Good evening, welcome to the Fairview Mac meeting.

I'd like to call the meeting to order.

And our first item is we start off with the Pledge of Allegiance.

Member Higgins, would you lead us on the pledge?

And can we get a roll call, please?

Councilmember Farmer.

Present.

Councilmember Higgins.

Councilmember Philbin here.

Vice Chair Rhodes.

Here.

Chair Anglin.

Here.

We have a quorum.

Thank you.

Next item, approval minutes from February 3rd, 2026.

Any discussion.

Yeah, I just noticed that there was a lot of comments around the um six-cycle housing element that was not included.

Um specifically, there was a lot of things that I said to get on record.

So I'm hoping that we can get those included.

Uh yes.

So at your last meeting, I did mention that your minutes would be changing to action only minutes.

So uh the video serves as that transcript.

So the video has all of your comments, but your minutes going forward will be action only.

We are still waiting for the formal memo from the county administrator's office.

Other comments, questions, or minutes.

Do we have a motion for approval?

Um move to approve.

Second.

Ready for approval of February 3rd.

Councilmember Farmer.

Approved.

Council Member Higgins.

Councilmember Philbin.

Aye.

Vice Chair Rhodes.

Aye.

Chair English.

Aye.

Minutes approved for February 3rd.

Thank you.

Item number one tonight.

East Bay Regional Park.

Oh.

Public comment.

Sorry.

Whoa.

Okay.

Cold bed, sorry.

My bad.

All right.

Let's go to public comment.

Three minutes for anything that's not on tonight's agenda.

Please follow the card if you'd like to speak.

Do we have any public comments?

Rolando Gonzalez.

It's green now.

Okay.

So hi and good evening.

I'm Rolando Gonzalez.

I'm a community affairs representative for East Fade MUD.

And I cover War 7, which is the southern part of the East Bay Mud service area from San Leonardo San Lorenzo all the way to Hayward.

I always attend your Mac meetings virtually, but it's always nice to see you in person.

I'm here tonight regarding letters that residents in the Fairview area may have received or will receive regarding insurance for their water pipelines.

And we want we want to make you aware of those uh letters.

Uh East Bay MUD has arranged with uh the SLWA insurance services.

SLWA stands for Service Line Warranties of America.

Um it's an independent company separate from Isaiah MAD to offer optional exterior water service line coverage for their water service line.

When uh home pipeline breaks uh after the meter, it is the responsibility of the homeowners to make repairs, uh, as that is considered private property, and repairs for a home uh break can cost thousands of dollars.

This insurance is totally optional.

Any arrangements, payments, repairs, or claims will be done directly with the insurance company.

Last July of 2025, the East May Mud board approved a contract with the insurance company to allow them to market an optional service line protection um uh plan to our customers, which includes a licensing fee for the use of our logo.

The arrangements allows for ESPEMA to raise aware awareness about the homeowner's responsibility for the maintenance and repairs of the private water line on their property and provide some an affordable option for customers who uh choose to enroll in the plan.

East Bay Ma receives uh a brand fee over the life of the contract from the company, and all proceeds will go to help support our customer assistance program or CAP program, which provides a financial assistance to our income eligible customers on their water bill and who haven't problems paying the water bill.

This is obviously a huge uh boost to our CAP programs and to our residents that use our services, but have a little bit of problems paying the bill.

Uh, to learn more about the CAP program, you can visit uh ebmud.com forward slash CIP.

Uh no customer information or account data was shared or sold to the insurance company.

Uh the SLWA uh insurance company is responsible for sourcing all customer information through a third party.

And as you may know, uh you can get this information from other sources uh for mailing purposes.

Uh we just want to make you aware uh in case you get questions from residents in the fair view area about these letters.

They are legitimate, the program is optional, and they can choose to either apply for the program uh or just simply ignore the letter.

We just want to make you aware of it.

That's it.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have three minutes.

Jennifer Pabst.

Hi, good afternoon.

It's CHP Officer Popst.

I apologize for not being there in person.

I had training up in West Sacramento today, so I wasn't able to make it back in time to present in person, but I just wanted to check in.

Uh so for February, CHP officer Barcini, he was busy with the Super Bowl and he had a family emergency.

So our special enforcement unit was short staffed.

Uh, we issued 10 traffic citations.

There were four non-injury crashes, but no injury crashes in the community.

And we didn't recover any stolen vehicles.

Uh we've just been focusing on routine patrol.

Our senior volunteers have been going through the area and reporting back any violations that they see.

And typically they don't have much to report back, which to me is a good sign showing that drivers are behaving when patrol vehicles are around.

Our continuous enforcement areas that we are continuing to see issues with our Fairview and Oaks.

People are still running the stop sign at that intersection.

And we still have Fairview Elementary School on our radar during school drop-off and school pickup.

Um, I know that the area isn't really set up very well for uh large amount of traffic.

So during those times, we try to be out there to make sure that everyone's driving correctly.

D Street, as always, um, I know that speed has been an issue in the past.

I feel like the speed bumps have helped slow down drivers and commuters going through the area.

And we're continuing our partnership with Alameda County Sheriff, Stanley Android PD and Hayward PD with the regional side show enforcement task force.

Some upcoming events that we have April 28th and 29th is uh our first maximum enforcement period for the CHP.

Our focus is going to be on speed, so we'll be focused in the Fairview community, but also all parts of our jurisdiction.

So it's kind of your heads up.

Um to when you see a whole bunch of patrol cars out there, we're working really hard.

Um we just had on February 16th, we just had six new officers report to Hayward and uh in April, we're going to get 12 new officers as well.

So we'll have a lot of new officers in our area on field training, but they are eager to get out and serve the community.

Our upcoming education on March 31st, we'll have a start smart at the CHP Hayward office at 6 o'clock p.m.

That's for our younger drivers between the ages of 16 and 21.

If you're interested in having someone attend, please contact our office during business hours to sign up or check it out on Eventbrite.

And as always, I'm taking traffic complaints at 345 Reckless Driving at chp.ca.gov or call our office at 5104891500.

Thank you.

Have a good meeting.

So I I didn't hear you mention, I did not hear you mention 2nd Street as a speed problem, and it is still a speed problem.

I haven't seen any officers up there in quite a while.

So I was just wanting to bring that to your attention.

Thank you.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have three minutes.

Paul Hodges.

Unmute your microphone.

Paul Hodges, we're on public comment.

Okay.

We have no additional speakers for public comment.

And no speaker cards.

No, not for public comments.

Thanks.

All right.

Now moving to item number one.

Oh, after we close public comment.

Thank you.

Uh Dennis Wasby, East Bay Regional Park Director for Ward 3, giving us an update on East Bay Regional Parks tonight.

Good evening, Chair Anglin, members of the commission, uh, staff and and public.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for inviting me.

Uh, my name is Dennis Waspey, uh, Todd had mentioned I represent Ward 3 of East Bay Regional Park District.

I hope everyone knows a little bit about the East Bay Regional Park District.

Uh largest park district in the United States, we say, or in the world or whatever.

We're a big big park district, uh covering two counties.

We uh represent three million people in Alameda and Contracosta County.

Uh we are represented by wards.

Uh I again I represent ward three, which repres in ward three, there are 406,000 constituents.

So it's big, big districts.

Um we do what we can with that.

It's it's a little difficult, but we're very, very big.

So I got on the board a little bit of my history.

I grew up in Castor Valley, uh, went to Castro Valley High School, all the other stuff, uh, went away to school, came back and said I want to raise my kids in Castor Valley, and I got involved in in the community, like you all looks like everybody here has done.

Um I was on the Castor Valley Sanitary District Board for a number of years.

I was on the Hayward Area Recreation and Park District Board for a number of years, and after working 37 years for East Bay Regional Park District and my real job, and for 36 of those years saying I can do a better job than those guys.

Uh, I ran for the board and and uh was elected in 2014.

So I've been on the board for about 12 years, or going into my 12th year.

It's a pleasure.

I was wrong.

I can't run it better than the the old people did.

Uh it's very difficult, but it's a lot of fun.

Umight, um I'd like to I'd like to tell you a little bit more about the park district.

We've got so much stuff, and uh I'm gonna tell you right off the top.

My staff sent me here and said, hey, do the do the vision for the East Bay Regional Park District.

We have what's called the district plan, and and you know, we're 92 years old.

And um if you've worked somewhere for 37 years ago, hey, it's fine.

But no, everybody wants to change it.

We got a lot of new people now, so we got to change every 10 years.

So we have to have a new, we used to call it a master plan, we don't anymore.

We called it a district plan.

So we're embarking on a new district plan.

It's taking two years.

We're gonna ask every single human being in that get all three million of those people to give us your ideas of how you want to run a park district or what you want to see in a park district, or what a park district should look like.

Surely it doesn't look the same as it did in 1934.

1934, it was um, you know, people lived in towns and they went up in the hills for recreation.

So if you went to Tilden Park up until the 60s, you could play tennis at a tennis court in Tilden Park.

You could ride the merry go round, you still can.

There's the steam train, lots of heavy-duty recreation, but tennis courts and pony rides and things like that.

It was you'd go for fun and recreation up there.

