Hello and welcome to the Parks and Recreation Commission meeting on Wednesday, November 5th, 2025.

We are here in City Council Chambers.

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So item number one, roll call.

Commissioner Lee.

Commissioner Michaels.

Okay.

Now please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Do we have any speaker slips or hands raised?

We do not.

Moving on.

Number five, consent calendar.

Consent calendar items are considered routine in nature.

It will be enacted in one motion.

There will be no separate discussion on these items unless a commissioner or staff requests specific items be removed for separate action.

We only have one item.

It is the October 1st, 2025 draft minutes.

Anyone have any revisions?

Move to approve as presented.

Commissioner Lee?

Yes.

Commissioner Michaels?

Yes.

Commissioner Whitmore?

Yes.

Commissioner O'Harrow?

Yes.

Chair Emkin.

Yes.

Motion passes five and oh.

Okay.

Now onto items of business.

Our first item of business is Eagle Scout project.

Commendation.

I was having trouble with that word.

Thank you.

All right.

So good evening, Commissioners.

Just want to share a few photos that maybe he can talk to in his um in his comments.

So there we go.

Uh that went away really quickly.

Okay.

So with that, um, we want to uh bring up our Eagle Scout Luke.

So come on up and introduce yourself.

Tell us a little bit about your project.

Hello, my name is Luke Williams, and I'm a senior at Sequoia High School in Redwood City.

I've been a scout since I was in first grade, starting Cub Scouts with PAC 65 and moving into Boy Scouts with Troop 321, which is where I've been for the past four years.

For my Eagle Scout project, I renovated the bike tire cleaning stations at Water Dog Park.

I chose this project because I love to mountain bike in Water Dog is one of my favorite places to ride.

Over the years I've spent countless hours on those trails, and I wanted to give something back to the trail system that has given me so much fun.

These cleaning stations help keep bikes in good shape, but they also play an important role in protecting our trails and open spaces.

By run by removing mud from the tires, it stops the spread of a dangerous pathogen called sudden oak death, which will kill all the green in our parks.

Using this station is something that benefits not only Belmont, but the entire Bay Area Open Space Network.

I want to thank the city of Belmont, especially Miss Shear for their for the support, as well as my fellow scouts, volunteers, and adult leaders who helped me make this project possible.

I'm very proud of how it turned out, and I hope it comes to serve riders and trail users for many years to come.

Thank you.

Awesome.

And this um is the sign that Luke designed himself.

This is a really nice catchy sign.

We but we printed this in our side shop, but he gets all the design credit.

Um this is catchy and kind of shares the message about why we're doing this.

And so uh our park staff's gonna be putting this at the um tire cleaning stations in Water Dog.

So thank you very much for uh doing that.

We have a commendation from our commission chair.

Yes, actually, maybe we can maybe we can all step down for a photo.

And I don't know if they can see online, if they could see the um oh yeah, the thing the sign you have up that's very clever.

I'm gonna go up here and hold the sign and then the computer should be.

Oh.

Okay, do we have any um commissioner or public comments or questions for Luke?

I just want to say thank you.

Uh I ride at Water Dog all the time and uh really appreciate you giving back to the trails.

What a great project.

Thank you.

Luke, can you tell us a little bit more about the like the actual cleaning station and what your materials you used and sort of how you came up with that particular design?

I'm just curious about it.

So the this the stations were already there from a previous Eagle Scout, but they were extremely run down, and all the bristles on the brushes had like just like gone away.

So it basically served no function.

And I've I was looking into it during a biology project about sudden oak death, and I was realizing how much of like a danger it is to the parks, and I realized that for my Eagle Scout project, I could like help out the community while also fixing this bike tire cleaning station, and it could help a bunch of the mountain bikers and water dog.

Did you have to reload like move the location at all or was it still in a pretty good spot like that they picked originally?

No, luckily, the like the frame, the metal frame was still intact and it was in a decent spot, all three of the stations.

So I didn't have to move any of them.

I just spray painted them and put in new bristle brushes.

Awesome.

Cool.

Yeah, that's great.

Thank you so much.

I appreciate it.

Of course.

Yeah, that was great.

Are there do other parks or other places that you ride in the area have those already installed?

I've seen them around, but I haven't seen them in the local, like Bay Area trail systems.

Thank you.

One quick question.

I was wondering when you were talking about removing the mud.

Do you know if it also removes seeds and things like that could be invasive seeds or anything like that?

Yes, it definitely does that as well, because the seeds are in the mud.

Okay, great.

Awesome.

Okay, well, thank you so much.

Um I we all really appreciate people who are coming forward and volunteering for the community and making it a better place.

So we really appreciate your efforts.

Thank you.

Of course, thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

Um on to item number B.

Belmont Creek Restoration Project Update from Public Works.

Hey, uh good evening, everyone.

My name is Daniel Matthews.

I'm an assistant engineer uh with Public Works Department, our engineering division.

Uh for coming up on a year now, I have been involved in this amazing project, the Belmont Creek Restoration Project, which has been coming down the pipe for some some time.

Um it's been a really transformative year back there, and I'm really excited to share this update with um what's been taking place, provide a little project background, and then talk about where we're at today.

Uh so just little agenda, summarize the project.

I know it's been discussed here um significantly, but give a little refresher on the project, talk about the pre-project conditions that motivated us uh to start this project, talk a little bit about the work completed to date, and I'm gonna take everyone on a photo tour of the project.

Um it's not quite ready for visitors yet, but show off some of the amazing work that's happened over the last year, talk about the remaining work, and share an invitation to the ribbon cutting, which is coming up soon.

So, zoom out.

What is this project about?

Um the Belmont Creek Restoration Project aims to reduce downstream flooding and enhance the beauty of Twin Pines Park by restoring Belmont Creek using natural and sustainable methods.

Um I think when you're so involved in the day-to-day, um, watching it go up one day at a time, you kind of forget what is this all about.

So to recenter us.

Um the project has been, like I said, coming down the pipe for some time.

Um it was identified in two planning documents back in 2019, the Twin Pines Park Master Plan and the Belmont Watershed Management Plan.

Um, so there's been a lot of interest in this project for a long time.

So talking a little bit about what was going on back there before the the uh project, and it looked a lot like this.

Um we had large blue gum eucalyptus trees, which are a non-native tree species that had fallen into the creek and channel during the 2023 winter storms.

Um it was causing you know unsightly hazardous conditions.

Um we are experiencing large creek bank failures along a portion of it, sloughing material into the creek.

Um, and not only did this you know not enhance the beauty of the park, um it was in some cases dangerous.

Um, you know, we're lucky no one got hurt with these trees that fell during the winter storms.

Um, but a core aspect of this project was that when failure like this occurs, it tracks that sediment and erosion downstream and clogs storm drain infrastructure.

So um Belmont has been spared the worst of it throughout the years, but particularly our neighbors in the city of San Carlos and the county of San Mateo were um receiving some downstream flooding that could in part be um attributed to this erosion happening in the park here.

So you can see very high water levels that have been caused downstream.

This photo on the left is taken from uh the creek crossing at El Camino Real in a harbor.

Um, and you can see just how you know impaired the water quality is there, how dirty it looks full of full of erosion from upstream.

Um, and it was a constant effort for both parks and public works staff to you know dredge the creek, pull debris out of the creek, make sure that at under crossings and location, you know, critical locations like that, um, that it wasn't being blocked by either erosion or in many cases, like the photo on the right, you can see there's a bunch of tree debris coming out of there from some of our blue gum eucalyptus that were previously back there.

So all of this culminated in this project, which we have now been in construction for since January of last year, we started with the tree removal process, which removed a bunch of those pesky blue gum eucalyptus trees and provided uh ample material for this next phase of the project.

Um, and then since about June of this year, uh we have been in construction for the actual creek restoration work.

Um so I don't want to get into the minutiae of that.

I'm more than happy to answer any questions about it, but I want to take us to today.

What where does the park sit today?

Um we see a lot of people coming back to the fence either on Ralston or in the park itself and trying to uh give a you know sneak peek through.

So I'm really excited to share these photos that I just took earlier this week.

Um, so start with the not exciting stuff above the creek.

Um, not like I said, this project is not only about the creek itself, but the goal of the project is to enhance the beauty of Twin Pines Park.

Um, this involved repaved trails through the park.

So you remember that asphalt trail that meandered, it wasn't in too great shape, and kind of this area to the northwest side of the creek has been restored heavily through these photos.

