're missing over 550 full-service restaurants, over 100 fast food restaurants. There's a lot of dialog that still needs to occur out there. I encourage you to do that. I encourage you to take a step back. Think about that because there is a financial impact, especially a mom and pop places. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 7: Good evening, Mayor and council people. My name is Wayne Murchison, second district. Um, the gentleman mentioned a lot of restaurants and just picking and going off of him and seems to me a lot of the fast food places have already been Styrofoam and their places are using just biodegradable stuff. So, um, you know, once you do it, people are just, it's not going to be that big a deal. However, like a lot of other groups, we do do a lot of beach cleanup. And last time I did one just the sun, same type of pictures and I had buckets of Styrofoam. And it does it breaks down the the scoopers can't get it. You could literally, as one guy said, stay in one's square spot and dig up a whole bunch of Styrofoam. So we need to ban it because it just gets into our wildlife and everything and permeates our every life. We're probably breathing it as well. So it's a good thing to burn it. To burn it. Thanks.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hello, Mayor. Council members, my name is Bill Hickman with the Surfrider Foundation. And I was here five years ago when the city council was considering a plastic check.
Speaker 6: Out bag ban.
Speaker 3: A lot of the similar arguments came up and ultimately.
Speaker 6: The Steve Long Beach was one of the early adopters of a plastic bag ban ordinance that went statewide, as you all know, was passed by the state legislature in 2014 and confirmed by voters last month.
Speaker 3: So there are a lot of similarities. And Surfrider, we see this at our beach cleanups. It's one of the top items. And before we look at banning something, we look and say, hey, is this recyclable with polystyrene? The answer is yes and no.
Speaker 6: Technically it is, but it's not economically feasible. A lot of examples were given why.
Speaker 3: And I think this is an important issue.
Speaker 6: I think there's consensus to do the final studies. I think we've been looking at it here for ten years and it's finally come to the forefront. So there are other municipalities that this has taken place and it's not a big hardship on businesses. I'm not aware of any business that has gone out of business because of this. So there are success.
Speaker 3: Stories and we need to.
Speaker 6: Look at the whole watershed and set an example here. In addition to the expanded polystyrene from restaurants, you should also consider the retail sales of polystyrene, the foam coolers, foam cups, things along those lines. Those are the items that we find out are beach cleanups. Also, those are included in some of the other ordinances throughout the state and something that can make an increased impact.
Speaker 3: A couple of the statements in the aquarium video early really struck me. Humans living in harmony with nature. The actions taken today will determine our tomorrow. The future generations.
Speaker 6: And how your actions can make a difference for this community.
Speaker 3: And beyond. So please move the item forward and please consider strong language to be an expanded polystyrene. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Speaker 6: Hello. My name is Brian. I want to say thank you to the city council members and the mayor. I'm very pleased about the talks of banning polystyrene. My personal experience with.
Speaker 3: It is a.
Speaker 6: Little bit like local beaches and the fishing community. So there's two type of people in the fishing community, the ones who are economically well-off enough that they don't rely on the food. And the a lot of our people of.
Speaker 3: Color who go there to feed their families, who just have.
Speaker 6: Little economics means of getting food in other ways. And there's two people who go there. The people who can't. Who can say, I'm not going to eat that because there's this constant warnings of pollution levels on our coastal fish croaker perch. And I'm just really concerned for a lot of our people of color who rely on coastal foods like the fish who are getting polluted through small particulates like this that get into their bodies. And who have no other means. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Hi. Thank you for hearing me. My name is Samantha martinez and I represent the Plastic Foodservice Packaging Group. We're a trade association and our members include the manufacturers.
Speaker 2: And resin suppliers of all different types of foodservice material. The type that you're talking about today. Tonight, polystyrene expanded polystyrene, as well as the poly coated paper that I see up there and a lot of people have with their coffee cups, the biodegradable compostable materials, the rigid plastics. You get the point. Anything that's that's a single use is made by our folks.
Speaker 4: And we don't want to see any of our.
Speaker 2: Products in the litter stream and we don't want to see any of them in the waterways.
Speaker 4: But there are many different types of materials.
Speaker 2: Because different food service providers utilize different materials for different needs, mostly for functionality, for hot or cold, for sizes, and also for.
Speaker 4: Fairprice as well as some of them are concerned about.
Speaker 2: End of life options and look at recycling and composting and the availability of those in their cities. But like I said, we don't want to see any of our products in the litter shimmer in the waterways. And we do support a lot of recycling programs, composting programs.
Speaker 4: Clean ups and educational programs.
Speaker 2: But we really don't believe that a ban is a solution because what you're going to find, unlike the plastic bag issue, you're going to replace one single use food service package for another that has environmental impacts when they're manufactured and has some end of life issues as well. It would be great if we all could go to reusable and I encourage you to look at that as part of your discussion. But again, I would encourage you to have a longer discussion. I saw I heard two restaurants were here tonight.
Speaker 4: I heard from the.
Speaker 2: Restaurant Association, the Grocers Association, that they heard from some of their members that they weren't aware that this was happening. So I would encourage you to make sure to reach out to some of their members. I do have letters from from just both of those organizations, but none of their members came mean. I just want to state that the State Water Resources Control Board acknowledged that replacement products banning and having a replacement product is not the answer. I'm not going to quote their whole their whole analysis. But they said any product ban enacted by an ordinance that would not reduce trash would not assist in achieving compliance.
Speaker 4: So basically don't ban one and replace it with the other. But we.
Speaker 2: Support this council looking.
Speaker 4: Into solutions of litter and waste. We think it's an important issue and it deserves discussion.
Speaker 2: And we hope that you will include stakeholders in the community. Thank you again for for the time.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, city council members and city staff. My name is Craig Cadwallader and I'm speaking on behalf of the Surfrider Foundation South Bay chapter and have handed out to all of you some documents that indicate that the Food and Drug Administration is changing its position with regards to styrene. And we often hear arguments that the FDA has approved the use of styrene packaging for food contact. And as you can see from the document, they are reevaluating that position. And I believe that's because the National Toxicology Program Report on carcinogens has listed styrene as a reasonably expected human carcinogen. And there is evidence that the styrene leaches from the containers into the food and beverages that are contained. And we think that's a bad idea. 100% of people who have been tested have styrene in their body fat. I've heard arguments that styrene occurs naturally in things like cinnamon. Well, I might also add that nicotine occurs naturally, lead occurs naturally, and we don't want those items in our body. So our position on polystyrene includes not only the litter but also the health impacts of this product. Expanded polystyrene is unique in that it is 95% air. It blows around easily and very often doesn't even make it to recycling because it blows out of the containers. We also know that it breaks up into tiny little pieces that are nearly impossible to clean up. But the other forms of polystyrene, including oriented polystyrene, which is a non blown rigid item that lids and straws and utensils are made of, also contain the same chemical. And we would really like to see you expand your consideration to not only include expanded polystyrene but oriented polystyrene and do something that's positive for your residents and business health and help us keep the environment clean. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. And our last speaker.
Speaker 3: Very good to. It's obvious. I think it's obvious based upon the what has been presented here. You can't make an intelligent, definitive decision long term tonight that would be based in law. It's going to take a while to synthesize everything and come up with a strategic plan. In the meantime, however, in the meantime, there is an opportunity. What you do is you can put forward tonight an action and put it in place. The next council meeting. Passing an ordinance to go after the slobs that throw the stuff away on the street, on the sidewalk. Start with a $200 fine for the first one. Double it for the second one. And if depending on the age of the person is under 21, they will wear a t shirt. My mother raised a slob. If it goes further, you'll have the record of the guy. The mother will wear a T-shirt saying I raised a slob and go after it, period. I'm very serious because it's going to take you at least a good six months to a year to put something in place based upon what you heard from the Trade Trade Association and if you want to do it effectively. Not so with play passing and updated or revised amending the city codes relative to the fines for acting as a slob period. It's easy to see them. It's easier to get that. And that goes also to the issue that I raised earlier on when the during the early on in Sydney relative to the city as a whole , i.e. some of the union are going to have to work know some of the police will cite for that. Some of the parking people will say for that those people that are out on the street, a bus driver will do that work. Thanks.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Now we're going to go ahead and go back to the city council. Starting off with Councilman Gonzales.
Speaker 4: Yes. Thank you so very much. I know all of you have been here for some time, so I appreciate your patience with us and I appreciate your amazing words. And more than ever, I appreciate your expertize. You're not just advocates. You're really experts in the field of the environment and in what you do. And I really appreciate that. So thank you very much. So before I begin my comments and the presentation that I have, which I promise will be quick, I wanted to make some amendments on the front end relative to the item. So before I started, I wanted to just clarify that we'll be directing the city attorney to work with city staff to change basically to work with city staff on this ordinance to begin the ordinance. The second thing is I'd like to add the Environmental Services Bureau as one of the lead agencies in the second recommendation to help put together the outreach plan and work with stakeholders for education and feedback on this ordinance. And lastly, I'd like to change the third recommendation to read the Economic Development Commission rather than the Committee. In business outreach. So with all that said, I want to again thank everybody for being here. My office personally, we've been working with many of you for over seven months or so. And the agenda item before you as narrowly crafted and thoughtful to all those involved that respects not only the work of our city staff and respects the impact to local businesses, and most importantly, respects our constituents in their yearn for a better environment. And as you will see in our presentation, the item builds upon the decade of over a decade of research and studies that the City of Long Beach has compiled, including work with the Sustainable City Commission, which was chartered with our very own council member. Darrell Super not currently this issue has carried on through three different city council members and will seek to implement a narrow ban on expanded polystyrene or starter styrofoam to go with food containers. So we'll begin this quick presentation. Okay. Here's the issue, as we've seen, of course. So background, I think we've gone over it, but I'll just go over it very quickly. So again, expanded polystyrene is not biodegradable. It can stay in landfills or marine environments for upwards of 500 years, risking mammal, marine mammals and seabirds. Expanded polystyrene, also known as EPS used for to go containers in the food industry, is not considered recyclable because of the food contamination and is unfavorable economically. And as of 2011, the EPA's Municipal Solid Waste Report represented about 2.17 tons of waste, to which only 20,000 tons or less than 1% was actually successfully recycled. Now the expanded polystyrene negative impacts locally. How does it affect us here in Long Beach? I've become, let me tell you, a an expert sort of on polystyrene. I never thought I'd know so much about this, but I have. And so EPS is the second most abundant form of marine debris, as we've heard many times. Long Beach, we conduct over 100 cleanups or so a year. And if the Environmental Services Bureau is involved, it's about 800 to $1000 per cleanup that we're at is costing the city. EPS has health risk associated with the carcinogen styrene as we we heard as well Granada Beach according to Heal the Bay received a beach bomber grade F during wet weather months for poor water quality due to trash, debris and toxicity. And lastly, the EPA says the leading cause of litter in the form of takeaways. 40% of trash collected near the 17 freeway and the S.R. 47 is from the city of Long Beach. Now I want to clarify the item because I know a lot of questions have been asked about what are you banning, what are you proposing , what does this mean, what are you doing, not doing, etc.. So requesting this, what I'm trying to do is requesting the city staff, city manager to direct the city attorney to work with city staff and draft language for an ordinance that bans the distribution of expanded polystyrene. So that includes plates, bowls, trays, cups, wrapping. You get it? This is a ban similar to Pasadena who passed theirs back in May. This includes foamed number six, also referred to as Styrofoam as we've seen. And it does not include. So this policy is not including polystyrene, the solid type, which is a plastic utensils, and it's not including the retail sales. So some of the key points to note from the city of Pasadena that had just passed back in May, similar to that city, it provides a one year phased approach to allow for business and public education to the businesses in public. And it also provides a hardship waiver to businesses as well. So if for any reason they can prove that this is going to be a struggle for them, it would be taken by a case by case method. Lastly, the education piece in the agenda item also discusses the Environmental Services Bureau working with in conjunction with the Office of Sustainability and our Commission for an Educational Campaign. Lastly, Big Business Progress. The Economic Development Commission would work to reach research business incentives and also see how they can bolster our green business program, which we currently have . But perhaps we can do a bit more. Now getting specific on the city recommendations because as we've mentioned, this is over a decade's worth of work. And specifically, this is from our former city manager, Jerry Miller. He says litter problem resulting from polystyrene foam food packaging is becoming increasingly difficult to manage and has costly negative implications. The recommendations he made at that time were to eliminate polystyrene foam in municipal facilities and city sponsored events and to revise the city's purchasing policy to include language prohibiting the use of polystyrene. And then 27 also by our then director of planning and building, Suzanne Frick, and then acting director Chris Garner of Public Works. He's they both said expanding expanded polystyrene is not easily recycled and currently the recycling process is not financially feasible. In that report in which they worked with many stakeholders, including DART and the Grocers Association and including stakeholders on the environmental side, including dozens of businesses back in 2007, they came up with the recommendation four different recommendations, which again reiterated to create an expanded polystyrene reduction program, create a green business designation program, ban expanded polystyrene at all city buildings and events. And the fourth, what do you know? City wide expanded polystyrene ban. So this is just a timeline of what has been done since 2005. Frank Colonna was involved. He initiated it. It was actually implemented by council member Tony Saranga in 2008 motion by her. Then we also did the single use plastic bag ban back in 2011. And now here we are revisiting the ban on expanded polystyrene. So just some cast comparisons. This is on the San Jose's website for sustainability. And I chose this because it gives you a good example of the options the IPS, fiber, plastic and paper options that are available to businesses. And in some cases, the cost differentials are cost neutral, and in some cases they are $0.01 cost difference depending on the unit that you purchase. So it's very different. I know with every different business people are purchasing a little bit more expensive material. Maybe some people are purchasing paper or whatever it might be. I know there might be a cost impact, but what that will be will be dependent, of course, on the business. But really, relative to what you're seeing here and what is mostly used, you can see the cost differential could be very low. And then California cities. So as I mentioned, we could be the 100th city to ban polystyrene. And this would be a ban, of course, a partial ban. This is not fully banning anything. You can see the cities that have partially banned in government facilities, partially banned polystyrene. Just in what we're doing for retail locations or for restaurant locations. And then lastly, a partial ban I'm sorry, a full ban that would include retail sales. And so this is just a blip that I'll Goleta shared with us relative to the EPS impact for businesses. So the average cost of a $20 meal and an estimate that 20% of meals are carried out, which means that there are 55,000 meals. Then this average restaurant uses 11,000 takeout containers per year, which translates to £550 of EPS that can be replaced with compostable alternatives. So that's it. I wanted to make sure we had some information. I'm happy to share this with my council colleagues. I will reiterate. To everyone that again, this is just an action that will begin the process to of course, we'd like to start the ordinance process. It gives us 120 days to think about the options and what we can emulate, similar to Pasadena or some some other cities that are doing the same thing or have already implemented what we want to. And for example, you know, working with our partners in labor and in business and making sure that we get it right. So it's the best vision for Long Beach is certainly most important. And I also want to note that, you know, we just sat here in the council meeting just approving a $10 million payment for one of the leaders in sustainability for the aquarium. And so as leaders, I feel personally that we need to be consistent in making sure that if we're going to do that, then why can't we ban polystyrene, a partial ban? We're not going from 0 to 1000. We're going from 0 to 100. And I think many of these individuals are experts here. Again, they're not just speaking from emotion, they're speaking from expertize and research. And I really appreciate that. And again, we've also unanimously supported climate change actions, lower L.A. River plans, we've breakwater discussions, recreation on our waterways. And the only letters of support or the letters of support that I receive were over well over 200 in my office. The only ones that brought up concerns were Dart Grocers Association and the California Restaurant Association. Only those three out of the people here today, we had about 26 people in support and about three in opposition. So again, I asked my council colleagues to really think about the work that's been done. Let's be respectful of that. It does take more money and it costs to do another study. I think we've already done that. The time is now to get this done. So thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 2: Well, I just want to say what a great job Councilmember Gonzales just did presenting that. I think that you've said everything that I had cued up and highlighted, ready to say, knowing that you were going to touch on, but and not such great detail. I also want to thank everybody that came out and stayed out tonight and not just tonight. People in this room, as she mentioned, have been working on this for over a decade. And I think there are two questions in front of us tonight. One is, what kind of city do we want to be for our children, for the environment? And Long Beach continues to talk about being a sustainable city. Right. We've had the commission my commissioner met with me. Kobe presented the sustainability plan where we look at in 2017. This was already done and part of your proposal was to ban Styrofoam. You've already done this and you've done it time and time again. Those are public meetings that are people are know are out there. And I think the second question is, outside of the environment, what other waste are we doing? We're wasting a lot of time kicking the trash down the road and not tackling it whenever people continue to say they want it. And I know that you guys are volunteers. I know the people that are out there cleaning our beaches, picking up every piece of Styrofoam, is a volunteer working and taking time away from their family to do that. And so I believe that what Councilmember Gonzalez has done has laid out a great path to get to what we've all said we wanted to get to by directing the city attorney to say, let's draft an ordinance but have process in there. I'd like to ask a question of the city attorney in the process when it says work with the Office of Sustainability, the Sustainability City Commission, community stakeholders. Could that be interpreted to also do one community meeting around this issue that restaurants and everybody else can come and be a part of?
Speaker 6: Councilmember Pearce. The way I read the motion as drafted. No, the request. The city attorney to work with staff to draft the ordinance relating to the ban. And I will say that the PowerPoint by Councilmember Gonzalez was very helpful to answer a lot of the questions that I had. But then the second part of the motion was to request the city attorney or designee, I mean, the city manager designee to work with officers sustainability on developing the public education campaign relating to the ban. So those are two, as I read them, two separate items. But we will be working with staff through the city manager's office, whoever they designate us to work with on preparing. If this motion were to pass the draft ordinance, and as I understand the presentation, we will be looking at cities like Pasadena and including those elements from there. And we have been talking to Pasadena actually about their ordinance, including those best practices.
Speaker 2: So in including working with community stakeholders to go through the process though, I mean, there's nothing keeping us from talking to some of the restaurants and making sure that they're meeting with staff or meeting with council to share their concerns or questions. Correct.
Speaker 6: There would be nothing correct that staff could have a community meeting on that, but it wouldn't be the city attorney's office leading that.
Speaker 2: That's fine. No, not that I thought it would be the city attorney. Thank you for that clarification. And just again, to reiterate, I mean, in 2007, the memo I'm looking at says that we had the Grocers Association, American Plastics Council and Long Beach Restaurants. And to be very clear, there were also two steps put forward by city manager, city staff before that directed to steps. And one of them being this step that we have in front of us, the work's been done. I think it's challenging for a city like Long Beach that our residents have vision and they have hope for what city we can be. And when we continue to let sometimes government bogged down by putting into too many steps to keep us from doing what's right. It's frustrating for for my constituents. And it's time for us to go ahead and put that step forward, guys. And so I'm I'm asking our council colleagues to vote with us today to make sure that we do the right thing, but to make sure that our staff and our sustainability commissioner and everybody else can move on to work on other things and not be talking about Styrofoam in another five years. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Our next speaker is Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mayor. And I want to thank my council colleagues, Pierson Gonzalez, for bringing this forward as well and for inviting me to join them in this. I'm also, as many of you know, and that has been pointed out, I have history with this was pillow talk before but it's a it's now come full circle to fruition into a council meeting. The the fact of the matter is, is that as council members piercingly pointed out, this is talking about process. This has been a process. It's been a long, long process, more than ten years with many council members involved, including one named Durango. And it took up our time that we come to the forefront with this issue, that we bring it to the fore to forward, that we bring it to a closure in the sense of having some kind of ordinance that deals with this. I think Councilwoman Gonzales said it perfectly. We're not going from one to 1001 to 100. We're talking about implementation slowly so that eventually we develop what would be a workable ordinance that would be available to everybody as a member of the Coastal Commission. My my responsibility is to ensure access on our coast and also that it's a clean coast and it's part of that. I mean, there's no question that the cleanup at the Coast Commission has had on a yearly basis, polystyrene is the number two major polluter that's out there. They're always picking it up because it's always there. And we are a beach city. And I think as a beach city, we need to take that responsibility to ensure that we address the polystyrene issue. So I'm fully supportive of this of this memo, of this motion to move forward with with an ordinance. And I also very much support the fact that we need to get our stakeholders involved. They need to have we have to have their input. And one of the things that is that and Councilmember Pearce took the words right out of my mouth. There's a lot of volunteers out there, tons, millions of people who are volunteers who go to the beaches, volunteer their time to clean it up. So that people can enjoy the beauty that the beaches have to offer for us. So it's not only about the experts. It's not only about people who have an extensive knowledge of what polystyrene means to the environment. It's the volunteers who are out there every weekend cleaning it up because they know instinctively or maybe educationally what polystyrene does to not only our beaches, but to our waters and to our marine life . And that's where it's important. Very true. We just passed a motion to help our aquarium to continue their programs in education and climate change. There are still some people out there and one in the in the Oval Office who doesn't believe in climate change while it's real. I deal with it every month when I go to, of course, the commission meeting. We're always talking about sea level rise and we're talking about the impact of plastic in our oceans, and we're talking about the pollution that we deal with on a daily basis and that marine life that we're losing all the time because of the pollution that we have. So I do want to implore my council colleagues to support this motion, to move this forward so that we can have a a environmentally safe beach in Long Beach. Where is Long Beach water? What makes it long, anyway? That's that's a a rhetorical question that does not end that answer. But that's what we want. We want a beach that people could come to and enjoy. And that's the only way we're going to be able to accomplish that, is by having limits on our pollution. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 1: I want to start by thanking everyone that's here today. I'm Gabriela Natasha, the Marine Research Group. The stuff that you do is really important and I appreciate your input. Also love your your t shirts. I think that it really stands for something that I truly believe in. When I was elected to the city council, I came to an early council meeting and noticed that in the back where we would get water had cups that were not environmentally friendly. So I went out and purchased for all my council colleagues cups with their names on it for them to bring to council each week so that they would not be using throwaway cups. And so I'll return this to Councilmember Price and I know Ms.. Pearce doesn't know. Councilmember Pearce does not yet have one, but I'll work on that. Now in the back we have something different. This is a compostable cup. However, this cup was manufactured in Colorado and polluted its way all the way to Long Beach and then to recycle this specific kind of cup, it is recycled in Kern County. And so it's a different kind of pollution that we're talking about. And so I'm concerned that we're not really addressing the system as a whole. This cup, which many people hopefully don't use as often anymore because they have more environmentally friendly coffee cups. The challenge that some of the providers in my district have is how popular the order on demand has become. So now you order your drink on demand and just pick it up. And so people are reducing their reliance and utilization of those cups. And so what does that look like? Furthermore, there's a business in my district that has revenue of $5 million a year, which is significant to sales tax revenue in my district. And they use a cup similar to this. This cup is produced locally and is recycled in L.A. County, and they had a significant recycling program that they put into effect to ensure that cups like this are recycled. However. The programs available are, in my opinion, the ones from START are too expensive. They rely on businesses fronting the cost for it, and I don't think that's fair either. I think that there are steps in between that are not being brought in on planes and trains and automobiles and ten wheel 18 wheelers or don't have the interior . That's plastic. That makes this very difficult to recycle as well. I took part in the discussion that we had at the L.A. County level that actually moved over to the corn cups. And the challenge with the corn cups became and I think Natasha talked about the eventual options for composting is we don't have a long term compost available in the region and so those corn cups are ending back up in landfills in Long Beach were burning them and a corn cup actually burns better than some of these other alternatives, but we still have a challenge. Additionally, I go to Washington, D.C. with the Federal Legislative Committee and meet with the Army Corps of Engineers about our beaches. And and one of the challenges is. The problem is the people who are littering, whether they're using this cup or this cup, they're still going to be littering. And I think that we need to do a lot of public outreach in that way as well, because whichever cup is on the beach is going to come back. And I would also say that if you were to come to me today and say, Stacy, I want your support for a foam cooler ban immediately, I would support that because that specific kind of of Styrofoam is almost never recycled. It breaks up into tiny pieces. It has those kinds of issues along with it. And so I'd like to see us get some reduction in recycling goals. I'd like us to potentially instruct waste management, our recycler of residential recycling, to clean poly polystyrene and sell it back to the other recyclable areas. There's another secondary recycle cycle center in South L.A. County that could recycle those if they were cleaned properly. And they buy it because it has a market versus a cardboard, which we have piling up in our landfills as well, because the price of cardboard on the secondary market is so low. I appreciate that. We've done lots of research over the last ten years, and I know that we are a group of bright people who could come up with something bigger. I imagine that we could come up with instead of just a ban, we could say, any Long Beach business, who wants to buy whichever one of these cups is made locally? Let's say this one was made locally. All Long Beach businesses get a certain price on buying this kind of cup from a local manufacturer because we would be in a position then to say These are all paper, not plastic and filled recyclable cups. In what environment? And so just trying to find a bigger solution than just banning one item where they're going to replace that with another item that could, quite frankly, be less recyclable, that there are certain clamshells that don't have fiber in them, that are solid plastic that we actually are hearing are even worse off. So I'd like to figure out what that looks like and and go big. That would be my comments. And I look forward to hearing from my colleagues.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Supernova.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mayor Garcia. And I'd also like to thank all the speakers tonight. I really appreciate you coming out on a different issue I referenced. It's tough to have folks out during the holiday season when you have a lot of stakeholders involved. And it really appreciate you coming out five days before Christmas. Just by way of background, it was mentioned that I used to be on the Sustainable City Commission. I was actually a charter member in 2007 and served for seven years and two terms as chair. So when we referenced the the city's actions seven years ago, I remember that because that was our first year of our commission. And in fact, the very first speaker mentioned Frank Colonna in those days. So our city manager and his staff, knowing that that item would come up tonight, actually forwarded as a memo today from Suzanne Frick in 2007, November 28, and referencing that. So the other part of my background, I have to tell you, is I chair the Environmental Committee of City Council. I learned about this item 11 days ago. Now to compare that to what happened in 2007, the environmental committee held outreach, invited over a thousand people to come and meet on this issue and the plastic ban issue simultaneously. And to say I haven't done my due diligence as chair of this committee is a gross understatement. And so I'm really kind of painted into a corner here. I don't want to be an obstructionist based on process, protocol and principle, but I think I'm really there because I just need to do the bare minimum due diligence. What I have is a plan in place where I'm open to holding as many meetings as as possible, starting right away if my council colleagues can do it with me. Councilmember Pierson and and Vice Mayor Richardson. And get this item vetted. You guys had some great positions tonight, some great ideas. I took a lot of notes, so bear with me as I try to quote many of you. And I think we can put this together very quickly. Now, part of the proposal is 120 days to come back to to us with with just the council deliberation, the education plan and whatnot. I think we can work a fast track if we get the environmental community involved and and really get all the input with all the stakeholders. If I can just go through the item a little bit here. For the agenda item 14 and. I think, first of all, I should put the caveat in that that it it changed to involve city staff and that's a great move. But part two mentions the Sustainable City Commission. Part three. Mentions Economic Development Committee. And then I mentioned the 120 day item, and then upon approval, it will make it to the Environmental Committee. And I would suggest that sort of the the cart and the horse syndrome, I think it should come to the Environmental Committee first. We get it fully vetted. All the stakeholders can be invited that time. There will be none of this talk of, boy, you really try to slip this bias five days before Christmas. I've heard that on multiple issues over the years, and it's tough to do an item like this that has the word ban in it at this time. So. I'd also like to just to quote some of the folks and and I really appreciate Tom Surfrider being here. Sonya Coffey from Surfrider and also you, my nominee to replacement in the Sustainable City Commission. You had mentioned that you directed staff in the city of Manhattan Beach, but you mentioned the word outreach to the community , and that was evidently a key component that you had, and I think we need to do that. Elliot Gonzalez on the Sustainable City Commission, we served, I think, a little bit of time together that business friendliness. I think that what Surfrider does in their program is excellent and I think we could enhance that in the weeks to come because you're going to you'd have to wait 120 days anyway. So let's see what we can do from a council standpoint to enhance those programs, get the buzz out there that that it's open and robust. Speaking of robust, I think that we could possibly bring this back with stakeholder input and then present the city attorney with something that's ready for primetime if we go with it tonight. My fear is that it's in little too rough a form. Councilmember Mongeau just mentioned things that she like included. Many of the speakers mentioned many items they'd like included. If we do a little due diligence upfront, we can get a cleaner piece to the city attorney that might be able to be turned around quickly and more efficiently. My other fear is that coming back to another night like this where it's not quite right, and then we have another delay as it goes back. So with that, I'll go ahead and propose a substitute motion for a little different approach, and I'll just kind of briefly go over some of the points here. So we would remove the language of the ban of tonight's item. We would request the city manager or some someone else to work to form a stakeholder group as a primary means to create the well-informed public participation process. The working group would include environmental groups, small business and restaurant owners, nonprofits and churches, the polystyrene or other product manufacturers and distributors. And I'd written down city staff before the council ever mentioned this, but definitely Environmental Services, the Office of Sustainability and one that no one's mentioned is the Health Department. We're talking about food safety here. We have our own health department that's kind of unique in the state of California, and I'd like to see them involved. And economic development, I think, is another key player. Part three would be request the city manager. And to to develop the stakeholder group for litter collection, maintenance, disposal of polystyrene, recyclability of polystyrene and other alternate food service containers. Economic cost impacts on restaurant community regarding food service service containers, alternate disposal efforts, composting waste to energy conversion and secondary material recovery facilities. And again, Councilmember Mongeau alluded to that and it should say here, hold up, prop now. So. I'll hold up a prop. This is actually a food container. It's half of a container that holds. I think it's a lemon cake or something that comes in in a tin. That's only half of it. This would not be banned under our ordinance. So these are the types of things. Just food for thought. Pardon the expression that we might want to look at moving forward. So that is my. Motion, and I'd asked my colleagues to support it.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next up, we have Vice Mayor Richardson. So do you. Well, I was just going to. So I just want to make sure that we there is a substitute motion on the floor. And before we move on. Is there a second on the specific motion? There's a second on the substitute motion. And before we move forward, Mr. Richard, attorney thing, do you want to clarify that motion? I think you wanted it clarified.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mayor. Members of the council member. Council member. Superman was one of your items to was to remove item one. The second was to form a stakeholder group. And then the third was asking for information or a study from the city manager's office. Was there a referral to the environmental committee or where was this to go to to do this study?
Speaker 9: Yes. The third item would involve the environmental committee. I mean, we would get them involved at any one process here. Do you want that delineated at this point? Exactly.
Speaker 6: I think it would be helpful for the purposes of the motion to see if the item isn't moved forward tonight. Where it is. Where are you sending it to? So that these items could be brought back to that body?