Now we've kind of said, well, we've got all that stuff down here.

You can go to Chuck E.

Cheese or or you know, uh parks around here, city parks, like hard does such a great job of doing.

So what we did, we kind of pushed back and said, well, you know, in the 60s and stuff, it's more about preservation.

We're we're I I personally think that I continue to think that we're in a race to beat developers for the only last developed land in in uh Alameda and Contra Costa County.

So what we do is buy land, uh, we preserve it.

There's a number of things that are come into that.

We say we buy land and we have to open it up a park because you folks uh pass bond measures for us.

Uh measure WW is the most recent.

Uh 500 million dollar bond measure to buy land.

It was the most generous thing that you folks have ever done for a park district.

And we're buying up land, we're preserving it.

Uh and and we're preserving it in in the way you folks want to use it.

Now motorcyclists or used to be a motorcycle hill climb on a lecture bow road.

We frown on that now.

It's it's we're more about nature now.

We're more about getting into the parks, enjoying the parks.

All of the stuff that we put in the cities, in my opinion, makes us all crazy as heck.

So to get into a park and just take a nice walk in nature, I think is is for me, it's the best thing about the regional park district.

But anyway, I want to do a little quiz uh because I have some junk to give away.

I mean, some great stuff to give away.

So can anybody tell me how many parks there are in the East Bay Regional Park District?

Go ahead.

73, a winner.

So we have a dog.

We're not doing your dog.

How many does anybody know how many park?

Oh, yeah, the online folks are no, that's okay.

The online folks can guess too, and I'll flip this frisbee right through the screen there, and they can get it, or I'll bring it to your house.

How many acres total are in the East Bay Regional Park District?

Guess, not you.

Bingo, you've got uh, do you have a dog?

Yes.

Okay, and then finally, how many trails do we have in the regional park district?

Trails in the East Bay Regional Park District.

How many trails do we have?

How many miles of trails do we have?

Keep reading up.

Okay, I won't bother you too much if you bribe me, I'll give you these utensils.

Anyway, um, yeah, and then the 1300 1330 miles of trails.

I find it amazing.

I hope all of you hike in the parks, and I hope all you know how so many people love the park district so much.

Dog walkers love to go to the parks, hikers love to go to the park, birders love to go to the parks, kids love to go to the parks.

Uh and mountain bikers are now really a big, big force coming to the park district, and it's amazing.

And every single one of those people say, those darn kids are raising cane in the park, you gotta do this.

And I see them on the trails and they're doing this and this and this.

And I go, okay, thank you.

And then the uh mountain bikers are saying, these old people are in my way.

I can't ride my bike at all.

They're hiking so slow, and the old hikers like me go, my god, those bikers are going 100 miles an hour, they're gonna kill me.

And I always look at them and I go, you know what?

You're within one mile of a trailhead.

And I would bet 90% of the activity that occurs in the regional park district is within within a mile of a trailhead.

And then if you go out one mile, it's 1,300 and well, minus the 30.

Uh, of just beautiful, you can do anything you want.

It's gorgeous, and there's no you won't see a biker, or you might see them, but it'll be an hour and they'll be long on anyway.

That's my editorial.

Um I would much prefer that you raise your hand, and I don't want the format here is if board members if anybody wants to ask me a question, you'd get me off of doing this presentation right here.

So I'll I'll be willing to take that.

No, Ashley says do the presentation.

Okay, the regional park district is embarking on a master plan or uh pardon me uh district plan for the next we call it the next century or whatever we want to call it, but for the next 15 years till we do it again.

And things have changed a whole bunch.

We're you know trying to get more communities to come to the park district, new people are moving into our areas, different demographics.

People like me are getting older and saying, I can still hike in your parks.

Uh so there are people with special needs.

We're being much more mean needy.

Uh there is a need for more uh parks.

There's always the balance, and it's the worst thing I've ever done in my career with the park district is the balance of recreation versus preservation.

Because as you see the map up there with all those 73 parks, and what we try to do when we purchase everything in green is a regional park.

And if you notice we've got most of the ridge uh we've got most of the shoreline, we've got 55 miles of San Francisco Bay shoreline, then we have all of our cities packed in, and then as you're moving to the right uh from left to right, you can see the strip of green all the way from Richmond down to Castor Valley, which is we own most of the hilltops, and then South, Garren, um Sinnol, uh Mission Peak, places like that.

So we've got great lands.

Uh we're trying to fill in the blanks on those maps.

We've they've got the Bay Ridge Trail, which goes along the Bay Ridge, 530 miles.

There's also the San Francisco Bay Trail, which is 500 miles around the San Francisco Bay.

We're doing lots of good work in the park district.

We can't control everybody else around the bay, but we're our bay trail and ridge trail are almost complete.

It's incredible.

Uh, you can get lost in a park uh for days.

Uh if you go from Lake Del Valle and down the Ohlone Wilderness to Synole in Mission Peak, you it's a three-day hike and it's beautiful backcountry, just just gorgeous.

So anyway, um we're trying to, well, as we say, we got 73 parks, 126,000 acres, 55 miles of shoreline.

Gee, man, that's all in the book.

Over 30 million annual visits.

So, but one of the things that people don't understand is we we do, you know, you want to come to the park and have your recreation.

You want to have your picnics, you want to do everything else.

But we have a charge as stewards of the land too.

We have um, I think it's gonna be on one of the slides.

So we want to keep parks welcoming, safe uh and enjoyable for everybody.

We want to provide access to nature, but we also want to preserve nature, and that's where the balance comes.

So, next slide, please.

So, you know, that's that's the deal.

We we recreation preservation.

Um we're dealing with climate resiliency.

That's a great shot.

I don't know if that's Don Castro.

I don't know if you all, because you're in the neighborhood, if you saw that great picture of the flood of 2023 when the boat dock broke loose and somebody was there with a camera and just watched it come right down the spillway and explode.

And we're dealing with those kind of things.

And if you do uh frequent Don Castro, you can see what's happened to that with the siltation, and it's just silted in totally and it's awful, but we'll never ever be able to dredge that.

It's just too expensive.

Uh plus it's Alameda County flood control.

No, um it's it's very difficult.

Um and wildfire protection.

That's the one of the next biggest things.

Next next great threat to the park district is is wildland fire.

And I was a wildland firefighter for 31 years in the regional park district and uh went to lots and lots of fires.

They get bigger and faster and stronger and do more devastation.

And I don't know if it's climate change or drought or whatever experiencing in California.

I think it also has to do with people who are building right up.

There's nothing better than a house right on a park.

I live right on Lake Chabot.

Todd, you live on right on Don Castro.

It's great, except for the fact that there's the potential of wildfire right near neighborhood.

So we're dealing with all that stuff.

Um next slide, please.

So we want to prepare and we want to ask everybody their opinions.

Uh so we're gonna try to provide a strategic roadmap with key priorities.

So, oh, I should explain.

We're doing traveling roadshows.

I don't think this is considered the traveling road show because most of our roadshows, there's gonna be lots of them throughout the summer.

Uh, is we want to get in specific areas like Fairview, but we want a conversation.

We don't mean talking, we want a conversation with you all and say, I want to have more mountain bike trails.

I want you to address fire fire protection in my backyard.

I want to have more day camps uh in the park district.

I want to have whatever you want in the park district.

So it's pretty important to um get out there and be a part of these.

They're trying to do it as convenient as possible.

They're doing some meetings in in public areas, and we're gonna hit every single area in our two county system.

Uh, there's a meeting tomorrow night up in North County.

There's a meeting Thursday night.

I mean, we're gonna hit it hard.

We're gonna do everything we can.

We spent two million dollars to study this master plan, which uh I hope we get some good results, and I hope you all take it seriously and come out.

There will be people from um um Ashland Cherryland district that will say, hey, buy Sky West golf course.

Excellent idea.

Thank you, Mimi.

Uh, everybody, but get out there and have your please get out there and do something because we will listen.

We can't do everything, but you know, there are there are constituency groups that will come to every one of our meetings and say, we need this.

And uh we we listen to the people that talk.

So come on out there and let's let's do that.

Um we want to move toward the vision of an extraordinary and well-managed system of open space parklands.

Um, so we're gonna analyze the existing conditions and future trends.

Uh, you know, what do you what do you folks like?

I mean, you can even say, hey, I love goats, do more goat grazing.

Some people want to do goat grazing, some people find animals to be funky in their backyards.

I don't know.

I enjoy them immensely.

Uh, some people would suggest we do more wild, more live fire burning, which uh is expensive and dangerous.

Uh, but you know, we we we want to know how you want us to manage our lands.

And you know, we have some experts, but we will we're open to things.

Um, you know, we we we use the word diversity, we use the word equity, we use the word inclusion because in the past, I think everybody understands some of those things weren't provided.

I mean, just the fact of where you live.

Um, you know, in Castor Valley and say Fairview, you have access because you're close to regional parks.

Folks that live in the flats, if you can't get to the um shoreline, it's a difficult way to get up into the hills.

Unfortunately, it's not our fault.

I mean, hard does an incredible job of putting parks in your neighborhoods.

But if you want to get out to real wilderness and get up in the hills and experience nature, in my opinion, uh, it's difficult.