Something I really want to highlight is um we had a we're really lucky to work with a fantastic contractor on this project, um, and they have done a fantastic job up to now of leaving the site in better condition than they found it, I would say, for the most part.

Um, so moving into the actual creek, um, it's completely different.

I mean, if you look at you know, this channel here versus a few slides back, it's it's almost unrecognizable in terms of um the creek banks, the capacity, it's still, you know, hasn't been planted back, but there's already this so much more pleasant to look at than what we saw before.

Um, so I'm gonna go through these photos and talk about some of these design elements that have been incorporated.

Um, so you'll see on the photo on the left.

Um, there's these log structures placed at the bottom of the creek.

Oh, look, I have a nice big mouse.

Placed down here at the bottom of the bank and and over here.

These logs are the actual material that was gathered during the tree removal project back in this winter.

Uh, so the contractor for that project, we were able to save a lot of money because they were able to leave those materials behind for incorporation into this project.

So these log structures have a few different goals.

The first of all is to slow down and detain water in the actual park.

Um, the other cool feature they will have as time develops is they'll prove to be an important habitat space for plants, insects, and and even animals, small animals within the creek.

Um, so it's a it's a really cool element of this project that you know carries on those blue gums that were there before.

Um, you'll also see um, and we'll talk more about these in a second, but these cool little rock pockets that are throughout the creek.

That's called a um a constructed riffle.

And its job is to kind of mimic a natural creek channel bottom.

Um, when we built when we were in construction for this project, um it would have been good to include some in-progress photos, but basically the entire creek as it was before had to be ripped out, and the contractor set everything back.

So there was a point where the entire channel was denuded just to bare soil, so everything in here was placed um carefully and mindfully.

So these constructed riffles, again, big goal is to slow down and detain water, mimic the natural uh the chat natural bottom of a creek channel, and just serve as a really nice water feature.

It's awesome to go out, and now that we've got some better flow throughout the parks as uh the gate at Water Dog Lake was open, you can kind of watch water you know peacefully meander through these constructed riffles, which is great.

This is uh down on the other side of the bridge closer to City Hall, looking upstream on the left.

You can again um see one of these constructed riffles, and another thing, another really important design element of this project that the riffles help create is these pools.

So, again, one of the main goals of this project is to reduce downstream flooding.

A way we do that is give water in the creek more places to sit and be detained.

So uh the design for this project called for the very careful construction of pools throughout the creek channel.

So you now kind of see this structure of a large pool, flows into a rifle down into another pool and kind of meanders throughout the park.

It's it's really fantastic and beautiful to look at.

The hydro seeding will help ensure that this work, this these creek banks that were regraded, should be much more stable for for years to come, along with just the natural reshaping of the channel bank.

There's portions of the creek before that were, you know, basically sheer walls that, you know, portions had failed off, leaving, you know, just a flat exposed face.

So most of the channel banks now are right around a two to one slope, so you know, inherently stable, shouldn't be going anywhere.

And with this hydro seeding and erosion control measures in place, such as uh these nets and and jute netting should be here for a long time.

So I'm gonna wanted to focus in on, talked a little bit about before, but here's a close-up look at one of these constructed riffles.

So again, we're using the logs that were left from the tree removal project.

Um, very carefully placed rocks to create kind of slow pathways for the creek to meander through, flow over.

It's really awesome, right after a rain.

You can kind of see it's like a little cascade through these.

It's awesome and and critical to the goal of reducing the downstream flooding.

Um the photo on the left shows an element of the project that I think is great, which is these carefully placed boulders along the creek bank to allow people access down to the creek.

Um very mindful that you know this isn't just a water feature, it's a place people want to go down, get close to, spend time by.

So there's several places along the project.

This photo's taken right near um the bridge that there's places for people to, you know, walk down, sit kids to jump and play on, um, all of which is safe, anchored into the ground, um, but provides a really nice space for people to sit directly at the creekside and enjoy, which is something that was, you know, very limited before.

Again, a photo on the right of one of these amazing root balls that was um from the tree removal project.

The tree contractor left several 20 to 25 feet trees sitting.

Um, and when the restoration contractor came in, they ripped them out in hole, excavated a portion of the creek bank, and placed them in there.

So, what you're seeing is you know, the real root ball from one of the blue gum eucalyptus that was sitting sitting in Twin Pines Park before.

So there's still a little bit of work left to do.

The project, as you saw, is mostly done.

Um, and really right now that it's all about park enhancement and beautification.

So we're still waiting on the installation of the split rail fence along the creek, uh top of creek bank that's actually going to start tomorrow.

Um, delivery will be here about 7 a.m.

Our fence is coming from Idaho.

Fun fact, yeah.

Um there is uh obviously the one thing you won't see in here yet is too many plants.

Um, the creek banks are gonna be dotted with over a thousand different plants, including dozens of native species and 32 new trees.

I know a question I got a lot out there was you guys took a lot of trees out, you know, you were going to restore that, correct?

Yeah.

Native trees going back in, live oaks, alders, it's gonna be you know much more enhanced and safe than it was before.

Um, and another thing that people may not often consider about this project is there is a lot of ongoing maintenance and monitoring to ensure that you know all of these plants that are being placed, as well as the creek banks themselves are are staying in good condition, good health.

Um, and as this project received a million dollars in grant funding from the state's urban streams and restorations program, um, we also have a criteria to meet.

I think about 80% of plants that we place need to survive through a year.

So uh we are not done yet.

It's not a turnkey project.

Um there will be we'll have close eyes on the site for the next few years, about five years is our monitoring period to make sure that the project is performing as intended.

Wanted to invite everyone here and at home to our ribbon cutting.

Uh we are, like I said, have have only a few remaining outstanding items of work.

Um, and it's time to celebrate, you know, the the arduous last month, few months of construction and all the challenges that came with that.

So Wednesday, December 3rd at 11:15 a.m., we'll be having a ribbon cutting in the creek.

It's open to the public.

It'll be a great celebration turning the space back over to the public.

And we're really looking forward to it.

That is all I had.

I'm more than happy to take any questions on construction, the project overall.

And yeah, I really appreciate everyone's time and interest in this.

This is this has been an amazing, amazing project.

So excellent.

Thank you.

Let's start with any public comments or questions.

Yes, we have one.

Nikki, you can come on up.

Good evening, everyone.

It's weird to be on this side of it.

A couple of really nice presentation, thank you.

I'm one of those people who walks there and tries to like peek over and see what's going on there.

So I thought I'd come tonight to ask some questions if that's okay, or maybe you can answer my ask my questions.

Just it looks really great.

One question I have is um you're it's such a it's such an improvement, but is will there be a phase two for downstream improvements?

Is that okay to ask?

Go ahead.

It is still the goal.

Um, there's not an immediate phase two coming, it's it's more of a long-term thing.

The initial goal of this project, the initial reach of this project was planned to be longer.

Um and there's been some adjustments throughout the years.

This project did actually, we did add about a hundred feet of it for the project that we are closer to moving forward, which is the downstream detention basin project that's now kind of taken the priority spot for for upcoming projects.

However, there is a longer segment envisioned in the planning documents.

There's just not an immediate, you know, time frame for when that would happen at this point.

Okay, thank you.

Just so that as far as cleaning up down like a Sixth Avenue in O'Neill, which is pretty gnarly looking.

I mean, that's that won't have as much of a problem now that the upstream is.

Yeah, again, the goal, the goal for this is I mean, what were the I think maybe the two most common culprits for downstream obstruction was one erosion and sediment from not just this portion of the creek, but but all portions.

But this as you can see, there was you know several sections where we were definitely not helping with the downstream erosion issues.

Um, and the other was just those blue gum eucalyptus, which is you know, if you've seen them, we have some still in the parking lot, just shed and shed and branches fall off and travel downstream.

So there should be some meet there is going to be a meaningful improvement due to this project, and I I think the goal is still to deliver a longer reach of the creek restoration through through Twin Pines Park in the future.

Great.

Okay, one other question.

Just curious what the hydro seating was what was comprised of it, just a few.

I wish I could answer that question better.

Um I would be happy to get back to you on that.

Okay.

Thank you.

Absolutely.

Do we have any other public comments or questions?

No, we do not.

Okay.

So why don't we um do questions first and then we'll come back around for comments?

So let's start with any questions.

Um just a quick two sort of two-part question.