Speaker 9: Okay. Well, I had mentioned the city manager as the entity developing the stakeholder group. He could designate the Environmental Committee to do that or be involved in that process or anyone of his choosing.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. Next up, we have Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So just following along this conversation, let's see that last motion. Mr. Enviro Committee Chairman commits the environmental committee to a bunch more meetings. I don't know how the Environmental Committee feels about that, but but thank you for that substitute motion. So I just saw this presentation. It was it was put together well. And I think that the presentation from the aquarium adds a lot of context, particularly when, you know, ah, we're literally about to build. We just invested in building a new facility to talk about issues like that. So, you know, that's fresh in my mind and in my context. And then, you know, a few comments from the public. Some of them were striking. One, the statement about more plastic than fish in the ocean, that's just staggering to think about. You know, and that comes from someone who enjoys the ground fish. And I just think about the term. There's a lot of fish in the sea. Just, you know, it's it's kind of kind of a big term considering considering we are, you know, at the mouth of two rivers. I do think, you know, we should be leading on this and having conversation and setting a standard, especially if we're going to expect communities upriver to follow suit so that we don't continue to pick up everybody else's trash. I think there were a number of good points brought up by the council. So in terms of like the engagement, the health department makes a lot of sense to me. The environmental standards looking at that makes a lot of sense. Councilmember Mongo had a lot of good recommendations in terms of looking at the awkward shaped things. And, you know, if we're going to, you know, repeal, you've got to repeal and replace, right? If you going to ban, you got to replace it. How can we guide that process? And, you know, I think there's a way we've learned a few things from the banning of plastic bags about enforcement. I remember when that went, you know, came the council. There was a lot of conversation about being punitive to small businesses and and how would we handle sort of how we handle , you know, fines and things like that and enforcement. And I would say whatever we do here, we need to prioritize enforcement closer to the beaches, into the rivers, and ask staff to look at that. And I heard the concern about engaging businesses or stakeholder groups, and that's all supportive. So what I want to do is try to throw a compromise motion that at that keeps the integrity of the first the first motion, frankly, just because on principle, I believe a lot of work went into this. And I want to make sure a lot of work went into this and a lot of stakeholders were involved in this, and that should be used as a starting point. So we'll start with the structure of that, and we'll try to integrate some of the concerns that that Councilman Supernormal and Councilmember Mungo expressed. And so particularly, I understand the concern about being an environmental committee chair and cart before the horse and those sorts of things. But I have seen when, you know, sometimes when the city attorney is the one to write the the ordinance, we don't we we tend to go get the input ourselves and then be very prescriptive on what we ask them to write. And I think this is an opportunity to do the opposite. We can delay just a little bit and ask the city attorney to get in, get engaged in writing the ordinance now, but be a part of the process, that outreach, that input process, so more specifically referred to the Environmental Committee to do a little bit more outreach with these stakeholders as a part of crafting the ordinance. So when it comes back, it respects the work that's been done, the ten years of history with former Councilmember Turanga, the work that the sponsors have done and sort of make sure this is a series of ten because I understand when folks ask about including stakeholders, but I also understand when that's a tactic to delay just when there's no intent to actually bring anything back. So I think there might be a way to sincerely, sincerely move forward, make sure those things are are included. And to be more specific, what might come back are very specific, you know, feedback about the timing because there wasn't in these recommendations was a lot of flexibility. I saw in the main motion about the timing for implementation, there was no conversation about finding all of those things, like the punitive elements are what we need, what we actually need the business community to weigh in on. So what I'm hoping is maybe we can get ourselves out of the way and, you know, add, you know, an extra two month delay to this timeline for the city attorney and the committee to actually work and gather information and use that. So we have a draft to look at. So I'm going to structure that as my substitute motion. So the main integrity of this at a at a, you know, two months to this 180 day time, 120 day timeline. So let's make it 180 days. Let's ask staff to a city attorney to begin the process, but make sure, you know, it's inclusive of those things that we didn't prescribe tonight and allow that feedback to come in in terms of like those punitive elements and then to actually add staff as a part of. The second piece of this motion here asks staff to look at, you know, explore some programs or some opportunities for us to take in consideration some of Stacey's excuse me, Councilwoman Mungo's recommendations, because they may have made a lot of sense. I don't have an awkwardly shaped Styrofoam item hold up, but it was compelling. It makes sense to me. So if the intent here is to try to find some common ground, something moves forward. I hope that that was a satisfactory compromise that still moves us forward. So that's my substitute substitution. Oh, the mayor left. I'm in charge. Okay, so that's my substitute. Substitute motion. Is there a second on that? Oh. Councilwoman Gonzalez. Great. Okay. So next we have Councilman Austin.
Speaker 10: Thank you very much. And first of all, I'd like to thank my my colleagues, Councilmember Gonzalez, Pierce and Urunga, for making this meeting fun and exciting and educational. This is an important issue, obviously, to many of us here in this beach city. I want to especially thank the public for coming out. Your public comments were not only educational, but, as I mentioned, to show that we have a lot of subject matter experts among our residents here and a lot of people doing a lot of great work at Goleta, the Marine research. Katy, thank you for all you do. I had an opportunity to sit in on a presentation about a year and a half ago, two years ago with Captain Charles Moore. I found out that he was the grandson of William Reed, which was another December last year, would take you back to some of the conversations we had as a council. But he signed a book called Plastic Ocean, and reading that book was very, very informational for me. And last year, I actually sponsored and participated in a beach clean up with the Surfrider Foundation, which was very helpful to me because I witnessed the negative impacts of Styrofoam on our white sandy beaches. And that's a no pun intended. It was that our beaches are a Styrofoam sand blend. And and it's very concerning for for several of the reasons I expressed here earlier. My question I mean and I do support a process, you guys, I'm consistent in that regard. I'm always going to be for a process that and make sure that we we do it right. We're not rushing that. We're considering all factors and we're engaging all stakeholders. And so I believe the substitute substitute motion accomplishes that. I do think but I do have a couple of questions and why this? This particular item does not ban retail use because at the end of the day, I mean, what we are proposing to do is we're asking businesses, small businesses, to alter their practices, but we're not asking our residents to alter their practices or retailers to alter anything. And so that is something I think we need to really, really consider if we're going to be intellectually honest about an approach to ban Styrofoam in the city of Long Beach. Again, I said I think the process should be fair and measured, it should be transparent. And I think the start up accomplishes that. Styrofoam doesn't work well in microwave oven. A Band-Aid in my own household. And I want to just just to say that, you know, week after week, we hear issues come up. And it's it's really important, I think, for us to be consistent. And I want to commend my my council colleagues for being environmental stewards. I want to commend the public for their commitment to the environment. Obviously there's some great efforts to to to to to to fight for the beaches and the environment and fight for the residents here. But there's other types of pollution as well. And we discussed those ad nauseum last week with over three and a half hours of study session, noise pollution, air pollution. You know, and I would just say, on behalf of my residents, I'm sure that they would appreciate some consistency on that issue as well. Right. Thank you. And so when we when we talk about other types of pollution and impacts on neighborhoods and communities and other areas of the city, unless, let's remember, the passion in which we fought for this evening. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilwoman Pryce.
Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I, too, want to thank my colleagues, and especially Councilwoman Gonzales, for bringing this item forward. I think the presentation that she did was excellent. And I have to say, I'm a big fan of people articulating their position via PowerPoint or in whatever way it helps them identify what is important to them and why . And I'm glad to see that that is something that we are doing more often because I feel like I learn every time there is such a presentation. So I'm very grateful for that. And I know Councilman Superman did it last week. And again, same thing. Perhaps that's the way I learn. I found it very, very helpful. So I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward. This is actually a really great item. We, my chief of staff, Julie Maliki, had worked with Council District Twos Chief of staff about a year ago in exploring this item. And so we did a little bit of study on the history of the item and a kind of understanding what had happened. And I agree with my colleagues that there has been a great deal of work on this particular item in the past. I do think it's important, though, that we have stakeholders involved at every stage, and what happens is that people change, right? Business owners change, community organization leaders change. And it's important for people to feel heard at the time that the item is happening. So to to talk about a process that happened that they weren't involved in doesn't really make people feel like they were heard. We have had Goleta come out to our community meeting to do a presentation and we've been very happy to support a lot of their efforts sponsoring some of the programs that they do in our local schools since we were my district represents a lot of the coastal community and so we've actually partnered with them. We do trash pickups. We do a monthly trash pickup event. I'd love to see some of the folks here at them. We we have done two now where we've picked up trash with about 30 community members. And yes, there's a lot of Styrofoam. It's all over the place. It's very frustrating to see. And it just makes me sad, honestly, to see it all over the community and especially in the lagoon and in our waterways. So I support the item. I wanted to hear from all of the people who came out to advocate for the item and from my colleagues so that I could really consider what everybody had to say and kind of trying to decide where I stand on this particular item tonight. I think it's important, like I said, to include current stakeholders, current business owners. I want them to feel heard. I have a tremendous amount of respect for Councilman Super Na. I don't take his expertize on the commission and the work that he did there lightly. I think it's definitely something that is worthy of the respect, respect for everybody, the ones bringing the item today and also those who have worked diligently on this item in the past. My only concern, and I have to be honest, I'm a little bit confused about our substitute and our substitute substitute because it sounds like they're similar or very similar. My only concern would be I think it's great to have a date certain because I understand that it happens when things get sent out for a study or something and they never come back. It's happened to several of my items, but I think it's important. I'm okay with the date certain. My my question is if really the ordinance is going to reflect the involvement of the stakeholders, would we not want the city attorney's office to. Listen to the information that we get back, because what's the point of us having a process if parallel contemporaneous to the process? They're drafting an ordinance not mindful of what's happening in the various committees or commissions or stakeholder meetings and that kind of thing. So I'm okay with the date certain, but I wonder if there's a way. I wonder if Vice Mayor Richardson, if you're open to a friendly to your substitute substitute that has a date certain but doesn't but allows them to start their ordinance drafting maybe after some meetings have been had so that people actually are heard because if they're drafting an ordinance and we're doing a stakeholder process, then the ordinance isn't going to reflect what the stakeholders are saying. And what I loved about the presentation that Councilwoman Gonzalez gave is that she is open to and is suggestive of some business incentives and business ideas. So perhaps I know we've done a lot of outreach, but we haven't done outreach with today's stakeholders in the business community. I know that for a fact because a lot of my businesses didn't know this item was on, so I would like to at least put that out there and not get the criticism of us. We didn't know about it.
Speaker 8: Sure. Yeah. And I think and thank you for allowing me the opportunity to clarify. I think that was the intent that when I say begin the process not of drafting it. Right? We just don't want to have to take a step of going back out, do outreach, coming back to the council, going through more procedure. Right. So the when I say involved in the process, I mean in that stakeholder part with the committee, like we want that to help inform those items that weren't prescribed tonight. Tonight was very high level. It said we want some some phase in it said we want some incentives and said we want, you know, to look at the, you know, any punitive elements that should be informed by the businesses who are impacted. So rather than like we know what, we need input on the council saying we're okay with getting input from them. So what I'm saying is city attorney like we're, you know, via councilman super knoll's recommendation of the committee just go, you know , let's sort of narrow that down, get that input there, give it straight to city attorney. When it comes back to council, we're ready to make make a no one can say that haven't been engaged council expressed interest in in doing something substantive and we want to just demonstrate that we're serious. It's not just a and we've seen it before, you know, delay to delay to the delay. Right. So so I think you're right. And so if that you need that to be a friendly, accept it. That's fine, too.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I mean, just just something to the effect of the city attorney to wait prior prior to drafting the ordinance, wait for feedback from the various stakeholder communities or groups.
Speaker 8: So the way I think it would be, we added an extra, I think 60 days, right? So we would hope that that element, that element, you know, stays. So the know outreach to the stakeholders through the committee happens in two months. And, you know, so that we know it's not a perpetual thing and that still allows the four months they originally requested for for crafting the item. I mean, the ordinance and sometimes and frankly, some of it may not be in the ordinance like incentives and all that stuff. Those a lot of times are separate programs as funding is available and it's not linked to an ordinance. So all of that together could come back.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. Let me let me go ahead. Before Mr. City attorney, I mean, a little clarification as well here. So just before we get to I never want to have a chance to speak. I want to just say a few things and then go back to that. The substitute substitute this on the motion on the floor. One, I just wanted to say for all the for all the folks that are out here, like thank you for your advocacy. And so, you know, when this ordinance comes back, whether it's in 90 days or 120 days, when it comes back to to this body and certainly when it's passed, I look forward to signing it and I look forward to getting making this law. I think that's really important. So I'm going to be very supportive of where this is going and where this well, this will end up. I think that Long Beach led the way on the plastic bag issue. It was a tough vote. We led the way, more cities followed and the state went and did their work in this case. But a lot of cities have done this work already. Long Beach can help lead the way. And eventually I think what will happen is the state again will follow and we'll end up with this with a statewide policy, which is oftentimes, as you all know, cities have to lead for the state to follow in these important environmental issues. This has everything to do with with what's happening currently, as you all know, in our oceans and on our planet. And it's absolutely direct ties to our climate change initiative. And so I support that. What I did want to say is what I think the substrate substitute has. I think the way I heard the motion is and I want to thank you for the clarification from Councilman Price and others, is a sense that you were going to take probably 60, 90 days or a couple of months to do public outreach. The Environmental Committee of the City Council will be involved. There'll be conversations at the Economic Development Commission. There will be conversations and hopefully reaching out to the business community, reengage our environmental folks and our leaders within the first few months of that process. Then after that process is complete, then at that point the city attorney begins drafting. The draft ordinance does need to go back to the council for approval to start the ordinance. But it begins it begins. The drafting process begins after all that input has been collected over the next couple of months. And then at that point, the draft ordinance comes back to the city council. It sounds like to me now 180 days, is that what you had said? I mean, I think that's that's I think, what, six months? Okay. I mean, that's.
Speaker 3: I.
Speaker 0: Think, you know, that could be scaled back. But I mean, if that's that's the will of the council 180 days. Is fine. And so then you.
Speaker 8: Can come back sooner if they're done.
Speaker 0: Well, if it's done sooner, yeah. Obviously, the most important part is the public outreach portion at the start. Right. So you don't want to rush the meetings with business. You don't want to rush the meetings with the the commissions and the committee. And if there is if it comes back sooner, at that point, the city attorney, that really becomes up to you. And I think in fairness, I do I do think it's important to engage the small business owners that are out there that have legitimate concerns. They obviously, a lot of them I've heard from care about the environment and they just want to know and want to, you know, both on the education side, but they want to be partners in this, too. And so let's let's let's make it a win and ensure that our small, small businesses that are operating good restaurants are also partners in this process. And that we can all go and hopefully do this together, I think would be ideal. And so I think that was the substitute substitute. Mr. Vice Mayor.
Speaker 8: Sounds sounds really good. And I think the small business piece is spot on. Let's not make the mistake of thinking all our small businesses are using plastic bags. Let's just be honest about implementation. Right. This is the we're going to need a lot more education in multilingual format for this to really be a success. So. Yes.
Speaker 0: Absolutely. And so I agree. To me, the sub sub sounds, I think, fair, and it includes the business community. And I want to thank Councilman Gonzales. I think you've done a great job in leading this issue as well. So thank you for that. Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: Yes, you clarified some of my question. So I definitely am supportive of the substitute substitute as Vice Chair of the Environmental Committee, as I would like to say that I definitely want to push to have that meeting happen soon so that we can spend the next two months engaging with stakeholders and hopefully the next two months after that, drafting an ordinance so that we can come back soon. So with my committee members sometime in January, maybe. So that's all I'm going to say. I think everybody's done a great job. I think it's a late night. And I just want to continue to say thank you guys for sticking in there with us.
Speaker 0: Councilmember supermodel.
Speaker 9: Thank you. I think everyone in the room knows what my intent was. If anyone thought it was a delay tactic, you are absolutely wrong. I was trying to speed up the process. I guess I suffer from being around too long. I've seen this go the wrong direction too many times for something is sent over here and we never see it again. I guess the 2000 motion would qualify under that heading and I was sincerely trying to avoid that. Also, just just one one of the comments that the vice mayor said was, get ourselves out of the way. It's not that he's wrong and I'm right, that it's just so contrary to my style that we're probably never going to agree on that. I'm very hands on and and that's just the way I work. Finally, I'd also just like to add one other city department and that is serve not your kind of serve, but the SC RF. I just realized in my credentials I forgot to mention I believe I'm chair of that committee right now. And so when we meet next year, remember that Vice Mayor and I will do everything I can to hold the meetings efficiently and and soon. And we can have a quorum with two members, myself and and Janine peers, if the vice mayor is not available. And the whole purpose is to get that stakeholder input. That was my goal for that. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Appreciate that, Mr. City. Attorney.
Speaker 6: Mayor. Thank you for the clarification. Just a couple other points. I think the vice mayor's motion substitutes substitute included the recommendations as amended by the council member from the first District. Yes. Which would. Okay, thank you. Which should include elimination of the sale. And just the and this is for the beginning point, I think at the Environmental Committee meeting, we would probably provide them with some sort of a a draft similar to what Pasadena has adopted as a starting point for discussion, because that was in as part of her motion and part of her handout. So we wouldn't be drafting a motion, we would be waiting for feedback. But as far as a starting point, we may provide them a copy of the Pasadena ordinance for a starting point to discuss. And then we would also send this to the Economic Development Commission for discussion of local business incentives. And as the Vice Mayor said, that may or may not be included as part of the ordinance because that would have a financial component that may not be part of that. And then I had 180 days. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next up, we have Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I am. I'm not in favor of making it longer. I mean, I'll go with it. I also think we should bring it back 120 days. I was looking for something closer to May 4th. I would like to see us also write into the ban. Specifically things like this and the Styrofoam ice chests. I think those are really terrible and I think that there are many alternatives already. But I would also like to see some exemptions if you have a business that has a recycling program on site so that they don't go over to a worse cup, they should be exempt from the ban. Or and or we should talk about what are the other things that many of these industry groups move over to that are actually worse? And we should make sure that that's included. And I think that's part of the dialog of bringing it back, because if we just say we're going to do a ban and we're going to reach out to the community and hear how they feel about it. And they're going to just change over to products that are worse. We need to talk about that because I don't think that that gets to any of our outcomes. So I'll definitely be throwing a stakeholder in there who will come and discuss the recycle program or what that looks like, and potential options for other businesses that want to implement something such as that because the other products that they have to choose from aren't as friendly. So thanks so much.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Andrews.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you. I'm just hoping you could just bear with me for the next 20 minutes. We should be able to get through this guy. First of all, I just want to commend Lena for such a fantastic job. And I think everyone of us really understand now a little more about what we're trying to do, because it's very important, especially when you talk about our oceans and the cleanliness, that we should be really looking forward to. So at this point, I would just like to call for the question of we can stop all of this right now.
Speaker 0: Okay. There's a there's a motion in a second called call for the question, which was any objection? I'm going to go ahead and go take a vote. Okay. No objection. Great. So with that members with no objection, please go ahead and cast your votes for the motion in a second.
Speaker 9: I'm cued up if that's prevent the system from working.
Speaker 1: No, we need to do the voice vote.
Speaker 0: A voice vote.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 0: On the call for the question. Yeah.
Speaker 1: There's a.
Speaker 2: There's a.
Speaker 0: There's. All right, that's fine.
Speaker 1: Well, on the on the actual motion itself, that's not.
Speaker 0: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: On the motion.
Speaker 0: It's on the motion itself. Yeah. Okay. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any oppose? The abstentions. We can't say in any ways. Okay. Motion carries unanimously, so great. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you, everyone, for coming out. And we will now move on to. Yes. Wow. It's been a long night already. We're going on to 13 and then 24 and I see Rob out there. You're very patient. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to:
1. Request City Attorney to draft an ordinance related to banning the sale and distribution of expanded polystyrene and other polystyrene disposable food service containers within the City of Long Beach with exemptions for the Long Beach Unified School District;
2. Request City Manager, or designee, to work with the Office of Sustainability, the Sustainable City Commission and community stakeholders to develop a public education campaign related to the ban, which would include, but not be limited to:
a. Timeline for implementation,
b. List of Vendors who sell non-polystyrene products,
c. Website with all available information regarding the ban
and information about polystyrene,
d. Hotline for questions and concerns;
3. Request City Manager, or designee, to work with the Economic Development Committee of the City Council to come up with financial incentives for local businesses who implement the ban of these products before the implementation date of the ordinance;
4. This ordinance, education plan and incentive structure | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_12202016_16-1149 | Speaker 0: And we will now move on to. Yes. Wow. It's been a long night already. We're going on to 13 and then 24 and I see Rob out there. You're very patient.
Speaker 2: Q I.
Speaker 1: Am 13.
Speaker 2: Communication from Councilmember Pierce, Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilwoman Mongo, Councilman Austin. Recommendation to request the city manager to work with the city attorney, the Economic Development Commission and the Planning Commission to review and make recommendations regarding Section 21.52 of the Long Beach Municipal Code pertaining to conditional use permit.
Speaker 0: Councilwoman Pierce.
Speaker 2: Do we have Amy here? I'd like to go ahead and direct to staff.
Speaker 0: We spoke.
Speaker 2: Mr. Mayor. Members of the city council.
Speaker 1: The item before you today is, is.
Speaker 4: To consider.
Speaker 1: An amendment to the municipal code looking at conditional use permits. This is something.
Speaker 2: That staff is very supportive of in diving into and trying to find a.
Speaker 1: Way to.
Speaker 4: Make the.
Speaker 1: CFP process more efficient and more transparent for both the applicants.
Speaker 4: And the neighborhoods who may be impacted by those businesses. We're very interested in this item and do support it. If you have any questions, I'm happy to answer them at this time.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: Yes. I want to thank staff for their time and effort on this. And this is an item that really came to fruition because we had lots of conversations with small business owners, many who came tonight and had to leave. But lots of conversations with small business owners that spent the majority of their dollars trying to open up their business. And, you know, one letter that we got, I believe, an email today and I promise I'll try to make it quick was from a business on Fourth Street that had been open for nine years, wanted to extend their store up their their KPIs so that they could open later. And, you know, the stories of the process and the red tape and the cost just really tied their hands. And so we know that in Long Beach, we have a lot of great small businesses, a lot of great owners that have a lot of vision and want to be able to move forward with opening up maybe a later hour or a second location, but that sometimes the process is just a little rocky for them. And I know that we've got some businesses here. They're going to speak about their experience as we continue to have conversations with different council offices. Each district has a different challenge. North Long Beach is not like downtown. We've got a lot of diverse businesses that require different types of cups. And so through the conversations, instead of just talking about one part of that CFP process, we really wanted to say, Let's open it up, let's take it all apart and put it back together again. After we do some real diving in and looking at what other cities do so that we can be a city that is business friendly to small businesses and not just the very large ones. And so I think that this is just a direction to really take this apart and come back to city council with some good directions and some good ideas. It includes a process for economic development, for a different committee to look at this. And so I really want to look forward to hearing the comments from my colleagues. I would like to ask if we could go ahead and have and I'm new at this, you know, could we have public comment happen now so that these nice people can go home if they need to instead of hearing to stuff?
Speaker 0: Yes. I mean, we can do I'm going to ask the second or the motion if they want to say anything. And then we can always go to go to public comment if without any objection.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 1: So I too want to thank Amy. Amy and I started working on the U.P. amendments two years ago when I was elected, and so when Jeanine approached her, she said, Hey, have you talked to Stacey? Because we've been working on and talking about some things. So I appreciate staff keeping that in mind. Each of our offices often work independently with the communities that we serve until we get to a point where we know where we want to go and then we find out. Our colleagues are also thinking in the same direction, and I'm really excited to have colleagues that are being mindful of this process. A couple of key things that that have come to date recently, and I hope that we'll work on including it in this item as well. There are lots of businesses that get stuck in this process for a number of reasons, and those processes become very costly. Certain businesses think that they're going to be moving in the right direction. They get a pre inspection or a pre meeting. They do all of the things that they're asked and then they submit and three or four months later they get back dozens and dozens of comments that are completely contrary to their original meeting. And that's specifically something I've heard from a business that's still in the sixth month of going through a process to open their doors, actually , not in my district, but over in the seventh District. And so we've talked a lot about what other options there are. And I want to kind of put a few of those out there for people to know and understand if you've ever opened a business and need to do a remodel of an ADA bathroom. There are 700 different contractors and a thousand different inspector. I'm sorry, a thousand different architects. That'll draw those up for you and charge you an exuberant amount. And something that constituents have come to me about. And I've also discussed with Vice Mayor Richardson, because it was his constituent who owns businesses in my district as well. We should be able to have pre formatted plans like that online. You should be able to just download it and get it to go. I gave you the credit. But but he he came to me too and called me today about it specifically. And you should be able to just download it and go because a ten by ten A.D.A. bathroom should be a ten by 1088 bathroom should be a ten by ten bathroom and we shouldn't have to pay $1,000. I'm not trying to look to reduce the revenues of our architects and our contractors, but we should know and understand what those look like and we should be able to move forward quickly and those costs should come down. And so I hope that before this does return to council, that this does get time to be presented to E.D. enough. And today, my colleagues and I listen to Inspector Gadget and the new systems that we're putting in place to make the processes easier and to other apps that we've used. And so I hope that will have that timeliness in it as well. And I do look forward to comments from the community.
Speaker 0: Great. Thank you. Vice Mayor. Oh, I'm sorry. Excellent. There was. If there wasn't any objection, the council would like to do public comment first. Okay. See, not any public comment on this item. Come forward, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening. Council Members Mayor Staff Jimmy Harris, senior vice president of Long Beach Area Chamber of Commerce, will make this short and sweet. We appreciate this item bringing it forward tonight. Appreciate a seat at the table when discussing this, 800 plus members. 90% of them are small businesses. And we've heard story after story after story about this process. So a lovely part of the conversation. Thank you.
Speaker 0: All right, Jeremy. It's about college friend.
Speaker 3: All right, next, mayor, council members. I represent the Brit in the mineshaft on Broadway. These parts have been there 28 years and 44 years, respectively. So we've been through. This process with the cops. A lot of times I just I just wanted to come come forward and back the recommendation that this be revisited. It can be very grueling on a small business. Time consuming, costly. And in the end, you can often come up with nothing if if not more restriction placed on you. So I. I appreciate the council members bringing this issue forward and I support it. And I would hope that you would take the time to consider the small businesses when you're making these decisions. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you.
Speaker 6: SPEAKER Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the City Council, Craig Cogen with the downtown Long Beach Alliance have a chat. I've had a chance to.
Speaker 7: Speak with Councilmember.
Speaker 6: Pierce, as well as city staff and a few of our board members.
Speaker 9: And we're fully supportive of looking.
Speaker 0: And reevaluating this.
Speaker 6: Process and.
Speaker 3: Certainly look forward.
Speaker 0: To being part of the.
Speaker 6: Discussion as well.
Speaker 9: So we encourage your endorsement. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker. For a twofer tonight.
Speaker 3: I am on fire and I love it. Is working it tonight? No, I too have been in contact with.
Speaker 7: Councilmember Pierce and I fully support the evaluation on the up. It's just, you know, as a small business, you work so hard. And when you do have to come around.
Speaker 3: And cross that bridge.
Speaker 7: You know the numbers that are thrown at you, you know, you're talking about $10,000. And it's you know, you're a little weary.
Speaker 3: I've had pleasant experience with a great team and.
Speaker 7: Planning, so I wanted to give them a shout out. But I'm fully on board with looking at this and seeing if there's a way we can make it better.
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Speaker, sir. Final speaker.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Surely beside with respect to multi-jurisdictional and agreement regarding Senate Bill two of the California housing element. I am finding not only in this city but other local coastal community cities are running into problems inadvertently and I don't believe intentionally when the community and the business community, the residential community does not understand that by right. Homeless services have zoning by right. And it does not require a conditional use permit when within a particular Jewish jurisdiction and locality, if the zoning does not meet the requirement of its its homeless. When is zoning? Jurisdictional does not meet the requirement of its population. If you have 4000 homeless people in a particular jurisdiction, but you only zone in an area where there's only 400, then you're going to run into a problem with your residential community and the business community because they're not going to be aware that by right. By right when you are not meeting your need. Homeless services are allowed to function within a commercial and a residential community by right. By, right? I believe it is an unfair. To the community of homeless people and the community of the business and community of commercial residential. When the three do not understand. That by right. Homeless services are allowed when you are not meeting your your zoning allowance needs. If you have 4000 homeless people in a particular city, you must zone by write. And there should not be. You should not be receiving repercussions after we move into a particular city. And then suddenly the community finds out homeless people are being assisted here and certainly we have a problem with it. I would say and I question I'm saying and I am also questioning whether or not as council persons representing each district, whether or not you have properly alerted and informed your citizenry that by right according to Senate Bill two, which augmented homeless services if the need has not been met. I'm finding this is the condition. This is the situation along the coast from Santa Barbara to Orange County. They're all having the same problem. They're saying we weren't told. So my hope is that you tell them.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you to Councilwoman Pierce all the cosigners on this item. And it seems like copies of the thing that the council every few years or maybe every few months we come back and tweak. And what's excited about this motion is a real opportunity to get creative. So so thank you for taking the lead on this. Councilwoman Pierce. So given, you know, allow we've tweaked this over the years. We like some things. We want to make sure some of those things are protected. So could the process be changed and streamlined, maybe cheaper? Yes. Should we be impacting our protections on neighborhoods? No. We should still maintain our ability to protect our neighborhoods from some you know, some of the bad actors or the nuisance activities in neighborhood. Should we roll back any of the protections we put in our loopholes? No, we should not. I want to just have a just ask a few questions to staff quickly on how to approach a few things. So is some of that stuff that's important to me? Like, you know, we went through a whole conversation, actually got awards about alcohol, nuisance abatement ordinance. Liquor stores were a big conversation. We want to make sure that we we you know, we had a conversation about defining what is a liquor store, because it's the same it's the same definition, same liquor license as a pharmacy or grocery store. And we had to, you know, go through that process and define that. How are we going to approach that and protect, you know, the progress we made there?
Speaker 4: So the NRA ordinance would not be impacted by this because those that covers locations that.
Speaker 1: Do not currently have a copy and is an important component in our enforcement of those locations.
Speaker 4: So the NRA would remain as is.
Speaker 8: So the and I get that the question is like, you know, maybe two years ago there was a conversation about, you know, what is a liquor store and what in the grocery store is a Walmart, a liquor store? A grocery store is a pharmacy, a liquor store, a grocery store, same license. We respond to them very differently. The community response to them very differently, yes. So we had that conversation. I want to make sure that, you know, where we landed is preserved here.
Speaker 1: Understood.
Speaker 8: Okay. And then, you know, there was a conversation and a lot of good work was done in the health department and it crossed over into planning around healthy standards in liquor stores. And, you know, we started to see some standard conditions be crafted and all of that. You know, we got to a good place. And then we stopped getting liquor store applications for a while, which is a good thing, too. So are we going to, you know, make sure that we look at that lens, the healthy food standards that have been crafted over the years.
Speaker 1: Specifically.
Speaker 4: Related to alcohol? Sirups Yes, we can.