It's difficult.

And that's a tough nut for us to crack because we're we're not the bus agency and we're not, we can't bring buses up to you know, Roberts Park to the pool up there, or Tilden Park up in the hills of Berkeley, or or the little farm up in Berkeley.

We want to, but that's just not our charge.

So but somebody may have an answer.

Some and we want to bring that out in these meetings.

Um, next slide, please.

The themes that we're going to go throughout the end goals and strategies of plan, obviously, equity.

We want to get more people into parks, more different kinds of people, different constituencies, uh, you know, everything.

Uh we want to be resilient.

Uh, climate change um is is affecting us.

Uh, I don't know if anybody knows about the tree die-off in in uh Shabot Park.

It was an incredible story.

Uh, Lake Shebo with a campground.

We had a tree die-off, and nobody knew what it was, but there were 1,200 acres of trees that just died.

And you know, in my constituency and in Lake Sherbo, boy, they get on me and they say, You're gonna burn our places down.

And there's one gentleman who's a very prominent gentleman in town, and good guy, but he's saying you're gonna burn the town down.

He puts up pictures and flyers with with Santa Rosa fire burning houses, and he said, You're gonna burn down Cowster Valley.

And so he wants us to do all kinds of stuff, and we go, okay, we're trying to do a little fuel break here, but uh about a mile by the crowflies way from Lake Sherbo, you got a hundred foot tall standing dead eucalyptus trees and 1200 acres of them.

So, what do you do with that?

You you can't so what we've done is we've cut them all down and we've got this incredible technology.

We use what's called a carbonator or carbonizer.

I don't know if you've heard of it.

It's the most amazing thing that I've ever heard of.

It's the most expensive thing I've ever heard of.

But we went up there to the uh to the gun range, the old gun range up there, put a carbonizer up there.

It's a uh if you uh a steel box, a a shipping container with no top on it.

Big 23 feet long, they cut down the trees, strip off all the um the bark and and and limbs, and get what's called stems, and they can be 23 feet long.

And they dump them all into this carbonator, and they have gas jets and they burn it at 1600 degrees.

And I don't know, I'm not a scientist.

I hope I'm saying the right word.

It's the the the what occurs is pyrolysis.

It it's such complete combustion that there's hardly any smoke, and it sequesters 90% of the carbon that would have been going off into the the greenhouse gas areas or in the skies, um, and contains it right in this little piece of charcoal.

You just made it right there, and it doesn't take long.

And so we've been doing that.

And now we've come up with a product called um biochar.

And you can even buy it at home depot.

Somebody else has got into it, but we're we're not giving it away yet.

Uh, but we're using it, applying it.

It's it has some great constituents of uh it's like a mulch.

Uh so we're doing that.

But that's the whole new change.

I mean, that gosh, we got to be resilient.

We never had that stuff happen before.

Our trees had burn, but this got some kind of fungus in the in the dirt.

It wasn't um, it wasn't sudden oak death, it was just something crazy.

Um, we're looking for fiscal sustainability.

You know, we we do have a, I don't know, I God, I'll give you a big prize if you can guess what our budget is.

Anybody want to guess what our budget is at the regional park district?

It's like 375 million, and that's that's without some of the transfers in and transfers out, and some of the funds we have with uh measure WW and things like that.

And we want to collaborate.

We really want to get down with people, which um I'll smile.

I've I've said uh forever we really need to get out to groups like this and and do this more, and then I hope we can do it more.

Uh next slide, please.

So the things we're looking for is access.

We want our parks programs and fillers facilities should be welcoming and accessible to all.

Uh our lands and programs and facilities should provide engaging outdoor recreation and enrichment opportunities for the diverse east Bay community.

Um, in our resource protection areas, we want to gosh, I'm running out of reading here.

Uh parks should provide uh valuable natural and cultural resources and should be part of the healthy and ecosystem that is resilient in the impacts of climate change.

And then our priorities and policies should reflect and respond to the needs of the East Bay community.

We really get the point we're trying to get you guys to participate and be part of us.

And our public lands and facilities should be well maintained and support healthy and inclusive recreation.

That sounds like boy, I got tired of that master plan preservation.

Don't tell my people.

This is the district plan timeline.

We started in 2025.

We're really getting into it in 2026 this summer.

Hopefully, we'll get a plan review and uh uh check it out in winter of 2027, and then we'll approve it, and then we'll make a document and put it on a shelf.

And uh who knows what we'll do with it.

Anyway, I I this was my presentation, but I would love to I know some people had some questions, and I would have much preferred asked some questions about maybe um why is Don Castro uh why doesn't have any fish in it anymore?

Yeah, does anybody have any questions?

I guess I'm done uh with my presentation, but if I got a minute or two, I'll answer any questions you want.

So we really can't do QA with the audience, but um we can start with public comments, see what they have to say, and then we'll go to the member comments or questions after that where we could ask a little bit more follow-up.

Okay.

Do we have any public comment?

Bruce King.

Oh, okay.

Hi, I'm Bruce King with Friends of San Lorenzo Creek.

I'm gonna throw out a barrage of ideas and in and issues that I don't think are getting solved.

It all has gets back to healthy ecosystems and whether we're doing things.

Um you know, San Lorenzo Creek, for example, uh flows through Don Castro Reservoir in and out.

And it is thoroughly silted in, it's in disrepair.

Um and downstream, I know we've got uh breeding well rainbow trout, and we have rainbow trout in Crow Creek also.

Okay, but we've had fishing in the past in Don Castro Reservoir.

Um, and we planted fish.

Uh, they were supposedly sterile fish.

So, but those fish have you know probably gone over the dam and throughout the system, and hopefully they've they've died at this point.

Um, but we don't know anything about the the fish that are in Don Castro Reservoir, for example.

I I've been studying the fish in the stream systems for for 10 years and writing reports and taking pictures, but I don't know anything about the fish in Doncaster or upstream.

And um there seems to be an absence of information on that.

Um we've got uh illegal fishing that's going on down below Doncaster Reservoir.

Um and you know, and I think we've got fishing going on in Don Castro Reservoir.

So I can't tell whether or not the fishermen even know where they're supposed to be fishing.

Um I'm turning out a bunch of issues, okay.

And uh we also had a flood control benefit assessment last June that was supposed to uh modify Doncaster Reservoir, the dam was supposed to put in a fish ladder, um, and the Don Castro Dam was supposed to be a retention to hold back about I don't know, 10 or 20% of the flood waters so that they don't enter the stream system because right now Castor Valley, Hayward, Cherry Land, San Lorenzo are going to get flooded according to the modeling that flood control district has done.

Anyways, they were going to modify Don Castro Reservoir, but that got put down by the voters last June.

And I don't know where all that's going, but I'm what I've really want is for East Bay Regional Park District to use some of your muscle to, you know.

I know flood control owns Don Castro Reservoir, they own Coal Canyon.

Um, but you operate a East Bay Regional Park District operates parks there.

So uh yeah, I think you've got some influence, and uh and I know it's difficult, but we need to get some of these discussions going.

Um, we also have the San Lorenzo Creekway, which hard and public works is managing.

They've got a 28 million dollar grant to build that from the bay all the way to Don Castro.

So we need to make that connector, and we that should be part of the planning here as to how we make how are we going to make that connector so people can go the entire way, especially the people that don't have cars to get up into the parks.

Thanks.

Dale Silva.

Yeah, I'm Dale Silva, living in Fairview.

I've been a constituent of Dennis's Dennis Waspys for as long as he's been in office.

And he doesn't need a plug for me, but I want to plug the job he does representing us.

He does a great job of us representing his constituents in Fairview and Castor Valley and elsewhere.

There's a trail that's been planned for a long time that would be huge, just huge for the Fairview community.

It roughly parallels Llama Lane.

You're familiar with 25 big palatial houses.

Well, they're in, and we don't have a trail.

Said 2024.

It's going to open it in 2024.

And the hell well, anyway.

My point is I'd like to encourage anybody here who happens to be on the East Bay Regional Park Board to do something about that.

To do what he can, because again, that for pedestrians, equestrians, and bicycle people, it's just huge.

Thank you.

Mimi Dean.

Hi everybody.

I'm Mimi Dean, and I'm here representing Save Sky West.

So I love the way that Dennis got a little something in there for us with Safe Sky West.

Thank you, Dennis.

Um I am here to talk about East Bay Regional Park District and how much I love them and how much I appreciate them.

And I know that Dennis is a really wonderful advocate for all the open space and the trails and the shoreline that we are so privileged to have in our communities.

I want to invite all of you to come to one of the talks that I give about Sky West, either at the Makers Space in Hayward on C Street or at the San Lorenzo Library.

Some of you probably don't know that Sky West is 126 acres of open space.

It's a former golf course in Hayward.

It was originally designated as a buffer zone for the houses of San Lorenzo to separate them from the noise, the light pollution, and the air pollution that's caused by the airport, which we know the airport has brought in so many giant jets over the last 20 years.

I was at a stoplight the other day, four minutes, four minutes.

I was at the stoplight, and three giant jets flew over me when I was at the red light.

I was blown out of the water.

That's enough on that.

It's 126 acres of open space.

It's magnificent.

