Good afternoon and welcome to the Almee County Board of Supervisors Personnel Administration and Legislation Committee meeting for Monday, June the 8th, 2026.

May I have a roll call, please?

Supervisor Fortunato Bass.

Supervisor Tim.

Present.

We have a quorum.

Thank you.

Let's start with instructions on participation.

For all participants, please state your name for the record prior to your presentation.

If you wish to speak on an item not on the agenda, please wait until Chair Tam calls for public input on non-agendized items only matters within the committee's jurisdiction may be addressed to notify the clerk you wish to speak for in-person participants.

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Please use the raise hand function when we aren't on an item that you wish to comment on for dialed in participants.

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The clerk will call your name when it is time for public comment.

If you are in person, please come to the podium to speak.

If you're online or dialed in, the clerk will call your name and allow you to unmute.

That concludes the clerk instructions for public comment.

Thank you very much.

We will start with the legislative update on the federal side from CJ Lake.

Good afternoon.

You've got Emily DeSilva here and John Assini with uh federal update.

So both um the House and Senate are in session this week.

They're both actually coming in for votes tonight.

Um several members will likely be absent midweek due to primary elections in Maine, Nevada, South Carolina, and North Dakota on Tuesday.

Um kind of the big news is um that the Senate passed its reconciliation 2.0 package um last Friday in a 52 47 vote.

Um, again, I know we've been talking about this for several weeks, but that included roughly $70 billion in funding for ICE and CBP through FY29.

Again, um this was kind of the deal that was made to be able to reopen Department of Homeland Security through the appropriations process earlier this year, um, and then simply fund ICE and CBP through a strictly partisan um reconciliation package.

Um Senate Republican leaders pushed the bill through.

Um it was an 18-hour kind of voterama, uh, losing only one member uh during the final uh passage vote.

Attention now shifts to the House.

Um GOP leadership is targeting tomorrow for floor consideration, but I think that could slip, especially because there could be several members away for the primaries that I talked about a little bit earlier.

And you know, they're already talking about the potential for um uh reconciliation 3.0, but I think the votorama um on Friday kind of showed that there could be some challenges ahead.

You know, there were a handful of Republican senators, including um Susan Collins of Maine, Dan Sullivan in Alaska, and John uh Hested of Ohio, who were all facing competitive reelections, and they broke ranks to support uh Democrat amendments targeting the administration's proposed anti-weaponization fund and other kind of politically sensitive provisions throughout the process.

Most of those amendments did require 60 votes, and so they didn't pass, but um it just shows that um, you know, Democrats were able to put vulnerable vernal vulnerable Republicans in difficult positions.

Um, and Senators Bill Cassidy, uh Louisiana and Tom Tillis, North Carolina, two Republicans who um will not be returning in the next Congress, also introduced their own amendments.

Um, so that just signaled kind of continued friction between the White House and Republican members who are no longer facing electoral pressure to stay in line.

Um, so we will see again if the House is able to get uh reconciliation through later this week.

Um, and then what uh, you know, 3.0 kind of reconciliation 3.0 may look like.

Folks keep talking about the potential for health care or taxes, but honestly, we haven't heard any um specifics on what that may, what the contours of that may look like.

And quite frankly, they're running out of time if they're wanting to get this done before the August recess.

Um, you know, there are very few weeks left this summer to do that.

John, I don't know if you have anything to add on the reconciliation piece.

No, there's a lot of unknowns out there, and I think there's more energy on the House side than there is in the Senate side.

The Senate seems to be a lot less open to going forth with the reconciliation 3.0 with a very clear purpose or direction from the president.

Uh as it stands now, the person from the White House's perspective that's been put in charge of this reconciliation 3.0 push is the vice president, which should indicate how much uh emphasis Mr.

Trump is putting on potentially passing a third reconciliation bill this Congress.

Um moving on to kind of the Iran war powers.