Speaker 8: Certainly. Thank you very much. And then the last thing that I think is really cool that could happen here, city of New Orleans, Decatur, Georgia, they created some like, you know, CFP and permit zones that in certain areas that they encouraged more entertainment or more activity. They got rid of the permit fees altogether. If you meet certain criteria, like if you're festival meet certain criteria or if your business is an area that really needs that activity. They had a special rate or special process that made it really easy for those areas. So like an incentive zone. In fact, the program, if you want to look up look it up indicator is called. There's a festival for that. And if you're on a certain corridor and you want to host a festival, if you meet certain rules, we get rid of that. I just want to just put on the table as we look at KPIs, let's, let's think about how we can also look at leveraging that and permits in certain areas to create some cool opportunities. And that's just a recommendation to, you know, just a recommendation of staff. Thanks.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 4: Just think you'd like to also commend Councilmember Pearce for bringing this forward. I think in many discussion, discussions with small and medium businesses were often talking about the CFP process and how we can fine tune it. And so. Just a couple questions for Amy. First, do we have as a city ombudsman specifically for small business? I know we have Saeed Jalali, who works as kind of a city wide ombudsman, but anyone specifically working with small business.
Speaker 6: So Mayor and council members, I answer that. We have said Jalali, who has been our ombudsman and the council in the FY17 budget, actually added a second position. So we will have a second ombudsman. We're doing the hiring for that right now.
Speaker 4: Great. And then how does the do we link the CP process currently with Business Port? I know as we're rolling that out, is that something that could be added in? Certainly. Yes. What we'd like to really do, though, first is to try to strip down.
Speaker 1: As one of the council members.
Speaker 4: Already has said, strip down the entire process and really see what is important to the community.
Speaker 1: And once we.
Speaker 4: Have that new process in place, it should be much, easily, much more easily disseminated through busy port. Some great. Thank you very much. I look forward to hearing back the report.
Speaker 0: Councilman Austin.
Speaker 10: Thank you. And I want to thank Councilmember Pearce for bringing this forward. I like to consider myself as a small, business friendly council member. I want to commend our Development Services Department for their excellent support, particularly in the business districts in my district, in support of small business. I think obviously there are areas that we need to improve, and this is why I signed on to this this item. I think we should always be striving for continuous improvement with our processes, particularly processes that that encourage or that engage commerce and economic development. I think, you know, we're one of the most important roles that I think I have as a city councilmember is is actually supporting small business and new businesses coming in with with with in conjunction with our business improvement districts. And we've we're doing ribbon cuttings, you know, once a week, it seems like, in my district. And so something is working. And so I want to commend you this biotech and your department and Pat West for for your support in my district. I did have one question in terms of process here, because what are what are we trying to accomplish? I did sign on, but I do see that this is a a process that that asks the city manager and city attorney to engage with the Economic Development Commission in Planning Commission to review and make recommendations on a number of areas. Is this in an effort to to actually go toward a change in ordinance later? And will this come back to forefront?
Speaker 5: I guess.
Speaker 4: Certainly because it affects Title 21, it does involve.
Speaker 1: Going to the planning commission and because it affects the municipal code title 21, it actually does have to come back to the city council as an ordinance.
Speaker 10: Okay. Thank you. I'll be supporting.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Council members, open up.
Speaker 9: Thank you. I'd like to echo the words of one of our speakers, Luis Navarro, owner of Lola's. I, too, have had some very good experiences with development services, so thank you, Amy, for your work in that department. We've talked about one item that I prefer, and that is as the cops are sent out. If the council office could get a heads up like 24 hours prior or something, as long as we're going to tweak this thing, I'd like to throw that in.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So you're talking about the noticing?
Speaker 9: Yes. I'm sorry. Yeah, the topic is noticing. I have no desire to pull that back. As was mentioned by my colleagues here, we what we owe to the neighborhoods. But we just like to get a notice just before it goes out. Would be very handy. So we're just not blindsided.
Speaker 1: Understood.
Speaker 9: Okay. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you. I just wanted to clarify also, in addition to sending this to the committees, I believe that some of us council members would also like to put together a community meeting sometime in the next month or two months to get the bid's involvement and to really have a public process on this. And one last thing is just, you know, the at cost. I got a couple of questions about the cost of notifications. And so this will make sure that we continue to notify residents that the neighborhoods aren't being impacted, but that we're doing it in a more efficient way and really trying to have government work smarter. So, again, thank you, everybody, for your support tonight. Hopefully.
Speaker 0: Councilman Andrew.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you, Mayor. I just want to thank Mrs. Bodak for really being there for my district because the fact that there's businesses going in and to really help in our community to look like a chair look and thank you again. This is what have.
Speaker 1: I'm not going anywhere.
Speaker 5: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. There's a motion and a second member. Please cast your vote.
Speaker 2: Motion carries. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Manager to work with the City Attorney, the Economic Development Commission and the Planning Commission to review and make recommendations regarding Section 21.52 of the Long Beach Municipal Code pertaining to Conditional Use Permits (CUP). Such review would include a written report reviewing the following:
· Uses which require a CUP.
· Efforts to make the CUP process more cost effective.
· Streamlining the public noticing process related to CUPs.
· Expediting CUP modifications for existing businesses.
· Creating a simplified CUP process for existing businesses opening another location. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_12202016_16-1148 | Speaker 1: Did you want to go to a hearing to.
Speaker 3: First.
Speaker 0: Actually hear item 12 and then I'm going to go to hearing to.
Speaker 2: Communication from Councilman Andrew's recommendation to approve transfer of six Council District one time infrastructure funds from the Capital Projects Fund and the Public Works Department to the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department in the amount of $20,000 to support the 29th annual Martin Luther King Junior Parade and Celebration Rentals.
Speaker 0: Managers.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you. I would just like to move to approve.
Speaker 0: Okay, there's a second. But Councilman Gonzales, any public comment? Seeing none. And I thought cancer appears. This is not Ukraine. This country votes. Was there a public comment? Please come down.
Speaker 1: When I did not intend to make. But Miss Miss Marshall, Latoya Marshall sitting back up there again, Mr. Andrews And she was unable to get some help in District six. So I'm questioning as to whether or not these funds, the $20,000 that's been allocated for a parade for Martin Luther King, and if Mr. King was sitting here tonight. He would wonder why Ms.. Marshall Latoya Marshall was not able to receive help sleeping in the park in District six. And then we are she our police department, I was told. Was going to write her a ticket for sleeping there in the park in District six. So while we're while we're the city is is. To be commended in supporting you in this just in in this in the $20,000, one lady won't be able to celebrate the dream because she has nowhere to lay her head tonight. So I know the decision can't be made tonight, but this is $20,000 here, and I know helping her won't require all of it. Mr. Andrews So I'm asking you on her behalf. She's I think she's woke up for the second time. She needs some assistance. So. So in fulfillment of the dream. Sir, I'm asking you to just think about it for her.
Speaker 3: Just before you leave. Now, this is not the first time we really went through this, Mrs. Fisher, because the fact that we do it, we've had every effort that we've tried with her and had her in places that she's left. So I don't understand why she's happy to sleep in a park, because we had, you know, in both, you know, motels that we put her in. And she has not stayed in those because of the situation where she said, I cannot, you know, be in a place where they have, you know, roaches. And I was just I mean, I can't put it in a place where, you know, we you know, down here we had a place for her to stay. And now she said she's out in the cold. I don't understand.
Speaker 1: I wasn't aware of that. No one to take the city. Yeah, no.
Speaker 0: Probably can't. Yes. So thank you very much.
Speaker 3: I wish you would really. We hadn't the week before, but that's on our own. You know.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm hoping that she's hearing.
Speaker 3: I'm hoping she is to really seriously thank.
Speaker 0: You very much. So there's a motion and a second. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Councilman Andrews. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to approve transfer of Sixth Council District one-time infrastructure funds from the Capital Projects Fund (CP) in the Public Works Department (PW) to the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department (PR) in the amount of $20,000; and increase appropriation in the General Fund (GF) in the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department (PR) by $20,000 to support the 29th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Parade and Celebration rentals such as: tables, chairs, dance floor, stage, Health Pavilion, etc. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_12202016_16-1151 | Speaker 0: Motion carries items we're going to hear item 15 when the hearing.
Speaker 2: Communication from Councilman Austin, Councilwoman Price, Council Member, Super Anon recommendation to request the City Auditor to conduct a limited scope audit that would include a review of internal controls over how funds are handled and spent by the PBA. PBA. Compliance with the City Agreement and possible benchmarking as to how other cities oversee p bids pba's.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Austin.
Speaker 10: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And first, I'd like to thank my colleagues, our council member, Price and Supernormal for signing on. And I'd like to thank the city auditor, Laura Dow for her assistance in this item. Our business district, as well as all of us know our key part of our city's success in the city's economic development. I mean, we've done they've done a great job of promoting and supporting many of our commercial corridors. I also have to say up front, our city staff in particular, Mr. Jim Fisk, does a great job in supporting our bids. And. And so if he were here, I would love for him to take a bow because I know he is. On the sunset of his career. He will be retiring very soon. But he's done an excellent job in supporting us. The City A is a significant property owner and stakeholder within four of the bids, contributing about $440,000 a year in assessment assessments. Combined with our bids and buyers, they collect about $11 million in annual revenue, including 8.4 $8.5 million directly from assessments either from property owners or business owners. Given the important role that business districts play in our city and the state law that entrusts the city council to establish these district, we believe that it's in the interest of transparency, open government. It would be beneficial for the city auditor to review these districts and associations and provide recommendations and best practices to assist them. This is a good government item in an effort to just improve and inspire public confidence in all of our entities. Our business districts are quasar government because there is a obviously a relationship and they have to come before the city council for proof that approval year after year. It's they've been involved in place for in our city for four decades and we've never had any such checks or controls. And I think this is this is necessary at this point. So I would encourage your support.
Speaker 0: Councilman Price.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Well, I support the intent behind the item, as has been explained to me. And I think transparency is is always a good, positive thing. I just want to make.
Speaker 1: Sure that the.
Speaker 4: Item is the request is limited.
Speaker 1: In scope to what's.
Speaker 4: Identified in the staff report as a review of internal controls over how funds are handled, compliance with the city agreement and possible benchmarking on best practices. That's what it's limited to. I also want to make sure and I talked with Councilman Austin about this, that the intent that this item is designed based on reading the item for our bids and our PE bids, but we have one bid that often it's not a bid, but often folks think is falls into the bid category. And that's the Belmont Shore Parking and Business Improvement area. That's a different organization. It's a merchant bid. It's a mayoral appointment for the body. The city pays zero into it. The commercial property owners are assessed to mulgrew's property tax. And just like any other entity or commission that operates within the city, they're subject to audits any way they could be. I just want to make sure they're not included in this item, because I think this item is designed for and based on my conversations with you, the bids that that receive money from the city and and are not part that they don't have mayoral appointments. The Belmont Shore parking commissioner, for example, is established via ordinance. So I just want to make sure they're not included in this item. And that's the intent of this body.
Speaker 10: The intent was for birds and bees and as as written, I'm not I don't see that that the parking improvement district was included in that. I would defer to the city auditor for some clarification, if possible.
Speaker 0: Mr. Goodhew, did you need something? Thank you.
Speaker 1: Mr. Mayor. Members of the council. Thank you. The way I understood it, too, was to start out with those puppies that the city does have an interest in. The city is a property owner of four of the bids. So we would start with the four bids that the city is a property owner and that pays the $440,000 annually and to ensure that the city is that the funds are being used as intended. At that point, we could either. Conclude the audit and apply the findings to the rest of the bid so that they're all uniform and standard. Or we could expand it and and do others if requested. So I think. If we were to start now, we would start with the four bids in which four PE bids in which the city is a property owner and start there.
Speaker 4: Okay. Thank you for that clarification. And I read this item as kind of the start to establishing some best practices which I'm all in favor of. So if the best practices were developed as a result of, you know, some sort of a sampling or audit practice, and those best practices could be applied to all the bids, I would have no problem with that. The one concern that I have is if there is going to be a financial undertaking by any of our bids to comply with an audit, I'm concerned about them using their very limited resources to hire consultants or somehow be responsive to audit requests. And I don't know what that process would entail. I would hope that it would be more of a collaborative process so that the bids with limited resources aren't using money to, you know, hire a consultant to be able to comply with an audit or help them through an audit.
Speaker 1: Yes. I don't foresee that being a problem. This is a very limited scope audit as recommended in the action regarding the internal controls over their funds and to ensure they're being used as intended to ensure that they're in compliance with their contract and then to do some benchmarking and identify best practices. This is a very limited scope as as requested in the item, so we won't be branching out further than that at this point.
Speaker 4: Great. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilmember Pier.
Speaker 2: Could we go to a public comment first?
Speaker 0: Sure. This is no objection on the other speakers in the motion public comment. Okay. Public comment. Please come forward.
Speaker 3: Very good, you clerc as the address as one has attended a number of meetings of the Belmont Shore Parking and Improvement Association. One of the things that was brought to my attention and I think it would apply here to to anyone. Is to make sure that we don't have what was presented a couple of weeks ago with the airport situation where there's a conflict of interest. If you've got landlords, if you have people on the commission that are landlords. And also commissioners that happened to be a landlords tenant. I think you have an inherent conflict of interest there, i.e. vote my way or your rent goes up. Right. So I think you need to. On any of these. Make sure that that situation does not exist. That there's no inherent. Conflict of interest. As I say, it's just happened to be what you had with the Air Force situation, according to some people. And I haven't followed all those details, but I would suggest you get inside of that to make sure that that does not exist in any improvement to any situation like this.
Speaker 4: That's an allegation. There's no conflict that's been determined. Just wanted to clarify that in regards to the airport item, I think that's important. Yeah, you can always accuse anyone of anything that hasn't been proven to be true.
Speaker 3: But I do know I do know of situations where that does exist. I mean, it's the landlord and the tenant are the are in the commission.
Speaker 0: Okay. I think time's up. Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 6: Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the city council, Craig Koch with the downtown Long Beach Alliance, one of four one of the four property based improvement districts.
Speaker 7: In the city. That the city does.
Speaker 3: Own property and.
Speaker 6: Pays us the full amount of assessments. We also do manage a tenant or merchant based bid, so we do have both models in our downtown for purposes.
Speaker 7: Of good government and transparency.
Speaker 6: The bids.
Speaker 3: Already comply.
Speaker 6: Meeting state requirements on the Brown Act and the Public Records Act. So any of this information is available at any member at any time by members of the public. We also do form I'm sorry. We also do complete and submit form 700 conflict of interest forms every year.
Speaker 8: Each of our board members and.
Speaker 6: Staff members comply with those requests. So I think there's good practice occurring on a daily basis relative to those requirements. Frankly, I'll be happy.
Speaker 3: To comply with any of these requirements that are being made.
Speaker 6: This evening of our organization.
Speaker 3: In fact, I've.
Speaker 8: Already sent.
Speaker 6: The ARTAS office a draft of our our independent audit, which we conduct on an annual basis, as well as our Form 990 that we're.
Speaker 7: Requested to submit as well.
Speaker 6: So that's all available. But I can't really speak for the other bids and the limited capacity that they may have. And I thank thank Councilmember.
Speaker 3: Price for.
Speaker 8: Bringing that up, because some of those bids do have limited capacity.
Speaker 3: But on the whole, I think.
Speaker 6: We are.
Speaker 7: Complying with state regulations and state.
Speaker 6: Expectations and certainly are very interested in this item. Frankly, it's it came it came to all of us as a surprise, not having any information in advance other than having the council agenda item posted and us asking.
Speaker 8: Ourselves.
Speaker 6: What was going on and really what the motivations were. So I'm really interested in hearing more about.
Speaker 7: That as well as what really.
Speaker 3: Transpires.
Speaker 9: From this point on. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thanks, Speaker.
Speaker 1: Good evening. Tosha Hunter, director of Uptown Business Improvement District. And just wanted to say that we are one of those smaller bids and I am the only staff person there. So we would definitely comply with anything that is asked of us. And to mirror a lot of the things that Mr. Cogen said when I came into this position, I asked for an immediate audit. We work with an outside agency that handles all of our books and our paperwork, so we would definitely comply. But things like this could be a strain. We're up for renewal. And that right there and and meeting the needs of our property owners and our businesses and keeping all the clean and safe. I was just here last week giving my presentation for my annual report, and so hearing about the audit would definitely be a strain because we're working towards that renewal. So I also wanted to say that in addition to be a strain on us or me, I should say for the Uptown Business Improvement District city staff as well, Jim Fisk is very helpful with us to us and undergo an audit like this. I can just imagine what it would put on his plate. He's been very supportive and just want you to kind of reconsider this and the finances. It would not a if there was any type of financial component that this would cause us, our bid would fail. And I'm not here for failure. So thank you so much.
Speaker 0: Thank you. See no other public comment? I'm going to go back to Councilmember Pierce who deferred the floor.
Speaker 2: Thank you. I want to also echo that I didn't get a lot of information on this item before it came forward and hearing from several phone calls today. What I've learned is that many of our bids already do an audit, already have information that is is already done in-house, that we don't want to add an additional strain . And third is that we just voted on a transparency item for open data. And so I'm would like to suggest I would like to make a substitute motion that we have Jim Fisk work with all of the bids to provide their information through this are open data that we just decided to vote on everything from management plans to annual reports to the seven seventies being on there already for full transparency. And that way we're not getting into doing a second audit of somebody that's already paying for an audit, that we're not doubling the work and creating more work that we do that first before we take another step.
Speaker 0: Okay. There's a substitute motion and a second. I think there was a second by Vice Mayor Richardson. Cutler appears to have anything else.
Speaker 2: That is it. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Vice Mayor Richardson. Okay, Councilman. I'm sorry. Councilman Ringa was the second motion by Pierce. Customary Ringa.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I totally agree. I think that this is a duplicate duplicative to say correctly, and I think that it should also, you know, I think the people that are doing responsible, good work and, you know, the strain already caused by having to maintain the bids in the year long basis and the artillery duty. You know, one thing that you include in terms of the following, the browning. Rules. I think that says it enough for me right there that I'm pretty sure that you're on the up and up. But I can't support the motion as presented. But I do support the substitute. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I'm going to support the substitute motion. So just my thoughts here. Over the past few years, bids have really stepped up in the wake of the loss of redevelopment, particularly in North Long Beach. When we saw the last redevelopment come in, my predecessor, Steve Neal, had the foresight to say, look, we're going to need some deal making ability here in uptown and, you know, charged us with let's go create a business district. It was not easy. We had responses from, you know, you know, city staff, a number of folks saying this might take you a decade, but no one had ever pulled the businesses in the room and asked them, were you willing to step up if the city steps up and partners with you to create it? And to our surprise, they did. They enough property owners signed a petition and voted on it. But since then, it hasn't been easy. Like people like going from, you know, very little capacity to the presentation we saw two years to two weeks ago. And City Council has taken a lot. It's taken resources. It's taken manpower. It's taken a lot of collaboration. So so while I you know, I do support transparency. Transparency should go in collaboration and go hand in hand with collaboration. And so I was surprised today that I was surprised. I was out of town when I heard about this, but I was surprised to see that COBA, the Uptown Business District and a number of the business districts had no idea that this was coming. And that's just so strange to me because I see that I see them as an extension of the city's family. And I think this sends a bad message if we do that. I saw a couple of things. So, number one, I feel that the motion, you know, substitute motion is good. If we want to learn more about what the business districts are doing across the city, they already report the was annually and they get very little questions and they prepare for those. And he takes time and those things are on record with the city. So let's just ask them. Let's work with, you know, Jim Fisk and our economic development folks, see what they're already doing and said before we commit them to extra work and place that information in an open space. Right. Put it on the open data platform. That should be something that, you know, doesn't take a lot of staff time. And we're already, you know, placing emphasis on open data. We might say it's very little impact. But if, you know, a business is being audited by a government, whether it be the city of Long Beach or the IRS, you need to, you know, hire people and build capacity to be responsive in a way that your property owners feel confident in. So we may say it's it's no capacity need it, but any smart person would say, you know, strap up, lawyer up or get get, you know, ask your accountant to spend more hours than what you budget to prepare to respond to it. So that's so I'm concerned about the, you know, financial nature of it. Next, I think, you know, there are a lot of questions that could be answered in terms of renewal schedules. How are they coordinated renewals, vigils? Because sometimes we participate, sometimes we don't, and we need to be aware of that. So that's something we can look at in the open data space. You know, what is the history of of audits like? If we wanted to look at the history a lot is what do we even get them? That's a question. Another thing, you know, I have a good relationship with my business district. I, you know, I, I know would find it troublesome if I, as a council member would be upset with a decision my business district has made and, you know, slap them with an audit because I have that power and I'm concerned about whether that's the intent here or not. It doesn't matter. I'm just concerned about the perception or appearance of an abuse of power, because we have access to a city auditor that elected officials make the decision when to deploy. And that's just troublesome for me. And I would not say anything about anybody here at the dais, but that's when this recommendation comes up. It is up. You know, that's that's a question for us all for those reasons that, one, the business districts were were clueless on this. Number two, we never asked city staff report and I don't remember any questions, not just about any questions from the council during the annual reports. Then I think we haven't demonstrated any progressive level of inquiry before going to an audit and I think that is no way to really cultivate collaboration. So that's why I'm going to support the service, the motion.
Speaker 0: Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 1: That's a lot of information. I didn't know about the item, but I don't have a permit or a bit in my district, so I didn't think too much about it. But I do know that we went through quite a extensive presentation today from our economic development director, and one of the things that I'm really proud of is since taking office, the fifth District has started 562 new businesses, and that's 562. It's our area code. It's it's really something we're proud of. And most small businesses don't make it in the first two years. And so when I was reviewing the Business Health app that our economic development department is launching and talking to them about the resources available and how we now want to go out to our bids and ask them to go in and check on the businesses that are in red because their business license hasn't been renewed. Perhaps they're having financial challenges. We're talking through what that looks like. I was hoping we'd be going to our bids with those kinds of requests in the near future. I am aware that they do an annual review and present all that information to us. I'm looking forward to being able to help them more efficiently respond to praise in the same way that we do and that we need to put all our data online. Every single council item needs backup documentation attached to the item, even if it's a week after all of the things that are handed out need to be attached . We need to scan all the documents that are in this building and get those archived immediately. And I haven't seen a statement of work on that. I don't know that we know where we're going on that. So I want to see open data be our solution, and I need to see a more aggressive timeline on that. I'll also say that. I really value having an independent auditor in auditor. DOWD And Laura does an exceptional job of bringing together her own internal auditors to discuss what the 2017 plan is going to look like. And so when they do that, they do it from a position of knowing and understanding all the audits that they've seen , the issues that they've had. I've met with her on this several times, and so I'm not super comfortable saying we as the city council are now going to instruct you to change your plan and change some things about that. However, if the substitute motion is successful and you and your team want to amend your own plan and your own timeline because you feel that this is a concern area. I've reviewed the list both with you in the past of what you're doing in 2017, and I think there are things on it that I'm really looking forward to seeing and seen very soon. And when I compare it to the need a necessity for this kind of review. Again, I didn't hear from my community on this because all of our business associations are volunteer, so they wouldn't be impacted, but I think they would value the best practices that would come from the review. But I'm inclined at this time to continue to listen to my colleagues, but to support an open data model that is in the direction of self reporting online, what you've already done so that it's easily accessible and a place where your your CO businesses would go without using a PRA to see what you've already done. It's easy to give that back to the board, but to give it to all your business members, to give it to all the community people who aren't members, I think that there's some value in that. So that's the direction I'm leaning at this time.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I want to go to Councilman Austin, Councilman Gonzalez, and then a vote. Councilman Austin.
Speaker 10: Thanks. And I think there's been some some miscommunication and some mis interpretation of the intent. The original motion asked the city auditor to do three things review internal controls of how funds are handled and spent by Pids and BS to how they are operating in compliance with the City Agreement. And three possible benchmarking as to how other cities oversee P bids and report back to the City Council findings. Now, there's nothing in that limited scope that would, in my opinion, at any cost, any any operating procedures of a bid. And if that that that would be something. And if so, that would be something that we could take on, I think is very, very important in terms of public confidence, since, you know, our public dollars are being passed through these entities. They are always I public, public. They don't have the same level of accountability as our city departments, but they function very much as a as the arm of the city, as as was mentioned by the the extension of the city, as was mentioned by one of the council members. I do have a question regarding the city auditor scope, and maybe this is for the city attorney or the city auditor. Does the city council direction or lack of direction impact the scope of what the city auditor actually can look at? Because if, for example, this substitute substitute motion or substitute motion that's actually on the floor would take us in a whole different direction and take the city auditor out of the scope based on direction here. But does canvas does the city auditor have the scope to and I believe she does audit independently.
Speaker 6: The right is separately elected auditor that does have the independent. There's specific requirements under the charter that the auditor is required to do. But in addition to that, as a separately elected official can to undertake additional audits.
Speaker 10: Okay. Thank you. And I don't believe that any of our bids have anything to hide. I think they are operating in good faith. I work very closely with the business improvement districts in my, my, my, my district, and I'm very impressed with the output and work that they do. But this is a IT issue of, like I said, good government, right? We do not want to have issues. And, you know, I've heard of issues in other other areas of the city. We have new bids coming online. I'd like to bring on another bid in my district. Right. But, you know, best practices want to be we want to make sure that best practices are established. I don't have an issue with open transparency and open data, but I've heard also that that audits have already been done. If that's the case, I'd like to make a substitute substitute motion. Right. To to. Expand the scope of the original motion. Basically review the internal controls of how funds are handled and split number two, how they are in compliance with city agreements. And three, possible benchmarking as to how other cities bids are functioning and best practices and report back to the City Council with that if if bids have already done internal audits. Well, let's take a step out of the process. Let's ask them 2 to 2. Volunteer those those that information to the city auditor. And I think that would streamline and get to the to the cut to the chase. And again, I'll make sure that we are doing all we can to ensure that the public confidence and public trust is is is that here to. And I'll make the motion for the substitute. Substitute.
Speaker 0: There's a substitute substitute. Is there a second on the subject? Catherine Austin, can you. Chime in on the subject to substitute their. Okay. Is there a motion for the substance substitute, which is Councilwoman Price?
Speaker 4: Yeah, but I would like a little bit of clarification. I want to second because I want to talk about it, but I definitely want some a little bit of clarification on it too, because it sounds reasonable. I want to hear from my colleagues about it, too.
Speaker 0: Okay, Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 4: Yes. Can you just clarify a little bit of your motion again, Councilmember Austin, so I can.
Speaker 10: Suggest the original motion with in addition to allow it allows the the bids who have undertaken independent audits or their own audits to present that information to the city auditor's office for review.
Speaker 4: Okay. It seems like it's the same motion. But what? I'll just say. Well, thank you for clarifying. I appreciate it. And so I'll say that I am also I'm you know, in looking at this item, I maybe I have to go back to basics and think that sometimes we just have to pick up the phone and contact our business improvement districts. And I think in terms of fairness as well, when I look at the Business Improvement District page on our website, you know, it also includes tourism and airport and downtown. And so I think that we're we it looks to me that we're being a little piggy and choosy as to who we want to include in this. And so I, I just don't think that this is an item that I would be able to support, because I don't feel like the lines of communication are open. I feel as though Jim Fiske is there for a reason. He's there to ask any questions. I know I've contacted him quite frequently about any questions I've had. I have Magnolia Industrial Group in my my district, the downtown Long Beach Associates, and I've attended the meetings. And if there's questions that are raised, we go through that and we talk about it. But I, I think that heading in this direction, I don't know is the best option at this point. But I do believe that there needs to be some framework put in place to be able to have checks and balances in some degree. But that framework needs to be put in place. And I think before getting there, we should put that framework in place. So that's my.
Speaker 0: Next step is Councilmember. Councilmember Supernormal.
Speaker 9: I'd just like to ask the city attorney to clarify the relationship between a council office and the bid. We had this discussion. I think I was on the job for a month or so when this came up and you explained it in detail that there's a bit of a firewall, for lack of a better term, between the council office. So I'm a little curious how we could a council office could trigger an audit.
Speaker 6: Mayor. Members of the council. Yes. An individual council member could not trigger an audit. I mean, that's why the item is before the council today to acting as a body to request the city auditor. The conversation that we had as once the city adopts or creates the permit, it becomes an instrument or an agency of the city under state law. So it becomes the responsibility of the city to approve the annual plan and to approve the documents and their operations going forward. But an individual council member under the charter can't direct or to do that under section two. Okay.
Speaker 9: Okay. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think I just wanted to reiterate the only thing I can support the substitute. Substitute? Because I feel like we we already have beds that are providing information and just making sure that we go forward with that step first and going through the transparency process. If, in fact, there is a need then for the city auditor to do an audit. She doesn't need our direction to do that. So I'm just reiterating that I would ask that you support my substitute.
Speaker 5: Thank you.
Speaker 0: K Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 8: Thank you. I, I don't think that the substitute substitute is responsible, responsive to the council's comments or the public comment. It's very similar to the original motion. If anything, it expands on the original motion. And so for that reason, I can't support it. When we you know nothing against our city auditor, we love our city auditor. But I think we just need to be careful when we deploy or make requests of our city. And and then I would say, I think the request about like more information is good. And I think that the appropriate person to do it. We should ask the city manager to ask Jim Fiske to put together a report on what a lot of these things are and start, you know, these best practices, see what those things are they can collaborate with in order. They can collaborate with the cities. That's the first step to a two from four. And let's explore what's out there. Until that's happened, I still don't I still isn't clear to me what the need for this motion is. It hasn't been clear to me in the lack of the progressive inquiry still remains.
Speaker 0: Councilman Austin.
Speaker 10: Okay. Well, it's it I it's very clear that that the, the will of the council is to, uh, to not, not pass or to not support the city auditor looking at bids, which is questionable to me. Right? Because it has been stated by the city attorney that that they are entities of the city. Right. And that public resources are going through these these agencies. And there should be greater transparency and accountability. Right. I don't think that any business improvement district has ever had any sort of of of public audit to this point. And so, again, the thought was just a matter of good government, right? Responsible government, making sure that we are crossing our T's and dot in our eyes. And and this this council ultimately is is going to be held responsible. Now, when members of the public are questioning the integrity of any public entity. Right. Or any agency. They come to us. They hold us accountable as a council. Right. They're not going to go to, unfortunately, Mr. Cogen, because not an elected official. You're not going to go to torture Hunter. She's not an elected official. They're going to go to their elected official and question. And and oftentimes we do get these questions as. As elected officials from disgruntled business owners or individuals who have had some sort of business with with the with the bid for one reason or another. This, I think, protects them. This this this motion my motion actually helps the bid's in increasing, like I said, public confidence in the integrity in which their business is done. And like I said, I have no reason to question the integrity of the bids in any area of the city. But I think it's important for us to put controls in. And so I'm going to stand on my motion and ask that members you support, then reconsider some of your positions. Because I don't think walking away and turning the your head to turn and turning a blind eye to where public funds are actually being. Utilize is a responsible approach.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Ringo.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mayor. One question about this motion. Would this be if for free? I don't have it in my district. Not right now. But I'm working on one. And my fear is, is that if we pass this motion as a substitute, as it's currently worded, I'm afraid that any future implementation of a permit in my district, as an example, would add another another step in that process of them doing an audit. And I have to correct I have to state that when we use the city auditor to do an audit, it is not an independent audit, it's our audit. We're ordering it. And she is our auditor and I'm. And when the P do their audits, I'm guessing you're using an independent auditor. So I would not and not to besmirch the city auditor's job, but there's already an independent audit in place. And this is duplicative, as I said before. So I'm going to call a question on this.