There are ponds that are full of the Western Pond Turtle, California's only native turtle that is on the threatened species list.

It's the number one site in the whole East Bay for the monarch butterfly.

Number one in the East Bay, more than Ardenwood, more than Monarch Bay.

We have two sites there now.

We've got to preserve this open space.

It's number five in the state of California.

Oh, actually, it's number four in the state of California this year.

I love hearing about places for people of different abilities.

We, the Sky West Group, we really view Sky West as a place for people of all abilities.

It's very flat.

It's already got the infrastructure.

It's easily accessible.

It's great for seniors.

It's great for families with kids and strollers.

It's just a wonderful place to just walk, find a bench to sit down on and just be there in nature without all the other craziness that goes on around us all the time, right?

You know what I'm talking about, the drivers.

Oh so anyway, um, in addition to all that, it's all about climate resiliency too, right?

All the trees that are in Sky West, all the plants that we could be planting for flood control.

It's right next to the Oraloma's horizontal levee, which is a flood control device, right?

Um, I just think that Sky West is super important.

And I really hope that you'll let me come to a meeting and talk about it more, or come to one of my talks.

And I'd like us all to say to our representative, SOS Sky West.

Thank you.

We have no other speakers for item one.

Thank you for the comments.

We'll go to our council now.

Start off with member Farmer.

Dennis, if you want to come back up, now we can ask you questions.

Okay, great.

I have no questions.

Member Philbin.

I also have no questions.

I thought you did a great job presenting.

I walked through your presentation booklet here.

Um I value the hey um hard and and Hayward Recreation Department, all the work that you do.

So thank you so much.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thanks for the presentation, Dennis.

Yeah, you know, Bruce's point about fishing and speaking to the back.

Bruce, Bruce's point about speak about fishing in Don Castro.

Um kind of be interesting to see what's going on down there.

Used to be a fair amount of fishing in there.

And uh sorry, Chris, to interrupt you.

Can you hold the mic a little bit closer to you?

Is this better?

So much better.

Okay.

Um it would be nice to uh see something done about that.

Um you know the salty, I'm I'm really puzzled.

Um what what's preventing uh other than cost uh the dredging to to open that up.

Uh you said it cost cost permits everything else.

Um so when uh I was a hundred years ago in 1975, I got a job at uh Cull Canyon, and that's when they dredged Cole Canyon.

It was amazing.

They built roads down into the lake, and they had giant equipment, giant cranes, loading trucks, putting them on putting this wet material on trucks, muddying the heck out of Cull Canyon Road.

There was no Columbia there.

Nobody complained, nobody cared.

Plus, East Bay Mud owned some land up the up the head up the way, so hauling it was hardly anything.

You just hauled all this wet mud up Cull Canyon and ran a uh sweeper every night, I guess, or something like that.

Simple, it cost a million dollars then.

We did uh Don Castro in like 76, and that was some wild plan, new plan of pumping uh pumping the mud off the bottom through a system that would try to vacate as much water as possible and then haul it away.

Now we're faced with everything's um for one thing now.

You couldn't take it on a road.

I mean, people are active now.

You you couldn't get anybody driving a truck through your neighborhood with mud in it.

And and by the way, a couple hundred trucks a week or a couple hundred trucks on a day.

But um uh April can tell you the East Bay Mutt had a plan, and fortunately, April was able to stop that.

They were gonna run 80 trucks through Caster Valley for or 100 trucks for 80 years or some crazy number.

And that's it's a lot of mud, it's a lot of stuff.

And the things that have changed is the cost are more incredible.

You would have to haul it to someplace different.

And by the way, somebody would find, I think they were measuring uh in 1975, they were probably measuring parts per million of something bad, heavy metals or something.

They're measuring in parts per billion and trillion now, so that if you find any of it, it's toxic, you'll have to haul it.

I don't know if you'd have to call it a Kesterson or you know, just it's just totally prohibitive.

And every single constituency is doing the same thing, Lake Temescal, which you know, I don't want to get into the politics of it, but who's got more juice?

The city of Oakland or Fairview or Castro Valley.

Uh they are mounting a campaign and suggesting we uh dredge Temascal.

And good lord, what's in the bottom of Temascal is that's that's a toxic uh uh soup right there.

So uh Temescal, uh Lake Chabot needs dredging.

I don't know if you've seen the back end of Lake Sherbo.

So it's it's we're all lining up.

I don't know who's gonna do it.

Uh I don't know where we'll get the money for it.

Um at some point, you know, people talk about it uh and suggest things like it's gonna take a moonshot, like uh Bill Cork told me we need to get the Corps of Engineers, the Army Corps of Engineers, those are the only people who can do stuff like that.

They built Alameda Creek uh environmentally, everybody's going, oh my god, what are you talking about?

But that's what you need is something giant and a big government program.

Uh so the answer is I don't know, but it is, you know, we study it, we do all kinds of studies and say, yeah, it's gonna cost 10 million dollars to put a dent at it, drop it three feet.

And some of these lakes are 60 feet deep and now they're 15 feet deep after 40 years of silting in.

So the question the answer is I don't know, I don't know the answer.

Okay.

Um but if you bring this up at the meetings, I think it's very important.

I think I think I think the the social capital we get from having a fisheries uh in in that neighborhood, uh, with young kids with not much to do, uh, and the proximity to Kelly Hill where people can walk to a lake and have a fishery.

That's what kids are supposed to do.

So that makes a lot of sense.

Uh yeah, I I missed the days when the kids were walking by on the way with their fishing poles and walking back with a string of fish.

Yep, yep.

And we used to plant all the time and in Castro, all the time.

So uh bring it up at our meetings, and maybe we can get something done.

I hope.

Okay, well, and then uh uh uh Dale uh brought up the Lama Lane Trail.

That's um boy twenty years for that development, and it finally went in, right?

Yeah, oh yeah.

So and and then and there's there's there's a fair amount of friction about access to that trail.

And yes, I I guess there's one of the property owners.

Yes.

Um if you my explanation, if you don't mind, I'm gonna I I spoke to um Sean, the trails manager.

Uh just the other day.

And of course, luminaline's on the plan.

And if if somebody remind me, Dale, you probably know the history better than I did because it was before me 20 years ago.

That was some settlement, somebody was got the opportunity to build a bunch of property up there or a bunch of houses up there.

And of course, you get you have to mitigate that.

You people have regional park does it all the time.

You build an open land, you're gonna give us a trail, or you're gonna give us some open space or some place to play.

And that was part of it, an easement through that land.

And it was an easement with a million dollars to build the easement because it's not easy.

There's big, you know, there's a lot of retaining walls that need to be built.

So I'm told that the person that was doing that died.

Wasn't is that correct?

That the developer died, and then it went into some kind of deal, and then oh boy, the neighbors were fighting over everything, and I'm not sure which neighbor was fighting to have it open or which one's fighting to have it closed.

But we do have the money.

Finally, the developer gave us the money.

We've been planning it.

Um, come on, get in here quick.

I'm told, you know, it's I'm told that Sean Dugan has told me that us we're wrapping up the design in the next few months and hope to begin construction late 2026.

Now that sounds like but I think I I trust Sean.

Uh he claims it'll be open to the public in spring and summer of 2027.

And I think let's hold it to them.

I got it in writing.

There are significant retaining walls to be built, uh and and design work that needs to be done.

And that's he claims that was what part of the big delay.

It wasn't a 20-year delay.

It's you know, there are priorities, and that's why I'm suggesting speak, because you know, we'll get a trail in uh I we just approved a trail in uh Richmond at Point Milati, which if you know where Point Milati is on the coast uh up there by Richmond, it's the most beautiful piece of open space on the San Francisco Bay left.

And of course, they have all the constituency up there, they have all the power in that area, and uh when we purchase that land, how do you purchase that kind of land?

It's expensive as heck and wonderful.

Nancy Skinner, who was uh the head of the Senate Finance Committee two years ago when we got this money, head of the Senate Finance Committee, very powerful Senator, and a former East Bay Regional Park District board member.

We got 36 million dollars to buy that from the state.

So there's juice or power or whatever you want to call it or influence.

Uh and we don't have that, but here, but we do have people, and then if you continue to talk about it and bring it up, things get done.

But I can assure you that in the last five years, boy, we've been concentrating on Point Milati, and today you'd be we we approved another uh construction management uh job on this two and a half miles of trail in Point Mulati.

It cost 15 million dollars.

Do the math.

15 two and a half miles of trail for 15 million dollars.

That's insane.

You could build a BART track for that almost.

Well, no, you couldn't, but uh so it's very difficult.

There's there's it's all politics, but if you're involved and you you you know speak to your representatives.

Uh unfortunately, I well haven't been invited here.

Uh and then I might add in the last five years, park district hasn't really pushed to collaborate, in my opinion.

Um so but we're now we're we're starting.

We're we're starting a new, we're starting to collaborate with people and we're asking people's opinions.

So the more people that come, the more people that um speak of what you need.

I mean, the idea that there's a there's a lake right there.

Maybe we could dredge off 10 feet, and I don't know if catfish will live in 10 feet of water.

Um, you know, the bass population probably wouldn't live in that, and we couldn't put trout in that.