Were there any phases of the project that were more challenging than anticipated?

And then also, like, was there anything that was surprising?

Like, oh, that actually was less challenging than we expected.

Yeah, I'd say I don't think we had any major hiccups.

Um, you know, I I think the the actual restoration crum construction went fairly smoothly overall.

Um we did have an inadvertent archaeological discovery in the middle of this project, um, very close to the end of the mass civil work that um I think was definitely something that we weren't expecting, and through a curveball.

Um thankfully we were able to recover on schedule, you know, mitigate um the discovery.

So I I think that proved to be a new challenge.

You know, this is um this is a once in a hundred-year project for the city up until this point.

So um it was definitely a learning experience at that time for you know what to do when we had that encounter.

Um, but I think really what went better than expected was after that.

You know, following that archaeological discovery.

There's a lot of stakeholders you need to bring to the table, different regulatory bodies that need to approve the resumption of work, and we were, you know, the project team was looking at are we even gonna get this approval to get this project going again this year?

So I think we were all you know on high alert following that.

Are we gonna be able to get back to work?

If we are, are we going to be able to finish it?

But we were so lucky to have a contractor who you know was ready to execute.

So we got the green light to go again, and we were expecting to be requesting extensions not be anywhere near where we are today, but they got us to the finish line in time for our waterboard permits for our Army Corps permits.

Um, so I think there was a point where you know we were preparing for the worst, and we were, you know, really lucky to get to where we are now today in such good shape.

Thanks.

Oh, this is great.

Thank you so much.

I mean, it's amazing work.

So really really appreciate it.

Uh I think you answered one question in terms of the access to the water.

And so are there going to be more designated kind of drop-in points that will be easy to figure out with the the railings?

Yes.

So I think there's two main ones right now.

Both are pretty close to um the bridge that have been designated.

So as you approach the bridge on this north side of the creek bank uh walking towards the bridge, there is now um kind of similar to, and I wish I had included a better photo of these kind of placed boulders um on the creek channel, kind of here to your side.

Uh let's see here.

There is a spot on this north side of the creek that is very similar to this, that it's kind of a fun log and rock interactive walk down to the channel where people will be able to get up close and you know see the see the creek and these design elements in action.

Similarly, this is on the south west side of uh the project, and there's one there as well.

I think those are the two main ones for now.

Um, but again, they provide a really nice access spot, and you can kind of meander along there because the channel is so much flatter at the bottom than it was before.

So I think there's gonna be a lot of improved access, up close access to the creek.

That's great.

Um, is on I guess is it in the south side?

So if you if you're in the back and you kind of go around the playground, yes, and then to kind of where was it not really a trail, but like uh like walking on that side.

Has that?

Yes, that area was actually um a we actually were able to improve that part portion of the park kind of unexpectedly.

Um during the tree removal project, we actually added a lot of extra material at the end just in case they were having difficulty with some of these logs, they weren't meeting the contractor's needs, they wanted a you know choice.

So we actually saved um I think over a dozen extra logs than were required, but our contractor was able to work with what we had originally intended.

So we were able looking at the planning documents and kind of the what's the long-term vision for the park, identified that there is supposed to be an informal path back there on the south side past the playground leading eastward.

Um so we were able to kind of write where the the slope kind of flattens out, use some of those logs that were left over, anchor them into the ground, and kind of set the side at least on one side for that kind of informal path that walks up the east side.

So it's not something that's captured in any of these photos very well, but you'll definitely see the improvement when you're out there that even you know this this portion of the project that wasn't portion of the park that wasn't really included in this project for improvements, definitely had a noticeable improvement as well.

So we looked for opportunities wherever throughout the project, if we had extra material or extra time to, you know, take care of the other long-term visions of the park as well in this area.

That's great.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you.

I I love the photos and the and the little virtual tour.

Um, I feel like I would have naively thought that water and sediment goes through Belmont and then into like repertoire's or into the bay, but it goes into San Carlos and it goes all over the county.

Yes.

Yeah, it will in the county the the main county area that is impacted is the harbor industrial area.

So if you if you aren't familiar with that harbor east of old county road is largely unincorporated county land um where the creek flattens out and it's is it underground through there?

No, I think there's a but um that is the area that really is the most impacted, and then San Carlos properties are on one side.

So those are that's the high impact area that is receiving um this downstream flooding from here.

So then it does eventually wander out to the Redwood Shores and the Belmont Slough from there, but kind of this intermere intermediary stop in the HIA is where we are seeing some of the most direct impacts for impaired water quality and downstream flooding.

And so then are do you have like uh like timeline metrics of when you're gonna be testing that water, or like can you just eyeball it and start with it?

Yeah, so there there is going to be part of again, it's not just for the biological elements in terms of plants, but the biological elements in terms of water quality as well.

There will be testing requirements for the next few years to look at things like you know, is water quality improving downstream versus where it's at today.

Are we seeing clear, less turbid water downstream?

That'll definitely be something we're taking a look at and is spelled out in our monitoring plan.

So that's one of the goals, 80% of plants within one year surviving as a goal.

Yeah, I'm not I don't know if 80% is the exact figure, but it's something like that, and we'll have to replace anything that does not uh survive.

Are there any other big goals that like are part of the project?

And I'm sure you have many.

I think I mean it it's a really interesting project.

So though I think those are two of the key metrics that our grant funding partners are going to be looking at.

Um I think the main thing the city is going to be looking at and and probably the state as well, is natural creek restoration is um there is definitely a science to it, but it's also an art as well.

And what it creates is this living creek channel where you know a lot of cities when they do creek restoration projects or want to manage their stormwater better, what do they do with their creek?

They go and place it in a giant concrete channel.

Um the city took this approach that prioritizes you know the sustainable and natural method.

Um, and there's a little bit of a risk with that, right?

It's not as sure fire as a concrete channel to direct water through Belmont.

So I think on the city's end and our grant funding end is a big thing that they'll also be looking at is is the creek banks and the creek staying where it's intended to be, the design intention of this.

Of course, we do expect it to shift and change with time, and the design is um purposeful on that and is forgiving.

You'll see notice you don't you don't really capture it well in the photos, but how much larger the creek channel is now than it is before.

But one of those other metrics that we'll definitely be looking at is is are the creek banks performing?

Are points, our control points are they approximately where they're supposed to be, you know, five years down the road from now, or are we seeing major shifts in the creek bank that may require some additional stabilization um efforts?

We don't anticipate that, but it is something that we'll be keeping an eye on.

I appreciate taking that you're taking the risk.

That's great.

Um, to keep those plants alive, are people gonna be like steered away from running around and climbing down there for a certain period of time or for the extra sensitive plants, there will be some additional um, you know, security measures placed around them.

The m the really the main thing we're we're not so worried about um pedestrian access and some of these issues, because again, there will be a split rail fence.

I'm sure people will find their way through to some of these creek banks, but because there's these new areas where we are directing people to for direct creek access, we hope they'll avoid some of these new plannings.

Um but we are I in in the monitoring and ongoing maintenance.

Something we are taking a look at is you know protective caging for some of these more sensitive species.

A big conversation we've been having recently is what are we gonna do with deer?

Are deer gonna play nice with this new project?

They don't know that we just spent you know, two million dollars on it.

Um so the the there are we are taking steps to ensure that it is safe from trampling, safe from wildlife is a big one.

Um, and there will be, especially for the first year, a very high level of effort for this maintenance and monitoring that's going on.

We are currently in the process of of getting someone on board for that.

Um, and we have some very good proposals that we're happy with, people who we think will, you know, make sure that this area is performing to the best of its abilities.

So cool.

Thank you.

Last question.

Did you say the word sloughing?

Yes, sloughing.

What does that mean?

Uh yeah, it's a great word.

Um sloughing is when a hillside or or some earth body kind of falls over or slides down.

It's a fun civil engineering word.

So like I can let me show a photo of it.

It's like here, what has happened in this area is part of the creek bank has this is and this really isn't a great photo of it, but you can imagine the shelf of soil kind of fell off and down into the creek.

You could say it sloughed.

Yeah.

S-L-O-U-G-H slot.

I spelled that wrong on my notes.

Uh thank you.

Um you answered a bunch of my questions, but uh y you also talked about the midterm, like the five-year plan and maybe even a little further.

But is there something in particular that that a challenge to you expect for this winter?

I mean, we're it's like upon us and we're already starting to see trees fall and that sort of stuff.