Speaker 0: There's a the question has been called, is there is there any objection to go to a vote?
Speaker 1: I object. I'd like to say to object.
Speaker 0: Okay. There's objections. So?
Speaker 6: So on a call for the question is not available. Is there a second on the call?
Speaker 0: Is there a second? Is your second call for the question. Councilman Pierce. So. So we'll take a.
Speaker 6: Vote a second. And it would have to pass by a majority of six votes in favor in order to call for the question. No.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 6: You drop it, I withdraw it.
Speaker 0: Okay, so we're going to move on to Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 1: Thank you for withdrawing your comment because I feel that some of the things that have been said, I just I'm going to say I hope that they weren't intended to me because I, I personally do support auditor out doing audits of anyone she and her staff determine need to be audited. That's how much I trust her. She is the most supported elected official in our city, in my opinion, and if she thought that this was important, I would completely 100% support her. And after tonight, she can still do that. What I have a hesitation with is. I don't see all the beds here or COBR and all the other groups, and I don't have relationships with all of them because they're not in my district. But but I do not take a blind eye to any of them, even when they are not in my district. And I will continue to utilize the process currently in place that I do believe in. Of the annual reports. Tosha, you and I have only met once, but I thought you did an exceptional presentation a few weeks ago and similar to the comments from Councilman Price. I've shared your story already with the board of our Volunteer Spring Street Business Association, and they want to meet you and hear about what you're working on. And when I think of those presentations, I think of that. And so not for the reasons that you'd mentioned. And and to be honest, before you mentioned those, I was leaning toward supporting your substitute substitute. But but for the reasons that I stand on the grounds that the city has a process. And if we want to change that process, I think we should do it with support of COBA and the leaders of those organizations, because as I mentioned last week, it's hard to get people to volunteer. This is the first time in our city's history that we only have 24 vacancies on commissions. I have often asked people to step up and be on commissions and the commitments and the scrutiny and the form seven hundreds and all those things. They're deterrents and I support them and I thank them for their service and I think them for what they put in. And I do think that there are certain. Bits that perhaps could use an audit more than others. And I think that that is at the discretion of the person with the certification. And and for that, I'll support the. Second motion. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. We're going to go to Councilman Price, Councilman Gonzales, and then vote.
Speaker 4: Councilman Price. Okay. Thank you. I'm going to try to keep it quick, but I will say I don't understand this whole calling for the question concept. I've been on this body now for a year and a half, and it wasn't until very recently that people started doing that. I really don't understand that at all. We all represent our constituents. We we worked very hard to get in these positions. We should be able to talk as much as we want about an issue. I mean, imagine being able to be going back to your constituents and saying, you know what, I didn't even have enough votes to express my opinion on the item. I mean, I just we should at least be able. It's I understand it's late, but we all ran for public office. And that includes a lot of positives and a lot of negatives. And working late is one of the negatives. And allowing your colleague to speak on an item that they feel is important that they should speak on is is the basic of respect that we should be showing one another? That's just my opinion. I will never, ever ask to call the question if one of you has something to say about an item ever. That's my commitment to my colleagues. If you feel you need to say something for your constituents, I will never cut you off from that. And I just we never did that before. I have no idea what's happening. So I would just ask us to really think about that. You know, I, I did reach out to the bid in my district and spoke with them at length about this. They're on board. They're fine with the item. I did speak with Jim Fiske. He was fine with the item as well. His concern was whether or not our bids were going to have to take on an additional cost to, you know, respond to the audit, which I think the city auditor has done a good job with. If you read the item on its own, which is what I did when I signed on to the item, it makes a lot of sense. And to me, if we were talking about any other issue, I can't imagine our council would have a problem with what it's asking for, which is establishing best practices for something that we are utilizing in the city and hope to utilize, more of which is bids. And I think I have to be quite honest, I think there's something else going on here that's beyond what's written on this item, and I don't know what that is. I think the item is a good item. I think the intent behind the item is a good item. I don't know. I sense and I could be totally wrong, but I sense there's something else going on that that is not readily apparent from the four corners of this document. So. You know, one of the things I was listening to NPR the other day and they were talking about Joe Biden. And one of the things that his colleagues were saying across the board was whether they disagreed with him or not. He never questioned their motives. And we do that every once in a while here. And I don't get that. I really don't. You know, we can disagree, but, you know, questioning one another's motives is just ugly and unnecessary. I think if you read this item and step aside, it's basically saying if you look at the last paragraph, we've several bids have been in place for many years. Others have recently been established, given the important role of business districts in supporting and promoting our business and property owners. It would be beneficial for the city auditor to review these districts and associations and provide recommendations and best practices to assist bits and pieces, especially those in which the city is a major stakeholder. If you look at it for what it says and don't read beyond it, I think it's a very reasonable item. Maybe I'm totally wrong on that. I'd like the substitute substitute, because what it's saying is if you are a bid that obtained an independent audit, we don't have to do another audit. You can provide that data. And I think that takes care of some of the concerns that were that were raised by De Alba, who's represented if we need to do more outreach, maybe we should do more outreach. I just I don't think that the item on its face. Is all that I think is being insinuated. It is. And if if it is, I'm not aware of that because I'm reading this document, which seems very reasonable to me. So, you know, I think if we were to step back and say, is this something that we would support absent the personalities absent, then we should support it. I just I hate to have personality come in the way of policy if we think it's a good policy. I think best practices are an excellent idea. I think the auditor helping us get there is a fantastic way for us to to do it together in a consistent fashion. So with that, I turn the floor over and I thank you for indulge me with that. Three point blank seconds of dialog. I hope that didn't set everyone back too far in their night.
Speaker 0: Councilman Gonzales.
Speaker 4: Yes, I appreciate the dialog. Just really quickly, I just I'm not understanding why none of these questions were raised during each of the approval processes for each of the bids that we had over the year. And so that's. You know, we we stood here and we talked to in many of the business improvement districts, they came, they presented. We told them how great they were. No questions. No questions. And so now we're we're looking to do this. And I don't think any business improvement district has a problem doing the audit. I don't think that's the issue. There is no question behind that. I just think in terms of process like we've talked about, in terms of just being able to have communication lines open, it's just a little it's a little much.
Speaker 0: And we have Councilman Austin.
Speaker 10: Thank you. And I'll just respond to Councilmember Gonzalez, because you you you quote, you said, we need to put a framework in place. This item asks for our city auditor to look at best practices. Right. You said that you don't believe that any of the bills have are opposed to doing this, but the city council is. That doesn't make sense. That doesn't make sense for council members who have who have serious stakes in this in this process. We all support our bids. And yes, last week the Uptown came and gave a presentation weeks before that to be back, even gave a presentation. And we love them for their excellent work. We want to continue that. Don't don't get me wrong. This is not an attack on our our business improvement districts. And that's what I think the the that has been the intent or the frame that that way it's not an attack on them. This is something to just improve our processes to make sure that we're streamlining and everybody is understands across the city that, you know, the city auditor may come in and and do an audit to to make sure that the books are good and that and in doing that, our residents, our businesses are going to feel a lot better about the process. They're going to feel good about their bids, as they hopefully do about their city city government, because it's a lot more transparent. That's the intent of the motion. And again, I would ask for you to support it, because I don't think anybody has anything to hide here.
Speaker 0: Kate, thank you very much. There is a vice mayor Richardson.
Speaker 8: Thank you. I just want to just say a couple of things, though. Some dog whistle politics. Something's going on. There's more to the story. I didn't place this agenda item on the on the city council agenda. And I don't think the other one turning our heads. I don't I didn't hear anybody here say, turn your heads. What we're saying is open your eyes and turn around your ears. Look at what's available first. Set a baseline and a justification for why we want to impose something on our business community, which is very important to many of us. And look at what's available. Key word, collaboration. It's a few red flags here. No heads up to Cuba. Both of the business districts in North Long Beach in uptown. No heads up to them or their boards. No heads up. No courtesy call or anything. No, no. No one knew anything.
Speaker 10: That that's that's the assumption.
Speaker 8: Well, the two people who spoke and I got the floor, but two people who spoke in public comment tonight, both did not say we're on board. What they said was and I can be more candid than they did. Look, whatever you put down us, we're going to swallow. That's fine. We will eat it. But I want you to be crystal clear. We did not know what this is. We don't know what it is. And we're struggling to figure it out. What is the rush like? Do your own homework. Let's look at what we have. Do the work of doing the diligence that is good public policy, that is good governance and built confidence in our business districts. And then and you have my word, I will support it if if the stuff comes back and there's additional things we need to look at. Great. But this is not how the city council should operate. And there is no there's something else going on here. I just think this like if anything else, someone said, take yourself out of it. And if anything else was happening, if we just jumped out of the blue and said, let's go, you know, do a performance evaluation on city manager randomly, that implies that there's a performance issue that provides you you want to know what the greater context is. That's what's happening here. So if there's greater context, we all want to know. Put it on the table if that's what it is. Otherwise, start do what we're asking for. We will go down this path with you. But let's show some progressive sort of inquiry. Let's find out what's there and do it. Partnership with all our business districts. It's just too many questions here. So. So I felt the need to sort of justify based on the dog whistle comments tonight.
Speaker 0: We're going to go and vote on the substitute substitute. The city auditor don't want to comment.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would just like to make a clarification on a statement that was made. I'd like to clarify. A statement was made that the city auditor isn't independent because the city auditor is works for the council. But that's not. I just wanted to clarify that the city auditor is is independent, just as other independent auditors are are independent. So I needed to clarify that result. And I think the independent audits that the P bids and the.
Speaker 5: A's are receiving.
Speaker 1: Are different than what our office would be looking at. So we would ensure that business owners and property owners are receiving the intended benefits that their assessments are supposed to give them, that there is approximately $11 million annually coming in from assessments in the ten and a half years that I've been the city auditor. There are never there never has been an internal control audit on the p bids or to look at whether or not the businesses and property owners are receiving the intended benefit, whether or not the city is providing adequate oversight. Whether or not. The contract is they are in compliance with the contract. So there are a lot of questions that I don't think have been looked at that we would be looking at. So if the council. Voted to approve this item. That's when we would take that as a priority. According to our audit plan, we would we would move this item up in priority to what we were planning to do. If the item is not passed, then we would.
Speaker 5: I would regroup with my team and.
Speaker 1: Determine what what.
Speaker 5: Step would we take next.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Auditor. Just as we're going to go and go to a vote and as also as a reminder, I think whether the council votes for the sub sub or the sub. Obviously our city auditor has the ability to audit any, any, any group, anything associated with the city. And we're public dollars are involved. And so I think that's something that you had mentioned right now. And so I think it's important for the council to know that her and her team can and will audit any area of the city, I think, regardless of this vote. So we have we have a sub sub first. So I want to make sure I'm clear with the subset which is Councilmember Austin sub subs. Then we have the substitute motion which is Councilman Janine Pearce and then back to the main motion. So please vote on the substitute substitute motion. Councilman Austin. Thank you.
Speaker 5: She feels right.
Speaker 2: It's a dead heat. Mission fails. Yeah.
Speaker 0: I'm sorry. I didn't see the vote. Is the voting machine not working or.
Speaker 1: It's it's okay. Okay.
Speaker 0: So motion.
Speaker 1: Should fail.
Speaker 0: Now we have the substitute motion, which was Councilwoman Jeanine Peirce's motion on the floor.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Okay. Motion carries. Great. Thank you. Moving on to the next item, please. But we got to the hearing. So a hearing, please. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to request City Auditor to conduct a limited scope audit that would include: 1) a review of internal controls over how funds are handled and spent by the PBID/PBIA; compliance with the City agreement; and possible benchmarking as to how other cities oversee PBID/PBIA's, and report back to the City Council with the findings. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_12202016_16-1165 | Speaker 2: Motion. Ocean carries.
Speaker 0: 26.
Speaker 2: Report from City Attorney. Recommendation to adopt a resolution supporting the Standing Rock Sioux tribe in their opposition to the construction of the Dakota Access pipeline.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any public comment? Yes, please. Come down, sir.
Speaker 3: I. I know how slow growth for her was, although both the. It was part of the myth of the throne. And this is a good thing. So.
Speaker 0: Yes, sir. Is there anything else? Okay. Thank you so much. There's a motion in a second. Any other public comment? CNN. Please cast your votes.
Speaker 2: Motion carries.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next item.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 0: Fortunately. Well, we have our second public comment period. CNN. Go ahead and please do new business. There is. Please come forward. | Resolution | Recommendation to adopt resolution supporting the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in their opposition to the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_12132016_16-1095 | Speaker 1: Which increase.
Speaker 7: Okay. Let's go ahead in here seven real quickly so we can get to the study session. Madam, quick.
Speaker 1: Item seven Recommendations to Authorize City Manager to execute an agreement with Art Center College of Design to develop a campaign related to unhealthy behaviors surrounding HIV and STDs for an amount not to exceed 80,000 citywide.
Speaker 7: Great. Mr. West.
Speaker 3: Yes. Our Health Director, Kelly Colby, will make a quick presentation.
Speaker 9: Good evening, Mayor. I'm mayor and city council members in the city of Long Beach. We have been seeing an increasing rate of STDs and HIV infections. In fact, we've seen rates increasing by 47% for chlamydia and for syphilis, 97% and gonorrhea up to 115%. The rates have been really going high, as well as an increase in infections in HIV, though some of those are some of the highest in California, second to San Francisco. So we know that we are really doing a lot of great work. And we've been working very closely with L.A. County in its work around bringing Prep, which is a prevention opportunity for HIV, as well as doing a lot of outreach campaigns. We have a grant in right now to L.A. County to also connect to, you know, to bring in additional resource for HIV outreach, connecting, testing and moving forward . So we have a lot of the work going on, but clearly the weather patterns are right now that we need to be doing some additional systems, doing some shifts in the work that we do. So what the screen allows for as we're requesting to work with design matters, which is at the Pasadena Art Center, and basically they pull together experts in the field and students in innovation as well as part of our team to really start to look at different ways and different opportunities to reverse the trends that we've been seeing. So we'll be working closely with them and our community partners, including the care clinic, the center being a star and others to really to sit with Pasadena Design Center, to really come up with a new and innovative approach. It will be starting in the spring and move into the fall and will be coming back with a with a new a new campaign process to move forward. So we're very excited about this opportunity and we look forward to working with our team members.
Speaker 7: Councilwoman Gonzales, anything to your motion? Councilman Austin. Councilman Price.
Speaker 8: Just real briefly, I know we have a busy meeting tonight, but I just wanted to commend the health department. And Kelly, with your leadership, this is a tremendous opportunity to think outside the box and be creative. I can't think of a situation where we've partnered with a group like this, a design, a creative entity like this, to help us deal with a public safety public health issue that's affecting our community. So I'm very grateful that you're doing this. And it's it's a great intro for an item that I will be bringing your way via council in January. So thank you very much for this collaboration and for bringing this idea to the council. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Any public comment on this item? Case C nonmembers, please go below. I have a public comment. I'm looking for the up here. I'm up here. I'm sorry. Okay. Sorry.
Speaker 3: I think the money should be better. Used to look into why it is that when the gay rights movement at the end of the 1970s was raising end to power, and then all of a sudden somebody created something called AIDS HIV. I think the money should be spent to investigate how it is. This appeared out of nowhere. They lied to us and said a monkey bit somebody. What a bunch of nonsense. You know, the truth of the matter is, is that there's a holocaust going on in our country and it's against LGBT people, and they really need to find the real reason and the real people behind making people sick and killing all these thousands and thousands of innocent people. It reminds me of what Hitler did to the gay people in Nazi Germany. Only they're not rounding them up and putting them in gas chambers and burning their bodies. What they're doing is they're poisoning the virus and the virus can be spread to anybody. And what they need to do is find out how it is this virus magically appeared when the gay rights movement was raising up into power at the end of the seventies. And the truth of the matter is, we're going into another dark time with Donald Trump and his dictators who are going to he's picking out a cabinet of the most anti-social or anti-gay people that I've ever seen. If we think we have a problem with HIV and AIDS, what they need to do is find out, yes, educate people about their health. We all know that. Okay. But we have to do that. But the thing of it is, is that there's something very wrong in our country where we all complacently sit around. And, yes, I'm against an international airport, but what about the lives of people? Isn't that a little more important? It seems like money has become our God and people are worshiping the almighty dollar rather than finding the real problems in our society. Why it is that people are having trouble surviving in our society and how to do better, and that somebody has to stand up and speak out against it because it's not going to correct itself and pray. And the gay away doesn't work. They've tried that for thousands of years and they also, by the way, burnt witches and gay people in the Inquisition. And as far as I'm concerned, AIDS and HIV is just something manufactured by some sick human beings who knew how to manufacture viral warfare . Yes, that's what that is. We have the capability of killing everybody many times over with the amount of poison that this country has generated. And if you don't know that, Google it. And the thing of it is, is that we're heading into another dark age.
Speaker 7: Thank you, sir. Time's all up. Sorry about that. Thank you very much. That concludes the public comment on item seven of the last item on the consent. No other public comment. Members, please go ahead and cast your votes.
Speaker 1: Motion carries. | Contract | Recommendation to authorize City Manager, or designee, to execute all necessary documents to enter into an agreement with Art Center College of Design, a California private nonprofit educational institution, to develop a campaign related to unhealthy behaviors surrounding HIV and STDs, for the period of January 1, 2017 through December 31, 2017, for an amount not to exceed $80,000. (Citywide) | LongBeachCC |
LongBeachCC_12132016_16-1129 | Speaker 7: Okay, great. Thank you. Now we're going to have moving on to the study session as we get started. I do want to make sure there are some empty seats and I think there's some folks out in the lobby. I would love an opportunity for if people still need a seat to get a seat. I don't know what the I know our fire guys are trying to keep the. But there are a couple empty seats, if you don't mind. If there is an opportunity for some of those folks to sit down, that would be great. And as we do that, we're going to go and transition right into the the study session. So with that, is staff ready? Is that are you ready for the study session? Okay. Let's let the other folks come in. All right. Great. Okay, so we're going to turn this over to and begin the study session. So to start that off, I'm going to turn this over to staff who will go through their presentation.
Speaker 3: Mayor council members. As we know last week, we were directed to come back with a study session tonight. So this is our study session regarding the FISA facility at the airport. I'm going to turn this over to our airport director, Jess Romo, who will walk us through the presentation and respond to comments. Mr. Romo. Yes. Oh, no.
Speaker 10: Good evening, honorable mayor, honorable council members just from the airport director at Long Beach because of a sudden family emergency of one of our Jacobs team members who was going to present tonight, I will actually be taking us through the PowerPoint slides. But we do have members of the Jacobs team here in attendance so that as we go through the evening and if you've got questions on specific topics, they will be here to answer them. The audience we have Dave Tomba and Tavon and Kathleen Brady. So at the council's request, you know, we're here to present the item regarding the FISA project at Long Beach Airport. One of the basic questions that I think most people know this at this point, but the Federal Inspection Services Facility is a facility that exists at an airport and is the base of operations for use. U.S. Customs and Border Protection. There is also an immigration agricultural component to it. And their purpose is to clear and inspect all flights that are coming from foreign countries into the United States. They all must be cleared by Customs and Border Protection. It's a facility that unifies that process where both passengers and baggage is inspected and processed for the safe, efficient flow back into the United States. Specifically, why are we here? Let me provide a little bit of history. JetBlue originally made a request of the city and the airport for the possibility of an office or a customs facility back in February 2015. Subsequent to that, the City Council in July of 2015 authorized the fees feasibility study and the release of an RFQ. After that RFQ process, the Jacobs was selected to perform the study in March of this year. Over the next few months. The study was was commenced and completed. It was released to the public, to the mayor and council on October 4th, 2016. And this evening we are here to present the findings of that study. We knew that it was very important to conduct outreach that was very clear by council and the mayor. And as part of that, too, community meetings were held very early on in the process in March and April of this year. And as part of that outreach, Jacobs received a number of comment cards, emails, and then as a follow up, conducted an economic impact survey after the study was was released to the public. We've had two presentations to city commissions, the Airport Advisory Commission on October 20th and the Economic Development Commission on October 25th of this year. And tonight is our study session for the city council and the mayor. It was detailed as deliverables for the study to have a number of components and they're listed up here. And really what they are is a market analysis or the demand of is there a demand for international service at Long Beach? It was also important to look at the environmental compliant compliance assessment component specific to any environmental work that either has been done or would have to be done as part of this project. An Economic Impact analysis which examines what effect financially the construction and the existence and operation of an IFRS would have to Long Beach and to the region. We also had to look at siting alternatives specifically if we were to have an office, where on the airfield would it be situated and followed by that the financial feasibility. If we were to get through all those those components or those aspects, how would it be paid for? Who would be responsible for paying for it? How how would it be funded from a standpoint of construction as well as ongoing operations? And then finally, the security risk assessment. What types of additional risks that don't already occur here at along B or at Long Beach Airport might be become part of that new risk scenario if there was an FAA developed. So flip that around a little bit and put it in the form of questions, really. You know, these are the questions that this presentation will cover and these are the questions that the study looked at and provided answers to. So, number one, is there a demand? What types of environmental clearances, again, have been obtained or would need to be obtained? What's the economic impact? Can it fit? How much will it cost? Who will pay for it? And finally, does it increase security risks? Before we get into those components, I want to give a little bit of background because there's been a lot of discussion about how this comports with the noise compatibility audience here in Long Beach. So just a little bit of background and detail for the mayor and council and the audience here tonight. Long Beach Airport has the benefit of one of the strictest noise ordinances, not only in the country but in the world. It is codified in our municipal code under Chapter 16.43. It's been in existence since 1995. It's consistently been reaffirmed by the city council. And this is the important part. It's a very complex and comprehensive ordinance. But its purpose is to limit aircraft noise. It does not speak to the limitation of aircraft routes. All that said, the stay was very important for the study to really make sure that the noise ordinance was looked in its full form as as they undertook all these aspects of the study and accept the noise ordinance as a given. More recently, and at the request of both JetBlue and the city of Long Beach, we letters were sent to the FAA, specifically asking about what impact, if any, there would be on the noise ordinance as a result of looking at the development of of an amphibious facility. And both in both instances, in fact, the second bullet point here is a direct quote from the FAA response that basically says The FAA does not find an issue of current noncompliance under anchor or the city's grant assurances. Concerns that the introduction of an international service consistent with the current noise ordinance would undermine that ordinance or cause a change in the FAA position toward it are unwarranted. So moving into the first component of the study, which is the market analysis specifically on demand. It's it's very important. And I think most people do realize. But, you know, Long Beach Airport is located within a very competitive Southern California market. There are five commercial airports that make up this market in the Southern California region. It is also a fact that passenger traffic throughout the five airports has been increasing. Of it at some airports, it's greater than others. I think from a percentage standpoint, John Wayne is probably growing at the fastest rate from a percentage standpoint, but absolute passenger numbers that's actually occurring at L.A.X. and across the board in specific to Southern California. International growth is outpacing domestic growth that's been occurring for the last few years. It is worth noting, though, and you'll see some following slides in terms of the the typical breakout of of domestic activity versus international LAX, which is a a very major effect. It is probably the major international gateway on the West Coast. Last year saw a 26% of its business came from international traffic. And this year so far international at L.A.X. is is is up about nine and a half percent compared to domestic traffic, which is up at seven and a half percent. So the modeling that was looked at in terms of what type of demand we would we would we could see here at Long Beach with the development of an I guess is building out this model over a five year period. So this table here really shows that over that five year period, the the top row is the number of seats. Or if you multiply all the the seats in an aircraft by the number of flights in the fifth year, you'd have about 446,000 seats. And of those seats, the employments or the people getting on the air or on planes going to international destinations would be about 379,000. Across the board, the ratio is consistent. It assumes about an 85% load factor. So just to kind of put that in very simple terms, that's the percentage of the of the aircraft on average that's occupied. So we're looking at, you know, what you'd call 85% of the seats being taken. The study also looked at historical slot utilization over a ten year period. And and it's important to note that that period between 26 and 2015 where the average slot utilization or of the slots there were allocated, about 32 and a half of those flights per day were being used. That's 79% of 41 flights because through those time periods, 41 was the number of flights that were authorized. We bring that up. It's important because right below that, it could show clearly that unused allocation within that that set of activity could be provided for to use for international service here at Long Beach. Now. From now going forward with the with the increase of through the supplemental slots of 50 flights per day, only four air carriers. The forecast is is showing that in year one, we would estimate six of the 50 flights would be international, which represents about 12% of the total activity. And in year four, so year four years four and five, you would you would see that potentially increasing to eight flights per day out of the 50 or 16%. General aviation or private aircraft that could also benefit from having an FAA ice facility on the field. That activity really would be very incremental and not not be measurably greater than what we see already. Specifically, and for those that don't know this, there are a number of aircraft that are already arriving at Long Beach Airport that are coming from international destinations. The thing is, they have to stop at another airport first to get cleared by customs before they return to Long Beach. So we see more of the benefits on the general aviation side coming in the form of improved efficiency of the airspace. I think most most people that live around Long Beach and in the L.A. region in general see that it's a very complex airspace. So with the efficiency of that airspace being managed by having direct access back to Long Beach as opposed to a tech stop before they get here, along with incremental reduction in an emissions. And our apologies. It's a very busy table, but this show's over a. A. 15 year period. Actually 14 and a half year period. Across the nation, on average, you see the breakout of domestic travel making up 80% of air traffic and international making up about 20% of air traffic. There have been some stated concerns from some members of the public in some of our meetings that if we were to allow international activity here, then it would become a 100% international airport. That really is not the case. And again, as I alluded to earlier and stated, L.A.X. being a major international gateway is has by far the largest percentage of the international activity will continue to. It will continue to have that level of activity. So in essence, Long Beach Airport will not become a 100% international airport. So we want to look at current and past activity as it relates to seasonal service here. But if you look at at the left, that graphic illustrates our our current route map out of Long Beach. And you can see that it mainly focuses on routes north of Long Beach, up the coast into Seattle. And we do have seasonal service to Anchorage. We do have two transcontinental flights to the East Coast, one to Boston and one to New York. Currently Long Beach, sir, by four passengers listed up on the on the slide. And they include American Airlines, Delta Airlines, JetBlue Airways and Southwest Airlines. This graphic here shows probable international destinations, and this is based on research done in meeting with carriers that obviously have shown an interest in JetBlue being first and foremost, foremost one of the carriers that has expressed your keen interest in developing some international service out of Long Beach. So you can see in the graphic there that from Long Beach, everything goes south into Latin America, Mexico and then into Central America. And it's really the constraint there is is tied to aircraft type, which if you look at the concentric circles, the inner most is a C, R or a regional jet. The second circle out is Airbus A320. The third one is Airbus A321. So those correspond with the range of each of those particular aircraft type. So that's that's what we're looking at. We're not looking at flights to Europe or flights to the Far East or really anything that's really that far out. Number one, the airfield does not support that type of activity in terms of aircraft type or facilities. Don't support that, which I'll show you in a few slides up ahead. And you know, so based on the current range of aircraft that are used by these by these airlines, that that's the that's the probable area to be looked at for international service. Looking at it in a little bit more detail. A number of international destinations were examined as probable international destinations. These would not. Each and every one of them become a destination in and of themselves. They're just really on a list of potential areas that that would be looked at by airlines. And you can see Mexico leads that list with six destinations. Costa Rica has two. And then Guatemala, Panama and El Salvador each have one. Again, the decision to serve any or each of these is really dependent on airlines, subject obviously, to the FAA as being developed here, their their ability to to extract interest in the route and a strong market for that route. So, again, these fit in in within JetBlue's network, existing network. Again, we forecast that 6 to 8 of these destinations would be considered by JetBlue. And again, they are based on type of aircraft and facility constraints that exist at Long Beach Airport. So really conclusions of the market analysis it was, he said earlier, international flights must operate within the constraints of the noise ordinance. That is an absolute. There is a market at Long Beach airport for international flights to and from southern destinations. And again, we would anticipate that 6 to 8 flights per day over a five year period. And in the fourth year, fourth and fifth years, we would be looking at about 379,000 annual arriving passengers. So the next component is the economic impact analysis. And this was performed in use results from a 2016 tenant survey. It identified the economic impacts of Long Beach and the potential contribution of an office facility. So without an office as it exists today, it's been studied and quantified that the annual economic contribution of Long Beach and its tenants is approximately 45,000 jobs and $10.3 billion in output for the region. Performing an economic analysis and doing this modeling is a little a little complicated, but just running through looking at this, this basically is a chart that traces the flows of spending associated with business and to tourism in a region. You know, you have your direct, direct effects that go into local and non-local purchases that then lead to goods and services and labors, that that also contribute to what they call a multiplier effect for both energy industry purchases and labor income and spending. The outputs of those are indirect impacts and induced impacts. So along with direct impacts, the three of those would represent the total impact. Of an.
Speaker 3: IFRS.
Speaker 10: At the first two meetings that this was presented, this was really focused at the region level, and there were questions and actually a request a couple requested in one specifically by the Economic Development Commission to see about looking at very localized benefits to Long Beach itself. So that was done. I'll get into a little bit of how that was done, but it basically employed a statistical analysis so that their estimated and that they supplement regional economic analysis in the study. It is important to note that these benefits are expressed as a range because this is something that is typically not done as part of an economic impact analysis. They look at the regional level. But again, through using sound techniques, we did some interpolation and came out with some some figures that are that really could bring us to the same conclusions just on a different scale as as higher level regional analysis was done. So this table here that's that shown or this.
Speaker 3: Graph.