But maybe we could start off with a fishery that's you know too.

I I don't know anything about fish.

Catfish could live anywhere.

That's all I'm thinking.

Uh, but you know, with the it could start.

Uh and then you know, we we have collaborators.

We have the county, it's a state project.

Uh Davis Grunskiak, you know, and that was an interesting program.

Um, we got a lot of free stuff, but we didn't get any money for maintenance.

But anyway, that's Llama Lane, and uh keep sticking us to it.

We'll get it done.

That's uh that that's enough out of me for the time being.

I should thank you, Dennis, for the presentation.

This is really um enlightening, and um very much appreciate the work that you all do in preserving the land here in our community.

Um, it's something that I know a lot of our neighbors really value.

Uh I think my main question is um I am appreciative that there's a um you indicate here that part of the timeline is to get community input and interested in um hearing a bit more specifics about how that can happen.

There is um reference to a community survey, which I imagine is gonna be sent out to people's homes.

It's been sent out for the last year, and we've tried to get everybody to do it.

I think there is some a new new one, new new ability to express your feelings on that.

The also there's a website on there, and what's it called?

District plan uh 2020.

There is a website, it's in that document.

Oh no, and by the way, those the the this district plan and the document are all back there.

You're welcome to take one.

And yeah, it's it's there's what are these things called?

Um QR code.

Thank you.

QR code can you be more specific on what page that the website?

Oh, it's the it's just on the bar here on the bottom.

Yeah.

Just the www.eb parks.org.

District plan.

Okay.

Second page.

Uh-huh.

So, and that will give you all the information.

It will also tell you that tomorrow night there's a meeting that you're welcome to go to, but we we're going to specific areas.

We're we we're not doing this thing where we just hold them up in Berkeley or Oakland where our headquarters are and things like that.

We're trying to get into the community, trying to get here from you.

So there will be one in um Jim Wheeler talked to me today.

He said that we want to do a, I think we're gonna do one in April in a hard facility.

Uh, but there's a whole list of of meetings.

You can go to 40 more meetings at the by the end of the summer if you want to.

And it doesn't have to be in your area, you can just bring up the same thing every time.

You say we need to dredge uh uh, you know, Don Castro, keep saying it every time.

Uh and and and get a following, and and uh, but we're gonna listen and and um you know, we're gonna listen and then we're gonna say, gee, do we have enough money to spend this?

And then it's gonna be the fight of who gets it.

But I think we're gonna have to be geographical geographically equitable.

Um, there's been a lot of push for some certain areas to get, you know, we have these opportunities, you know.

My colleagues told me, Oh, we've got point milade, the best place in the world, and it's up in Richmond.

Oh, we've got to buy this.

We have to buy this.

Sierra Club have to buy it.

You just have to, it's the best place in the world.

Well, then Golden Gates Fields closed, and you know, that's in El Cerrito and or Albany and Berkeley, and then now we're told you have to buy that.

And most of the people like myself that represent Ward 3, and the people that represent Livermore and Fremont, and the people that represent Hercules and Oakley are saying, okay, you Berkeley, Oakland guys who have all the juice.

How many times is it going to be we have to buy this?

And these police, you know, that land's not cheap on the San Francisco Bay.

It's expensive.

You can get an acre, uh, you can get 100 acres of land out in Oakley or out in uh you know Brentwood area for a dime, and you buy uh 600 feet of the Oakland waterfront, which we did, and I think it was three or four million dollars.

So it's it's difficult, but unfortunately, it's all about politics and it's about being there and having a voice and your voice, you are a body, you're you're a political body.

Uh so you combine your your efforts, your constituents can have make a difference.

Thank you for sharing how the constituents can get their voice heard.

Um very much noted, and I'm hoping other people are noting that as well.

And um, on that note, I'll just share um a concern that many neighbors have shared with me, is specifically emergency egress and um wildfire um risk.

Uh, we have a tremendous amount of um aging eucalyptus trees that um are posed a big danger.

Um I thought that was really an interesting concept, the carbonizer that you um were describing.

Um, those are the types of things that I'm certain a lot of our neighbors would be very interested in figuring out how to do eucalyptus abatement in our neighborhoods.

Yes, definitely.

And if it's on district land, um let us know because uh we're we're all working on that, and everybody's getting it.

You know, I don't know if you know we another thing today.

Could listen to this one.

We signed a contract today for five million dollars for five years worth of goat grazing.

So we're committed.

And I don't know where goats graze up in your area in Fairview area.

Um, if they do, I I know that you know, we high fire danger where houses are against park district lands, but we we run those goats, and then it's become a big operation.

And for 10 years, my uh colleague and I on the board have said, why don't we have our own herd of goats?

We've got all the land in the world, we get all the feed in the world.

Let's have our own herd of goats.

And um people have laughed at us for 10 years, and now I think at five million dollars, they're starting to listen to us because those goat grazers know they got a good gig going.

Uh it's it's perfect fire protection and great public relations, by the way.

Thank you.

I got a couple quick questions, then we can get you out of here.

All the silt that you talked about having to move out of Don Castro, where did it all come from?

Was it a sudden surge?

Did it build up over time?

Was there land dumping that came down the creeks, or where did it all come from?

Built up over time, and you know, once again, I'm speaking as a resident.

I just remember Don or I worked at Cull Canyon and I watched that thing silt in, and it was a shame.

You know, when they built those places, and I might add there's another Lake Jewel Lake, which is a gem of Berkeley up in Tilden Park uh by the little farm in the environmental education center.

They build these giant lakes, and then they go upstream a couple hundred yards and they dig a five-acre pond.

All the silt comes down and decants into that in that holding pond, the silt pond they're called, and then it decants clean water into the lake.

Then you get somebody who said, Well, we can't do it this year.

Ah, we're too busy this year to get it.

The silt pond fills up and fills the lake, and it's awful, but um, I think everybody's to blame.

Uh, but that's pretty much what's occurred.

And there are there, you know, there's there's uh when you I don't want to get too deep into it, but when you create a silt pond, you've created a habitat for some endangered species or threatened species, I guarantee you.

So the idea there are rules and regulations.

I think when we try to do Jewel Lake Silt Pond, we can take 50 cubic yards.

Does that sound like a little or a lot?

That sounds like a little, and that's what it is.

It's a little.

They don't let us take much because you're destroying a habitat.

You've created a habitat and now you're destroying it.

And once you destroy it, you're killing the endangered and threatened species in that area.

It's complicated and weird and sounds like a the answer.

But yeah, that's silted for years and years and years and years and's gotten worse and worse and worse and worse, and in storms and floods, it drags tons of dirt down there.

Are you guys tracking visitations each year?

You know how many people come to each park each day, or not even close.

I I love the regional parks.

I swear I love it, and I've been there for 50 years.

I I read these things and say we've got 30 million visitors a year.

Get your calculators and do 365 into 30 million and 73 parks, but some of them are very small.

It's it's a um I I think it's and when it rains, nobody comes for a whole day.

It's it's it's interesting.

30 million is uh I I can't say it with a straight face, but we get a lot of visitors and we get lots more people.

People depend on the park district.

I mean, there are people that come every day.

I walk in Lake Sherbo every day.

I depend upon it.

There are people of various uh abilities, as we've talked about before, uh, that come to the park district, depend upon the park district.

There are people who come do chai chi in the park district.

There are people that you know, bird watch.

It's they're well well used.

We don't have to worry about that.

I just don't know who came up with that number of 30 million because that's a stretch.

I think that's more new somebody gets.

Um then somebody had asked about staffing.

If there are any staffing challenges in the parks overall, or is that it?

Pretty good.

We're always gonna say we have staffing challenges.

We uh, you know, everybody could use more people, but I think we're well staffed.

I think we've got a great staff, we're well staffed.

You know, we have our own police department uh with uh I think it's we've got 57 sworn officers, uh, work three shifts.

Uh we've got a fire department that takes care of our fires in our area and medical emergencies.

Uh we we've got lots and lots of people, lots of great staff.

So um, you know, we could always use more, and when we open up more parks, we do need more staff to like park rangers to manage that.

But we're good.

Any other questions?

Well, thank you very much for presenting, Director Waspey.

Thank you very much for having me.

Thank you.

Okay, moving to item number two.

This one is an action item considering and reviewing the addition of a fireworks and social host ordinance.

We have Detective Sergeant Imperial here tonight to tell us about that.

Good evening.

Uh thanks for having me.

I'm Sergeant Kurt Imperial with the Alameda County Sheriff's Office.

I'm joined tonight by my good lieutenant Sean Corey, who's out in the audience.

Uh tonight we'll be going over the proposed fireworks uh and social hosts ordinance, uh, which is a roadshow uh to consider and review for the addition of uh fireworks ordinance uh to the municipal code uh which would ban all fireworks in the unincorporated uh areas of Alameda County, and we'll also provide us a fine structure.

Uh this action item will also provide a recommendation to the Board of Supervisors.

So why do we want this ordinance?

Uh about three years ago, uh your committee uh voiced your concerns uh about the use of fireworks, and the sheriff's office uh stated that we'd put together a team to conduct research to see uh what could be done to create uh fireworks ordinance.