Is there something that that you might expect since this work is brand new that that might be an immediate impact?

I think that the the the where the project is now, we're actually set up for for success with this winter.

We'll be completing as the hydro seeding has taken place, which will benefit from moisture throughout the winter.

Um we are gonna do the planting, which will again provide additional stabilization benefits and that will, you know, serve you benefit greatly from uh the moisture in the winter.

It's just something we're gonna have to keep a close eye on.

You know, if we get, you know, the the this channel is this this new creek channel is purposely designed for I think a hundred year storm is what they're what they're looking at for this.

Um so in theory, we should be good.

Um and it's designed to exceed those requirements, but you know, things have been crazy recently.

So there is a level of safety factor that was built into this.

I don't anticipate that we have any issues, but should we start getting some really good rains, it'll be interesting to see how the channel does perform.

Um I think we're all very confident in the design and in the creeks much increased capacity to handle these sorts of events compared to before.

Um, and just going back there now with the removal of those blue gums um and the you know real stabilization of these creek channels, I think it is, you know, infinitely safer um and less hazardous than it was before as we head into this winter.

I think we're much better prepared with the creek channel as it is now.

That's great.

Well, let's hope we don't test it with one of those hundred years terms anytime soon.

Yeah, thank you.

We got a little taste of it on um on uh earlier this week when they opened the the water dog lake gates, it was really interesting to see, and you know, water raised in the channel.

You know, it used to be a much, you know, kind of significant, you'd see it jump a few feet at a time with this big wider channel.

We got about a water, a foot higher of water through the channel.

So um that speaks to its added capacity.

I mean, it it really is a bigger, bigger channel, much better equipped to handle these sorts of events.

Awesome, thank you.

Um I was I I used to take my sisters down to the creek, and like we'd we'd encounter the what is it, sloughing all the time.

So I appreciate the fact that you guys are like putting like more clear places for people to go and like actually look at the creek and stuff.

I really like that part.

Um, are you guys worried about like I know you kind of already said this a lot already?

Are you guys worried about the rain at all?

Like, because it's already starting to rain, and that's kind of what started like all this like bad erosion in the first place.

I don't think so much anymore.

I I again, like I was saying before, when you do one of these natural creek restoration projects, there is I would say a small inherent risk to it that you know it is still susceptible to rain.

It's not a giant concrete wall.

I remember when we got our first rain this year, I kind of I think it was overnight, and I came in the next morning like, okay, is the creek still gonna be there?

And and yes, it absolutely was.

Obviously, we haven't gotten a you know a good few days of sustained rain, but what we've seen so far, um, from things like these initial rain events, the opening of Water Dog Lake and that surge of water downstream is that it's exceeding our expectations and how well it's performing.

Water looks so much clearer.

We're not ex seeing any failure on these new creek bank sections.

It's it's a relief to see, um, but it it's exactly what we expected.

So it's something we'll be keeping a close eye on.

I'm personally very excited to see it get some sustained rain and see how we do back there.

Um, but if things go how they've gone so far, I don't think we have anything to worry about.

Um and then the downstream that you were talking about happening like throughout San Mateo County, which is kind of like whoa, so detrimental about the erosion and stuff.

Um is it so bad that like uh like it how bad is it basically?

How bad has it?

Was it terrible or was that the point of the whole thing, like to reduce it so that way it doesn't get bad?

I mean again, it's not all attributable to to it's not all Belmont's fault.

It's not all attributable to this little, you know, the stretch of of uh the creek here.

Um but the the HIA regularly floods.

They've already flooded um I think once early this year was due to something not being opened properly or cleaned properly.

Um but this is an area that is low lying flat close to the bay.

Um and so especially if a large rain event coincides with the high tide, they already have very little capacity.

And when you start adding, you know, inches of soil and erosion to that at the bottom of the creek channel every year, that already little room for capacity you have gets eaten up.

So um it's an area of Belmont you don't see often just because it's mostly, you know, unless you're getting your car repaired or getting on the 101.

Um, but that area really does see annually multiple times, you know, major flooding when a rain event coincides with with a high tide event.

So the goal of this project is, you know, we can't because it is tidal as well, um, and because this isn't um the sole factor of why that happens and and what's contributing to downstream flooding, but the goal is to assist how we can and you know provide some meaningful reduction in downstream erosion and hopefully downstream flooding by doing so.

Thank you.

Yeah, very insightful.

I'm excited to see it.

It's gonna be fantastic.

Thank you.

Um I still have a couple questions.

Um so you're talking about the the riffles and how the you know the rocks are set up.

So in between the riffles, is it just like mud creek bottom or is are there rocks?

There are some rocks placed throughout, but it is mostly um a soil or natural material creek bottom through there.

Um another great benefit of these riffles is that they will hopefully filter the material that material as it moves through, but um the the pools there are are a really important element.

So the goal being that not only will these and let me let me pull up a good photo of where you can kind of see these two or three and here in a throw here, is that not only will it give the water a place to be detained and and stored, but when it it does move on to the riffles, hopefully any erosion that that or any soil that that water was carrying will have a chance to be deposited back into the bottom.

Um so it I before there was water in it, I was a little bit like, wow, this looks funky, it's all these, you know, well-designed riffles and then just a big patch of you know, kind of a big dirt hole.

Um, but the way that it's playing out, you do really do see improved water quality actually in the pools themselves through the riffles and then into the next pool.

Wait, wait till the kids find your well-designed riffles and start making dams out of them.

We'll see how that goes.

But they're um I I the photos don't do it justice, but uh everything in this project, including the log structures that you see here at the bottom, are pretty kid-proof.

They're well set into the ground, these logs are anchored into the ground.

Um the rocks are, you know, there's some large rocks that are placed in there.

It's not, you know, the typical little river rock.

There is some of that.

Um, but this mix that was specially designed, um, the riffles hopefully aren't going anywhere.

Um I think we're in I think we're in good shape.

I'm excited to see some dams though.

Um so this uh this is kind of a weird question, but so you have, you know, riffles and then big open spaces like ecology wise for the animals, I don't know how many animals actually live in the creek.

Is that okay to have those big open spaces?

I think before it was lots of rocks, right?

So you had fish and maybe crayfish and things under there.

Is is this okay?

The new setup for supporting life that might be in the creek?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

There's not a ton of life every now and then.

I mean, it's rumored that people pull a fish out of Belmont Creek every now and then.

Um, but the the goal of this project, and the great thing about this natural creek restoration is that the designer tried as close as possible to mimic the natural channel of a creek bottom.

So if the animals do take interest in the habitat space that the creek has to offer, that it's usable to them.

Um so there was definitely a large biological study element to part of this project, and it was a very important consideration in the design.

Excellent.

And then one more question, this should be easy.

Um after all the planting is done, and um assuming that it takes roots, how long till it looks filled in and more mature?

Like five years till it kind of everything is filled in, or is it can we expect it to be a little faster?

I think it'll be quicker than that that you'll see.

I mean, these are these plants that are being placed, um, something that, you know, the plants that were there before were kind of it was kind of a hodgepodge of non-native species, in some cases, species that didn't even particularly like to be close to a creek in that kind of riparian environment.

Um so the plants that are being placed are really designed to thrive and take off in that environment.

Um things like willows, which if you can kind of see these small little, maybe have a better photo of it.

The the creek bank is just dotted with willow plantings now, which those will probably see meaningful growth within one to two years, along with most of the plants.

So it'll be really cool to see how it flourishes.

Um, but I I I think that really within a year or two, you will see some meaningful vegetation out there so long as the deers don't eat it all.

Hopefully you can do a time lapse or something so you can see it all grow and and fill in over time.

We we did we do have a time lapse.

Um it it hasn't been finished yet because we're still in construction, but we do have a time lapse of construction up till now that we're very excited to share.

And if there's any you know, amateur time lapsers or professional time lapsers out there who will want to uh help us with the next phase, that would be great.

Awesome.

Okay, before we move on to um commissioner comments.

Are there any new public comments or questions?

Yep.

Okay, so let's do commissioner comments.

I don't have anything.

I don't have anything more, no.

Okay, uh yeah, thanks again.

I'm big on signage, and so thinking about how to explain things and really bringing everyone who visits to kind of like make them aware not just what this is, but kind of how it impacts you know the whole city and everything that you talked about, like how to capture that, and you know, did you know the stuff runs underground for a while before it goes out?