Speaker 10: Is really a snapshot of looking at the fire's impact to Long Beach. Once it's up and running and you can see that it's expressed in the range that that is it goes from $20 million up to $60 million, the median or the middle. The median point of that is 38 million. So again, because this is something that's typically not done in industry yet, to keep everybody honest, it was we just decided it was best to show this as a range as opposed to a specific dollar amount. Again, I apologize. This slide is a little bit busier, but I'm putting it up here just for reference because the following slides will take information from this slide here and give more detail both on the regional impacts and the local impacts. But suffice to say, if you look at that on the left side of the of the slide that's focusing on regional impact and on the right side is focusing on local impact. And that's looking at the existing impacts to Long Beach of Long Beach Airport. What the impact of the construction of an office would mean at Long Beach Airport and then in the after condition, what an F bias would contribute to both the region and locally. So as I said, I think up front at one of the first slides is that the economic impact summary shows that again, in its current condition , about 45,000 jobs, $10.3 billion in regional output as a result of Long Beach Airport doing against some interpolation. If you drill that down to the local the local effect, it's estimated that about 6300 jobs and a $1.8 billion impact or local output is produced by the airport to Long Beach. As it relates to facility construction, again, regionally estimating that about 250 jobs and $38 million in one time regional output, and then at the local level estimate that 47 jobs and $6.7 million in one time local output. As to the ongoing operations, we estimate that about 350 jobs and $36 million in annual regional output. And then at the local level estimate there are 80 jobs and $7 million in local output. One of the other reasons why we're looking at the FISA and why airports look it up, ISIS as well is the annual spend rate of international travelers will outpace that of domestic visitors to an area. So the analysis shows that about 30% of the annual international passengers are visitors to the U.S. and the estimated visitor spending is about $104 million per year. The multiplier effects of the international traveler. Spending translates to about 1400 jobs in $186 million in annual regional output and 179 jobs and $31 billion in annual local output. All right. Drilling down to the ongoing operation or existence of the FARC, about 1750 jobs and $222 million in annual regional output, followed by 260 jobs and $20 million in annual local output. So that takes us to the environmental compliance portion of the report. And this really looks at two key components as it relates to environmental compliance. We have both the California Environmental Quality Act or Sequoia, and the National Environmental Protection Act, or NEPA. We know that there has been a an environmental impact report that was prepared at Long Beach for the Terminal Area Improvement Project. It was completed in 2006 and studied many elements which we will be looking at on following slides. NEPA is actually a separate part and component that the at the federal level that really would be looked at in coordination with CBP and FAA on the type of NEPA documentation that would be required as part of this process. What you have on on the slide there is as part of an environmental impact report under Sequoia, there are 17 separate areas that have to be looked at and that were looked at as part of Long Beach's Environmental Impact Report. And each one is looked at in detail and was studied as part of the report for purposes of highlighting those that are probably front and center in an airport environment would include air quality, greenhouse gas emissions, noise and transportation traffic. And that's not to understate that any of the other items are not important. So as as part of this study, we we engaged a consultant to look at and review the the existing environmental impact report. Kathleen Brady from bone terrorism as so she was retained to to perform this review and did so. It's important to note that the study itself in this review does not constitute any type of seek or compliance. The appropriate environmental assessment would have to be performed if and when the city determines to proceed with a project. That said, based on on the initial review, it does reveal that there are some scenarios where it's possible that no additional environmental impacts would be generated. And then the last bullet there is just for for your edification and it reference that in the prior air there were scenarios that either match our activity now or even exceed our activity now. This is not to say that this is where the airport is or where it would go with an F at all. It's just to say that the air actually in the past has studied activity that eclipses our current, active or current flight pattern right now. Some of the other functional areas that were evaluated as part of that are really go to capacity throughput parking both for aircraft and for vehicles. And the three that are highlighted in blue really are those that would be most pertinent to the development of an FAA US facility. Again, they would not ignore these other functional areas, but those that are in blue would probably be most pertinent. And as a recap, as it relates to the environmental compliance, the City Council on June 30th, 2006 evaluated an amount of 102,850 square feet of terminal facilities, followed by a council action in April, April 24th, 2007, where of that 102,850 square feet, 89,995 square feet of terminal facilities were authorized. Now, from that amount, we have seen through phase one improvements at Long Beach Airport, 73,769 square feet of terminal facilities which have been completed. So if you subtract 8600 square feet of improvements net that are part of a plan that we would move forward with, again , subject to approval of an. So if you reduce that by that square footage to be removed, that would yield 37,681 square feet of of remaining capacity. Again, that would also be premised on the council approving the difference between the 89,000 995 and the 102 850. So now we're going to get into, say, the facility siting alternatives and we're going to show three slides and. Before we do that, I want to give a little bit of background on this. So it's going to show three conceptual options that are prepared as part of this study. They are based on a simulated flight schedule that again was done as part of the market analysis that shows 6 to 8 daily international arrivals and a design criteria showing 255 passengers that could be processed per hour. So we're not talking about some big great at this facility that you would see like at L.A.X. We're a large international gateway. It would also have to be appropriately sized. And these estimates here did take into consideration customs and border protections, airport technical design standards that would have to be done as part of contacting CBP if this project were to move forward. These options are evaluated for feasibility only. They do not represent an actual footprint or even an actual site as it relates to where it sits in relation to the airport. So the preferred project would be determined at some future point. All of these are shown to be feasible. So option one shows a facility that's situated north of the terminal building itself. You can see that in the light blue on that point, I guess my. I think my. My laser. Is it working? Okay, just. Anyway. I think you can see I apologize. I think it's somehow it's not working. So you can see that linear building there that there is there on the right lower right portion that has a gross square footage of 35,051 square feet, has an estimated costs of about 21 and a half million dollars . Again, this this is conceptual only. And also keep in mind that this includes what they call exterior areas, hallways that would not necessarily go toward counting for the allowable square footage that that the capacity that we have under the current air. Option two moves the facility to the south of the terminal complex. It's it's it's smaller. It's at 30,672 square feet at a cost of $17.3 million. And then finally, it's a little bit of a of of a alteration of a version or option to is one that has 2820 8406 square feet at a cost of $20.3 million . Next we go to financial feasibility because at the end of the day, it has to be something that can be both supported from a development standpoint, construction standpoint, and then also from an ongoing operational standpoint. So this here is just a reminder for mainly for folks out in the audience that no city of Long Beach General Fund dollars support the airport. It's an enterprise fund. So all the revenues that are created out at the airport in the form of rents, concession fees and rates and charges to the airlines, those all go to support Long Beach Airport. As a result, no general fund dollars or taxpayer dollars would be used to construct or operate the up ice facility. Conversely, the FAA puts pretty strict restrictions on airport revenues so that they cannot be taken off the airport. So all revenues that that are generated at the airport have to go to benefit the airport. Airport revenues cannot be used to pay for city services that are not related to the airport. Now, this does not take into account that we pay for city services such as fire and police and other administrative support that we receive from the from the city of Long Beach. And that is allowable. Based on the analysis, Long Beach Airport could commit up to $3 million of passenger facility charges or fees. That PFC is something if you ever notice on when you're flying out of Long Beach. It's a $4 and 50 cent charge that we are authorized to collect and we basically use that that money for capital projects or other things specific to the airport. So again, no public money from our new general fund. Money would be used for this project. The rest of the cost for this would be or could be funded directly by JetBlue as the primary user of the facility. Based on rough budget numbers, again, they would have to be determined to be, you know, correct and accurate as to square footage and construction cost. But the they're looking at about $13 per face arriving passenger in the first year. So that is that would only be assessed to international travelers coming into the airport, not for any domestic passengers coming into the airport. And that's really to reflect initial startup costs starting in year two and then continuing under year ten. We would see that we would estimate that that would drop down to $6 per arriving passenger. We'll see on some following slides that these range of charges is really comparable to other California airports. And ultimately the financing plan would be negotiated by all parties. So the upshot of this financial feasibility analysis is that it is financially feasible. This is just a chart showing, you know, it's a little it's it's it's a little busy, especially as it relates to Long Beach. But again, since these are estimates, we had to provide ranges of cost. So there is a capital charge and then there's a net operating charge and you can see the range for the capital charge. The net operating charge is expected to be $9 again in the first year, then dropping significantly down to between $1.35 and 248 in in years two through ten. You compare that with Orange County or John Wayne or with San Diego, Oakland at $10, Fresno at $12, or Phenix, which actually has a common combination of charges based on the the amount per arriving passenger, as well as what they call a turn fee for the aircraft itself. So again, the the rate that we're looking at or the charge we're looking at for each international arriving passenger is a is an acceptable manner and is definitely within the range. And then last we come to the security risk assessment. You know, the study looked at the potential for additional risk as a result of an amphibious being operating at Long Beach Airport. The findings are showing that the FISA facility would not increase the risks to Long Beach Airport nor the community. And and really, what people need to keep in mind is that CBP really is an extension and, you know, another form of law enforcement. So, you know, they are they very well protect FISA facilities. They would complement, you know, the existing law enforcement presence that we have. You know, elimination of risk is at any airport in really admitted pretty much any public venue. It's it's seldom possible. I would even, you know, subscribe to you that it's not possible to eliminate risk. You manage it. But Long Beach Airport currently commits significant resources. And we can we will we will do so going forward, whether we have an amphibious facility or not, to protect the traveling public. And, you know, we we we are very lucky to be complimented by Long Beach Police Department. We got a great partnership with them. And they provide, again, a robust security operation. So next steps. It really is. City Council will decide whether or not to move forward with an FAA facility at Long Beach Airport. And our understanding based on discussion last week is that there's a tentative, tentatively scheduled for January 24th, 2017. So before I turn it back over, that's the end of the slide. I did want to close with a few comments that I think just really help ensure that that we are being very transparent with this process. And overarching concept of the FAA feasibility study is recognizing that it is premised on the continued protection and protection of and a Biden with the city's noise ordinance at the currently authorized level, a maximum of 50 air carrier flights may operate on a daily basis. Where these flights depart to or originate from does not, in and of itself affect the legitimacy of the ordinance. The intent of the FISA feasibility study has been to serve as an analytical and informing tool for the city of Long Beach as it contemplates possible next steps in the process. The goal has been to provide a comprehensive, transparent and fact based document for mayoral city council and public review. Finally, the City Council has authorized staff to engage with JetBlue and other interested stakeholders for the purpose of gathering additional information on more specific aspects of the project for example, facility size, siting cost, etc. Many of these data points will be useful when we return to the Council in January. We do believe it is appropriate to wait until after the Council considers the item in January before initiating any formal outreach to the governor's office. And thank you. And we're here to answer any questions you may have.
Speaker 7: Thank you. And I want to thank, obviously, the staff at the airport and staff for preparing the study session, as well as the council members. That agenda is a study session for today as well. So I know there's going to be a series of questions from the council and obviously we're going to have public testimony as well from the from the public. And so going to get to all of that, I want to make sure that everyone has a chance to speak and be heard, including, of course, getting questions answered and asked from from the city council. So I'm going to I'm going to go and start with a couple questions. And I think I think one of the things that's important and I look out and I see some friends that live in the neighborhood and I see Rick and Bruce and Chris and Jan and folks who have been in your backyards. I know how important of an issue this is to you. And so I know I've committed to each of you individually, but as well as to the community, this is a very, very serious issue. And I know how important this issue is to each and every one of you, because I see your passion. I understand how you believe this has a deep and profound impact on your homes and your neighborhoods and your community. And so I see that because I think as we deliberate this this issue and as we hear from folks on the staff side, folks in the aviation community, and really most importantly, the public and the people that are that are living in this in this city, I want you to know that you are being heard. These questions are important. And we're going to have, I hope, a good opportunity to ask questions and to hear what you're saying today. So I just want to particularly thank you and I want to thank those of you that have contacted me personally and and our offices as well. So I want to just begin by asking a couple questions. And so there have been, I think, two areas of focus in the conversation around an international terminal in the U.S. And one, I think we've spent we have spent some time talking about, well, we'll spend more time talking about tonight is this idea of the noise ordinance. Right. Of course, we've heard obviously, Mr. City attorney, what you said in your analysis. We've heard, of course, the the the read the letter from from from the federal government. And of course, we've heard from folks on what we think the impacts are or not are. And I understand the position that the attorneys office has taken as far as its impacts and not having any sort of damaging impacts to the court noise ordinance. But the area that we have spent we haven't spent much time, I think, discussing, which I think is is as important, is the issue of economics and the economy and the impacts of domestic flights and those and the impacts of those domestic flights to our local economy. And I've asked these questions of some of some some of my friends and people I know in the aviation community. But we haven't just been they haven't been discussed so much. And I think these are important things to consider as we as we move forward. I think everyone's probably aware that one of the largest sources of revenue for the city is the tourism economy. And folks that come in to and from conventions and that do convention business. So one thing that has always been of interest to me is having those flights and those domestic flights that link to the cities that bring these businesses. And so I'll give you an example. As you probably know, flights have changed in Long Beach as far as what we have. We used to have a lot more transcontinental flights. So you should be you used to be able to go to the Long Beach Airport and pick up a flight and head over to Washington , D.C., more often than we do now or New York or Chicago. Those connecting flights are oftentimes very important because they provide a stable economic return for the rest of the business and the conventions and folks doing business in the community. We certainly have the North-South flights, which have been, I think, very steady and very supportive to going back and forth to Sacramento and the Bay Area. And in fact, I've been very pleased that some of those flights were moved around so that we have more of those Bay Area connections. One of my key questions in this is I saw one of the tables that you had. Maybe we can go back to the slide staff you had mentioned. This is the first time I'd seen it. I wanted to just talk about the some more that six out of the 50 flights in year one you expect would possibly go international, which you mentioned being a number of 12%. Is that correct, Mr. Roemer?
Speaker 10: Yes.
Speaker 7: That's great. Can we get that slide back up with, if possible.
Speaker 3: You.
Speaker 10: Okay. He's bringing back the liquor. Sorry about that.
Speaker 7: I just want to make sure I have the numbers right, because. And then you also mentioned that possibly in year four, eight out of 50 flights or 16% of the total flights. Of the carrier flights would be. International, is that correct?
Speaker 10: Yes.
Speaker 7: Have we projected that out further? So I'm wondering if in year four, which is, you know, a blink of an eye and you're for we're at 16%. What would happen at year eight.
Speaker 10: That was not done as part of this analysis that I will tell you this based on my previous experience working on air service marketing and air service development, going that far out is, you know, would be speculative at best. I mean, you could make a guess what, I would rather not give you something that is unreliable, then give you something that, you know, there's no way pushing eight years out. I think it's really hard to predict.
Speaker 7: Okay. But you I mean, you've pushed it to four years out. So what? I mean, do you think in year five that goes to 20%?
Speaker 10: No, I think if you look at the the table that year in years, four and five. Years, four and five. They're both at it. You know, the number of employments is these are data showed in a different form, but this is based on eight flights. So and so.
Speaker 7: I mean, and I just want to follow the start. So I know that I understand what you're saying about speculate too far out. Are you saying that it you would imagine that this would would plateau or would it see or would it have small growth or what can we expect is obviously, we're going to we're going to if this moves forward, we would live with this for longer than four years. Well, what what do you see happening out in the future?
Speaker 10: Well, here's all I'm going to answer it this way, and I'll try to give you as as full and direct of an answer as I can. Number one, we've got the noise ordinance, which puts the upper limit. And as of now, and unless we see something changing two years out, four years out, you know, eight years out , we're looking at 50 flights maximum. Okay. For the for the air carrier group within that 50 flight profile, each carrier decides on how they would like to fly those routes again, assuming there's an amphibious facility here or not. You know, so to the extent that there could be some headroom, you could see some incremental increases. But back to the other slide that shows that on average, airports and air patterns show about a 20% versus 80% of international versus domestic. So, you know, I don't see it might go up incrementally above that 16%. I don't see you know, I don't see it increasing much more, at least in that, you know, in that first set of years. All that said, because of the uncertainty of anything that could happen in the economy, you know, something.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 10: Inadvertent and negative, could could could cause flights to reduce. We just don't know that.
Speaker 7: Okay. But in your in your best estimate, you think that that 60% certainly could go a little higher, but maybe not higher than 20%. Is that what your what your best estimate, what you're saying?
Speaker 10: I would say that and I would add this again, this is just a snapshot of what we see today. You know, for ten years, I manage the Ontario airport and over that period, we saw international go from 0 to 3% and it's been stuck at 3% for about two years now. That's a function of what the airlines want to do. Similarly at John Wayne, you see that profile there. It's a much larger base of passengers, but they're also at about 3%. So, again, you're talking apples and oranges because that's a, you know, 11 million passenger airport versus ours, which is under 3 million. But I'd say given that, I would I would say that 6% or eight flights is likely at the upper limit of what we would see here at Long Beach Airport.
Speaker 7: Okay. And so I think why that's important is I just want to make sure that one of the things that we're really thinking about is and it Mr. when I mentioned this, too, to Mr. West a few times, is that there is a there's also a difference between, of course, our airport and some of the other airports . Right. And so the key difference is that we we have this ordinance that we have all agreed that we all support, that caps very clearly the amount of flights. So while at other airports, there's, I think, flexibility or more flexibility in increasing the domestic market. At our at our airport. We like that we've kept and provided this protection for the community. And so any growth on the international side will be at the expense of the domestic flights. I mean, it's basically it's not all it's it's for every international flight that we gain. And I just and this is an important conversation we should have. We will be losing domestic service. And so I just want to I think that that needs to be both said and and discussed as part of the as part of the conversation. So let me let me just let me just continue. So. My my my concern on on this discussion and I'm interested in is that what protections as the city have. Can we or can we not legally even limit the amount of let's say we wanted to go forward with international? Are there limits that can be placed to limit that or is that not something that's that we're able to do.
Speaker 10: Now other than within the larger envelope of the noise ordinance, which sets, we know as the upper limit, cities, counties, state governments are not allowed to tell carriers where they fly or how they fly. That's that was all part of deregulation.
Speaker 7: Okay. Now, I think I think that's fair. I and I. I appreciate that. And so I just I wanted to just put that out there because I think that one of the things that's important is the conversation about the noise ordinance is is is very important. And we're going to have that. But I think the conversation about the economics of of domestic flight and so I, I would love our airport to be able to connect currently today to flights to to New York and to Washington, D.C. and to Chicago and to all these places that would, I think, would help our convention business . And so I just I just want to make sure that as we have this discussion and as we move forward, that we have and listen, I've talked to I've spent a lot of time talking to our hotel folks, and a lot of our hotel folks are very excited about the opportunity of having international folks coming in and out. And so I hear that. But I also think I've also talked to hotel folks who have shared with me exactly what we're discussing right now. And I have had numerous meetings with hotel folks that have said. What's going to happen to our domestic flights. And so I put that out there for discussion. I have a long speakers list, so I won't monopolize the time, but I just wanted to put that out there as well. So as we move forward, I think those questions need to be answered.
Speaker 10: Mr.. BAER And if I may add one other thing, and it was shown on one of the slides here that the facility design and showing that the throughput at 255 passengers per hour is at peak. This is not a facility that is going to support a large volume of international activity just because of how it would be designed and constructed.
Speaker 7: I know. I appreciate that. And I thank you for that. I understand that. And I think but I think also that I think when folks, you know, ask us where they want to fly, I think they almost always say trans transcontinental flights. So let me just take the speaker's list, Councilman Austin.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and I appreciate those questions. I want to thank you, Mr. Romo, for the presentation. It was should be noted that this presentation was from our airport director and not from Jacobs Engineering, and I have some specific questions for them. Did you say that there was a representative here from Jacobs?
Speaker 10: Yes, we have three representatives.
Speaker 0: Okay. I'll hold my questions until later. I am going to keep my comments short, but I'd just like to make a quick statement. I am I'm really thrilled to see so many residents come out who took their time to learn about this very, very important issue facing our city. I want to thank you all in advance for sharing your thoughts and your concerns with the council this evening. I've had the opportunity to to to knock on your doors and talk to many of you at your front porch, your front porches and your living rooms out and about in the community. And I've received hundreds of emails and communications from residents in my district. I am unequivocally clear where my residents and my district stand on the possibility of Long Beach Airport building and if I is stationed in hosting international flights. The feedback that I've received has been resoundingly in opposition to this proposal. And most thoughtful and informed residents see this as a risky and unnecessary proposal. I respect that and I agree. The few jobs in the economic benefits that have been stated really are not worth the risk, in my opinion. It should be noted also that passenger airline activity at Long Beach Airport is actually at capacity today. With respect to our noise ordinance, our noise ordinance dictates our capacity, as it's been mentioned. Our airport is actually lauded as one of the best as a domestic travel resource. And I believe that international flights could significantly change the character of our airport and our city. It could result in a net loss for our city to our convention and visitors bureau and to our hospitality industry. As mentioned earlier, Long Beach is unique because of our noise ordinance. Our airport is unique because of the noise ordinance. It's also unique, uniquely located, located in the middle of some of the best neighborhoods in Long Beach, which are impacted by this dense. And so over the course of the next month or so, as we are deliberating as a council, I hope you have an opportunity to talk to the rest of the city council, communicate your concerns. I know. And I want to respect them for for being here this evening and listening with attentive ears to to to to the to the the I'm sorry to the the study session this evening, but also to to you as residents. And again, I want to thank you for coming out. I have a whole lot of questions. I expect to be here until the wee hours of the morning. I've already asked my my staff to order breakfast, but I want to wait until after public comment. We hear the comments from the public before I get into questions. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Councilmember Turanga.
Speaker 11: Well done. I'll just say I wrote it for the kid. And when the kid did not write it, I'll both the mayor and they'll have made excellent points in regard to questions already. And I do have my my whole list of questions as well that I will be hitting later on in this presentation. But I do want to echo echo Councilmember Els Austin's point in that I've been listening. And one of the reasons why I brought this issue to the fore right now in terms of a study session is because you weren't being listening to I mean, the audience was not engaged. And in the conversation the two community meetings, if you want to call them that, that we that we sponsored or that we put together, did not have community interaction. It was basically one sided. It was from the city's point of view or the feasibility Jacobs point of view, the both commissions are basically limited comment, public public comment on a lot of the items that were presented. So I felt that this study session would present a better avenue for you to come here and ask your questions. We also offer an opportunity to ask questions via email letter, and I've gotten a lot of those. I have a big stack right here, right there, right here of your comments that I've received. Some of your penmanship is worse than mine, but that's neither here nor there. I get the point, and it's a point that's important. And there's going to be more discussion as we move forward in regards to what it really means and what impact it will really have for Long Beach. Talk about what it will have economically, talk about it, what it would have environmentally in regards to the flights. The one big question that I have and the mayor made up made a point to it is that when we come to the noise ordinance we already had this year, an FAA etiquette mandate to add nine flights because our noise bucket allowed for that. Now we're going to be looking at in the future perhaps another possibility of having to add flights, because we're doing so well with our noise bucket that we can handle it. What's going to be the future of that? Should we have that bias? Where are those flights going to go? Where are they going to be? So those are questions that was that were not addressed by the Jacobs study. And those are the questions that we need to have answered as well, is that when we move forward, as we move forward with our airport, where are we going? And the one big question. It sounds very silly, but one big question is what if we do nothing? What what's what's the impact? What's the impact there?
Speaker 3: I We are, we are.
Speaker 11: We are we are potentially putting ourselves in terms of the city at at a disadvantage of being able to grow our economy or grow our flag to grow. Convention So this was brought up. You know, I think we need to look at that as well. In terms of the report came out, it was very glowing, very positive. But if I read reports, right, or as I as they should read, there should always be some conclusions that are not so positive that say, if we don't do this, this is going to happen. I saw nothing, no negativity at all in this report. And that's why we're here, because there weren't any brought up there. I'm pretty sure that when the contractor was making his studies in, especially economically, there were there are going to be some negative impacts. There will be negative impacts. And it was also likely there's going to be some regional growth in regional out of great benefits to the economy. But at what expense? You know, the yellow, yellow, yellow, an A and a plus in a minus because you're taking some money from you're getting more money here. Where's it coming from and who are you taking it from? What comes right down to that? Who's donating to it and where is it coming from? And it may be that we probably are looking at when we're talking about regional impacts, L.A., Ontario, John Wayne, are we going to be taking some of their businesses that way? We're going to be growing that. I don't know. I mean, that's something that we need to evaluate and analyze as well, because we are going to be part of this Metroplex. Issues that we're that we're dealing with right now that has not been addressed. And we're talking about the other parts that we haven't had in terms of what changes is going to make in flights. I mean, there's going to have to be a re configuration of how flights are going to come in and fly out, flying and fly out of Long Beach. Should we have an office and where it's located? So those are just some some. Food for thought at the present time. But obviously I want to add my voice to thanking you for being on here tonight. I've gotten a lot of phone calls, a lot of emails, a lot of pull up to the site and, hey, what are you going to do about the fires wrote when I'm driving or when I'm walking. But the bottom line is this is your opportunity to voice your concerns. And we are here to listen. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Councilmember. Super now.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mayor. First, I'd like to thank everyone for being here tonight and apologize for the delay upfront. But now we're all here. I also like to thank the folks in the lobby. We know you're there and I appreciate you being here. All those who submitted E comments, we have them. They've been logged in and to all those viewing from home. Thank you for your civic engagement. I have a number of questions over the presentation that I just wrote down now. I also have my own presentation that I'd like to get to, but immediately due to one of the slides and number 42 involving the Elbe PD. I'm going to defer to our Councilmember Pryce. This is her area of expertize, and I'm a little confused by the comments made as to jurisdiction in that area. I don't think the BPD is involved. So if your permission, Mr. Mayor, I'd like to defer to Councilman Price for a couple of questions, then come back to me.
Speaker 7: Yep. And she's next anyway, so we'll come back to you.
Speaker 8: Thank you. I appreciate that, Councilman. Super. I do have I have I have a number of questions as well. But in regards to security specifically, can you talk me through a little bit of how the conclusion that our security risk won't be negatively impacted was made? Because it seems it's counterintuitive in regards to the security risk. So I just want to I kind of want to understand that and what the role of Long Beach PD would be, because there is a jurisdictional issue there and we have certain limits in terms of what we can investigate and enforce and policy wise matters that we do investigate and initiate and others that we leave to the federal government. So if you could give us some more background on that conclusion and justification, I'd appreciate it.
Speaker 10: Okay. Let me work backwards from there. And I apologize if I was not clear in terms of the specific roles and responsibilities. Long Beach Police Department, as everybody knows, has been a longstanding present presence at the airport. Their role would continue as such, so they would not be involved in any of the operational issues regarding the processing and screening of inbound passengers. They would be available for a law enforcement call should one be needed as what as what happens from time to time at the airport. But again, they would not be doing any of the work that normally is done by Customs and Border Protection as as you may know, Customs and Border Protection are sworn officers of the law. They they do carry weapons. But, you know, their their main purpose there is to ensure that both people and their their goods that they're that they're bringing into the country have been properly screened, appropriately screened to ensure that no contraband or other illegal substances are are being brought in to the country. Now, as it relates to security risks for the passengers coming from abroad, keep in mind that every country and including Mexico and Latin America, everybody needs to be screened because no carrier wants somebody on an aircraft. It's got some kind of a unsafe or an unauthorized weapon or substance or anything else. So as it relates to the public or the safety aspect, these are people that and a number of them are going to be Americans. But these are people who are going to be going to international destinations for business or for leisure, and they're going to be coming back. But before they get on an aircraft, they've got to be screened the same way that passengers leaving Long Beach, getting on domestic flights have to be screened. So in that regard, we don't see this being a case of that just because in and of itself, it's international destinations that are going to be served that that creates a security risk.
Speaker 8: Okay. I appreciate that and I hear you. I'm not sure I totally agree with that, but I appreciate your opinion on that and I do appreciate the study session. I'm grateful to Councilman Yarrawonga for bringing forth the item for us to have a study session. I was happy to sign on to that item and I think my attitude with this whole process has been the more information we obtain to better analyze the situation, the better that we will be in terms of making a knowledgeable decision moving forward. I do have some comments that kind of echo some of what the mayor talked about regarding regional versus direct local financial impact. That's an area that I still remain not completely clear on. So I do have some questions on that. But I know that Councilman Super now has his own presentation, so I'm going to give the floor back to him. I'd love to hear from the audience, and I expect I'll have some additional questions as well as we move through the night. But thank you very much for the presentation, for stepping in at the 11th hour to do the presentation, even though that wasn't planned. I appreciate it. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you so much, Councilman. I do want to go back to you now. Okay, Councilman Worshiper.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. So, as I stated, I'm going to go right back to the presentation. I've actually seen it two other times, but it's a little different this time. So I came up with a couple of new questions and the first one was from slide number seven. And it states there that we have one of the strictest, strictest noise ordinances in the world. And that we've heard over and over again if you've been with this process now, just Romo was kind enough to visit my community meeting two weeks ago and we discovered at that meeting that it might be one of the strictest in the world, but it's not the strictest within 22 miles. So if you could express what you did, that community meeting, how it is, Orange County prevents flights coming in at night, but language doesn't. Yeah.
Speaker 10: I'll be happy to do that at a at a reasonably surface level, only because I'm not expert on John Wayne's noise ordinance, other than the fact that similar to Long Beach, it was it was implemented pre anchor or the Airport Noise and Capacity Act, which is one of the reasons why Long Beach Long Beach gets to enjoy the strength of this ordinance. So I may end up I'm kind of turning to counsel here in the event it's something that it's a little bit more in detail than I can provide because I just don't have that background. But I think, as I mentioned at the community meeting, the folks that developed that noise restriction or set of restrictions at John Wayne, I'm going to just use the term they had the foresight. Okay.
Speaker 9: So I'm going to rescue just a little bit because it just so happens we have an expert here. Lori Balance is a principal in the law firm of Gaskin, Dillon and Balance. And for some of you, the I have been following airport issues for years. That is a law firm that we typically use to help us with airport regulatory matters. And Lori also is outside counsel for John Wayne Airport. So she's uniquely situated to give us an answer about the difference between Long Beach is set up and John Wayne's.