Uh and that team has been composed of myself uh and uh a couple of members from uh the county council.

Um I I've been meeting with your subcommittee with Todd and Vanessa, uh, and we've been sharing ideas for the past 10 months that I've been in this unit.

Uh so it's it's uh been a big a big part of my daily um duties coming to my office.

Uh so first we'll start off with um I'm I'm gonna kind of uh uh quickly go over these these fireworks stats.

Um I think the last time that we met, I gave you guys stats for like just 4th of July.

Uh what I did is I compiled stats for about a one-month period in uh all of our jurisdictions or our areas that that we patrol.

Um so very quickly, you you could just these are all uh in the handout, but um in San Lorenzo, Hayward, you can move on to the next slide.

Uh out in uh Ashland, Cheryland.

And here in Castor Valley, uh on both the upper and lower ends of Castor Valley.

Uh and then also out in your area in Fairview, and the Five Canyons area, and finally uh out in the Sonola area or Tri-Valley area.

Um, in total for just over one month period, uh the sheriff's office responded or uh, or we we've had uh at least 600 just shy of 645 fireworks calls that were uh reported to us.

So the title of this proposed ordinance uh it will be cited as the fireworks and social host ordinance.

ACSO, uh, we will be the administrators of the provisions of this ordinance.

Uh and any all the hearings or the appeals dealing with this ordinance uh will be heard by the Board of Zoning uh adjustments, ACSO uh or designees as enforcement officers.

We will have the authority and discretion to issue verbal warnings, written citations for civil violations, issue notices and orders, and or place individuals under arrest.

So the admin admissible evidence for a violation of this ordinance will include law enforcement reports, our reports, which would be documenting any persons being observed in possession of any fireworks or discharging any fireworks or fireworks being discharged at a specific property.

Photographic or video evidence taken by our agency or other authorities we've designated as enforcement officers.

And any secondary evidence can include photographic evidence, video evidence, and statements submitted to ACSO or their designees by residents once we've gone out and investigated that call.

So some general violations for fireworks use.

No person shall possess, manufacture, sell, offer to sell, use or discharge any dangerous fireworks or safe insane fireworks in unincorporated Alameda County.

Individuals who are found possessing manufacturing, selling, or offering to sell uh dangerous fireworks or safe insane fireworks shall be subject to verbal warnings.

They could be placed under arrest andor issued a criminal citation pursuant to any applicable laws in the state of California.

So basically, they would be subject to what we already do.

We'd be giving them citations already for the people actually using the fireworks.

So individuals using fireworks, we go to the next slide.

Again, our discretion that we could use, we certain individuals could be given a verbal warning and released, and fireworks could be confiscated.

Individuals can be issued a criminal citation and released, or they can be placed under arrest and taken to jail.

The general violations for a social host, uh, it will be unlawful for any responsible party and or property owner to permit, allow or promote the discharge of any dangerous fireworks or safe and sane fireworks if they know or reasonably know that an individual is discharging fireworks on his or her residential or private property.

So a responsible party who permits such fireworks use makes them strictly liable for any violation of this ordinance.

No responsible party and or property owner shall aid or abet another person's violation of a provision of this chapter.

A responsible party aids and abets another person's violation of this chapter if he or she knows of the other person's unlawful purpose, and the responsible party specifically intends and intends to and does in fact facilitate, promote, or instigates the other person's commission of this violation.

So basically, if uh somebody's lighting off fireworks and then the person lighting off fireworks takes off inside the house or inside the garage, and everybody uh is not willing to come out, and we contact the property owner, and the property owner is not willing to uh get this person out of there, they're they're considered their aiding abetting that person shooting off the fireworks.

A host is not in violation of this chapter.

Uh, if a responsible party or property owner initiates contact with law enforcement to assist in removing any person from their property in order to comply with this chapter, uh, and that request uh for assistance has to be made before any other person contacts law enforcement.

So individuals who are uh social hosts of fireworks activity, uh they are going to be subject to receive a civil uh administrative citation.

And that citation uh is on the next slide.

It's an example of it.

Um we'll go over in detail uh what each section means.

Uh and section A tells you the uh the fine schedule, section B is basically the persons that will be cited.

Section B is basically the persons that will be cited.

Section C will be the specific violations that they will be being cited for.

And D is the person or the officer deputy issuing the citation.

And then the second documentation there is a notification or notice of violation letter that will be sent out with that citation, with basically a notice stating when and what time the citation or what time the violation was observed, and it gives an administrative breakdown on what people could do to appeal the citation.

So the citation process itself.

Efforts may be made to identify the responsible party and/or the property owner.

If the responsible party is identified, the enforcement officer needs to determine if the responsible party is a property owner or a renter.

If the responsible party is a renter, efforts should be made to try to identify the property owner.

In situations where the responsible party is a renter and the property owner and they have been identified, an administrative citation shall be issued, naming both the responsible party and the property owner.

So back on the citation, there's person one, person two in section B.

So if it's a renter, that renter would go in section one of section B, and the property owner would go in subsection two of section B.

And the reason why we're putting the property owner as that second person is because it gives them notice that somebody on their property was cited in violation of this.

So if an enforcement officer is unable to identify the responsible party or is enforcing this ordinance through what we call report and observe techniques, the administration the administrative citation shall be issued to the legal property owner and or legal occupants.

People are shooting off fireworks.

So then they just don't come out.

At that point, we will utilize the assessor's office records.

We'll figure out who the property owner is, and they will be person number one in subsection B.

And to cover if they are renting, we will include and/or legal occupants.

That was it that was issued.

The civil penalties, the first violation of this ordinance is going to be $750.

A second violation will be $1,500.

A third or subsequent violation will be $2,500.

There will be no grace period for repeated violations by the same responsible parties and or property owners.

So any subsequent violation, regardless of the amount of time between violations, will assess the fine to the next level fee, but not exceeding $2,500.

If payment is not, if I'm sorry, if payment is not received by the date uh listed on the citation, a second notification letter will be sent to the legal property owner advising them they will be accountable for paying the unpaid fines and will have the right to appeal within 10 calendar days of the date listed on the second notification letter or the unpaid fine will be sent to Alameda County Central Collections uh agency.

All funds collected under this ordinance uh shall be retained by the county of Alameda in a separate account and used exclusively to fund the enforcement and public education of this ordinance.

The appeals process.

Um the responsible property uh I'm sorry, the responsible uh party, the property owner and or legal occupant, uh if they wish to appeal uh the administrative citation, they have to fill out uh this form.

It's pretty self-explanatory uh within 10 calendar days from the date the administrative citation was issued.

Um then it goes, I will forward it once it comes to us, we will forward it to the BZA.

The BZA will then uh conduct an administrative hearing uh within 45 calendar days from the date the appeal was filed uh to ascertain if a violation has occurred.

We gonna skip to the next slide, please.

At the administrative hearing, uh the BZA will hear and consider all relevant uh evidence, object to objections uh or protests, and shall receive testimony under oath uh relative to such uh alleged violations, uh and the BZA's decision of any appeal may be sustained or determined to be unfounded.

The responsible party uh or property owner may appeal the BZA's findings uh to the county of Alameda by filing an appeal with the clerk of the board of supervisors within 10 calendar days of the BZA's decision.

At that point, uh the board of supervisors shall set a date to hear the appeal, in which the date shall be not less than uh seven calendar days, uh nor more than 45 calendar days uh from the date the appeal was filed.

And uh upon conclusion of that hearing, uh the board of supervisors shall determine whether the responsible party uh or property owner were in violation of this chapter.

And any person uh who wants to appeal the board of supervisors decision, they can uh by uh filing a petition for review with the Alameda County Superior Court.

So our tentative timeline for this ordinance.

Uh we've already had the other MAC meetings in February.

Uh there's been a little change to this slide.

Uh I believe the Castor Valley uh MAC general meeting has been moved to March 16th here in this location.

Uh so we have yet to present this uh roadshow to them, and then on March 25th, uh this will be run by the Board of Supervisors Unincorporated Services Committee, and between April and May, uh we're hoping the ordinance is considered by the full board.

Uh and we are certainly hoping by uh June that the fireworks and social host ordinance is in place pending the Board of Supervisors approval.

Uh so what we're seeking is uh the MAC's comment and input on the proposed draft.

Uh this is an action item which would enable the MAC to vote to recommend uh the Board of Supervisors adopt this proposed draft ordinance or vote to uh recommend the Board of Supervisors adopt uh the proposed draft ordinance uh with amendments uh or vote to recommend the board of supervisors not to adopt uh this proposed draft ordinance.

Um so again, the the next steps include these presentations to the finally the the last Mac and the services committee and finally to the Board of Supervisors.

Um that concludes my presentation on this.

We'll leave it open for public comment.

Thank you for the presentation.

We really appreciate all the work you've put into this.

Captain McMillan, Detective Feagley, Ms.

Rhodes.

Um, a lot of people have been looking for this for a long time.

So appreciate the thorough work here.

Before we go to public comments, do we have any questions for him that we want to hear before we come back to us?

Where do we got it?

No questions from me.

Yeah, how will the public education of this ordinance be performed with a month before 4th of July?

So we're we plan on uh putting out some a lot of public service announcements.