And so a lot to maybe think about to put there, and so maybe in and ideally there's a little bit of a teaser assignage and something online, like a QR code that you could kind of explain more or link to things, and so I know there's a lot temporary, like how do you make that permit and yeah, yeah, absolutely.

So we have um throughout construction, we've had this sign, which you can see our city manager here for scale, this large sign posted right at the front.

We are currently in the design process and we'll be ordering some interpretive signage for kind of right at the center of the project, right adjacent to the creek to tell the Belmont Creek story, the story of this project, and what are the design elements?

What is what was the aim of this project and and what is there to look forward to?

So it'll definitely be something that we'll be turning our attention to more, and the gears are already spinning in that way.

Yeah, and maybe to the extent you can if there's little tidbits that are like human scale type things.

Like, how much like how do you relate to it from you know, body height or bathtub kind of contents and things like that?

Absolutely.

Probably what you don't want in the creek, but let's just say magically it's environmentally friendly.

Are there any kind of you know, you always see these kind of like duck races or paper boat races and things?

Is there something that if you do it right that there is a segment that you even really upstream you could start that kind of could maybe it's magical, compostable, decomposable types of things?

I don't think a particularly deep vessel would make it through these riffles, but there is meaningful flow through them.

So there could be some very cool, you know, we're we're part of why we're so excited to turn this project this area back over to the community is to see what comes of it.

I think things like that are totally feasible with the way it's built out today.

Maybe not in summer when we get our really low flows, but this time of year, absolutely.

Um so it'll be really interesting to you, and and you're regardless of the riffles, there's also just some meaningful long, you know, close bordering a hundred feet kind of throws of pond throughout the the creek now as well, too.

So um, yeah, bring on the boat races.

Or something like the city could have a fun little I'll challenge Bridget.

I I take that silence.

Um the other uh going down.

I mean, my kids are older, but we would go down down there quite a lot.

Are you are there spots where it's you know we walked a bit?

And so will you have, hey, don't go further than here or some type of markings to know really where you should be kind of.

There won't be, there won't be, to my knowledge, signs posted actually in the channel kind of saying no access beyond this point.

When you're out there, it's pretty clear the areas that are intended just because it goes from nice and flat to more stable stable creek bank.

Um and of course, during rain events, this access may be limited as well, too.

But um I know there was planning documents that maybe showed something like a trail at the bottom of the creek that wasn't it that wasn't implemented as a part of this project, but there really is meaningful improved access.

And even if it's um, you know, there are areas that are safe accessible for most folks.

Um and if you're more adventurous, you know, part of this improved stability of this is you can absolutely you know take a walk up the creek still too.

So we encourage people to get down there, enjoy the areas, but also get out and play beyond it if you're feeling a little more adventurous.

Cool.

Do you think I mean would you offer something to the schools for field trips or something to have you talked about that?

We've been thinking a lot about that.

Um, and again, it's a it's part of you know um part of our our grant requirement too, is you know, throughout the project keeping people engaged, and after the project, what are you gonna do to keep people engaged?

Various volunteering efforts that we've been talking about, field trips, group visits, things of that sort.

We're really excited to start turning our attention towards that and away from construction.

Cool.

And then the last maybe there's a way to kind of unlike either playground to kind of have a little bit of signage or how to kind of encourage that type of don't just say here, kind of you know, invite like more of an open invitation to nature.

Yeah, absolutely.

The the playground on the south side of the channel has one of my favorite views of the entire project where you can look down and kind of see around the first two bends of the project eastward of the bridge.

So I think there's so many great opportunities for for information outreach related to this project.

I will be considering awesome.

Thanks again.

Yeah.

Uh I just love how much you love this project.

I love this project.

It comes across.

It's great.

I'm very excited.

It's wonderful.

Yeah, no other no other comments from me.

I'm a little spiteful, though.

The red ribbon cutting um is happening while I'm in school, so can't come.

I don't know.

I I'll be like in Spanish or something.

But uh Field trip.

Yeah.

I mean, like the the outreach to schools-wise, uh my AP environmental science teacher always uses like Belmont as examples for like different topics we're studying, so like if there's any like possibility to get in contact with Carlmont, that would be cool.

Also, we have like BTI kids who are like the biotech kids, like they do labs and stuff all the time with like actual like ecology stuff, so that would probably be a good idea.

I don't know, just throwing it out there.

Absolutely.

This project in in so many different ways is going to make a fascinating case study for for various groups and interests.

So we would absolutely love to get groups like that engaged.

Yeah, thank you.

Um so I have to say when I the pictures and I was one of those people looking over the fence as well the whole time.

And it the project is so much bigger than uh more dramatic than I was imagining.

And obviously I've seen all the presentations, but still it took me by surprise.

But it looks it's looks fantastic.

Um I'm really excited to be able to get in there and actually interact with it and see it.

And I have young kids, so I'm I'm very curious to see how the kids and the deer interact with it in unexpected and unanticipated ways.

So that'll be fun to watch.

Um and I'm glad it does it does look as far as I remember that you did extend it a little bit from the original project.

I don't think the original one for the first phase was supposed to go around the bend to where the kids enter the creek right past the bridge, and now it it does.

So that's it's nice that now the areas that seem to be highly utilized are part of the areas that have been redone.

So hopefully the community really can get in there and interact with it.

Yeah, the the portion that was extended, um the portion on this side near the bridge remained remained approximately the same.

Um the portion that was extended, I don't have a photo of is actually closer to the playground on the east side of the park.

Um that was done as you may know we have this detention basin project that's kind of in brewing in the background.

Well, a portion of that project is um a mitigation requirement that okay, you want to build this big underground facility.

Well, we're gonna need you to do some restoration in a riparian or creek environment.

Well, we had just the project for that.

So um the extension about about approximately between 50 and 100 feet was very mindfully done to not only complement this project well and just extend this project, but also meet the requirements of that future project.

So if you walk down that new kind of unimproved or um informal path on the south side of the creek, you can see where it was extended, and really that extension I think makes it a much better final product.

Yeah, it looks lovely.

So hopefully we'll all be able to, most of us will be able to go to the ribbon cutting and enjoy it.

So thank you for your presentation.

We are all very excited about this, and and like you said, we're very excited.

I'm very excited that you're excited about it.

It's really you brought it to life for us, so thank you.

Can I just add a couple of comments too?

So excellent presentation as always.

I I agree, he's so excited about it.

I love giving him opportunities to share this.

Um fun fact um is where the logs go into the ground.

Um, I think they go 20 some feet into the ground, kind of back into the ground, and and some of them are vertical and they go about eight feet down.

So when Daniel was saying, you know, these these logs aren't going anywhere, they're not going anywhere.

So I thought that was kind of a fright.

There you go.

So um, so I thought that was a fun fact.

Um, also uh, as Daniel mentioned, right?

We've been able to kind of improve the pathway on the south side of the creek, made that made that safer.

You know, there were some places where not only did the creek bank slough, but the fence that had been there had also sloughed down into the into the creek.

So we have a much safer passage there now, which is great for everybody.

It has also inspired us to do some more fuel reduction on that side of the um of the park and going up that hillside, and we'll continue to do more of that.

And when that opens up, it's like we have another park.

I mean, we have much more usable space now.

And in the Redwood area, if you'll see it after the ribbon cutting, with all those eucalyptus trees gone.

Um we have some new spaces that we couldn't really consider before.

And I don't think even when we did the Twin Pines Master Plan in 2018, I certainly couldn't even envision really what that would look like with those eucalyptus trees gone.

Now they're gone, and it's gonna be um, it's gonna be incredible.

It's kind of a whole new canvas for us to think about um how to use those spaces.

Um, and as far as how our kids going to use it and try it, uh I know that the CampSore kids of summer 2026 are gonna be super excited to be our you know, our product testers of that and show us what's working and what's not uh out there.

So it's really a great project.

Yeah, just thanks again to parks, and this is really a I think this project is a testament to you know the power of collaboration between parks, public works, and our like if you list out all of the stakeholders for this project, and just in terms of organizations, I think it's like past 20 at this point, people at the table, so discussing and making this project happen every day.

So fantastic.

Well, thank you.

Yeah, that's it.

Thank you.

Okay, well, next up on the agenda item C is the open space volunteer update.

Volunteer update.

That's not this much.

Oh no.

No, just got um yeah, I don't see it here.

Here, hold on.

Sorry, Bridget.