A group of 38 Senate Democrats sent a letter to President Trump last week demanding more information about the legal basis for the administration's claim that hostilities with Iran have terminated.

Um Adam Schiff, uh Tim Kane uh from Virginia, and minority leader Chuck Schumer um led that, and um the signatories argued the war remains active and ongoing, um, citing the continued naval blockade, you know, repeated exchanges of fire, um, and President Trump's own public threats of military action.

Um, the issue is you know, of course, growing more cute after we saw on Sunday Iran fired missiles at Israel for the first time since the April ceasefire.

Um, Senate Dems are also working to secure a fifth Republican vote on a war powers resolution following a Memorial Day procedural vote that advanced with the help of four um Republican defections, and then a parallel house effort passed last week, 215 to 208.

Um, of course, um, President Trump can, you know, simply veto, but um, it does seem like it is gaining some steam.

Um, John, I can pass to you if you want to take FISA and NDAA.

Yeah, that's that's great.

Uh, so on the 56702 authority, this is in very serious risk of expiring this Friday, and neither chamber has a clear path to reauthorization after Senate Democrats blocked procedural vote early Friday morning, and will continue to oppose the Pfizer reauthorization in response to President Trump's decision to name Bill Poulty, the who is currently serving as the federal housing finance agency director as the acting director of national intelligence or the DNI.

This is the position that was held previously uh by Tulsi Goward, who is of course a member um of the House representatives before her service as DNI, and also I believe she served on the intelligence committee um during that, or she at least participated in classified briefings.

Um it's interesting about the DNI because it has a statutory requirement um that was passed in the wake of September 11th that DNI um director has to have direct uh experience in national intelligence matters, which is something that many uh senators on both Republicans and the Democratic side um have said that he's in violation of the statute and therefore ineligible to serve um as DNI.

So it goes beyond just sort of the rumble tall of politics, but he's actually in violation of the statute if they were to confirm him.

Um, Democrats will argue that Poulti, of course, lacks a national security qualifications required by the statute and have decided that they're not going to move forward with the section uh 702 authority until he's removed or a qualified permanent nominee is put forward in his place.

Meanwhile, Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Tom Cotton and Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley have asked Secretary Rubio to begin planning for a significant gap in foreign intelligence collection.

Secretary Rubio uh responded in writing to this request warning of dire impacts of national security if the Section 702 authority lapses at the end of the week.

But despite those warnings, uh Senate Republican leaders have no intention of continuing to hold a failed floor vote this week, and the odds of reaching 60 votes before Friday's deadline uh are getting slim by the day.

Um, on the NDAA side of things, the House Armed Services Committee uh completed its FY27 NDAA markup early Friday morning, adopting uh the massive authorization bill in a 42 to 12 vote, uh, with Democrats accounting for all no votes.

Senate armed Services Committee begins its own subcommittees uh markups this week with the full committee markup scheduled for Wednesday.

These are done in closed sessions, so are not available to the public, unlike the House, which does their public uh uh market process.

The House markup produced several party line flash points with Republicans voting 29 to 27 to formally rename the Defense Department, the Department of War, uh, which is a provision that drew sharp criticism from ranking member Adam Smith, um, a competing democratic amendment to restore the names of military bases renamed from confederate designations, also passed narrowly with two Republican votes voting in the affirmative, um, though its fate in the final bill remains uncertain because of course the Senate must reconcile its version with that of the House.

So some of these provisions that are more politically unpalatable or can't get bipartisan support will largely fall out of final product uh as happens time and again.

But happy to answer any questions.

Um there are also a number of appropriations markups this week, um, with labor H marking up uh tomorrow.

The full committee report has been released, as has the CPF list from the House.

So we will continue to monitor progress on uh FY27 appropriations.

And then so far, uh Emily, correct me if I'm wrong, but there was a Senate appropriations markup for six bills that was supposed to be scheduled for Wednesday, but that notice has still not gone out.

The reason for that is one of the bills that was supposed to be marked up by the Senate was the CJS bill.