Speaker 8: Thank you. So, yes, I'll try to answer a little. Kind of broadly to start with. And if you have additional questions, please feel free. Much like Long Beach, we did enter into a settlement agreement with the communities surrounding John Wayne Airport, and we negotiated that settlement for an arrival and departure curfew. Those curfews went into place before the Airport Noise and Capacity Act went into place. So John Wayne Airport, like Long Beach, is grandfathered. Those provisions are grandfathered. An airport could no longer do that kind of curfew unless you go through a very difficult part when 61 study so John Wayne airport was able to grandfather those curfew provisions . We also have strict penalty provisions. So if aircraft arrive or depart outside of the curfew, then there is a penalty structure that penalizes those aircraft.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. Boy, did I get a surprise on that answer, but I really appreciate the expertize here. The next question I had was. The slide, and this is from previous presentations. It's slide number 33 and that's the demand peak of 255 an hour. I think we saw at the presentations that that is under ideal conditions. And I think those in the audience would be hard pressed to find ideal conditions at at the Long Beach Airport because we deal with delays and all sorts of things all day long. So maybe that's a question for the consultants because they came up with that formula. I don't want to put you on the spot again, just but we can get back to that one if they present later. If we can, I think now I'd like to bring up a couple of slides that we put together and. The nature of this is I'll start off with an old riddle if you've never heard it, and that is what's the difference between ignorance and indifference? And the answer is, I don't know and I don't care. And what I'd like to address tonight is the I don't know factor, because I think that's the missing link here. I think all these folks in the audience know something that needs to be shared with the council members. If you live in an air packed, airport impacted neighborhood, you have a base knowledge that needs to be shared here. So I'm going to attempt to do that a little bit. So in that, I'm going to just start with the. With the late night flights, that piece, no one really knows, because as we just discussed, Long Beach has no way to prevent late night flights coming in. That's flights that come in pass ordinance. So what I did here is I went back to the council meeting. I think I was on the job for about two months. And Robert Land of JetBlue came to the podium and he said, let me be crystal clear. On behalf of JetBlue, we are and remain always have been. Let me do that again. We are and we remain and always have been committed to the ordinance, the noise ordinance. And that's the night where I made a comment. And it wasn't my most Churchillian moment, but I said, You're killing me, man. But it express I just couldn't believe that based on my experience, that JetBlue had that position. So giving him the benefit of doubt. Maybe he was talking about future flights. So we have a comment from October 25th, 2016. And Mr. Land said and finally, I in closing, JetBlue has a proven record here in the city of being 100% committed to the city's noise ordinance. We fly our flights in adherence to the noise ordinance. So the we're completely 100% committed and committed to the ordinance was used in both quotes. If we can go to the next slide. Here's the record and I chose the last few months. We don't the numbers aren't in yet for December. So I use December 2015 through November 2016, those 12 months. If you were to ask anyone who doesn't live in the flight path, what on average, how many times a month does JetBlue violate the noise ordinance? Well, I can cut to the chase here. And and it is more than once a night. And that figure is kind of shocking to people who who don't live in the impacted areas. So you can see the total numbers. Well, let's just say there were 366 days in that time period. 2016 is a leap. Year has one extra day. So out of the 366 days, JetBlue violate the new ordinance 375 times. So that's our experience. So if you want to know why the audience members are a little bit cynical or mistrustful, you can go back to these figures here. I'd also like to call attention to that dollar figure $610,200 in fines. And that's the staggering number that goes to the Long Beach Public Library Foundation. And while they're doing an endzone dance over that figure, Mr. Romo, can you tell us what it costs to administer this? I don't want to put you on the spot. If you don't know, I can give you the number. I believe your noise office costs $940,000 a year. So maybe we want to adjust that. So tell the library they can have the money after they cover costs. How would that be? I'm just joking. Now going back to that original quote, I think I said that night, I can't believe this because JetBlue just flew a plane out of here at 2:30 a.m. a week before they're coming to the council to ask for a favor. And so if we can go to that next slide with the map, my staff, Barbara moore, put this together today, now bringing this study session forward. This was last night. Okay. So the folks in Los Altos and Stratford Square in the fourth District. And also, I guess La Marina Bixby Hill, College Park, they experienced this landing at 11:48 p.m.. Now, there was a little problem. I spoke to Ron Reeves earlier tonight. Web track didn't actually show the plane, but we can see by the the way they lit up the noise monitors. I think it's 88 DB over Stratford Square at 1148 at night. So that just kind of illustrates what the folks in the impacted areas deal with. And that's what I think we need to community communicate here tonight. Now. So now I'd like to challenge another area, and I'm going to pick on the two greatest experts. I believe in the room on this thing and also two of my three favorite city staff members, and that's Mike Mays and Ron Reeves. So I'll go back to a quote they made to the grunion. And this has to do with. Is the destination or the origin. It doesn't. Does that matter? And Ron Reeves said. I mean, I'm sorry Jess said it again tonight that, you know, this doesn't matter. Okay. So if we go to the quotes from the grunion, it just it just reiterates that Mr. May said the origin or destination of flights is irrelevant to the various noise buckets established in the ordinance. For instance, if there is a customs facility, the number of flights permitted by the ordinance would not change, nor would the current established curfew hours of operation. And then it was, Ron said, for the purposes of the ordinance, we are connected. The noise levels, not markets and aircraft at a given weight will generate certain noise. Now I think they are absolutely correct scientifically. However, that's not the real world. Where the plane comes from is critical. And that's because delays are based on either weather or mechanics for the most part. So if you have an origin of a weather impacted city, it's going to put a delay in effect. So and that is either foreign or domestic. So I'll flash forward to this year. The next slide is a press release from JetBlue, where they quoted Mary Garcia and just Romo saying talking about the new JetBlue service to Fort Lauderdale and that it's great for the city and, you know, it's a great connection to the Caribbean. Okay. Now, at the bottom of that slide, look at this chart. Okay. So that flight, I think just from really you can correct me if I'm wrong, the 9:24 p.m. to 5:25 a.m. is that known as like a redeye in the industry going from Long Beach to Fort Lauderdale? Yes. Okay. So this great new flight, we're all excited about leaves here at 9:24 p.m.. Okay. That's pushing the envelope on the noise ordinance. That's not an ideal flight we want to bring in here. But on the other end, it leaves Fort Lauderdale at 5:51 p.m. and arrives here at 8:28 p.m.. Well, my feeling is that's way too close for comfort too, because you don't want to be have a an origin from any place that's weather impacted. So if we go to the next slide, here's the headline just 30 days prior to that press release. This is on October 4th. Okay. So the headline is Hurricane Matthew. All right. So Fort Lauderdale International Airport reported 79 delays and 38 cancelations due to the storm. Some airlines, including JetBlue, Southwest, etc., are issuing travel waivers that eliminate penalties for change flights. Okay. Am I making my point that.
Speaker 3: Where.
Speaker 2: The plane come from comes from does matter? So if we want to go to international, I don't want to use that chart and what JetBlue stated as some of their destinations. So let's just take one that wasn't on there. Acapulco. Does anyone have any idea what the on time rate is for that airport? It's it's I think around 60%. So if they have planes flying out of there, coming into Long Beach, we run the risk of those late night violations all the time. I think in conclusion. I just think it's some of these conventional wisdom remarks just don't hold water, in my view. And that that's kind of the difference. That's where the education piece needs to come in and they're there. We can state facts. We can look at a feasibility study, which is just that. It means it's feasible. It doesn't mean that we necessarily need it or want it. You. But there's there's just far more here than what meets the eye. So with that, I would love to relinquish the microphone and hear the public comment tonight and reserve other remarks for later. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. I still have Councilmember Pearce.
Speaker 4: Yes, I had a clarifying question on the noise ordinance. I understand that we have a curfew and we have penalties. That's correct. Right. Right. Is there no way to change the penalties that we have? To increase them.
Speaker 9: Here's let me try to answer that. We have had the current noise penalties on the books since the ordinance was adopted in 1995. Up until this point, there has been a stated preference, I would say, by the Council over the years not to touch the noise ordinance for fear that that may open up something that no one really wants. So, quite frankly, that's why we haven't done that. The penalties that Councilman Superman referred to in the slides are actually not the penalties that are outlined in the ordinance. The penalties in the ordinance are actually much, much less than what is depicted up there. Those penalties are as a result of a consent decree entered into between the city prosecutor's office and the offending airlines, whether it's JetBlue, American or whoever violates the noise ordinance. The penalties in the ordinance are actually very, very low in the low hundreds of dollars. Definitely not a deterrent. So to answer your question, yes, the city could undertake a process to see if we could raise those penalties so that they are similar, maybe equivalent to what John Wayne has. For instance, we would have to engage in with the FAA a fact finding process and with their concurrence, make a determination that based on the history that we have at the airport, that it's appropriate to raise the amount of penalties so that they truly act as a deterrent to carriers that fly in and out of here.
Speaker 4: Thank you for that answer. And do we know off the top of one of our great heads here.
Speaker 8: The numbers that we saw about the number of flights that go.
Speaker 4: Beyond our.
Speaker 8: Hour curfew? How are we in compared to cities like Ontario or John Wayne?
Speaker 4: My voice.
Speaker 10: I'll take the first part of that, because having come from Ontario, Ontario does not have a curfew. So that that wouldn't apply there as it relates to John Wayne.
Speaker 4: No. It's okay if we don't have to answer, but I'd like to.
Speaker 8: You know, there are. I don't know offhand. I do know that the numbers that I saw here are greater than what you see at John Wayne Airport. The penalty structure is different at John Wayne Airport than you have here. Whether that's a deterrent or not. You know, I think that the air carriers do the economics with respect to the penalty structure and and what it costs to put people up in a hotel. So.
Speaker 4: Okay. And then let me ask in discussion about the flight to Fort Lauderdale. What role does the city have?
Speaker 8: What role does the airport.
Speaker 4: Have in negotiating the additional flights that, say JetBlue said they decided they wanted a flight to. Yeah. Cuba or something. Do we have a role in saying yes, we want to increase flights to that destination or no? So I'm getting no.
Speaker 9: Let me try to answer that simply. There is no making the city. Typically, cities, typically as airport proprietors, don't have the authority to dictate where a flight goes to or comes from, provided that the carrier in this case has an available slot at the airport to land and take off. Beyond that, the city really cannot control that. Okay.
Speaker 4: And then my last question before I let folks speak. On the economic factor of having flights land, say, at LAX.
Speaker 8: Or a different airport before they come.
Speaker 4: Into Long Beach. I know that, you know, with like Longines event or something like that for our conventions that are business, we might have people that touch down.
Speaker 8: Somewhere else first.
Speaker 5: And then they gas up.
Speaker 4: There and then come here. Do we see that as a a negative economic impact and a negative environmental impact, or is it that's marginal?
Speaker 10: Well, let me take that in reverse order. And it has explained in the presentation the you know, the inefficiency created by a tech stop or a fuel stop is something that does have an environmental impact relative to increased emissions, you know, because it takes power to to take off and reposition the aircraft. And then you're getting back into the airspace, which again in this area is very complex. So I'm not going to say it's unsafe because air traffic control does a great job at managing the or the busy traffic patterns and aircraft that are, you know, in the air. But it makes it a little bit more difficult financially. What? Well, Long Beach loses out on when it doesn't sell the fuel here at the or B I can say here I'm thinking on the at the airport when when the airport does not make the fuel sale, then it doesn't get the fuel flow, which fees, which is something that does benefit the airport's revenue fund.
Speaker 4: Okay. And my absolute last question. I'm so sorry. Say that JetBlue decides that they you know, we build this FISA facility and. The international flights aren't working out and they decide to leave. Is this a facility that's available.
Speaker 8: For a different courier or are we looking at multiple.
Speaker 4: Couriers now trying to come in to Long Beach because we've built this facility?
Speaker 10: Well, in a word, to be built would be available to any commercial carrier that wanted to make use of it subject to availability as part of CBP, staffing it and not stepping on another carrier schedule. So it's not an exclusive facility for JetBlue, so it could be used by anyone. As to the city and the airport protecting the respective positions so that if international traffic did not pan out, if you will, we would structure an agreement such that the lion's share or the bulk of the capital going into building it would come from, in this case, JetBlue. So I believe that there is an interest on their part to participate in a financial agreement where they pick up the bulk of the of the cost to build it. As I said, we would we could we could commit up to $3 million in PFC funds to make up the difference. And worst case scenario, should there be an amphibious facility built and whether it's a few years later or just any time in the future. You know, it always has a potential for adaptive reuse to be, you know, so that it wouldn't necessarily just be an empty building. I wouldn't necessarily want to commit to what it could be, but we would want it designed in such a way that it could be reused for another airport purpose.
Speaker 4: Great. Thank you guys so very much.
Speaker 7: Okay. Thank you. We there's a lot more questions. We're going to go to the public comment period. So please come up to the microphone. To the mic. So please make sure you just state your name and begin. Please go ahead.
Speaker 4: Shirley Brassard. What was comical to me in hearing this is that the planes are already flying. They're coming. Domestic flights are already here. So really, what difference does it make if if we're adding international flights, the planes are already flying in. Personally, if I'm getting ready to board a plane, my thoughts are not Who am I? Keep me up at night. I'm not even thinking about it. That's right. That's bad for me. That's. That's not good for me. I should be considerate. I'm keeping up somebody. But I have to ask my neighbors, how many of you think when you're in that air? How many people are you keeping up by boarding the plane when you go to Los Angeles and get the flight? How many people are you keeping up or do you not care? Because it's not Long Beach. Now we have a new president coming in and this man is all about international business and in acquiring and building up the Americas. And Long Beach is a gateway city. This is the gateway city. And I have no personal stake in this. But I believe the horse is already out of the barn. I don't believe we're thinking it through. We don't want to hear an airplane fly over after nine. But some of us ladies were nursing at nine. My my concern when I'm on a flight is whether or not I'm hearing any noise at all, because if I'm not, then potentially I have a problem with the plane up there. I want to hear the noise. I believe we're not thinking it through. And you want to grow Long Beach? I just do not believe from a business standpoint that this is advantageous just to because you don't want to hear a flight after nine. I just don't want to hear it. But I'm a drive to L.A. X and bought a plane at any hour. I want to get out of here. That's what we're doing. It's hypocritical. Neighbors. It's hypocritical.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hello. My name is Pete Perez. Thank you for this time to speak with you. I urge the council to vote no on the international terminal in order to reduce the possibility of airline lawsuits aimed at overturning a no noise ordinance. The current economics of the airport has meant that we do not have an overabundance of airlines fighting for slots at airport at Long Beach Airport. This reduces the airline industry's incentive to sue for more slots. If we open up the airport to a whole new range of international destinations, the economics of the airlines flying out of Long Beach changes dramatically. I believe that the airlines will find it profitable to fly more slots out of Long Beach. And when they find that number of that, when they find that the number of slots available is insufficient, they will likely sue to overturn the noise ordinance. What stopped a potential. Let's stop this. The potential actions to overturn the noise ordinance by not changing the economics of flying out of Long Beach. Once the genie is out of the bottle, it cannot be put back in. We are fighting this fight because city residents allowed Douglas aircraft to build a runway with the promise that it would never become a commercial airport. We lose if we all lose if the noise ordinance is overturned. No international terminal. I appreciate the time. Thank you, gentlemen.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening. My name is Lloyd Fox. I live in the third district of Holbeach. My daughter, son in law and her three children and three young children live in the Los Altos area, the fourth District. And obviously, as Councilman Superdog pointed out, very highly affected by this. I'm very concerned about the establishment of the FISA facility. I don't believe that this is necessary for this city. I think it's harmful to the city residents of Long Beach, and it poses a threat to the current noise ordinance, as has been pointed out. And I believe if you look at the numbers, the benefit to Long Beach is marginal. It really is just not there. And I think the overriding question for the mayor's office and for the city council is what kind of city do the residents of this city and you as residents and representatives want to live in? What kind of city do you want Long Beach to be and do you want a safe, peaceful city, or do you want a city that is going to be satisfying a corporate greed to add a few extra bucks to their bottom line and they could care less what happens, what happens to citizens and what happens to our city. As Councilman Superport pointed out, JetBlue is a flagrant violators of the noise ordinance. And, you know, I understand the difference in the penalties. I've read through all this information. They paid an average about $15,000 a month, as has been pointed out, which is less than what it cost to enforce it. And it's the comments that that were made about Chip was fully committed to the Long Beach noise ordinance. I would like JetBlue to be committed to obeying the noise ordinance. We've served as a city. We're kind of blessed in many ways. We're served by two international airports that are literally within 20 minutes of the city of Long Beach. And when you look at the study and you look at the economics of the study, you have assumption piled upon assumption and an attempt to justify the FAA US facility. And when there is an adverse factor mentioned, it's called speculative. It just it's speculative. It's really not important. And I disagree totally. The economic benefit pointed out in a study is literally worthless, and it's based on this entire regional economic benefit analysis, which is done as as, you know, you know, based on it, based on the the the logistics of the study methodology that they use. But the point is that and we tonight heard something for the first time at least, I've heard this about some a local benefit that somehow bit extrapolated from the study. But I personally don't think that that is really a very transparent way to do that. The Jacobs has acknowledged that the study did not analyze the difference between adding international versus domestic flights, the $3 million that might be spent, that is in the study. That's an assumption in the study. There's $3 million to be spent, and I don't think there's any way of getting it paid back. So I appreciate the time that you're spending on this matter and hope that you will turn it down in a final. Thank you, sir. Thank you very much.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Hello. My name is David Alpern. I live in the fourth district and I preface my comments by saying I'm a fan of our airport. I'm glad that just joined us this year from L.A. World Airports. I'm also a fan of JetBlue and try to fly them out of LGB whenever it fits my itinerary. I also represent the diligent struggle each of you on the city council and our wonderful progressive mayor how we're trying to manage our city's finances and identify new revenue opportunities. With that monetary message in mind, I ask that you please pay close attention to my economic concern with the potential decision you might make to allow LGB to go international. There is concern that JetBlue might pursue the issue legally if the international airport proposal does not get approved in such a scenario, the city's legal team can reasonably and easily respond that LGB is exactly as it was position to the airlines when they first considered launching operations here. That is a defensible position as prevailing facts and consistency of practice have a strong and solid legal grounding. However, if the airport goes international, it potentially becomes more attractive to a batch of airlines who may wish to fly more profitable international routes out of the LGB and as such, will be willing to unleash their highly skilled legal staffs to find cracks in our noise ordinance in order to defeat it and create opportunity for themselves. A legal onslaught like that will be much tougher for the city to counter, given that the concept of precedent will no longer hold and the parameters will have changed with the transition to international operations, thus opening up considerations that did not exist at the time the noise ordinance was created. The city would be facing enormous legal expense to try to defend against and protect the status quo against highly skilled legal teams financially supported to aggressively bring it down. Thus voting in favor of international operations now means you are opening up the city to potentially very expensive legal costs in subsequent years. Our city attorney, Charles Parkin, is correct when he says that we can be sued with or without the customs facility. However, I would like to ask the city attorney to opine on my following theory. As a domestic airport, JetBlue would have very little ground to stand on since they came here knowing their limitations. However, our city attorney would potentially be facing numerous carriers if you were to go international, including additional airlines, who would want their bite out of the LGB Apple. I'd be willing to pull their resources for a legal battle. This batch of airlines will likely have a stronger legal argument to challenge the noise ordinance. And what would likely happen is that their negotiating teams would then ask a future council vote to approve adding more slots to appease this new carrier challenge. So to help avoid the scenarios pending court battle, the city's neighborhoods would have to put up with, endure and even suffer from yet another ten or 15 slots. So I'd like to request Mr. Parking as well as council members to please address our city's potential more difficult position in this scenario that I just illustrated. Thank you. And I will be eager to follow your assessment of this.
Speaker 7: Great. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Hello. I'm Elizabeth. Andrew and I live in the fourth district. I live across from Los Altos Shopping Center, and I would like to invite you to my kitchen for a cup of coffee. Or maybe at 3:00 in the morning when I get up to go to the bathroom. I urge you to vote. No, thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Please. Hi. My name is Mike Mangan. I'm a member of.
Speaker 2: The eighth District.
Speaker 3: I don't have any audio visual presentation, and I want to thank Mr. Romo for a very thorough presentation. He said something very interesting when.
Speaker 2: Mr. Mayor asked him to speculate.
Speaker 3: So, you know, I don't want to speculate and I can understand that. But this is all speculative. Everything we're doing here is speculative. And so with that in mind, I think a simple cost benefit speculation is not out of line. This noise ordinance and I don't want to repeat what people have already said, it is not some physical law of the universe that cannot be violated. And the arguments I hear of, well, the noise ordinance is going to protect us because we have the noise ordinance. That's not an argument. That's circular reasoning. That's a tautology. There's no evidence there at all. It was written by politicians. It's enforced by politicians. I think it's safe to say what one considers. Who is going to be running the FAA in a couple of months. I will be objective and say all bets are off if we go international. Okay, I. I would like to commend Councilman Super. I live in.
Speaker 2: The eighth.
Speaker 3: District and it's interesting to hear the concerns at the other end of the flight path.
Speaker 2: And I wanted to tell you.
Speaker 3: That you gave me several talking points that I can.
Speaker 2: Spread as I educate people about that. And I like to commend the.
Speaker 3: Efforts of Councilman Turanga. That was one of one of my emails was in there, by the way, and he's not sitting here, but I've done a great job, too. I thank you for your efforts and your attention to what the residents of this city truly want. Truly want the people who live here. And like the earlier speaker, I was shocked at the lack of actual local benefit that this fire facility, that this facility would provide. The regional impact fine. But the local impact, the benefits are meager. Meager. And I understand that speculative. But the speculative costs, the speculative cost are staggering when one considers public health. Those are two words that were not said enough today, public health. So I urge everyone whom on this council, mayor, who might be wavering on this, I urge you to vote no. The people who are voters in the city will have your back on that decision by a wide, wide margin.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 12: Thank you very much. My name is Sterling Ringland and I'm currently a resident at eighth District 4300 Cerritos Avenue is where I currently reside. I want to thank you, the mayor and all the council members, for letting us speak today. It's a very important issue. I believe I come before you to plead the case that you do not vote to begin the construction of the FISA facility and that you end this red tape bureaucratic charade of attempting to turn Long Beach into an international airport. My grandpa once said to me, If it don't make sense, it probably isn't true. And that phrase became so familiar to me when there's talk of an international airport first came up, one of the actual major arguments for having this expansion occur is if we don't have it done, the city might get sued due to failure to comply with the noise packet ordinance. So we are actually discussing that the 5 to 10 second disturbance I've had all my life here in Long Beach, the same disturbances which I have had to endure during my classroom, the same disturbances that disrupts businesses and lowers property rates. All of that. We're actually saying we need more of that. Else we might get sued. That makes absolutely no sense. And if that argument has any weight behind it, any backing behind it, then the ordinance needs to be changed. Which, by the way, the ordinance has not been changed in two decades. It has not been updated and we need to update it. That is the truth. And then there's all these numerous, long, complex and complicated studies that we've already had conducted, and the public can't really understand it as well. We are expected to go through all this information with all this complicated jargon, and it's not very transparent to us. I get the airport is trying to explain it to us. Well, but this is very complex information. And you're expecting all these people to go through 700 plus pages of documents and bury through this to just figure out what their opinion is. And that's not very fair to the average Joe and I myself. I decided to give those wanting the expansion the benefit of the doubt in believing that this study has some truth to it. Let's say that Long Beach does actually get approximately 2000 jobs total and that we do approximately get $105 million expanding yearly. The question we've got to ask is, do the benefits outweigh the costs? Among many, many other questions? And the reality is the expansion does not outweigh the costs and get wanting to make Long Beach a more prosperous and wealthy place and want us to make us more productive. And there's a long list of questions we should be studying and answering that are important, and that will help us achieve those goals, like solar panels, like increasing the amount of taxes we have on the wealthy, like having more transparency in the criminal justice system. All these things need to be addressed. But we're addressing this red tape bureaucracy. It doesn't make sense to quote war games. The only winning move is not to play. Don't waste taxpayers hard earned money or time on a project. Not with the cost. Please, Councilman. And women do not allow this expansion to occur. We do not need any more unnecessary studies or unnecessary discussions about this. Let's focus on actual issues and not on a waste of time. Thank you very much.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Good evening. My name is Nancy Lopez. I'm from the fifth District. I have attended since probably October every single meeting in regards to this matter. And this is the first where we've actually been supported by members of the community and residents. In other occasions. We've actually been told that we have had to wait and it is not until late in the meeting that we're able to actually speak and by then people need to go home. So I'm actually happy that there's a greater turnout than usual. The noise ordinance is one of the things that is most mentioned in regards to this matter, and it is something that our family deals with all the time. We live on the corner of Willow and Clark right across the street. We can actually walk to the airport and we can see the flies come in and out. And although that's a major concern, there are other concerns among those noted security, which I think, you know, I, I don't even know his name, but he said that, ah, in the study it says that security is going to be fine . But like I forget who said super near. I don't know. But Long Beach PD cannot enforce security in our communities. Neither can the Department of Homeland Security. So Customs and Border Patrol, if there's somebody that's, you know, that's outside of our neighborhoods, that could be a potential threat. They can't come and help us. It would have to be Long Beach PD on that. No housing, nothing was said about the impact, the economic impact on the houses, on the market value of those houses. There was nothing that was said about that. And I think we were able to come to an economic development meeting. And I think, Councilman Cohen, he said that there was nothing that was looked into about how this would impact our houses negatively. I know that this Long Beach, the Long Beach Airport, is unique in that it is in some of the nicest areas in Long Beach. And that's something that a lot of families have invested in, and I don't think that's being considered. Lastly, the financial revenues, it will bring a large revenue, but none of that can go back to the city. So if there's any negative impacts, how is that going to affect what can actually be done to improve the city ? That's that's it. Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: My name is Dan Freeland. I live in Los Altos area. I've lived underneath landing and taking off airplanes for over 60 years. So given that couple of questions, Jacobs Engineering, I expect, is done other feasibility studies. Is that true? Yes.
Speaker 7: I think the I think I'm assuming Mr. West answer that is yes. Are a bunch of these.
Speaker 3: Okay. Has Jacobs Engineering done any feasibility studies that came up? No, we don't recommend it. You can't do that. It's a bad idea. Okay. Secondly, if. If somehow the office is created and it's kind of like putting a bowl of honey on the kitchen table and you got six kids and only one kid can have the honey . So no, you can't have that. Mama said that's my honey. You can't have any. Who? And six kids. Five other kids are going to say what? They're going to go talk to PA. All right. So now we've got multiple airlines perhaps interested in international flights out of Long Beach. And they're going to sue us. They will sue us if this is a good idea. They will see it as a good idea and they want a piece of it. Give me some of that. So now who's going to fight their lawyers? Is the airport going to pay for that or is the city going to pay or are we going to pay for that? We are going to pay for that. Or the airport. We. Nobody's answering that here. You know, everybody back there is saying it, but. Okay. Yeah. Just wanted to make sure that. Now, I'd like to thank Stacey Mungo for a community meeting she had a couple of weeks ago in Eldorado Park. She pointed something out to me that I thought was rather interesting. She had mentioned a lady, some lady on Redondo, who is complaining about helicopter noise and to the point where the people had scheduled or routed helicopters rerouted the helicopter, so they flew over Stacey Mungo's region. Stacey Mungo called the helicopter people and said, Hey, you want 54,000 phone calls and emails about this noise? You better do something about it. Thank you. Ms.. Mungo. I thought that was a very interesting story. If we are impacted by an airport, who are going to get to complain? We're here now. We will be back. We won't stop complaining. Thank you very much.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Good evening, and I thank you for the opportunity to participate in this event. My name is Elizabeth Eastman. I live in the seventh District, 840 East 37th Street. I've lived there for 20 years, raised my two children with my husband, John Eastman, who will follow me, children who have been to Longfellow, Hughes and Polly. They are currently in college, both of whom are about to finish their education, one getting a degree in astronautical engineering, the other one actually doing a double degree, one in violin performance and also mechanical engineering. I would like nothing more than my children to come back to this neighborhood, to the neighborhoods we've lived in, and have the wonderful life for their children that we were able to impart to them. My question and my real concern is, is like so many, this great concern about the noise ordinance and if were not even confident about raising the question about increasing the fines, why on earth would we ever go down this.
Speaker 4: Path of engaging in.
Speaker 8: A international facility? If you're so fearful about losing the noise ordinance over.
Speaker 4: Increasing the fine. Then why do this? So I implore you.
Speaker 8: To please, please.
Speaker 4: Vote against this.