I transitioned very quickly and put pressure on you to find things quickly.

I don't see it cute up there.

Oh, you didn't get it.

Whoopsie.

Um how do we do this now?

It's not sure.

Um, why don't we why don't we do this?

We'll do the other ones first and we'll see what we can figure out.

Okay, I don't want to point to grab it.

Okay.

So you want to go here?

All right.

Amory's gonna solve this.

I thought it was in the commission presentation.

So do you want to come back to this item or would you like to do a verbal update now?

Or what would you like to do?

Well, let's kind of stay with the order.

Let's see if it's here.

Okay, well, I guess we'll do that item in December.

There we go.

That's okay.

It's not here on the uh existence in the looks like we'll move the open space volunteer update to the December agenda.

Although if there's anything pressing you think we need to know, you could always uh address it in the department updates, which would move us on to item D, which is Belmont's centennial celebration update.

Okay, uh all right.

So just wanted to give uh the commission and the community an update on uh where we are with our centennial planning because it's gonna be 2026 before we know it.

Um so again, what we've done today, we've got a steering committee of um uh a few city staff members and then a city event committee that um is small but mighty, and uh we hope to engage more of the um of city staff once we kind of have our uh have tightened up exactly what events are happening when so that people kind of know what they're signing up for.

Um and we've done the branding, um, as you've seen or seen before.

This is our um City of Belmont logo.

You're gonna see that everywhere in town um uh throughout 2026.

We have done some public surveys and outreach asking for uh feedback and ideas.

We have a website, Belmont.gov slash 100 years that has a lot of information and will continue to sort of be our dynamic um information portal for um information going out to the community and opportunity for the community to um to give us feedback on that website.

We do have community event applications.

Um that's for anybody in the community that wants to host any kind of a um centennial type event.

It doesn't need to be open to the whole community or anything, it can just be your neighborhood or or a certain group of people if you wanted to have a little bit of a centennial flair.

Um, let us know what your idea is, and um we do have some funds to provide a modest stipend.

We're not gonna provide a personalized drone show for anybody in town, but um, but we do want to support some of these kind of little neighborhood um gatherings and events.

We know that there are some parts of town that have uh really interesting history, interesting architecture, that sort of thing.

And if somebody wants to curate something again for a small group of folks, um they don't need to bring all 26,000 uh members of the Belmont community um to their event.

We're happy to support those things.

So uh again, this is the logo, and these are some images of the banners that are gonna be up and down Ralston Avenue all of next year.

And a couple of things that's um that are happening.

Um, first of all, the signature event.

We've now kind of um put a pin in that and are gonna have an event on October 24th, 2026, and it will be a picnic at Twin Pines Park.

Um we had been debating different locations, we weren't sure what was gonna happen with the detention basin project or with um the Notre Dame campus and that sort of thing.

So finally um the the skies, the clouds have parted, and um we have we can see clearly we're gonna do this in October.

The water dog run is about a month before in Twin Pines Park, and um, and so we picked um this Saturday in October.

It's close to the official birthday of the city, which will be October 29th, but we didn't want to combine trunk Retreat and boobash and centennial all on one day.

So um October 24th is the event at Twin Pines Park.

There is still some discussion about um about some kind of a parade or something like that down part of Ralston, maybe to kind of bring people to Twin Pines Park for this event.

All that is still TBD.

Then we're gonna be doing branding at our usual annual city events, Earth Day, Egg Adventure Hunt, National Night Out, et cetera.

We'll be doing tabling at our co-sponsored events, celebrate the music, the water dog run, the summer concerts, and there are discussions with the Belmont Community Foundation about what type of events they might be hosting next year.

Citywide branding is going to be light pole banners and the Ralston Avenue banner across Ralston.

And we I don't I didn't put it on here, but we are also going to have a swag shop open for the community to sort of purchase their own sort of customized items with the city logo.

So rather than us having in you know boxes of t-shirts that nobody wants or something like that, we're gonna let people get the mug or the hat or the tote bag or the blanket or whatever they want, right?

Anything you want, we will print it.

So um and the and then the community can get what they want.

So then we also have um sort of a nod to obviously Belmont's history and culture, and um we do have historic articles.

Um those are gonna be reappearing in our um in our weekly updates.

Um we are gonna be having some tours around town.

We've got um a community member that has stepped up, um, she's got an interest in and she's studying um GIS.

What is GIS stand for?

IQ and the information.

Okay, there we go.

Um, and um, and I gave her about 30 ideas of things she could do.

I don't know if she's gonna um do all 30, but she's gonna pick a couple and maybe provide some um tours, kind of tour maps, gonna work with the historical society, and um we might be able to do some guided tours and also some self-guided tours throughout town to highlight the Belmont history.

Um also um the Belmont History Museum is collaborating with the San Mateo County History Museum and is gonna have a display in Redwood City in the County uh County History Museum Rotunda.

Um we'll be putting together and working with our indigenous peoples um communities to get an acknowledgement together that will be a fitting thing in Twin Pines Park, maybe have an unveiling at the picnic.

And we are uh gonna be doing storytelling with residents.

We're gonna be host an event in December at the library where people will come in and sort of have their uh sort of do a podcast recording where they can tell a story about their um experiences and their growing up in Belmont or moving to Belmont or fun facts.

Um so we already have a few people queued up for that.

If you know anybody that you think has an interesting story, please um let me know or have them get in touch with me.

Um so we'll be doing that in December and then probably again in February.

And in February, we're thinking we're gonna bring the audio equipment to the senior center so that we can get some of our regular seniors, some of whom are 100 years old or older, um, to tell their stories.

Then we've got some creative projects, a time capsule that's um we plan to inter probably in front of City Hall during the picnic day, a community art project, and then uh repainting hydrants and utility boxes, and then having a video recap of all these different um celebrations.

So, how is this gonna be funded?

Uh, we do have some budget uh allocated for this this year and a little bit next year as well, but we are looking for um grants.

Um we're offering grants to local groups, as I mentioned, but we are also looking for sponsorships from the community, and uh do want to do a shout out to our early sponsors, uh Crippen and Flynn Funeral Home, Jacqueline Court Orthodonics, and McGovern Insurance.

So every little bit helps, so we are very grateful for that.

Uh here are the different sponsorship tiers that uh that we are offering.

So, and with each one, each successive tier has a little more swag or a little more um higher level of recognition.

So, next steps are um again, we're gonna be kicking off in December or early January, putting the banners on Ralston Avenue, and we um that will kind of be the big ta-da for the community.

We're gonna be implementing the events throughout 2026 and are working to to finalize the the fall um city event plans.

This does not happen um with a small group.

This happens with lots of partnerships, lots of volunteers, and lots of community engagement.

So again, if anybody in the community is interested in participating, um they can um let us know through the Belmont.gov slash 100 years website, and um we'll be happy to um put them on the team.

That is all.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Um are there any public comments or questions?

No, there is not.

Okay.

So we can do comments and questions together.

Let's start this.

Okay.

Um advocating for a parade.

I really want the parade to happen.

It sounds exciting.

Um I think it's a really good way because we've been talking like we have talked about in the past, like making everybody feel included.

I think it's a good way to make that happen.

So I'm very much advocating for a parade.

Um I can't think of any questions right now.

Um thank you for the presentation.

I'm really excited.

Great.

There was some discussion in a previous presentation about some of the other types of events that we might have, like there was something about like trying to find historical elements and building together like a path through the city to discover some of those.

Um, are you gonna happen?

Um, thanks.

That's what we're thinking here when we're talking about the historic tours.

Oh, yeah.

When we do kind of the GIS tours, yeah.

So that's where um this is.

That's one of those those are some of the ideas that you had for exactly.

Yeah, well, uh they were ideas, but they've now we now they're they're they're gonna become real because we have somebody who's interested in Belmont history and has the GIS skills to make it.

Whether it's an app or a QR code or something like that that um where it might be a self-guided tour.

Maybe occasionally we we have somebody from the Belmont Historical Society, you know, leading the tours, but yes, that's trying to make that happen.

Thank you.

Yeah, looks good.

I'm excited.

Um the each like event throughout the year, is there's not like a theme that ties everything together, right?

They're kind of like individual events that feel like standalone, like a standalone idea and it's not connected throughout.

Um you know what we don't have kind of an overarching motto or anything like that.

We did talk about that, right?