Of course, Commerce Justice and Science, and the justice provision or the just of that bill, um, the weaponization uh fund would be eligible for potential report language or general provisions, ultimately prohibiting Department of Justice funds from being used for the purposes of the uh anti-government weaponization fund that is being pushed um by the president.

There's concern on the Senate Republican side that there'll be enough members in the appropriations committee that would actually include a provision that would ultimately prevent that money from being used for the Department of Justice.

So the markup has still been delayed.

Um, Emily, I don't know if that's still the case, but that was what we were talking about earlier today.

Yeah, I haven't seen anything different.

And you know, originally it was supposed to be marked up last week and they got pushed because of the reconciliation uh challenges.

So who knows, Senate is trying to move, but like you said, um, nothing has been official yet.

And the bottom line, I think more concerning is that last year the Senate was able to reach a top line kind of bipartisan agreement early on as far as approbes, and that has not been the case as of yet.

So it could cause some challenges kind of moving forward.

Yeah, and I'll just add to that a little bit.

Uh, we were in conversation um with the House appropriations ranking member last week, and she detailed uh the difficulty that the appropriations process is under this fiscal year, the lack of progress that Republicans and Democrats are making on coming up with um a solution to continue funding uh through this process and the lack of agreement between the two chambers on moving forward on a process.

Um, as we all know, the FY26 process was pretty fraught, uh, but we it is actually more fraught this year with the run-up to the midterms so close.

So expect continued fireworks on discretionary funding fights.

I think that's all we have.

Thank you so much for that update.

Um, Porter not abass.

Questions or comments?

Thank you, Chair Tam.

Um, it's just incredibly frustrating to hear the bad news that keeps coming out of DC.

Um, I do have a question.

Uh, I was I'm curious to hear if you are familiar with the Defense Production Act and the recent announcement that Trump will invest 700 million in the coal industry, including 70 million, I believe is the number, 75 million in West Oakland to support a coal export terminal that the city of Oakland and advocates have been trying to fight for the last 10 years.

I'm just curious to hear if this is a done deal or if there is anything else that's needed in terms of this budget appropriation.

So the Defense Production Act is something that's done on an administrative level.

They release an announcement that this money would become available for the coal industry.

At this point in time, it's unclear how they're going to exactly move forward on getting that money out the door to various stakeholders that would want to take advantage of it.

But this is an overall push of the energy dominance priority that the president set out, which is essentially a give to the fossil fuel industry and particularly the coal industry, which has been under significant strain for the better part of 20 years.

How successful it's going to be in moving this money out the door and changing how the industry operates, is anyone's guess.

The primary buyer for American coal is going to be the Chinese, which is why they're interested in the West Coast port uh investment.

But I would struggle to say that it's anything but a done deal, as we've seen the courts uh step in in these kind of um situations.

Um when it comes to sort of the initiatives of related to the energy industry.

Emily, I don't know if you have any particular information related to the Port Oakland, but that's kind of globally what they're looking at right now.

Yeah, I I don't, but we can certainly look into it, Supervisor, as it relates to the Port of Oakland.

Okay, I would appreciate any information you may have, including any potential lawsuits that might tie this up.

Um thank you.

Um thank you for that update.

Uh, just to get some clarification, the uh war powers vote, especially the one in the House, uh, it goes to the Senate, and then it could be vetoed by the president, but it would take two-thirds vote to override any veto.

So it sounds like it's largely symbolic then.

That's right.

That's exactly right.

Okay.

Thank you.

Appreciate your updates.

We do have a request uh on the federal legislation side from uh Alameda County Health to oppose the regulation for federal financial assistance OMB 2026 0034, because the rule would basically empower a political pointee to terminate um grants and awards midstream at their discretion and restrict DEI programs, gender-related research or service, and certain international collaborations.

Do we have concurrence on opposition to that?

Yes, I do concur, and I will make a motion to move this recommendation to oppose to the full board.