Um letting the community know through other meetings that this will be coming to life hopefully soon.

Uh and that way property owners are aware uh of what to expect, so they're not kind of blindsided by this uh if and when it takes effect.

Thank you.

I'd also like to make a comment about um uh rental agencies like Airbnb.

They should if they can be notified so that renters, property renters or property owners can get the con get this information into a contract before 4th of July with their renters.

Okay, thank you.

Kate.

Do you have any public comment?

Dale Silva.

Hello again.

Excuse me, I'm Dale Silva in Fairview, of course.

Um, I was one of the early encouragers of this effort.

There were many earlier encouragers.

And I certainly uh urge you to approve the proposal before you.

But there's some people I really like to take this opportunity to thank first and foremost is Sergeant Imperial, who is the man.

This this was I got it that I felt like was floundering and had for a long time until he appeared on the scene.

Excuse me, and and um communicated with all the right people and got it leg, gave it legs.

So thank you.

I want to acknowledge Chris Miley, Supervisor Miley's son, who uh took a who works for Sheriff Sanchez, who took a personal interest in this.

Service Sanch Sanchez in this very room, maybe well, I don't know how long, three years ago said, yes, let's do it.

We're gonna do it.

Um, thank um Todd Anglin and Vanessa Rose, the the uh Mac committee.

I mean, you look at the record here.

We've uh the MAC formed a committee and pointed those to those two, and less than a year later we've got an ordinance.

So uh and of course, um people in Fairview, Fran Krug, Brenda Clark, and Bobby Clark, who um uh kept the fire burning for a long, long while when uh it was just flickering, kept fueling and pushing and pressing, and they deserve huge credit for this.

There are two aspects of this.

One of them gets a lot of attention.

The main one, of course, is the is the property owner responsibility, the social host aspect of it.

Uh the theory being, of course, it's a lot easier to identify a property than it is to identify a perpetrator, which is pretty sound.

The other one is on the sixth page.

I really want to emphasize this.

The sixth page of the of the draft, I'll read it identified as number three.

Um addressing evidence um that's taken seriously of fireworks uh um fireworks happening in uh on a property.

Secondary evidence can also include photographic evidence, video evidence, excuse me, and statements submitted to the Alameda County Sheriff's Office or their designees by residents, by residents is the key.

We saw the uh presentation, the several maps um that Sergeant Imperial presented of calls for service.

You know, it's just like a constellation, all those dots.

These guys can't be everywhere.

This provides a mechanism for uh a neighbor who wants to who observes uh fireworks activity on a property to file a report and assures that the community that that report will be followed up on.

And of course, that doesn't mean as was pointed out, that doesn't mean the sheriff's department or code enforcement is going to run out and write a ticket.

It means that a uh an investigation will start, and even if it's just a letter um saying that uh, you know, you we we have a report that you were in violation.

Here's a copy of the ordinance, and if it was dropped at that, that would be huge.

So um I appreciate the opportunity to to speak on this and encourage you to approve it.

Thank you.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have three minutes, Vanya.

Hi, yes.

My name is Vanya Taylor, and I live in the Fairview area.

Thank you so much for um presenting the fireworks um ordinance that we're looking to put in.

And I'm very um glad that this has been brought up and hopefully it does pass.

I do have a couple of questions.

First of all, I think you kind of covered this, but um, about the notice for all residents to know ahead of time that this ordinance is happening.

I also wanted to ask about a website to uh submit the information, and can it be anonymous?

Because while we may be reporting neighbors or neighbors' friends that are visiting, we still have to live amongst these people.

So is there a way that we can submit stuff anonymously as to what address it is or the person that we know we're doing it, and or the videos and pictures, and um it would not ever be made public that maybe the next door neighbor or someone down the street or something like that reported, because a lot of times people do know who's continuously doing these types of things.

And then lastly, my next question is there are a lot of times where people come into other neighborhoods in which they don't live in and do fireworks.

So would this also could you also find people who drive up into the Fairview area or in the um the unincorporated areas if we got license plates of the people doing it and things from that standpoint, and would they still be fined if they were doing the fireworks?

Thank you.

On the line, Brenda.

Hi, I want to thank everybody for your diligence.

Uh, the sheriff's department, especially, um the board, the subcommittee for getting this done.

Um we all know that I've done a lot of deep diving into this for many years, and the very first time this came before before the uh pre-MAC before the uh unincorporated services committee was brought to them by the Sheriff's Department um back in 2016.

What are we gonna do about the fireworks?

We need some sort of tool in our toolbox.

So from 2016, what is this nine years?

Um, almost, yeah, 10 years.

Hey, um, we've taken up the torch, and we've we uh I I did want to mention for those of you who don't know that fireworks have been illegal in Fairview, safe and sane as well.

Um, you've seen the signs, those of you who've lived here for 40 years, like I have, they've always been illegal.

There just wasn't a way to um enforce it.

Uh to make sense now.

We're for three years now.

We've been surrounded by every jurisdiction around us has that ordinance.

And yes, they have a website, and yes, it's anonymous, and it's been brilliant.

The city of Hayward did it right away.

Um Santa Clara County, San Jose, every unincorporated area around us has had this ordinance now for three years, including unincorporated uh, or is it the city of Livermore?

City of Livermore.

So uh we're really excited.

Um, for those who are concerned about the property owner being responsible, property owners are always responsible for their tenants' um behavior.

And um, I think getting the word out is very important.

And the lady that just spoke, who spoke about people coming from other areas to set off fireworks, fireworks in Hayward is because in Fairview, it's because they know it's there's no penalty for that up here.

Fireworks in Hayward is because in Fairview, it's because they know it's there's no penalty for that up here.

Come from Hayward to set them off up here.

We had an issue a couple of years ago on Fairview throwing uh uh fireworks out of a car because they know it's illegal, but they're gonna do it anyway because there's no um recourse.

So thank you so much.

Uh thank all of you and uh I appreciate it.

Let's do this.

For public comment.

Great on the oh, I'm sorry, one more.

One more Francis, you're on the line.

Hi, this is Fran Krug.

Last month I attended the Sheriff's Advisory Committee meeting to express my thanks to Sheriff Sanchez and her department for taking on the challenge of developing a stronger fireworks ordinance.

Tonight I want to specifically thank Sergeant Imperial for his work in driving this ordinance over the finish line.

Hopefully, the hard work of so many will result in fewer violations and a safer environment for everyone in the unincorporated areas of Alameda County.

But until the Board of Supervisors approves this, the fires in our hearts are still going to be burning here.

Thank you.

Okay, we'll close public comment.

And we'll go to um start with Member Philbin for questions.

No questions.

None?

Okay.

Member Higgins.

No questions.

Just really?

Can we can we vote?

Can we vote on it?

I'm anxious to get this across the field.

Member Farmer, any questions?

No questions.

The roads.

I'm gonna disappoint Chris.

Sorry.

Um, I just add to the congratulations again, Sergeant Imperial.

Thank you so much for your hard work.

Obviously, this is something that's very important to us.

Um the Nate, the main question that I have is um in some of our conversations you did a really great job of explaining um the rollout kind of leading up to the Fourth of July in terms of how you plan to uh provide the kind of enforcement that we're um hoping to see.

And I just thought it would be helpful for the community uh to be able to hear some of your plans around that and make them feel um like uh it's not just this ordinance, but there's also some muscle behind how it's gonna play out leading up to the 4th of July.

Sure.

So in addition to putting out those public service announcements of this or of this ordinance if it if it is approved, uh, you know, it we will be putting out hopefully in you know, hopefully TV commercials, uh putting it out to the media.

Uh and at the same time, my unit um we we also enforce um the fireworks um use and sales uh prior leading up to 4th of July, and usually I think during our last meeting that I had with you guys back back in July or June, I think it was uh it was June or July.

Uh we we put out uh the information of those individuals that that we've arrested uh that we've done investigations on, just to kind of put it out there that you know if if if you are uh wanting to test the waters, uh if you will, um you will be subject to being uh arrested, your house uh being searched with search warrants and a bunch of uh detectives there and uh it's it's a very uncomfortable uh situation for you and your neighbors.

Um so in addition to that, uh that you know, we'll we'll also be putting those public service announcements out as well.

And specifically for in terms of just um kind of boots on the ground for leading up, can you speak to that, please?

Yes, I'm sorry.

Um, so we we will have um training for the deputies, the patrol, and mostly the our patrol deputies are gonna be our primary tools for for this ordinance because they are the ones that are responding to the calls for service as they are put out uh to our dispatchers, and then our dispatchers will put them out to our patrol units.

So our patrol units uh will be trained on um how to write these citations um and what to look for uh if it's you know if it's too dangerous for them to go out because you know, if they're in an area, because it does happen where you're in an area and and you're surrounded by fireworks, you who knows uh how hostile that crowd might be.

This this is a tool where they again they could just use observe and report where they don't have to make contact with anyone.

Uh they just have to be there enough to observe uh video record with their body warrant cameras.

We have the ability to do that with our county issued cell phones as well to document uh who and where is coming out of uh a specific property, and that enough that is enough right there to uh figure out which property is involved, uh, get on the county assessor's website and identify that property owner, and at the very least, that property owner uh would receive the citation.