We we talked about that a little bit, but um, but don't really have anything because sometimes it's just gonna be our branding and some outreach and an opportunity to, you know, to have a birthday cake or at National Night Out or use it as an opportunity to engage with the community.

Um, cool.

Um, I the the San Mateo County History Museum um exhibit.

Is that gonna be digitized for people who can't go or so that it could stay online for like in the future?

That's a great idea.

We'll we'll find a way to kind of capture that.

That'd just be nice just if you know seniors can make it or people with really little kids.

Um I wrote down this day in Belmont history.

I don't know what I mean by it, but I thought that could be cool too.

Uh okay.

Sounds good.

I'm excited.

Thank you.

Uh well, maybe the this day some posting every day for the year.

Like what looking back, was there anything in the past hundred years that was relevant?

Yeah, yeah.

That's that would be cool.

Uh this is great.

I encourage I think the social team is uh well uh represented here.

Social media team, you mean social media team.

That's what we seem.

Yeah, to be creative with 100.

And maybe maybe there are fun little Easter eggs you could kind of put throughout the year to kind of celebrate things.

The other thing is to how to incorporate uh thoughts for the next hundred years and to make sure it's not just a look back, but a look forward.

Because there are so many things that are happening.

Um so I would just encourage trying to figure out ways to do that, or maybe there's like an idea board or what would uh digital or or or analog would be, but exciting.

Yeah, I'm I'm sure this last time I uh really support Utah's uh enthusiasm for the parade.

I think that's a fantastic idea to pull people in from the different neighborhoods and bring them down to a particular event if there's that sort of culmination of the parade.

You just want to drive that little car.

I do uh lots of horses, you know, maybe some the shriners are part of lots of parades, I don't know.

Um the marching band that stands up the Carl Mont High School marching band, the drum line that comes out for the water dog run.

We have the whole marching band leading the lots of potential, but um I'm equally excited about the the logo and the branding opportunities for them.

I'm encouraged that we have there'll be a uh uh storefront where you can purchase things because I was frustrated.

I showed this last time at sports basement where you can get a San Mateo or Redwood City hat.

There's not a Belmont hat there.

Well we that hat should be on the shelves everywhere with that patch and uh all those options.

So anyway, I'm excited about other thing I was uh uh thinking about the opportunity to support uh neighborhood or other sort of smaller community generated events uh is encouraging too.

So I'm looking forward to see what people come up with there.

Yeah, I'm I'm excited that there's a a date for the picnic because it helps schools and sports organizations everywhere to plan around that knowing that there's gonna be a big event in Twin Pines that day.

Um I was wondering if the schools have you have you gotten the schools involved at all?

Do they do they have any plans either for to incorporate history into their lessons, Belmont history, or someone to do a project on the schools in Belmont because they have a lot of history or special events are they in the loop at all with um they are.

We actually just had a meeting this morning where we where we um talked about that and just kind of kick that off with them to for this school district leadership to share that with their teachers and at the different schools, and having that to be included.

But it could be a good partnership.

We have right a lot of school districts and students and school districts and students and people who could help out.

Um I had something else, but now it's gone.

I think I got I got excited about the parade and then I started thinking about it.

I lost my questions because I was like, oh, parade would be fun.

Okay.

Uh so uh if there are no other questions or comments, um, then I think we can move on to the next agenda item.

Okay, the next one, uh uh item E.

Happy Hydrant and Utility Box Art Project Update.

I'm doing it right this time.

Yeah.

Better late than never.

Um okay, so this is about the uh happy hydrant program.

So uh as you recall or um in 1976, I think, for this for the nation's bicentennial and the um city of Belmont's 75th 50th anniversary, excuse me.

Um uh many hydrants were painted throughout town, and they were painted in uh most of them were painted with sort of a historical flair, sort of in different garbs of um different iterations of continental soldier uniforms.

Um and obviously some of them have gotten a little faded over time.

Um so we reached out to midpen water and said, hey, can we repaint some hydrants?

Um since then, hydrant painting um requirements and restrictions have have gotten a little tighter, and so rather than painting as many as were painted back in 1976, the water district gave us permission to paint 24 hydrants along some along Ralston and some along Alameda Dels Pulgas.

And there were requirements on uh types of paint and how much black could be used and that sort of thing with those guidelines.

Um we put out an application for folks to submit um uh designs.

We did indicate that it was um for the um, you know, in celebration of Belmont Centennial.

Um a lot of the submission we didn't get 24 submissions.

Um we got 11, a total of 11.

Um and um some of them have a nod to Belmont's history, uh, but most of them do not.

Um, and um there was some discussion about that with the uh committee of subcommittee of um commissioners, um Emkin and Cunha, and some of the um members of the uh arts and history community in Belmont.

Um but the decision was made ultimately that um the committee did want to recommend that we move forward with all 11 uh designs.

Um they'll be scattered throughout uh town on Ralston and Alameda.

And um I think I'll just add my two cents in here.

I think you know Belmont has changed in 50 years in these last 50 years, right?

The demographics have changed, and not everyone here is aware of and familiar with Belmont's history, but they do still want to celebrate Belmont, and they want to uh give a nod to Belmont's love of art and and visual arts and color and nature and that sort of thing.

So that's sort of an intro to the submissions that we got here.

So here's one uh about time.

This one actually uh is a nod to um some of the stained glass work at Notre Dame Duniamir Chapel.

Uh this one um is looking to the future.

It does have a little more black than uh midpen would allow.

So we would need to change that to a darker blue color.

But if if that happened, it would be acceptable to Midpen.

Here's another one.

A little button nature and a monster or a unicorn.

Not sure.

This is a nod to our little um the little kiosk on Ralston.

Uh no, excuse me, on Alameda Dels Pogus, the former sales office for the Belmont Country Club uh properties.

Um, and here's one with again celebrating nature, deer, um, flowers.

Here's something celebrating music.

There we go.

A little more nature.

Oh, nice.

Did you do?

There we go.

This is highlighting where these are going to be throughout Belmont.

So on behalf of the subcommittee, subcommittee's recommendation and putting this forth for uh approval of these um the original agenda set eight hydrants, but we did get three late submissions, and we're hoping to get approval for all of those today so that we can move forward with getting those painted.

Uh, any comments or questions?

Yeah, so the one that's another project that I'm really enthusiastic about.

It's a unique element to Belmont.

Um for those additional hydrants that we originally had permission to paint.

Can we sort of reserve those for future projects?

And if we have, let's say someone sees this and gets excited about doing it.

Can they can we do sort of one at a time kind of piecemeal?

Um we probably want to do them in batches because midpen has to go out and kind of prep the hydrants, and we don't want to do onesie twosies on that.

Um, but yes, I certainly think that once the banners go up on Ralston and and we do a you know that 2026 push, we can we'll do another round of applications and um and can lean a little more into the history, it'll make a little more sense to folks once we're in our centennial year.

So I expect we'll get a little more um historical response then.

Thank you.

Um if we do get more, or even if it's these 11, it'd be need to have like a map or like uh, you know, something that if people wanted to go out and see them at some point, it would be nice to go check it out.

Perfect, we will do that.

When will this when will they be painted?

Um so we need to give midpen about a month to do all the prepping, and then we'll give the um artists the go-ahead, and they'll have a month or two to paint them.

So early next year.

Um thank you for the map that showed where the application ones are located because that's very helpful to see.

They're nicely spread out, but there's still lots of ones to choose from if people want to do one close to their house.

And I think if we're promoting it later using one of the designs like Cameron's design that has more of a historical bent might be good for showing people, I found that looking at the designs very inspiring.

Um, seeing what other people come up with made me want to do one.

And so I think maybe seeing some designs might take it from some kind of abstract thing to like, look, this is what a design looks like, and this is a historical design, and it's beautiful.

So yes, hopefully we'll get more interest in the centennial year when people uh understand the project better.

Um okay, so it sounds like we need uh a motion to approve the current designs for these for this project.

Someone like to make a motion.

All motion.

Second.

Commissioner Lee.

Yes.

Commissioner Michaels.

Yes.

Commissioner Whitmore.

Yes.

Commissioner Hill.

Yes.

Chair Emkin.

Yes.

Motion passes five and oh.

Okay.

Um item F, winter 2026 meeting schedule.

So, um, we kind of do this every year because January comes up so quickly after the holidays, and um, because we have a holiday closure, um, uh it necessitates uh moving the meeting, and then if we just move the January meeting and keep the February meeting as is, then we've got two pretty scrunched back to back meetings.