Oh, second, do we have any public comment on this item?

There are no public comments on this item.

Okay, may I roll call vote, please?

Supervisor Porton Abbas.

Aye.

Supervisor Town.

Aye.

Motion passed.

Thank you.

Thank you both for your updates.

Uh, let's move to the state legislative update from Full Moon Strategies.

Good afternoon, supervisors and members of the public.

Amy Costa here with the county's uh state legislative update.

Uh, we had kind of a slow week last week in Sacramento as everybody was watching kind of the election and uh engaging in that, but things are starting to heat up, both temperature-wise and action-wise.

Um, on the election, uh, several million ballots remain to be counted statewide, but the picture is becoming a bit clearer uh for November as results have been trickling in post Tuesday.

California voters ultimately will decide on nine constitutional offices, half of the state senate and all 80 assembly seats uh in the fall.

The insurance commissioner race right now is currently the only statewide contest to feature two Democrats in November.

All other statewide races appear headed towards a Democrat versus Republican matchup in the fall.

At the legislative level, eight assembly candidates have effectively secured their election after advancing without a general election opponent.

Um we are expecting pretty significant legislative turnover in Sacramento with several legislators pursuing congressional board of equalization and local offices.

As a result, roughly two dozen or so new lawmakers are expected to be sworn in uh in December when the next session begins.

Um, so with the primary behind them, lawmakers are returning their focus to policy bills as well as their budget work.

Um our next uh big deadline uh is July 2nd, and the legislature will head into recess.

As I noted, things are heating up on the budget.

We shared via email both the Senate and the Assembly have released their budget plans over the weekend.

Both Assembly and Senate staff were meeting to try and reach an agreement between the two houses.

We can see both the assembly and the Senate bills are now in print.

They reflect each House's package.

So the Senate budget and fiscal review committee has all of the AB budget vehicles and the Assembly budget has all of the Senate vehicles.

The Senate budget plan is immortalized in AB 109.

The Assembly budget plan is an SB 109.

In addition, as always, we will expect to see more budget bill juniors, other fiscal year budget items, as well as trailer bills or the required statutory changes.

In recent years, the vast majority of the trailer bill content has been what was actually put forward by the administration, and most of those have been online for some time and will include the hyperlink in our written report.

Currently, we're understanding that the legislature met over the weekend.

They are trying to finalize the legislative budget package.

And the timing of that would be that likely a bill will be in print later this week, potentially on Friday, in anticipation of a Monday floor vote representing the legislative package.

And obviously, the next step will be for the three-party agreement where legislative leadership, the speaker and the pro-temps reach agreement with the governor on the state's roughly $350 billion budget.

Some of the major debates that are emerging between the parties include, you know, really how to address the projected structural deficit of the budget and the role of revenues in that conversation.

Lawmakers generally support several of the governor's proposals on the revenue side, the first of which was to extend the limit on net operating losses for corporations.

That generally seems to have alignment with the legislature, as well as his proposal to expand taxes on digital software.

Those two items together could generate about $3 billion annually, but disagreements remain between the parties over any additional tax increases.

And of course, health care funding proposals remain a big issue for people to figure out.

Medi-Cal, as you can imagine, remains one of the most contentious issues.

The administration has proposed increasing monthly premiums for undocumented individuals from 30 to 50 dollars beginning in 2027, as well as implementing some additional eligibility restrictions.

These changes are flagged at a savings of around 712 million annually by 2030, though the Senate has pushed back on some of these proposals in their framework.

I would note also that the assembly in their budget package included 250 million dollars for engigit care as well as another 250 million dollars for public hospitals.

Lawmakers obviously are still figuring out how to respond to the federal funding reductions under HR 1, with counties obviously estimating it could cost local governments up to $9.5 billion annually.

Differences also remain on homelessness as well as education funding.

The Newsom administration proposed just going forward with the $500 million for homelessness programs that they had previously proposed, whereas the Senate proposed a billion dollars and the assembly proposed $800 million.