Speaker 8: And I simply leave you with the question why was there no analysis of costs associated with the loss of the lot of the noise ordinance protection? Our neighborhoods and our city will suffer dramatically. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: John Eastman. I'm her husband and happy to be so there were there were there were two just false statements in the presentation. Councilman Supernova did a terrific job of just blasting the first one that ours is the strictest ordinance in the world. It's a paper tiger. It's only a strict as the enforcement and the fines are so low that we guarantee none and not non-enforcement or noncompliance. The second thing, though, is even more troubling to me. We can't restrict rich routes. The airlines fly. That's just not true. They cannot fly here internationally if we don't have a federal inspection service that allows them to land here internationally and nobody is forcing us to build that thing, we're going to pay for it if we decide to do it. It is entirely our decision whether to put at the airport that we own an international facility that will allow those flights. So we do have the ability to restrict routes, routes they can't. Now, I want to go in my remaining time to a more fundamental flaw with the study, though, and that is the notion that we're going to have an economic benefit from this. That's got to be based on one of two things, either as I suspect that it's going to be filling in demand where there is not demand right now from the 32.5 average slots usage daily slots per month at 79% utilization to 100% utilization. Newsflash if you drop it further down to 50% and utilization are heck all the way down to 15 flights a day back to where it was in the 1990s, we would all be very happy. So we don't need to increase the demand to get to the full utilization of the noise ordinance slots. If the domestic market won't allow for it, we will all be very happy with that. The second thought we might get to that is if there is some differential between economic benefit from the domestic rather than the international flights. This study does not assess that. But I think, as Councilman Sugano, you pointed out rightly, it may be a negative impact rather than a positive one if we're supplanting rather than adding flight. This study is flawed. The overall premise is flawed, and please vote against it now. Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Please. Joe Soto, fifth district mayor, city council members. Staff. Mr. Mayor, we've been here before. A couple of decades ago. You remember that you've had the experience of staying here till midnight when you were a councilman. We fought for airport expansion. This is airport expansion, but we're calling it a different name. We're calling it international flights, domestic versus international. What we need is more domestic competition. And we don't have the competition there. We don't need international flights. I saw real estate for a living when I commit to a 30 year loan. I want. I'm more of a commitment on your part than four or five years on a on an overhead projector. Convention business will not come from south of the border. Convention business comes north of the border. So in the presentation, a statement that was made. International flights must operate within constraints of the noise ordinance. But JetBlue is the largest noise violator in the last 12 months. JetBlue broke our noise ordinance 117 times. That means that JetBlue flew flew over our home, our homes between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. in the morning. Now, that's not counting JetBlue's landing between ten and 11. That's I'm sure I didn't track that. I'm sure that's in the hundreds. But they get a break there. Shouldn't we be telling JetBlue before we grant you an international airport that you need to start breaking the noise ordinance, show us that you can do that. Instead, we're at the precipice of offering or allowing them an international airport. That doesn't make sense. Airport manager mentioned something about an in the feasibility study. Mr. Cuomo. You said something about the first year of our Pepsis. There'd be $13 per passenger. And then the second year through ten years, it would be $6 for PFC. Was that correct in that presentation? And it was something like that. It was a dramatic drop. And I was wondering if if that was based upon, we would become a point of entry, because there's a difference between how we're going to take this international airport or and or point of entry. L.A. Access point of entry. Federal government shares with the expenses, it costs a lot less money for the city. John Wayne has been lobbying for years upon years since they started doing the international flights to become a point of entry. John Blue. Blue is a bigger airport than us. They have more power in my time is up. One question I do want to ask you is can we be an international city with an award winning municipal airport? Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: I'm Joe Miller, fourth district. I've been to of all of the study sessions and tonight it just morphed into something different and different handouts, different everything. The terminal one is what used to be terminal three. Option one used to be terminal three. So, you know, trying to keep everything straight has been a task this evening. There's three there's ten items that I'd like to bring up that my neighborhood is very concerned about. One is that no master plan for the Long Beach Airport basically means that the city's master plan is JetBlue's business plan. The FAA's feasibility report envisions the well used to tonight. It was different. Envision the last international flight at 9:30 p.m. tonight it said 1015. I'm not sure why. It says from Cancun it's 1015. But at all of the feasibility studies, we have asked at every one that we've been allowed to, what are the rates of late international flights at the surrounding airports? And we have never received an answer from that. We've kept on asking, we keep on asking. And no one seems to be able to find out what the late rates of the international flights are from the surrounding airports. Tonight was the first night that we saw a local feasibility impact. All of the other studies that we've been to, we have never seen local impact. People have asked about the local impacts. The Jacobs people said, Our software doesn't do that. Tonight was the first time. It's always been trickle down. Tonight the first time. We don't know where these numbers came from. Tonight was the first time anyone has seen these local impacts. Real quick, I want to bring up the impact of the Trump administration on international travelers coming in the U.S., especially from Mexico. Like everything in the next four, 4 to 8 years, we have no idea what is going to happen. The impact of the Trump administration on bilateral agreements between Mexico and the U.S. is unknown. The only Trump Mexico policies that have been known as the president elect continues to insist that he's going to build a wall and change NAFTA. What the impacts of that on our Mexican flights are going to be, which seems to be what's going to happen. Nobody seems to know. I also want to mention really quick that the terminal options. Please read those carefully because there are some passenger inconveniences it lists inside there. And you know, going from a award winning boutique airport. Does anyone know what an award winning boutique international airport? The answer is there are none. And there is a reason that all the world's top ten international airports are outside the United States. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 13: Mr. Mayor. Thank you. My name is Robert Land. I'm senior vice president of government affairs with JetBlue Airways, 4400 Donald Douglas Drive at the airport. It's good to be back here. Councilman Urunga, thank you for calling the study session. We fully support an open process and participating in that with all the people behind me. I want to remind the council that JetBlue is a 16 year old relatively new entrant in a very legacy dominated industry here in America. We've been a disruptor to this industry with award winning customer service and everyday low fares throughout the country and in international markets, which is about a third of our network, including Havana, which was our 100th city two weeks ago, doing it with new aircraft, 20,000 crew members across the system, including 700 here in the Long Beach area . To something you said earlier about the split between domestic international. Are they coming from here? Visiting JetBlue doesn't operate hubs. We operate focused cities. And what that means simply is we don't connect people. So where most airlines connect. Most legacy airlines connect between 60 and 70% of their customers who want to go from A to B, the airline makes them stop at sea. JetBlue's business model is completely different. It's not better or worse. It's just different. But it has relevance to this conversation. JetBlue's business model is an indie origin destination. So 90% of our customers, nine out of every ten of our 35 million customers every year start in a and go to be and we don't make them stop and see. We have six focus cities where we do that are all densely populated areas. That's the only way that model works are only one five are on the East Coast. The only one on the West Coast is here in Long Beach. That's good for the local economy. People are coming to or leaving from Long Beach, contributing to the economy, not just passing through it. Paying a PFC, as alluded to earlier, they're actually spending money here and spending time here. Our 700 crewmembers who work at JetBlue. They contribute to the community. They partner in parades and meetings and they contribute to the economy. They're your constituents. We began here 16 years ago, almost 16 years ago. Today, we're at 35 flights to 13 different markets coast to coast, including several to New York and Boston. And you saw the new one coming to Lauderdale. We asked for the customs facility a couple of years ago. This would only be for a very small portion, as you heard earlier, of our flights. A very small portion. Two years later, we're very happy that last week the council lifted the ban on city staff speaking with us. We look forward to working with the city staff and giving them all of the information they need to help you make an informed decision. And in closing, we request this council consider the Jacob study's very positive comments on the economic impact to the city jobs. It will bring tourism enhancements. There will be, we believe, in our models, forecasts, convention business and embrace the city's stature as an international city and vote in favor of the facility.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next week. Speaker, please. Next week replace.
Speaker 5: My name is Laura Soma. I'm a resident of Long Beach. My address is on file. I live in District four. I'm here speaking to that request.
Speaker 4: By JetBlue Airways.
Speaker 5: To the city to expand service at Long Beach Municipal Airport and change or airport to an international airport. I have a poster here because unlike the study, we don't get to put our graphics on. And I hope the city the video they can see what my little poster is is my show and tell.
Speaker 4: This is the Long Beach Airport. These are the areas that are affected by JetBlue.
Speaker 5: 1148 last night, plane landed right over us. And these are the.
Speaker 8: Districts drawn that are not affected by.
Speaker 5: The commercial.
Speaker 8: Airlines flying in and out. And you see the way the district lines are drawn. It's kind of.
Speaker 5: Unusual that the airport is in a district that doesn't have commercial flights going over it and it just doesn't seem.
Speaker 4: Fair.
Speaker 5: And it doesn't there's some kind of social element justice. So I really hope that the city at large on the camera can see that it's trying to.
Speaker 4: Turn that around to. Our group can see it too.
Speaker 5: Oh, so we need some just votes. The. The airport turns to 75,000. Just paid for this business study. And I have an MBA from a very prestigious university. And I know that that document is really just a business instrument because that's what businesses do. It's a $5 billion corporation wanting to study. And today in Washington. So that study, I think.
Speaker 4: Has a bias.
Speaker 5: Because it doesn't show negative impact. But. So today in Washington, there's a new wind blowing at the federal level. The $5 billion.
Speaker 4: Corporations are poised.
Speaker 5: To eliminate regulations that hinder their growth. This is true in Congress and at the executive level. Government regulations that used to protect us are now in jeopardy. This is not the time to turn our municipal airport into an international terminal. Taking this action would hand JetBlue the highly profitable flight I get from their business report.
Speaker 4: The highly profitable flights.
Speaker 5: With no real competition. This is exactly what Delta, American and Southwest need to sue Long Beach, the city of Long Beach, and its ordinance that limit its ability to compete. So and Southwest has a history of suing airports in campaigning and winning its its lawsuits. The ordinance is not allowed to impede competition. So handing JetBlue these flights is not a good idea.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Hi. My name's Richard Gutman. I live in the seventh District and Wrigley Heights. Is she smart or not? Most Long Beach residents have neither the time nor the inclination to know a great deal about city council members intelligence. It's not like we can give them an IQ test before we vote. In the case of Stacy Mungo, I think I know that answer. A friend who worked at Lakewood High School when Stacey was a student there says Ms.. Mungo is very bright. Ironically, I find that troubling. I think it's fair to say that Mungo has been the chief proponent on the council of making our airport into an international one. She was a big backer of the $345,000 feasibility study. Mungo surely knows that Long Beach never contracts for a study, does an environmental impact report, or conducts a survey. It doesn't find it can and should do what it already wants to do. No one knows for sure if allowing international flights will eventually lead to the loss of our noise ordinance. But is it wise to take such a chance? We're gambling with large areas of Long Beach additions to the main runway into basically areas with numerous flights 24 hours each day. And for what? Making JetBlue happy, making it slightly more convenient to fly to Mexico or to South America. Even the best possible outcome of allowing international flights provides our city with practically negligible benefits. There is no way that Staci Mango doesn't understand this. It makes you wonder what is her real motivation? Thank you.
Speaker 7: The next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Hi. My name is Terri Foster. He's my last name. I'm a long time resident of Long Beach. Also, the primary reasons I've heard given for converting our unique airport thus far have included increasing revenue for the city of Long Beach, as well as avoiding possible lawsuits by airlines. However, should our airport be converted to yet another international airport, two of its highly significant and imminent impacts would be decreased property values and thus decreased property taxes. Has Long Beach done a study to help determine the potential loss of revenue because of these factors? I have yet to hear any concrete numbers or even any estimates concerning them. Interestingly, they weren't even addressed in the very expensive Jacobs Engineering Engineering Feasibility study, which seems like a no brainer as far as their inclusion in the report. In addition, and as far as possible lawsuits are concerned, it would open the door for thousands of lawsuits against the city by residents and property owners whose homes and investments would undeniably take a huge hit. Aside from the obvious heightened security issues, which would come with an international airport, the traffic congestion would be phenomenal, not only because of the increase in traffic to the airport itself, but also because of the congestion which is already inevitable due to the massive development which is currently in progress at Lakewood and Carson. And in addition to the many other residences and businesses already in the immediate area along with Long Beach City College. As far as the interest of council members and their district residents, only three council people were present at the October 20th airport meeting at the gas company. There are many excellent speakers at the meeting who were obviously extremely educated in various aspects of the Jacobs engineering feasibility study, which was pretty much eaten alive due to much of its outdated, irrelevant and seemingly biased results. It is my sincere hope that each and every council member, as well as the mayor, carefully read the minutes from that meeting to better understand the results of the study. There was an onslaught of charts which could easily be interpreted by many to be simply smoke and mirrors during the presentation . I understand that revenue is obviously important to any city's operations and well-being. I'm also well aware of the fact that we live in a capitalistic society, and I have absolutely no problem with this. It's a good concept provided that decisions are made responsibly. Greed is not good, and it certainly isn't an asset, nor is ignorance. There's a very interesting and informative, informative article in today's Press Telegram regarding two members of the Airport Advisory Commission who have obvious and troubling conflicts of interest in converting Long Beach Airport. It's outrageous that these people somehow made it onto the commission. Per the article, although the Commission does not have authorization to approve this project. The City Council has requested its input on it and not surprising in the least. The Commission is expected to send a letter to the Council recommending approval of the international airport in January. Our Long Beach Airport was ranked number seven in the United States on the Conde Nast Traveler survey and increase from its number ten ranking in 2015. Again, number seven in the entire United States. We, the people at Long Beach, already have a valuable gem in our grasp.
Speaker 7: Thank you, ma'am.
Speaker 9: Don't be fooled by the shell game that is being played before us. Please vote no.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please. Just trying to. I know we have a lot of speakers and is trying to be good about time if possible. So please next speaker.
Speaker 8: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, Councilmembers and City Staff.
Speaker 4: My name is Wendy Nicolai and I live in the seventh district. I have written to.
Speaker 8: Each of you.
Speaker 4: A couple of times since the study came out, and I did attend the airport advisory commission meeting and I spoke at that as well. And during that airport advisory commission, I had asked the council members in the city to really study these numbers in the in the study. And I don't know if anyone's done that, but I have a little bit 700 page study. There's a lot of information there. So I'm just going to tap on a few things within the 2 minutes I have left. One is that it cites that there's 350.
Speaker 8: Jobs that will be created as.
Speaker 4: An economic contribution, and that generates $36 million of output. Here's what I saw. I saw that only five long term jobs were created and those were in operations and management. I saw 150 airport staff jobs that were created, but those don't make sense because we're using the existing slots. So you would think we can just reallocate those resources to those international flights. So I question that number and I also question that a lot of those numbers were generated by short term construction jobs, and that's not a long, long term benefit. Here's what I did see. I thought $23 million of debt being taken on.
Speaker 8: For 20 years. And I saw a plan to pay off that.
Speaker 4: Debt $13 at a time by charging passengers. And I question that $13 per passenger when surrounding airports charge $8 or less and their parking fees are much less or $25, and a lot of people don't park there anymore. So where's the plan to pay off that building? So let's not take on 23 more million dollars of debt and be more in debt to JetBlue. So I can't argue with implied numbers. I'm not an economist, but what I did do is I took their same numbers, a divided what their output was by the number of jobs they created. And that came up with a number. And that number was here's one of them, 253 jobs created, $39 million of output when we built this facility. That's about $154,000 per job in output. So I just took that and said, hey, well, what happens if we just bring a business to Long Beach? 200 people strong. That one business, one business in five years would generate $154 million in revenue without any debt. It would increase the tax revenue to the city, it would increase.
Speaker 8: The real estate value to the.
Speaker 4: City, and it would do that with no risk and no cost. Secondly, we need a master plan. Councilman Alston mentioned this. No one has answered it. We don't have one. There's been dance and song around that. We don't have one. We have something like one. But we don't have one. Without a plan, we can't consider the FAA metroplex in bigger picture. We can't plan responsibly for growth. We don't have transparency to the city and its residents, and we cannot get our dependency off JetBlue in control. So I ask you to please turn the situation around and gain back the public's trust. The JetBlue gentleman mentioned that this has been ongoing for four years. Tonight he mentioned two. I've heard about it for one year and the decision being pushed forward in three months. Please say no. It's a high risk endeavor. Short term gains, long term concern.
Speaker 7: Thank you, ma'am.
Speaker 4: Please vote no. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thanks so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: No. My name is Gina Legault. I'm a long time Long Beach resident. I do work for JetBlue Airways. I am a flight attendant based in Long Beach. I've been flying out of Long Beach for over 13 years. And I can tell you from talking to hundreds and hundreds of customers because they love flying JetBlue and they really want to fly international. I think this is a progressive city with all the improvements we've made. I'm a third generation. My family's here, and I think the international terminal is just one more quality of life and choice people have. As long as whoever flies internationally out of or flies any flights. So Long Beach follows the ordinance, the rules, the slots, those rules we have in place. I think it's a great enhancement to travelers and I do think it should be approved. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Hey, everyone. Hey. No, no, no. We're all going to be respectful to all the speakers. Please. Okay. Thank you. Next speaker. Good evening, Mayor Garcia. Members of the city council staff members. I'm Myron Campbell and I'm a ground operations leader for JetBlue here in the city of Long Beach and in absolute honesty. I always count it a privilege to speak before you. I respect what you do as community leaders and consider it and consider most of you consummate professionals. Because of what I've listened to, read about, and watched you do for your communities and this thriving city.
Speaker 3: That is why I encourage your approval.
Speaker 7: Of Federal Inspection Service by.
Speaker 3: Making it a yes on FISA. Here we are this evening.
Speaker 7: With what started as a letter sent to the airport director with a request for our staff. F. I. S last year in February to a host of community meetings, study sessions, voting, airport advisory and Economic Development Commission sessions.
Speaker 3: It's been a long road.
Speaker 7: A very lengthy process, but all respected and require due diligence for serious consideration. And so far we've seen positive results. Results. Again, this is why I encourage you to vote yes on FISA over the past year. We've dance with them. And tonight, actually, we danced with some noise ordinance concerns that have displayed no impact or change. If an FISA facility is approved, then we've moved on to other.
Speaker 3: Unsubstantiated.
Speaker 7: Claims such as environmental, economic, or maybe even social impact on communities. However, the feasibility study has addressed these issues as having no negative impact on the city. JetBlue has been a passionate and responsible corporate citizen that has woven itself into the fabric of the community, which has contributed to the enhancement of the use and enjoyment that makes Long Beach such a prideful and exciting place.
Speaker 3: You know, in all of the legal, political.
Speaker 7: And social maneuvering that has taken place since February.
Speaker 3: Something important has gotten lost. The truth of the matter.
Speaker 7: Which is Long Beach air.
Speaker 3: Carriers who.
Speaker 7: Were slot restricted were just slot restricted. And we will remain restricted whether an FAA facility is approved or not.
Speaker 3: FISA approval will not negatively impact the airport or.
Speaker 7: Estate of Long Beach council members. There are a lot of us.
Speaker 3: Back here in the background.
Speaker 7: And some people behind me, a lot of us want to tell you what to do. How to do your job. But I believe the reason you're sitting there and we're sitting here is because of who you are and what you've done for your communities. You are the best. I urge you to continue to embrace that higher principle for which you have been called to serve by fulfilling your duty and making the right decision for the city of Long Beach.
Speaker 3: And making it a yes on FISA.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Mayor. Council Members. Staff Thank you so much for allowing us to speak and for going into depth on a very important, life changing, city changing issue. There's more to talk about than I have time to address, but I'm going to talk about two main topics that I don't think have been gone into nearly enough. Is this better for volume? Oh. I'm David Raichlen, aka Alien, and I'm a longtime resident and business owner here in Long Beach in the eighth District. Thank you, Al Austin. It's just super nice, all the people who have provided useful information. Unfortunately, the FISA study does not provide useful information, and there's a good reason for that that has not been mentioned at all. The study is based entirely on other people's research. There is a tiny amount of original research that's done in the feasibility investigation, but most of it is what we call a meta analysis. That's a fancy term, which I know from my years doing scientific research, but basically a meta analysis means that you're using someone else's data to draw conclusions that are different than the conclusions of the original investigators. And metadata studies have a horrible reputation because they're usually wrong. And for kind of the obvious reasons that when you start looking at other people's data for a purpose that was not originally intended for your bias. Conscious and unconscious bias starts to take over. And when I asked the Jacobs people at the press study sessions eight months ago about statistical bias and unconscious bias and how they were going to address that, they said something very interesting. First, let me explain that bias comes from poor judgment. And we try to make judgment, not a factor in creating the data and doing the initial analysis. And you only use judgment after. The data has been properly organized, and Jacobs didn't do that. In fact, they couldn't even define what statistical bias was, what unconscious bias was, what a statistics session was in a report. There are no statistical methods discussed anywhere in the 700 page report, but it's all based on statistics. So that means it's all based on their judgment and not on facts because they didn't discuss their methods. They could have made this stuff up. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Okay. We're going to next speaker. And then we have we have about 30 minutes public comment in line right now in addition to a lot of questions from the council. So I'm going to limit it to 2 minutes at the end here towards this line. So. So as we get to the end of the line and start limiting it to 2 minutes, but keep going because we're going to have continue a lot more public comment. And so we're going to have to take 3 minutes, but the line gets keeps getting longer. The last person that was in line behind you, ma'am, will be limited to 2 minutes after the last lady that was in line before I made the announcement. Okay. So please continue.
Speaker 14: Good evening, Mayor Garcia, councilman and councilwoman and Long Beach resident. My name is Watson MATTHEWS. Judging by what I'm wearing tonight, it's no secret what I do. I come here today, having grown up in Southern California and as a resident of Huntington Beach and as an airline pilot, was well aware of the technicalities and formalities of farce . With all that being said, I'm 100% in favor of the customs facility being built and urged you all to vote accordingly. I've been a pilot for 12 years with the airline for nine of those years. In the course of my career have flown five different types of passenger jet aircraft. I'm well aware of the noise profiles of the aircraft I've flown, especially when operating in and out of Long Beach. Since that is my professional duty and responsibility to minimize the impact when I fly in flight as efficiently as possible. I've reviewed the various concerns presented by Long Beach area residents at this meeting in the two previous ones. And I must say that all my questions and concerns were fully and properly answered, using facts and logic instead of emotion. I live near Huntington Harbor under the final approach. Quarter of the aircraft coming in over water. And aircraft routinely fly over my home at low altitude. I know this fact because I routinely fly over my own house on a weekly basis and know without hit on that. Despite aircraft being as low as they are in my neighborhood, I see them fly overhead. However, I do not hear their noise profile. I understand that implementing FISA is a change, and for the most part, we as humans have issues with change. The current noise ordinance caps the number of commercial flights serving Long Beach. Building FISA doesn't change that. The current noise ordinance sets curfew times. Building FISA doesn't change that. The findings of previous pollution emission studies remain valid because implementing FISA doesn't change that either. I've mentioned a handful of things about what FISA doesn't do. Let's go over a few things that it does do. Construction alone will bring in upwards of $38 million and hundreds of jobs after completion. FISA Second, economic contributions are in the millions annually, with hundreds of businesses being positively affected. For you as the traveler, the ability to fly in and out of Long Beach International gives you the ability to join much cheaper airfares. Based on an airline's historical impact on starting service. If there's one thing that everyone in this room can probably agree on is that L.A.X. is an operational disaster. And I say that with most respect to airport officials in this ceremony. Why would anybody want to spend hours dropping off or picking up a loved one at LAX when they can do so in minutes here in Long Beach? Why would you, as a traveler, want to spend an hour or more going through security in LAX? We can do so in minutes in Long Beach. I'm presenting this to you today, both as a passionate resident, but also as someone that knows and understands the ins and outs of the industry. I'm here because FISA and LG in Long Beach. Absolutely needs to happen. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please. And before we go to the next speaker, I just this is a reminder. I think it's important that every person gets an opportunity to give their opinion. Please. And in a way that's respectful. Please go ahead.
Speaker 5: I was just confused. If you lived in Long Beach or Huntington Beach, it was confusing. My name is Laurie Smith. I'm resident of the third district. I live in Bluff Park. I just wanted to follow up to an early discussion about the comparison between John Wayne Airport and Long Beach Airport. The real difference is that it's who manages the airport. John Wayne Airport is managed by the county and a board of executives and directors and here at Long Beach it is managed by the city. There is no checks and balances at this airport. The city of Long Beach. The city of Long Beach. Your council officials right here are the ones who manage it. And they also have an airport advisory commission that, as of yesterday, is now under investigation by a state commission. John Wayne Airport has a terrific community airport commission. I read their minutes and I will be happy to post that online. And what we need here at Long Beach is a community roundtable where each neighborhood association can have a representative and it's run by an impartial facilitator. So please let your representative know about that. I'm also curious if the JetBlue facility would just be for them, or is this open to like general aviation and private jets? So that was a question I had. So yesterday I just wanted to inform you that I received notice from the California Fair Political Process Commission that they have initiated an investigation into conflict of interest issues with regards to the Airport Advisory Commission. And these are the same issues that I've talked to you about at numerous meetings, and I emailed to you and spoke to you about last week. The conflict of interest issues are under Bush under investigation involve the vice chair and the chair. And it is with regards to business dealings that they have with JetBlue and the city of Long Beach. On tonight's agenda, the vice chair is also an owner of Millionaire. And item 13 on tonight's agenda. The city is looking to lease their office space so that they could house their airport staff there. This is going to be $800,000. And this gentleman has been participating in the airport commission and their draft report was also filed at the government on our city government's website. I just wanted to read you the the letter I received yesterday from the Fair Political Practices Commission regarding the Long Beach Airport Advisory Commission. This letters to notify you, me, the filer, that the enforcement division of the Fair Political Practices Commission has initiated an investigation into the allegations under the jurisdiction of the Fair Political Practices Commission of the sworn complaint that I submitted in the referenced matter, and they thank me for bringing this matter to their attention, signed the Chief of Enforcement Division. It was also seek to Mike Mays, the Long Beach City attorney. I have also filed with the district attorney, L.A. County District Attorney Division, the integrity division, which will be looking into the Brown Act violations and the conflict of interest. Please look online for.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 5: The public forms that.
Speaker 7: We got I got it's 3 minutes a person.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much. So much. I'll give it to the clerk now.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. Anne Cantrell and I live in the fifth District. Like some of you council members, my district, at least my area is not impacted directly by the airport flights, but I am concerned about my city as a whole as I think you should be two years to not only represent your constituents in your district, but the whole city. And I also like Long Beach Airport. I'd love to fly out of Long Beach Airport. But as Mayor Garcia suggested earlier this evening, I'm concerned about the lack of domestic flights, which I fly much more than I do international. I used to be able to fly to Washington, DC nonstop. Can't do that anymore. I can fly to Austin to visit my great grandchild. But there's only one flight a day where there used to be more. I if JetBlue is limited on the number of slots they have. If they're good business people, what would they use those slots for? Domestic to Seattle or international to Guatemala, which makes the most money. And I think that's going to factor into what where they decide to fly. I am also very concerned about the environmental compliance. It appears that your the feasibility study is relying on an air that was done for the airport expansion. And they're saying that there were a lot more square feet left over so that there is room. For putting in this terminal. The reason that there's square footage left over is because the airport expansion was going to be much larger than it is now and fortunately. Long Beach Hush two was able to convince the council to reduce the size of the terminal. I. Would ask you to put an end to this right now and vote no. My name is carelessly and I'm from the fifth District. I'm here mainly because I'm concerned about the airport and the airport expansion. I've looked at the documentation that's out there on the feasibility study, and I have concerns about how that was put together . Also in the document that I saw today, although I really appreciate that there's numbers in it and some assumption of. What could come of this in a positive way. It's a little touching to me that it's all good news. And I say that because I was a manager in aerospace at three different companies at Rockwell, Hughes Electronics and Boeing. And I can tell you that when you do a project study about something you want to bring in. First of all, you need to understand every number, what the assumptions were, where it came from. And you better be able to explain that to the people around you. I would ask my city council to take that kind of attention into looking at this. In my experience, what's normally missing is, is the omissions where you find the bogus part is what they didn't put in the numbers. The second thing that I really see missing here is the most important part of a feasibility study is the risk analysis. I can tell you that you wouldn't last at Boeing a week if you did a project like this without showing some risk and that they spend all their time, once that's been done, creating plans to mitigate that risk if they decide to go forward. So a plan where everything is positive and there's no risk to me is not believable. I mean, I think we wasted $350,000. It lacks credibility. And you should go back and ask them. First of all, we should have given them a model of what we wanted to come out of it. And there should be a section that says Risk. And that's the biggest thing. Moving on from there, in my own personal experience, I grew up around L.A.X. I played on the freeway at the 405 when they were building it. I saw LAX built up. There's four neighborhoods right around L.A.X. Three of the four suffered gravely from airport expansion. The one side that came out smelling like a rose was El Segundo. And that's because the airplanes don't go over El Segundo. They also did not let the the big hotels in. There's only two hotels, one on Sepulveda and one a little further away. So once you bring the hotels in, you're bring in the skin trade and that really devastates a neighborhood. I only had 3 minutes and I'll let it go at that.
Speaker 3: Good evening. I'm Tom Carney. I'm from the Bixby area and I actually set up here when you asked why with important noises important to me, I'm in the flight path. But just as important to me is the airport as a source of air pollution. One which is heavily burdened by air pollution. We have the Port 17 and we have the Alameda Corridor. We've made great strides in the last five years while volume has increased at the ports. The pollution levels have come down. If we implement new clean technologies, different processing techniques, we've reduced it when it comes to jet engines. There is no clean technology and jet engines produce particulate matter that is the most nasty of all. EPA measures a particulate matter by microns, ten microns pad 2.5 microns, very bad jet aircraft. Because more efficient burning. All the fuel produced. Particulate matter down to one micron level. That's important from a health perspective because that very easily gets into the lungs. It'll penetrate the blood air barrier. So he can run regulatory issues with circuitry issues, which is very dangerous for those in the underserved communities homeless. There was other though disadvantaged because they can't afford access to health care. Severe respiratory infection for some of us can become life threatening to them. Every international aircraft that flies out the airport is producing more air pollution, which is regressive to the all the great gains we've made the city all last several years. So to me, this is beyond the noise. Part of this is also a matter of the air pollution, and it's also a matter of environmental justice for the city and its citizens. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Gary Mayor. Council members.
Speaker 14: Staff my name is jeremy harris, senior vice president with the Long Beach Area Chamber of Commerce, the upper chamber, our leadership, our many members and businesses. We strongly support the current process on this very critical issue to date and appreciate the study session tonight. We also appreciate the thoroughness that you've all taken along with airport staff allowing public to comment on this process. Again, going back to almost two years ago when it was first asked for.
Speaker 3: Furthermore, and by way of.
Speaker 14: Background, the Chamber has a long standing history of supporting the airport and protecting the noise ordinance, an issue that has been addressed several times tonight. We also highlight what has also been said by the FAA in 2015 and 2016 and affirms from the federal government that it will not negatively impact the noise ordinance if a custom facility is built. The chamber further supports the customs facility at the Lambert Airport due to multiple economic benefits for Long Beach and the region. And I like to just highlight a few of those that again was included in the study and has been talked about at length here tonight and shared by the airport director. Construction of the facility would create 200 to 250 jobs, could generate a financial one time output of roughly $35 million, sustained employment by the airport, air carriers, government and business of supporting operation of international flights and the Cousins facility would create approximately 350 jobs and about $36 million of annual output. The potential additional economic expenditures resulting from international travelers spending is estimated at $104 million directly to our tourism. And then also business and tourist travel impacts that are estimated to result in increased approximately 1400 jobs and about $186 million in annual output. This is why the Chamber has come forward to take a look at those numbers. The believes that it's a worthwhile reason to move forward and take a look at a coastal facility. These economic benefits are not only are just only part of the entire equation, but only speak to those here tonight. We encouraged by these benefits to our noncommercial aviation business businesses as well, to find the Long Beach Airport a convenient location and a destination to fly in and out of. Long Beach, as you know, has some of the most unrivaled businesses and talent and got Gulfstream, Mercedes, Virgin Galactic, just to name a few up in the airport corridor area. These companies and many others like them require convenient access and travel to conduct business internationally. Because of such companies, Long Beach is seen as a regional economic driver, but one can argue can be seen as an economic driver throughout the state, country and the world due to our international city moniker. Many thanks to our sea port.
Speaker 3: Of course.
Speaker 14: The Long Beach Airport needs to have its full potential realized as well. That allows that will be by allowing a custom facility and initial international flights so we can come true. International City, we look forward to communicating with your individual office over next few weeks outside of the holiday season, of course, in order to better understand the position and the need for a customs facility. Thank you so much for tonight.
Speaker 7: Thank you. But great. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Hi guys. My mind is totally boggled. I had so many things. There's so many different ways you could go on this. Oh, I'm Lynda Scopo. I live in the fifth district, but I've also lived in Muncie, the first. I lived on the third, and I've lived in the fourth and directly under the flight path. So I know what I'm speaking in terms of what it's like to live in the flight path. Now, I was one of those moms that was nursing her kids back in the nineties when we only had 15 flights. And it wasn't because I was nursing my kids that I was up because the one flight it was, my kids woke up because of the flights that went over my house. So you got to consider and that's with due respect, it's not one flight a night. If you look at how many they just said that was one for every single day. Every single day. And it matters. Our homes, our lives, our values matter. How do you guys like living in Southern California? Do you guys all like living down here? How many of you want to end up having to move? Let's say, you know, because we can't afford to live here anymore. We got to move to Texas. We got to move somewhere else. We got to move with it. Let's face it, the weather's terrible. We don't have access to, you know, the delights of L.A., Southern California, San Francisco and our fabulous weather. We pay a premium to live here. And I am really tired of people saying we need to accept the flights. We need to accept the noise. That. Oh, no, it's not going to affect our property values, our quality of life. When it was 15 flights a day, it affected our quality of life. Every single one of my kids videos from their birthday parties, because guess what? So in California, we party outside every single one of their videos there. In travel times, we see everybody do people in my backyard stop and wait for the planes to go overhead. It's real. And and the lady that brought the sound of that flight tonight, it was coming from her phone. I can tell you it's a lot louder than it sounded on her phone. And I know some of you lived under it. I know some of you visit it. And I really appreciate how open you've been to a lot of what we had to say tonight. I actually feel like you're hearing us. We don't have much time. And there were a lot of things I wanted to say. But one thing that struck me tonight was when they were talking about the old study that they did, and I and it was an Cantrell that brought it up. And it really struck me, too. And I think people kind of missed it. Was that the study that they did when we were talking about airport expansion and it was up to at 100, 250,000 square feet that they were originally proposing. That created crowds like this short time ago. And a few of you were around to watch it. It was terrible. It was scary. And we felt like our city was against us. And at that time, a lot of people like Jet Blue as well. And I love flying JetBlue. I flew on a couple of weeks ago. They were fabulous. They're fabulous company, but they're not fabulous. The people live and are affected by their flights. They you know, they respect us. No, they don't. How many flights, you know, violations do we have? They don't respect us.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much. And before we have the next speaker, can we get the clerk to pick up the mic or someone?