So um the proposal is to consolidate January and February into one single meeting on January 21st.

My first and 22nd.

Uh it said January 21st.

Oh, sorry.

Which is a Wednesday.

Yeah.

Okay.

It's the third Wednesday in January.

So we would just need a motion to make that happen.

If that if that works for their commitment, uh so right now the proposal is January consolidating the two meetings, January, February into a single meeting and January 21st.

Would everyone who's present be able to do that?

Do we know if the commissioners who aren't here?

Do we know if that date works for them at all?

I did not hear from them on that.

I think we'll have to decide without them.

Okay, does would someone like to make a motion to consolidate those two meetings into a single meeting on January 21st?

I move that we consolidate the January and February meetings on the 21st.

Second.

Commissioner Lee?

Yes, Commissioner Michaels.

Yes.

Commissioner Whitmore.

Yes.

Commissioner Hare.

Uh Chair Emkin.

Yes.

Motion passes five and oh.

Great.

Okay, on top of we're still December 3rd, right?

Yes, yes.

Still December meeting, just the January and February are now a single meeting.

Um, okay, other business updates.

Department updates.

It's been a busy month for the department.

That's a fun activity.

It's been a busy month.

Yeah.

I guess every month seems like it's been a busy month.

Yeah.

October 2026 is gonna be big one.

Yep, yeah.

Did I mess it up for you?

Sorry.

No.

Seems like forever ago.

Um, but we had our final movies in the park at Barrett.

Um, we watched Shrek uh Footsteps Interact Club, they helped um with concessions.

They went through the crowd and sold different snacks and stuff to everyone.

Um it was actually one of our best turnouts at Barrett, even though it was very cold, but it was a good night.

Um this year we had our traditional high school fair, but then it also morphed into a college fair as well.

So we had um around 20 schools, including high schools, um, community colleges and colleges around the area, um, speaking with our local middle schoolers and high schoolers um to give them more information to prepare.

Then a couple days later we had our Jawali celebration um at the senior center.

I was not there, but it looked very crowded, very busy.

Um we had a huge schedule throughout the day.

Yeah, okay.

Um we had a very stacked schedule.

We had people reaching out from reaching out to us for weeks and weeks um wanting to be part of the event, so it was really cool to see the community um coming together and growing this event with us.

Okay, okay.

Then last week we had our trunk retreat.

Um, it was very busy, very crazy.

Um, it was great weather, we had a great turnout from everyone, um, a lot of creativity with all the different trunks that we had going on.

We also had um the boobash portion of it as well with the haunted house.

Um, we had music and food trucks, so it was a really good um turnout for all of that.

And then here's our staff photo.

I'll show that.

Our theme was inside out.

Um, so we all dress up as different characters, um, and little kids were following us around all night and super excited.

So that was fun, very warm, but it was fun.

Um, and then we are having commission openings um coming up.

So if people want to reply, or if anyone out there would like to apply, we're gonna have the two um youth commissioner positions and then how many?

Oh, I don't have that number.

Two or three?

I don't know.

But they'll be openings.

Um, so the you can either apply online, um, stop by the city clerk office or give us a call, and um applications are live already, and then some upcoming stuff.

We have the Veterans Day celebration next Tuesday.

Um, that will be in the park at the Memorial.

Um, letter Susanta.

We are already accepting letters um now until December 8th.

So letters need to either be dropped off to our office or postmarked by December 8th, and we have the big Santa's mail outside of our office.

Um we have our holiday craft fair on November 22nd.

Uh, vendors are very excited.

We sold out in like the first 10 minutes of registration, so they are ready to go.

Um, and then as mentioned earlier, we have the ribbon cutting ceremony on December 3rd, and then our winter wonderland workshop will be taking place on December 6th.

Registration is required, but it is free.

Um, and that will be at the Twin Pines Lodge.

It's just um an afternoon for kids to do some different crafts.

You can also write your letters to Santa there, and it's just a big, you know, winter celebration day.

And then our Santa at the firehouse is on December 11th.

The sensory event is at 5 p.m., and registration is required for that just so that we know who will be joining us.

Um, and then the traditional event begins at 5:30.

Um, people that join us for the sentry event are more than welcome to stay for the entire event, but that's just a portion for them to have a more calm experience um with Santa and everything like that.

That's all I have.

Um I'll add um a few other things.

When is our activity guide is coming out at the end of November?

Yes, and registration opens December 2nd.

All right.

And um, it was clear.

Okay, um, uh, yeah.

If you haven't attended a movie in the park, I encourage you to do that.

I actually brought my um adult uh daughter and son-in-law, and we all watch Shrek together and they knew the whole movie by heart, and it was super fun.

We got burritos uh across the street in Cromwell Shopping Center, and it was a it was a really nice um evening, so not just for young kids.

Um, and I'll just again uh uh emphasize what Anne Marie said about the Diwali event.

It really was a community-driven program this year, and we moved, we had a um, rather than focusing just on traditional um Indian dances and and music, um, we also introduced some more modern performances and shorter performances, and it was fabulous.

The entire MUR was packed the entire time, and just such beautiful um music and culture and uh community, and it's really it's us delivering our mission of enhancing the quality of life.

We got a lot of appreciation from the community for making that space available, and um again the goal on those kinds of events is we're happy to provide the space.

Um, but um the community might know best what sort of programming uh and agenda they want to have, and so we were very grateful for community's input on that.

Lunar New Year is gonna be on February 8th, and similarly, we ask for community input and ideas.

We're already getting some, but uh we can always welcome more.

People can volunteer, people can offer up to perform or um share some information or donate donate um food or something like that.

We're we welcome it all.

Uh, and that's all.

That's all I have.

Are there any comments or questions?

I have a quick question.

For a Senate at the firehouse, are people encouraged to bring an unwrapped gift?

Am I remembering that correctly?

Yes, it's not required to come to the event, but we heavily would like it.

And would is there going to be snow this year?

Yes.

I always have to ask because I love the snow.

Okay.

Does anybody else have any comments or questions?

Okay.

Uh item B.

Commissioner, questions and comments.

Everyone.

I know that there's construction down there.

I've heard a lot about it and just thought maybe there would some update on the side.

Thank you.

Yes.

Rain doesn't help because sometimes when there's rain, as we found in the Belmont Creek project, when there's rain, sometimes we have to stop work for anywhere between 24 and 72 hours.

But even with that, the intent is for Salzon Trail to be reopened by Thanksgiving.

So people can take their pre or post Thanksgiving meal walk on Salsa and Trail from end to end.

So we're we're really excited about having that be reopened.

Thanks.

No, I saw your email about the um construction fencing that we're having a problem with down there around the construction site.

Yeah.

Um we do need um hikers and bikers to not mess with the construction fencing.

It's up there for a reason, and some of it is to keep people out uh for their own safety.

Some of the fencing is actually specially designed fencing to keep dusky-footed wood rats from coming into the construction area, and um uh because when we encounter a dusky-footed we're gonna get there, all the work has to stop, and the um the animal has to be relocated, and all of that just kind of takes time and causes delays.

So it's not just a simple fence.

Um, it's it's a lot more complicated than that, and we really do uh need the community to stay out of the fenced area.

Um I have a question.

I'm not sure if if you're the right person to ask, but I will anyway.

Um the meals that they serve at the senior center on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday that are uh subsidized, I think by the county.

Is that funding still in place during the government shutdown?

That's all so they're still getting the meals, everything's fine, or is it something that's at risk?

That's a very good question.

Yes, we're continuing our meals.

Okay, no problems with that.

Yeah, just wanted to check.

Um, if there are no other questions, then um can I just add one other thing that I heard at an at another meeting today, and you just reminded me.

Um I wasn't aware of this before.

Samaritan House, which we're all familiar with in the county.

Um Samaritan House provides a lot of um food and support to our community, and especially now when the need is greater, um, they are getting a lot of donations from the community, they can always take more.

The school districts when they have extra um meals, they deliver them to Samaritan House, so that's all great.

Um because of the shutdown and some folks maybe not getting paid right now if they are having trouble paying their rent.

Um, you can go to Samaritan House and just ask for um short-term rental support, which I thought was a great thing that I didn't know about.

So I just want to make sure the community knew that.

Thank you.

It's really important to get that information out there.

So thank you.

I didn't know that either.

Okay.

Well, with that, this meeting is adjourned.

All right.