Both houses oppose the governor's plan to withhold uh close to $4 billion in constitutionally guaranteed Prop 98 funding for K-12 schools and community colleges.

Climate funding and prison closures are expected to also be uh an issue at the table and final negotiations.

Um, about a week ago, the California Air Resources Board put forward changes to the state's cap and invest program, and those changes are projected to reduce climate funding through the greenhouse gas reduction fund by up to $2 billion dollars annually.

And lawmakers are urging the administration to close a sixth state prison after five closures during his administration.

So as I noted, the constitutional deadline uh for lawmakers to pass a bill and to get paid is on Monday, June 15th.

Um, and because the constitution has a 72 hour imprint rule, we expect that we'll see any such bill in print by Friday.

Um I would note in recent years, the legislature has taken up their version, voted on it, and then prior to July 1st, we actually saw the three-party agreement, which we are expecting again this year.

So more to come on that.

On the economy, the LAO late on Friday came out with their new car registration update.

New car purchases can be useful and timely as an economic indicator.

The LAO reported that California's slump in new car registrations continued through April 2026, signaling growing concern for the short the state's short-term economic trajectory.

Seasonally adjusted new vehicle registrations dropped by 8% between September and December 2025.

Rather than recovering from that pretty substantial drop, the market experienced an additional 2% decline from November through April, compounding concerns about uh the broader economy.

The recent downturn underscores a longer term tram of Californians buying fewer cars than they did pre-pandemic.

Statewide registrations have already been steadily declining for several years leading up to 2020 before plummeting in March and April of that year.

Uh while registrations rebound uh in the months following the initial COVID-19 shock, they have generally failed to return to their pre-pandemic baselines.

Um, the LAO often reports on this as kind of an indicator of kind of consumer confidence, consumer spending in the state.

So we usually monitor and report that out.

With that, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much for that update.

Uh Supervisor Fortunato Bass.

Questions or comments.

Thanks for the update, Amy.

Um, as you know, there's a number of budget issues we're very concerned around, especially those that relate to our safety net and our public hospital system.

Sounds like we have to sort of hold tight until Friday and this, between Friday and Monday, um, unless you've got any indication how the talks are going.

Um I would simply say that clearly there will be something.

The question will be is it enough?

And the reason I say that is because both houses did put forward financing um for both um counties, whether it was administrative, indigent care, or public hospitals.

So, you know, I'm not a fortune teller, but I would say generally that's a positive indication.

I do think the question will be whether or not it's sufficient.

Right.

Okay, thank you.

Are there are you sensing any convergence on the state assembly and Senate side in terms of some of these bills?

Particularly we're concerned about besides indigent care, the um the hospital support.

Um I think a lot of it will really um be um centered around revenues candidly and um what revenue package they agree on, um, which will you know indicate kind of how much they can afford to spend in these areas?

Um, my understanding is that the legislative staff and leadership met over the weekend.

Um the Senate was briefed yesterday.

Um, and so my understanding is they're working on the final details.

And as I said, you know, at the very latest, we would see a bill in print on Friday.

Okay.

Thank you so much.

Uh so we have a request on the state side from Alameda County Health to oppose AB 1337.

This is a bill that would revise the circumstances that would allow disclosure of personal information in a manner that could link the information to individuals that um get this public assistance and social safety programs.

A lot of people see this as enabling public charge in the future.

So do we have concurrence to oppose AB 1337?

Yes, I concur and I'll make a motion to forward this position to the full board.

I will second that motion.

Do we have any public comment on opposition to AB 1337?

There are no public comments on this item.

Thank you.

May I broke all vote, please?

Supervisor Fortunato Bass.

Aye.

Supervisor Town.

Aye.

Motion passed.

Thank you.

Are there any public comments and items not on today's agenda?

There are no comments on non-agendized items.

Thank you.

This meeting is adjourned.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.