The Alameda Commission on Persons with Disabilities met on May 13, 2026. The meeting included a public comment from the Public Works Director on a potential infrastructure bond, approval of prior minutes, and a detailed presentation on parking enforcement and ADA accessibility. Commissioners discussed education versus enforcement strategies, planned community engagement events, and requested a report on pesticide use in city parks and golf courses.
May thirteenth, twenty twenty six. Um we will begin with roll call, please. Uh Chair Mullins. Commissioner or Vice Chair Bondsmith is attending uh remotely, although she has not yet joined us. Commissioner Bueller. Present. Commissioner Canaler. Present. Commissioner Lipp. Commissioner Lyons. And Commissioner Schmitz. Thank you. Okay, we'll move next to non-agenda public comment. And we have with us this evening um, Public Works Director, Aaron Smith. Hi, good evening, uh Chair and Commissioners. I'm Aaron Smith, I'm the city's public works director. I definitely know some of you and look forward to meeting others. So I'm here as part of general comment. This came to me a little bit late, so I apologize it's not an agenda item, but I am just gonna take a few minutes of your time. So over the last year, the city's been engaging with the community regarding an infrastructure, infrastructure challenges. And during city council workshops last fall, they identified more than 800 million in urgent need. This includes aging roads, storm drains, public safety facilities, accessibility in existing city facilities. That's me adding that into the talking points because I think it's important, and where I get to, I think it'll make sense. So I'm here tonight to update you on this work and share how we're gathering community input to prioritize these critical projects. A recent example, we had a major power outage while the high street bridge was in the open position, and we had to wait hours for this simple issue to be resolved. To prevent this from happening again, we're exploring backup generators to ensure residents can get on and off the island 24-7. You likely remember the significant flooding this past January during King tides, flooding that occurred even before the rain started. This is just a preview of how sea level rise will impact Alameda in the coming years if we don't take action now. This is my personal note, and as I know you all are familiar with our ADA transition plan, which identifies nearly 8 million in barrier removal needed to improve accessibility at our existing city facilities. Uh, with a little bit more detail on how implementation of that ADA transition plan is going in our city facilities. But I can tell you at this point what we've learned is that the amount the cost estimates in our ADA transition plan as it relates to the facilities upgrades needed, is understated. So all to say it's more than 8 million that we actually need. And then there's other things like our pavement condition index is out of a hundred, it's 66. And while that's slightly better than Oakland's, which is 58, it's far less than our neighbors in Emeryville and Pleasanton. Um I wanted to note that more money for paving means when we pave, we're dealing with multiple accessibility issues, which includes curb ramp up improvement if it's an existing one that doesn't meet code, or new ramps where ramps don't exist. So that project helps us meet the curb ramp deficiencies that were identified in the ADA transition plan. Additional paving also improves striping, slope requirements, and crosswalks and other things that can be targeted for accessibility. It shows up in our property values, vehicle wear and tear, rising insurance rate, and slowing emergency response time. Without a dedicating funding source, the city is forced to use the general fund for urgent repairs, and these repairs become more expensive every year, they're un there they go unaddressed. One option under consideration is a 300 million dollar local bond measure. This would create a protected dedicated funding source specifically for our infrastructure needs. If approved, property owners would pay approximately $49 per year for every $100,000 of an assessed value. There's an example here, although I think this assessed value is fairly low for Alameda, but for a home with an assessed value of 500,000, that equates to roughly 245 dollars per year. This funding could address things like improving accessibility at city facilities, paving additional streets, maintaining stormwater systems to prevent pollution from getting into the bay, and ensuring our first responders can react quickly to fires and medical emergencies. We recently mailed Alameda voters an information guide and survey. And if you haven't yet, and I'll have Lillian send this out to you, there's a dedicated website, which is at Alameda CA.gov forward slash stronger together. That's the branding for the infrastructure bond. And you can also review materials and also a summary of what I'm sharing now. So what we ask and we hope is that you'll help us spread the word, and we want to hear from as many residents as possible during this time as right now, or surveying, getting input, and then in July, our city council uh will consider whether it goes on the ballot, and then the ballot would be this fall. So this isn't a QA, but uh Lillian can share my email, and I'm more than happy to uh follow up with any questions you have.