And then uh if it turns out that it isn't them and it's their renter, then they have the whole administrative process that we went through to uh plead their case, and that citation would uh eventually go to the rightful renter if that is the case.

Uh and I did get to see Sinnel's presentation by McMillan and um appreciated um that presentation.

I didn't get um to see Eden's, I didn't see the video posted as of today.

Um, how could you just tell us a little bit about the response there?

So, unfortunately, I was not uh present as well, but I believe Lieutenant Corey was was there.

Uh so he might be able to answer your question.

Good evening.

Yeah, I mean, it's a it's a short answer.

Uh, everyone is seems to be very much in support of this.

Um, and we've had a lot of positive feedback.

I think if there's anything that people uh need maybe more clarification on or just had questions on was like the property owner aspect of the citation, but I feel like most of that's been cleared up.

So uh across the board it seems to be very positive feedback.

Thank you for that.

Thank you for answering all the questions.

And I uh I think it goes without saying that I'm a huge proponent of us as a board pushing this forward.

I think we're in a great position to move this to the board in a timely fashion in which we would um be able to put this into effect before July 4th.

Uh and I do think that it would have a great impact.

So I'm in huge support of that.

Thank you.

I just have a few comments, and then it sounds like we're close to a vote.

Um, first off, I think I might have missed thanking Chris Miley.

I got a lot of cold medicine going on, so it's still appointed on that, but he was huge every two weeks for five since August, I think.

You guys have had regular meetings on this.

That was huge.

Um we definitely cannot over-communicate or over signage when this gets approved, assuming it gets approved.

You know, signage as you enter areas, you guys have a great social site, but use the chamber of commerce.

Um, obviously your Macs, anything we can do to get the message out.

I know Aureloma sent out a mailer in sponsorship with somebody else not too long ago.

So it was cheap bailing, just to add an insert into their billings, and just anything we can do to really get that messaging out on such a short time frame, because if this passes mid-June, that's two weeks till 4th of July, is there?

Um, I know there's been a lot of discussion on primary versus actionable evidence.

And to uh the caller's point, you know, ease to report by the public would be outstanding.

If there's a website where we could upload a video, um easy type of access, you know, you guys will work out all the logistics, but anything we can do to make it easy for people to upload things, whether anonymously or not, I think could go a long way.

You know, obviously the question there becomes when is it actionable for you?

But if you keep getting multiple complaints on the same process and there's tracking in place, I think that could help.

Um I would love to see a warning sent out to an address if there's no action taken.

If you show up and you don't see any signs of fireworks, nobody's around, just mailing them a warning or somehow getting them a warning saying, hey, here's the new ordinance.

Here's how much it cost you.

If you get caught, you you guys were reported, you know, make sure you're not on this list.

I think that would go a long way if it's possible.

I know you guys are busy and you have a regular job and we're adding all this stuff on too, but I think this could really help get people's attention.

I remember Hayward's numbers the first year that went in place.

I think it was like 95 actionable citations, um, something high like that.

Year two and three combined, it was like 50% of the one year the first year, because people got the message and it did a lot of impact on what it was supposed to do.

I'd love to see the continued use or looking into Chopper usage and drone usage.

We talked about the videos that have the Google type map overlay with the street address.

The evidence is clear as day, and the drones and equipment's gotten a lot safer now where fireworks probably aren't as big of a threat, but great arsenal for you guys and keeps your job easier.

And really appreciate the focus here on getting this done before the 4th of July, looking at mid-June.

So those are my comments.

I think I kind of heard people might be ready to vote.

So anybody have a motion.

I move to uh vote of in favor of this.

So to recommend approval to the board of supervisors.

Okay.

Any discussion.

Any discussion?

Okay, roll call vote, please.

Council member Farmer.

Yes.

Council member Higgins.

Yes.

Councilmember Philbin.

Aye.

Vice Chair Rhodes.

Aye.

Chair Englin.

Aye.

Motion passed.

Thank you very much.

Great.

Thank you.

And then and could I add just a couple questions?

Of course.

Uh so I I really appreciate you you guys bringing this to our attention three years ago.

Uh sorry that uh it's taken this long, but uh you could congratulate yourselves for uh bringing this uh out and and bringing it to life.

So uh you guys did a great job in uh letting us know what what needs to be done because you guys care care a lot about your community as do we because uh we we want everyone out there to be safe.

Um as far as I I believe the first callers can if you don't mind, I'll just answer a couple of uh the first callers' questions just so I could address those.

Um I think we we've already kind of covered uh how the notices will be put out.

Um as far as um reporting a crime uh anonymously uh or the fireworks activity anonymously.

Um the best and easiest way to do that is just by calling uh our our dispatch and letting them know that there's fireworks activity right here, right now.

And for any crime, the dispatchers are gonna ask um if if they want to be contact if the caller wants to be contacted, uh if they want to provide their name or if they want to remain anonymous.

Uh the other option is there there isn't a an anonymous uh uh email tip area, but we don't get those until like hours, days later.

So the the best and most efficient way is through our dispatch center.

Um and as far as uh people that come into the area uh that don't live in in your neighborhoods that are that are coming in and lighting off fireworks.

Uh again, the best way, let us know, and then we will you know get people out there if if we have the staffing and and we'll do everything we can to get out there and uh deal with them criminally.

Um if if they're not part of a specific property, if they're just showing up in the middle of the street lining off fireworks.

Uh I've seen that several times coming up Kelly uh Avenue and uh people just stop in the middle of the street and they'll light off a box of fireworks and then they take off.

Um but for for those situations, if it's reported, if we get a license plate, we'll investigate it.

We'll try to find the car through the resources we have, uh, and then we'll start our investigation.

Um, and then those folks will be dealt with criminally through an arrest or citation, tow towed vehicles, what what whatever comes about with that investigation?

Um and yes, I did forget to uh add Chris Miley was part of our uh research committee.

So I would definitely like to thank Chris for uh being part of these meetings every other week for like eight months.

So thank you, Chris.

And thank you, everyone tonight.

Okay, we'll close that item.

I don't have anything for the chair's report.

Subcommittee reports.

My only comment on fireworks ordinance is probably leave it open until the it gets passed by the board of supervisors, and we can provide the small updates on what we see along the way.

Rhodes, did you have anything you wanted to add?

Or okay.

Do we need public comment on there?

Okay, I think we said all we had.

We'll close out public comment on that.

Any announcements from the council?

Just my monthly invitation to the annual Veterans Day celebration on November the 8th.

It's a Sunday, one o'clock at Lone Tree Cemetery.

Put it on your calendars.

Thank you.

And then Ashley, one more comment from me.

The D Street bumps that they put in.

Yeah.

The bottom half of the road is striped and the top half is not.

I don't know if that's the same one you had.

And when you're coming down there the evening with the sun in your eyes, you cannot see those suckers.

So if they could add striping on the top bumps also, I think there's about four or five of them that are not striped.

That would be great.

Between Maud and Palisades.

Any other comments?

Well, you you brought up the oh yeah.

You you brought up the the D Street stuff.

And the question is uh we're we're past the first week in February, and uh it's it's still not done.

So um can we get some kind of update on the uh I'll let public works know they were here two months ago, so um these aren't questions that I can answer, but we'll pass on to public works.

And I have I have one more.

Um there's a pile of trash accumulating on Windfelt that um neighbors have reported and requested be cleaned up.

It's promised to be cleaned up a month ago.

The trash pile is still building, so I'm like some follow-up on you know, getting that taken care of.

Is there a cross street?

Yes, it's the one that goes up the hill.

What's the name of the street that goes up the hill?

It's Winfeld and Winchester, thank you.

Is that on that vacant lot?

Yes, the vacant lot that's right there.

And there was another one that I I missed on my notes.

The there um I got an email.

I think a couple of you also got an email from uh Leilani about traffic enforcement around um Fairview School.

So we might maybe ask CHP and the and the sheriff.

Um maybe we could put an agenda item on Beth.

Yeah, I think that the person who wrote the letter is an employee of public works.

I think so.

If I go down to the bottom of your letter.

So she probably is doing this as a formality.

Well, she she has she has school-aged children.

I I just want to remind everybody we don't want to get into discussion because this isn't on your agenda.

So if you uh just want to send me a note, I will follow up with public works, or um you are free to reach out to Amberlow or the director of public works yourselves.

Okay, and is is my comment earlier in the meeting about traffic control on 2nd Street sufficient to for that to be followed up on.

Thank you.

Any other comments?

Well, uh so this is the this was around traffic control around school in the morning and afternoon, and I I think if something's gonna be done about it, there's needs to be sheriff, school, CHP, and someone from someone in the county, public works.

Yeah, I I I mean it's this is the kind of thing that uh the Mac is very handy at.

So maybe you guys could make some calls and kind of get to the bottom of it, maybe start with what Leilani, and uh then get it on the agenda.

We'll get all those people in the room.

And uh I believe the issue that came up um getting a note from Tona uh that was handled.

I was out of the office at the time, um, but we'll follow up.

So I think it's something has been resolved, but noted.

Any other staff comments?

Nope.

All right.

With that, everyone have a good night.