Speaker 8: Thank you.
Speaker 3: I mean.
Speaker 7: Next picture, please.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Good evening. My name is Melinda Cotton. I live in the third district in Belmont Shore. And in all the time I've lived here, which is more than 30 years, we've constantly been told, don't touch the noise ordinance, don't fiddle with it, don't change things, because it's it's not the FAA that's going to be our problem . It's going to be the lawsuits from other airlines. And so I do share that with you, that economic benefits sound very minimal. Mayor, your your discussion with the present cator basically it sounds like we're better off if we have local flights, if we have domestic flights that bring people in specifically to come to Long Beach, because most people, when they fly, especially international, are looking at a schedule and they're looking at price. I fly in and out of L.A.X. regularly, Orange County occasionally. I don't spend money at L.A.X. I don't spend money in the cities around there or in Orange County because I'm coming home to Long Beach and people who are going to be flying here from Central or Mexico or whatever are probably coming here specifically to a location, not just to spend money in Long Beach. And there is a great expenditure necessary for the FAA itself. But what I'd like to get to, and you might wonder why in this third district by Del Mar sure I'm here because where I live, south of Second Street, when they change the flights at the airport, that noise comes rumbling over the hills. And I certainly feel sympathy for people who live right under it. And also and thank you, Councilmember Your Anka, for mentioning the FAA. The next gen, the change of flights that they're doing. Well, Orange County Airport has a lawsuit against the FAA because they are changing the flight patterns and they are impacting neighborhoods that were not affected before. And over the last few weeks, I and my neighbors have were outside quite a bit because we enjoy being out. I work finding more flights over us. We can see them, we can hear them. They're pretty high up, but we don't know what's happening next. And I have not heard that law said that Long Beach is studying the flight patterns and how we're going to be infected. And Councilmember, I would hope that you would help us look into that because they are going to impact our area more. And we had a time a couple weeks ago where apparently there was fog. They had to go into a holding pattern with JetBlue for an hour. The planes were circling over our heads. They didn't go out to sea or to circle. They were over our heads. So I thank you for your time. I appreciate your listening and hope you'll really look into the changes that the flight patterns that the FAA is imposing.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. And then I think so. It looks like we have our last speaker. We're going to cut off the speaker's list. We have the lady at the end. Our actually the gentleman the gentleman at the end there in the red shirt or that they'll be our last speaker here. And please.
Speaker 1: Continue. Thank you. My name is Donna Sievers and I live in the third district. Like many residents here, I attended.
Speaker 8: All of the Jacobs study.
Speaker 1: Sessions, the Airport and Economic Advisory Commission meetings. And although I don't live directly under the flight path, I listened to the concerns of the residents who are most significantly impacted by aviation noise.
Speaker 8: And I learned that Jacobs.
Speaker 1: Study did not adequately address the many environmental concerns of the community. The decision regarding the FAA facility will impact our city, not just the three districts under the flight path. And I'm concerned that not only is the international terminal not necessary for our economic future, but that the entire process has been less than transparent and perhaps even tainted by undue influence by JetBlue. And I hope all of you will consider the comments you've heard this evening. Any restoring noise ordinance is a risk that I don't think any city council members should be willing to take. When I learned that JetBlue holds 85% of our allotted slots, that concern me as it should you common sense would suggest that other air carriers would most likely take legal action against our noise ordinance so that they too could benefit from the international flights reflected if there are increased.
Speaker 8: Profits to the.
Speaker 1: Corporations and to the stockholders. Additionally, I think it's vital to consider the comments by Mark.
Speaker 8: Berry, the Deputy Chief.
Speaker 1: Counsel for the Federal Aviation Administration, comments that were recently quoted in a press telegram article to quote Marc Berry reminded the city in a letter in October that a potential new carrier could challenge Long Beach's noise ordinance and with the FAA if it thought it was a barrier to entry, I think that's an important phrase barrier to entry, which would cause the city to make modifications to the ordinance to facilitate market entry or consider other. Of courses of action, unquote. Please do not ignore this significant legal insight from the deputy chief counsel of the FAA. Every decision made by the city council is a challenge, and you have many factors to bear in mind. Please bear in mind that only a few JetBlue employees have spoken in favor of the FAA facility in the meetings that I've attended. Additionally, you may want to consider it was also mentioned the rhetoric between President elect Trump and the Mexican government as another possible negative factor. You may want to consider that the Fresno Yosemite International Airport had to be financially supported by the city when the Mexican air carrier chose not to utilize the facility. You may want to consider that John Wayne, LAX and Ontario airports already support the international needs of our local community. But most importantly, I think you need to consider that we have a mutually beneficial relationship thus.
Speaker 8: Far with our airport.
Speaker 1: And to now risk this by allowing an FAA facility is unwise. And I hope you will vote unanimously to reject the FAA US facility. I've never quoted Nancy Reagan in my life, but I will now please just say no.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Thank you for the opportunity to address you. My comments are short. I'm in opposition to the proposed international terminal, which is being pushed by JetBlue for the Long Beach Airport. Please know that this goes beyond noise and is intrinsic to the quality of life of each and every resident of the city. According to the American Lung Association, State of the Air 2016 Report. The Long Beach metropolitan area continues to have the worst ozone pollution in the nation. The Long Beach metropolitan area has the worst ozone pollution in the nation. The air quality is so bad within a section of Long Beach, it is known as the diesel death zone. It is imperative that you give this matter grave consideration and know the consequences that additional flights in and out of Long Beach will have on the air we breathe. JetBlue may claim a wonderful economic stimulus to the economy, but if you look beyond the imminent smokescreen they will produce. The reality is that an international terminal will bring a deficit to the health of the half million people who live within the city. Not simply by the increased air traffic, but by the supporting vehicular traffic that not even 2 million blue bicycles can offset.
Speaker 4: I respectfully ask.
Speaker 8: That you regard the future of the city and that of its residents.
Speaker 4: Knowing that every action put into motion today will have a direct impact on our lives and the lives of those who will follow.
Speaker 8: Us for years to come. Let us not be known as the worst.
Speaker 4: But as the best.
Speaker 8: By laying the groundwork for a sustainable and exuberant future. Reject the proposed international terminal at the Long Beach Airport. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you, sir. I think you've already had a chance to take two or 3 minutes, and I have to get to the people who haven't spoken.
Speaker 3: That's fine. But I wanted to address.
Speaker 10: Particularly.
Speaker 7: Sir, I have to follow the rules and I have to go with the rest of the speakers.
Speaker 3: Listen, I'm not Jet Blue, and I didn't have ten employees. Sir, that's my thing, sir.
Speaker 7: I can't, sir, I. I have to follow the rules set up for proper public comment on this week. I have to allow everyone that hasn't spoken before you, sir. So please let me continue with. Look at the environmental impacts. Thank you, sir. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Larry, could you clear casually addresses a problem we haven't discussed before and it becoming increasingly problematic, particularly on airline flights that are long. The airlines used to have a policy that if you ended up sitting next to a unruly kid. And they had a vacant space in another seat. They allow you. They give you that seat. That's no longer the case. If it's your own kid, you've got to check that out.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Always witty. Ray Gavel. Eighth District. First of all, I'd like to say happy holidays to everybody. What was not supposed to impact people's holiday celebrations with their families instead has consumed hours of personal time for many of your residents. I'd like to first thank the 300 people that showed up tonight. There were over 4500 fliers that went out into the community and maybe hundreds more that were copied by their individuals at their homes. And there are many, many people that are concerned about this. Unfortunately, many of them had to leave. They came with their children. And this started an hour and a half late.
Speaker 4: So that was quite offensive.
Speaker 8: Just a couple of corrections on or points of order that I'd like to make. Mr. Romo said that in 24, 26 when I sat there and T.B. was the the people that did the study that recommended 102,850 square feet. And after two years of council deliberations and realizing that the terminal size and the number of gates determine the throughput, we were, we determined that 89,995 square feet was the total to be allowed. So there is not a balance of 37,000 square feet that still to reach the maximum of what was approved by the council. And Mr. Mays was talking about the fines and changing the fine structure. And our former city attorney, Mr. Shannon, said when we tried to change the fines are talked about, it said, no, you don't change the fines. You don't do anything to strengthen or weaken the ordinance because it could be considered invalidated and openness up to a challenge. So I would encourage you not to take that into consideration. And then, Mayor, you said that our number one source of revenue was tourism. But I believe unless it's changed drastically in just a few years, property taxes are our number.
Speaker 1: One source of revenue. Now.
Speaker 8: The other point is that we have 33% of the citizens of Long Beach, 150,000 people live in four, seven and eight. You've heard tonight from people that live in three and five that are now impacted by the airport and the activity that's going on there. So there's another 100,000 people, half the city will be impacted by this significantly if this moves through and our noise ordinance is challenged and they win. I did provide you each with a with an email on the economics, and I had two questions that were not accurately answered within the Jacobs report. What are the impacts and how does that economic value of your international flights compare to adding flights to D.C. or Chicago or New York or Salt Lake? And this is what they said. International operations are forecast to be incremental to domestic operations. Therefore, the economic benefit from international flights will also be incremental to the economic benefit from domestic flights. In fact. It's a wash. Thank you. And please, everybody that's out there listening, make sure that you mark your calendars for January 24th, I believe, which is scheduled for the council's final decision. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 3: Good evening, Mr. Mayor, and members of the city council. I'm Bruce Holt, and I live in the eighth District. And just by way of information, I spent eight years on the airport advisory commission during the time where we evaluated whether or not we wanted to go with the new terminal. So I have some experience in understanding the tug and pull that is associated with different points of view. But at the end of the day, to me, it comes down to your your body deciding the relative benefits to the airport and the greater city against the risk that might be incurred by the airport impacted neighborhoods. And in creating the the current direction, I guess it was on July 7th, you asked for three things to take place in terms of studying this activity. Two of them were dealt with by the Jacobs engineering study, but the third one, I think, has been very inadequately dealt with. Let me give you a real brief comment in the minutes of the meeting from the city clerk. Item number three was the FISA motion, which was made by Council Member Austin and passed by your entire body, required a risk assessment of potential threats to the airport noise control ordinance and a plan to mitigate impacted neighborhoods and schools from environmental and health impacts. Should the airport noise control ordinance become invalidated? And I think that is the absolute bottom line issue. Most of us in the neighborhoods face is not that we can't deal with what the current ordinance permits or doesn't permit, but what happens if the ordinance is invalidated? That's the real risk area we have now. That part of the study was given to the city attorney's office to deal with and their response, I think, was pretty inadequate. Their report said that in response, in responded to your direction, that they offered no risk assessment of potential threats other than that, other than the threat is no different with or without an FAA. Yes. Well, that may be a true statement, but it doesn't deal at all with what those threats are. Those threats are not starting with an FAA as they have always been with us in terms of if the ordinance is invalidated. So I think for you to make a truthful and valid assessment of what the benefits and the risks are in this body, you're really going to have to understand what true risks there are to the impacted neighborhoods and how we might mitigate them if, in fact they are visited upon us. Now, I understand this can be considered very touchy information. We do not want to give or, you know, a wide exposure to to what our risks are. They could be exploited. But I do feel that at least your body in counsel with the city attorney should know that. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Bruce. Next speaker, please. Next speaker.
Speaker 3: Though it is for a small guy. My name is Ramon, like rum and coke.
Speaker 12: I am in the fifth district.
Speaker 3: I've had the luxury of.
Speaker 12: Speaking.
Speaker 3: With. A lot of people associated with airport. You know, the director and everything else. So.
Speaker 12: And Stacie and really, Christine is provide me a lot of information from her office.
Speaker 3: And I'm very appreciative of everyone.
Speaker 12: That has helped give me information of trying to get unbiased information out. And I have screwed up a few times and I've been called on it and I appreciate that, but I've done my best to correct it. I've had this just this morning. I spoke with Stacey and she gave me a lot of information.
Speaker 3: And I appreciate that she's done a lot of work to help enlighten me of the process. The Airport Advisory Commission members are appointed to their positions by the City Council. As stated in the municipal court in the Long Beach Municipal Code, 2.27.030. The AC.
Speaker 12: AC duties the Airport Advisory Commission is tasked with consulting.
Speaker 3: And advising the City Council on Airport.
Speaker 12: Development Issues since there is a conflict of interest being investigated by the c f P.C. between the AC, JetBlue and the city of Long Beach, then the city.
Speaker 4: Council.
Speaker 3: I'm asking the city council, then the city council agenda items regarding.
Speaker 12: The such matters should be delayed until the.
Speaker 3: C p.
Speaker 12: CFP complete their investigation.
Speaker 3: The Airport Advisory Commission has filed a draft of their annual report on the Long.
Speaker 12: Beach City.
Speaker 3: Website. It is, which in turn has now jeopardized it. The City Council of a Conflict of Interest. It is reasonable to.
Speaker 12: Assume that if the City Council and the staff proceed further with official.
Speaker 3: Business and dialog regarding the JetBlue before the the c f PPC investigation.
Speaker 12: Is complete, then they too may also.
Speaker 3: Be investigated for a conflict of interest. I also would like to say that that the. The other company. If if JetBlue is given the ability to do to to get the international airport slots, the other companies from the outside might be able to contest the the you know, saying, look, they're not getting.
Speaker 12: To be treated the same as.
Speaker 3: Or equally and they may be. Able to. Contest in. Go further with with you know what I'm saying? With the noise. I think you should.
Speaker 12: Be able to break the noise.
Speaker 3: Ordinance by trying to insist on them getting in.
Speaker 7: Thank you, sir. Time's all up. All right. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 5: Good evening, Mayor Council. My name is Angela Kimball, and I live on the very edge just outside.
Speaker 4: The fifth District.
Speaker 5: And in the county. I want to thank.
Speaker 4: You all for listening to all of us residents tonight. I know a resident. One of the things I wanted to talk about.
Speaker 5: Was NextGen, a neighborhood. One of my neighbors.
Speaker 4: Touched on a bit before me.
Speaker 5: But we're feeling.
Speaker 4: It. I bought my home outside the envelope of where these planes fly for a specific reason, and I sat in my car, drove.
Speaker 5: Around neighborhoods to figure out where to live so I could have parking and quiet.
Speaker 4: And now that NextGen is starting.
Speaker 5: To phase in, we're feeling the first phase and the.
Speaker 4: Metroplex situation.
Speaker 5: We're feeling it. The planes are.
Speaker 8: Allowed.
Speaker 4: There all night long from midnight, three or 4:00 in the morning. They're hovering about now where we never had noise before.
Speaker 8: And we're not against the airport.
Speaker 4: We realize things. There's growth. But you need to think about the residents.
Speaker 8: The residents who have invested in this communities all through Long Beach. And it's not just where I'm at. It's the entire city. It's Huntington Beach. It's SEAL Beach.
Speaker 4: It's all of these need all of these outlying areas that are being impacted. So, you know, you need to think beyond yourself and your own district.
Speaker 8: I beg you.
Speaker 4: Please, please, please, think about the districts that. Are all around. It's very impactful when.
Speaker 5: Neighbors post online now. Hey.
Speaker 4: What's all that noise? You know, what's with the planes? Oh, there. There's a jet fighter down.
Speaker 5: At the airport. That's now they're rerouting aircraft. That's what's going on.
Speaker 4: It's temporary. But this may not be if you go international.
Speaker 5: And JetBlue, they you.
Speaker 4: Know, they're great company. Flown them. They've sent me emails to support their FISA terminal. I've gotten like four or five of them.
Speaker 8: Hey, let the council know you want to fly International.
Speaker 4: Well, no Jet Blue. I don't want to fly.
Speaker 5: International and take me off your mailing list. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Your next speaker.
Speaker 8: Good evening. My name is Glen Dolce from the seventh District. And tonight we're here in city council chambers once again on the airport issue to hear your comments and questions on the FISA study. Many of us have read the study. We've read analysis of the study. We've asked questions and we've attended many meetings. Last week, you, the city council, passed a resolution to support the water protectors at Standing Rock. You heard many speakers. You each made your positive supporting comments and from behind the rail and supported the resolution. Tonight, I hope you'll hear us and receive results to support residents on protecting our valuable noise ordinance by deciding to turn down JetBlue's request to internationalize our municipal airport. Will you support the future of livable neighborhoods in Long Beach, or will you support corporate interests based out of New York City? This is my question. Which path will you choose?
Speaker 7: Thank you. Male speaker, please.
Speaker 8: Good evening. My name is Jean Young and I live in the eighth district. My address is on file. Thank you very much for holding this study session. You hear a public comment on the JetBlue proposed facility and its effect on our lives and in Long Beach. I have many questions. Starting with the release of the Jacobs study. In early October, the city attorney reported that if the noise ordinance was lost due to a successful challenge, navigation easement would be pursued, which means that the city would install sound installation replacement doors and windows in exchange for property owners giving up their legal rights to airspace over their homes. I was surprised and I kind of question that the city was so willing not to defend the ordinance, but to prepare now for going away. I also questioned why the Airport Advisory Commission, an advisory body, not a community roundtable for concerned residents or a representative of the city at large, was forced to act outside of its own charter to be a forum for public comment on the office. I also questioned why the Airport Advisory Commission produced a draft annual report which endorsed the customs station and encouraged its construction. And then at this past December six City Council meeting, a motion was approved to have the city manager move ahead and negotiate a financial agreement for the Customs facility development with JetBlue, as well as to move ahead and request that Governor Brown approve the facility creation. I noticed that that was stricken from today's meeting agenda, but many thought the entire FISA discussion was taken off or we would have had greater numbers here tonight. I also question that JetBlue used its frequent flier loyalty program to urge support for the customs facility. As we've heard, it's one of the worst violators with 610,000 in fines in 12 months. I also question that more than actually that JetBlue took out a paid advertisement saying it was partnering collaboratively with the city to get this facility built. Now, I would just ask you the question. I would ask you to vote no on this, but ask yourself these questions. Could this jeopardize our noise ordinance? I think we've heard that the answer could be yes. Construction of a customs facility could kill our current noise ordinance and flight cap. We have a 50 flight maximum dedicated to our noise ordinance, but they FISA opens the door to any competitor who desires flight slots over the current limit. Do we really need this? We have customs facilities at L.A.X. and John Wayne. And could a one carrier bond become dangerous and costly?
Speaker 7: Thank you, ma'am.
Speaker 8: Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you so much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 4: Good evening. My name is Peter. Good doctora. I am a resident of the eighth District.
Speaker 8: And I want to thank you as well for.
Speaker 4: Listening to us tonight and staying here so late and I'm.
Speaker 8: Sure hungry like the rest of us.
Speaker 4: As I'm looking around, I see that the majority of you are paying attention and are really showing a sincere desire, in my opinion, to understand this and do the right thing. Others of you are multitasking, maybe, I hope. I do want to follow up on the economic benefit question. It's true, some new things surprised us today. Some in the in the presentation that was given by the airport director, it included some information that I was not prepared for I had never seen before. And I would like to get more information. I understand that Long Beach has a need for funds. We know we've cut the police department with the fire department. We have a great need for homeless services for the homeless. We want to build a rebuilt our great aquatic center. We know if you're going to ask us to take the risk and maybe suffer for the better of the greater good, I would like to have some concrete numbers and maybe if Mr. Romero sorry could tell me where in the study or were online, I could find the information that you cited that shows specific Long Beach benefits. We were at Ms.. Mungo's meeting, and she she voiced the same concerns and also had the concern that maybe it wasn't. The Bill for an economic impact study to crystallize out benefits for such a small geographic area. So I I'm very curious how you were able to do that. I appreciate maybe one of you will officially ask that question tonight and for for me. Thanks.
Speaker 7: Thank you. And our final speaker, sir.
Speaker 3: My name is Mark Hawkins. I live in the seventh District and I want to apologize. I was the one with the cat. Call the pizza and that was rude. I'm sorry that I made that that that remark, but I have been here with everybody else for almost five and a half hours, and we're hungry and we're thirsty . And, you know, when I first heard about this study session, I laughed because it seemed like we've been down this road for decades and been down this very same thing. But you know what? I was wrong. This study session. Did nothing but reinforce what I've always thought all along. We talk about the noise bucket and all that, and just about everybody here knows about the noise bucket now. But after this evening, for those of you that are pro expansion of the airport or pro FISA, if you didn't learn this evening that there are some communities, neighborhoods , 33%, I think I heard 33% live under those airplanes. And I have something in common with with with REI, other than the fact she used to be in my district and my councilperson, but we both used to work for United Airlines. We do not we know a thing or two about airlines, how they work. She flew. I was in operations for the gentleman who flies. I don't know what airline he flew for, but says that Los Altos or Bixby Knolls is like is like Huntington Harbor. Give me a break. Give me a break. And you're right. You were I believe there is a lady over here that was confused as to whether he lived in Huntington Beach or Long Beach. This is Long Beach, lived here for 34 years. And we have the same beefs as we had 34 years ago. But I appreciate I appreciate representation that represents not only their district, but all the people, all the people that have lived in this in this city. And we'll take up any more time. Let's eat and let's go drink.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Public comments now closed. So I will go ahead and go back now to the city council's with any additional comments or questions. I'm going to start with Councilman Austin and then we'll go through the list. And why don't we just for I know there was ask can we just start by if someone wants to answer the question about the the the lady that asked a question about the economic data, if we wanted to start with that and then I'll go to Mr. Austin, please.
Speaker 10: I believe the question that was asked is that local data why it wasn't in the study. And I think because originally as planned it was done to the regional level and it was only at the request of the chair of the Economic Development Commission asking if we could take a more granular look at the local level. So that's what occurred. So that's the answer. It was not you know, it's not in the study. It was not. Tonight's the first time that it was presented, but again, it was in response to two requests from the commission.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Councilman Alston.
Speaker 0: Thank you. And I, too, was one. First of all, thank all of the folks who endured the last 5 hours who sat through this. It shows a great passion from the community. And I think the council received how important this issue really is to you all. So thank you all for coming out this evening and sharing your thoughts on this very important issue. I, too, was kind of surprised by the the new information regarding the economic impact. And I will seek to challenge that methodology as much as possible in the weeks to come. Mr. Romo. I have I want to say at least 100 or so questions here. All right. And for for the and I don't I don't want to keep everybody here all night, but I do want to get answers to the questions. And so with would it be possible or I guess I would like to ask deaf if I submit these questions that that we can somehow answer these questions to the public in a in a public forum. Is that is that possible to do?
Speaker 3: We could answer the questions tonight orally, or you could submit that to us and we'll respond to them in writing and present them back to you in the city council.
Speaker 0: I'd like to. Well, I can ask a few of them, but I'd like to submit them in writing to you and ask that they be provided back on to the public. Because I can imagine over the next people want to get back to to haunt to their homes, they want to celebrate their holidays, but they also want to take time to to analyze the questions and answers.
Speaker 3: So you could just submit the questions to us right now, and we'll put them on a website as soon as we can with the answers.
Speaker 0: Duly noted. You know, and with that, that's all I'm going to say for tonight. This was a night for the residents to speak, and I think they spoke loud and clear. Thank you very much.
Speaker 7: To the council for your anger.
Speaker 11: But thank you, Mayor, and I appreciate it. I would love to see those questions as well and the responses, because there are many and there were a lot of questions that were raised here by the public. Again, thank a residents who came out to address their issues, to get their questions answered, and hopefully that some of those questions will be online. Eventually when when staff puts it out. My big takeaway on the conversations and the discussion that was held today was the the human aspects of the discussion here, the the effect that it would have on. People's quality of life. The the health risk assessments that that that need to be taking place. And maybe quick question regarding the the the health risk. Oh, I if I recall correctly, we did a AQ R&D study back. I want to say excuse me, back in the early 2000, maybe about ten, 15 years ago, where the the flight path were were.
Speaker 3: Reviewed.
Speaker 11: And how they went over West Long Beach. And what were the risk assessments for air quality in West Long Beach based on. Um. Exhaust that the planes would would release as they're flying over West Palm Beach and all the schools that were down that area. Am I correct on that? Was it was there a AQ, M.D. study that was done back then at that time?
Speaker 3: I can be wrong. We do called the mate study. So Akmed did a pretty significant air quality modeling. It made two and meets three, I believe maybe even meets four. Whether it specifically called out Airplane. We'd have to check on that. But there's certainly been air quality analysis done in the past by a committee.
Speaker 11: And I think that the discussion tonight, I think, says we need to bring that back. Perhaps we could ask the A.D. to do another updated assessment as to what the impacts this would have for for the airport in terms of international flights and planes that would be flying out further than what we normally have. Quick question on the planes themselves on page 15. Yes. 15. There's a. Modeling here in terms of the planes that are used a c RG 900. The A320 and the A320 one. Is are those planes currently in use at the at the airport? All three of those.
Speaker 10: The C RJ 900 is in use not by JetBlue. It's used by both Delta and American. And this, the A320 with that is the the aircraft of choice for JetBlue. They do fly the A321, but not into Long Beach.
Speaker 11: So at the present time with JetBlue, we're talking about them using the A320 at this time.
Speaker 10: That's correct.
Speaker 11: Okay. Has there been any study done in terms of what that plane does with its flights or neighborhoods and the possible exhaust or pollution that it might create over those neighborhoods?
Speaker 10: Not that I'm aware of.
Speaker 11: How long has it been in use?
Speaker 10: The A320. I believe it's been in use since the early I wasn't here in 2001 when they started service. They may have had the eight 319, which was an earlier version.
Speaker 11: I'm just trying to determine if it was used within that period of time where the match study was done back in 2000.
Speaker 3: We're so.
Speaker 10: Will check. I will tell you that it's it's it's been at least ten years and likely it's been for the duration of their operations because they've been flying the A3 19 and A320 since they launched. I just don't know what they flew at Long Beach when they started.
Speaker 11: Okay. Well, perhaps we need to look into that a little further, but I'm more interested in, again, in terms of what the quality of life issues are, the the human risk assessment that we need to evaluate a little better. And also, when we're looking at an FAA facility, what we need to do in terms of secure and NEPA making sure that those are up to date, I'm not confident that having done those at least within the last year or ten years ago, that we would need to update that only because we have a new facility coming in. And we would I would want to make sure that anything that goes on there in the airport, any additions, go to the airport address. Are there environmental issues? And again, I want to thank everybody who came tonight. Thank you for your comments. I learned a lot. Learned a lot. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Councilmember Cipriano.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. And. I'd also like to say once again, thank you to everyone.
Speaker 7: Okay. So we're going to do public comment after we. Okay, ma'am. Thank you. I got to have someone come out, come over there right now and gets you what you need, and we'll get you in front of the council. Right now, I'm gonna turn over to Councilmember Super now.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you again. I just wanted to acknowledge Rob Land and apologize. You know, the place was so crowded tonight, I did not see him in the audience, and I certainly would have acknowledged him before quoting him tonight. So, Mr. Land, great to see you tonight. We had a question come up regarding the fines, and I had quoted the huge numbers for consent decree numbers. And Mr. Mayes accurately pointed out that at the fines are a little different than that. So, Mr. Mays, if you want to correct me if I'm wrong, the consent decree is in lieu of a criminal prosecution for violating noise ordinance. Is that a fair statement?
Speaker 9: It's not exactly in lieu of it. It's part of a criminal prosecution. It's basically an agreement between the prosecutor and the party that's involved in this case. Airlines out at the airport as to what an appropriate fine would be. So it's part of the criminal justice process.
Speaker 2: Okay. Thank you. And Councilwoman Pierce had asked about those fines. So I just quickly I didn't want to get into the Orange County issue again. So I just quickly looked up San Diego. So Long Beach, your first infraction is a warning. Your second infraction is a warning. The third infraction is $100 and the fourth infraction is 300. Okay. So after four times it's 300 bucks in San Diego, your first infraction is $2,000. Your second is $6,000. Your third is $10,000. So let's just use San Diego for a comparison. We're probably not going to change that. But the question was asked, so I just wanted to put a reference to where we are with our fines. Also. Yeah, I apologize. Although I've been at the other presentations, this was different enough. I think Mr. Miller pointed that out. Rice feverishly taking notes because it was foreign to me. I didn't expect it to be foreign to me. So that's why it's a little jumbled up here tonight. I apologize. And then finally to Mr. Land's comments here at the podium tonight from JetBlue, he mentioned something that is really important, and it wasn't mentioned by anybody else tonight. And that is I sometimes hear people refer to JetBlue as having a Long Beach hub. And what he explained is JetBlue is not a hub operational model. And he said, if you recall his quote, it's an origin and destination model. That's a critical piece in terms of how they operate. That is when they fly into Long Beach. And there's a mechanical problem if you're Southwest at a hub like I think their hub used to be Sky Harbor in Phenix. Maybe it still is, I'm not sure. But you can roll out a spare plane, take its place. That isn't JetBlue's model. That plane has to be fixed before it can take off again. And people always ask me, Well, why were they flying out in the middle of the night? How many people were on that plane? Well, that's not the issue. That plane might have to be in San Francisco or some other destination to take off the next morning. And that's a very important flight. So that was a critical piece that he explained there tonight. And I just wanted to point out exactly what that means. That's what we deal with almost daily. Well, there are whether, as I mentioned before there, whether delays and mechanical delays, I'm sure that makes up well over 90% of the delays. And that's a piece with JetBlue. So, again, I just want to thank everyone for being here. And everyone did a great job tonight. Thank you.
Speaker 7: Thank you. Okay, that looks like it, concludes counsel, comments and questions for the evening. There is a emotion and a second to receive it file that was set before by Councilman Austin and Councilmember Ringa for the study session. So with the motion, please cast your votes to receive and file the study session and the report, please.
Speaker 1: Motion carries.
Speaker 7: Okay. Thank you. We're going to just take a 1 to 2 minute recess and we'll actually start the the council meeting. The rest of the council meeting. Okay. Thank you. You all for coming out. Go back into session. If I can take a roll call, please.
Speaker 1: Councilwoman Lena Gonzalez, Councilmember Janine Peers. Councilwoman Susie Price. Councilmember Dara Spooner. Councilwoman Stacey Mongo. Councilman Dee Andrews. Councilmember Roberto Durango. Percent. Councilman Alston. Vice Mayor Rex Richardson and Mayor Robert Garcia.
Speaker 7: I'm here. Thank you. And we just need obviously everyone else either to sit for the rest of the meeting or to. We can just do the conversations outside. I want to just finish continuing the meeting with public comment, please. | Agenda Item | Recommendation to conduct a study session to receive and file a presentation on a feasibility study for a Federal Inspection Service (FIS) facility at the Long Beach Airport. | LongBeachCC |
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