All right, and with that, we will adjourn the special meeting and we'll call to order our regular meeting for May 12th, 2026.

Will you please call the role?

Yeah, Councilmember Zakino here, Leary, here, Rohrerbach, Kerr, and Rathel.

Here.

And Kozlowski is absent.

Thank you.

If you'll please stand with me for the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation under God, indivisible, liberty, and justice for all.

And do we have any updates to the agenda this evening?

Yes, Mayor, we have an additional information transmitted for the public hearing, which is agenda item number 10.

We have two letters that have been transmitted to the council, and there are additional copies on the back table for the public.

Thank you so much.

And now's the time where we do business from the floor.

If you're here tonight to address the council on any unagendized items, you can come on up.

You'll get three minutes to address the council.

This is just on unagendized items tonight.

Anyone from Business from the Floor going once?

Going twice.

Sold.

Business from the floor.

All right, perfect.

We will move on to scheduled presentations.

Please call item number one.

Item number one is a proclamation of the mayor proclaiming May 17th to the 23rd as National Public Works Week, declaring May 20th as City Works Day, and recognizing public works as emergency responders.

There we go.

There we go.

All right.

Who wants to hold our proclamation here?

Lindsay?

All right, perfect.

All right.

Tonight we have uh Rebecca Neves, our public works director, uh Jennifer Tio, our management analyst, and Lindsay Markets, our administrative assistant for public works, accepting our proclamation.

So thank you all for being here.

Uh our proclamation of the mayor of the city of Folsom proclaiming May 17th to 23rd, 2026 is National Public Works Week.

Uh recognizing public works as emergency responders and recognizing May 20th, 2026 as City Works Day.

So whereas public works professionals focus on facilities, infrastructure, and services that are of vital importance to sustainable and resilient communities and to the public health, high quality of life, and well-being of the people of the state of California and the residents of the city of Folsom.

And whereas public works professionals play a vital role in disasters and other emergencies and are often considered the silent arm of public safety, working diligently, often without fanfare, to support emergency response partners regardless of the hazard.

Public works maintenance and operation staff are among the most visible and essential elements during the response and recovery phases of disasters.

They assist with rescue, evacuation, flood control, and sheltering, provide temporary traffic control and perimeter security, transport critical supplies and equipment, and restore damage infrastructure, making their broad capabilities a critical component in nearly every type of disaster or emergency.

And whereas the year 2026 marks the 66th annual National Public Works Week, sponsored by the American Public Works Association, with the theme Service Powered by Community, reflecting the strong connection between public works teams and the residents they serve, as well as the collaborative interdependent partnership shared with police, fire, and other emergency service partners.

And whereas City Works Day, taking place on May 20th, 2026 at City Lyons Park, invites residents of all ages to engage with and learn about the interconnected public works services that support daily life in Folsom and to repeat to meet the professionals who work collaboratively to protect and serve the community.

Now, therefore, I, Justin Rathel, Mayor of the City of Folsom, on behalf of the Folsom City Council, do hereby proclaim the week of May 17th to 23rd as National Public Works Week, and May 20th as City Works Day in the City of Folsom, encouraging all residents to participate in the educational activities and events, honoring the indispensable contributions of public works professionals and their collaboration as emergency responders alongside and in support of police and fire and safeguarding public health, safety, and quality of life.

Let's give these folks a round of applause.

Hey.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Council, for recognizing uh National Public Works Week and City Works Day.

Uh we just want to invite all of you and the entire community to come join us May 20th at City Lions Park.

Attendees will be able to look at approximately 35 booth vehicles and city equipment displays.

And we expect about 2,000 attendees.

So this year's theme is uh service powered by community.

And you may notice we don't have any of our amazing public works staff up here.

It's because they're all in bed.

6:30 is past their bedtime.

So they're up quite early.

But I just, in all sincerity, I just really wanted to uh not only thank um our first responders and police and fire, but also our team in public works who works alongside with them in emergencies.

Um it really can't be understated some of the value and and how they are able to keep the community moving when unsightly things happen, when we have uh calls about down trees, uh blocking roads, flooding.

Um, this happened to be my favorite one.

This was our this last Christmas, actually.

So we had a couple of uh gentlemen who had just opened their brand new um Christmas gift and did not want to get their new sweater and pants dirty.

So they did have to go and get some slickers on instead.

But uh we had just kind of an example of some of the work that our teams do out in the field, and just uh really wanted to, you know, highlight the the good work that they do.

Um, you know, a lot of folks are uh, you know, when the storm comes in, that's when our folks are heading out, where most people are heading in for shelter.

And so um, just when you see them, you know, uh wave at them and and say thank you.

That's you know, just they love serving this community and they love serving all of you.

So thank you for your patience and your care and your support of our public works team.

So that's all.

Thank you so much, Public Works.

We appreciate you guys.

And please pass that along to all the folks that couldn't be here this evening.

Uh next item, please.

Okay.

Your second item this evening is the annual presentation by the Sacramento Yolo Mosquito and Vector Control District regarding the regional mosquito and vector management efforts.

And if you're standing in the back, we do have a few open seats up front.

You're welcome to grab uh if you're on the edge and you could, if you have seats in the middle, if you can move in and make everyone feel welcome, we really would appreciate it this evening.

Hang on, I'll get it.

I know it's nice to sit on the edge so you could run whenever uh the meeting's over, but it we if we can make everybody feel welcome, that's awesome.

Thank you all for doing that.

Great.

Well, thank you, City Council members, for having me, Mayor.

Uh, my name's Steve Ramos.

I am an assistant manager with Sackyolo Mosquito and Vector Control District, and I'm back out here again to talk to you about why mosquito control matters.

So, once again, thank you for having me.

Um, our district is a dual county district.

We service both Sacramento and Yolo County.

Um, there's about 60 districts like us, very similar to us up and down the state of California, typically located around urban areas, um, more populated areas.

Uh so tonight just wanted to talk about you know what our mission is, kind of remind the folks uh here in the audience who are all here to see my presentation, of course, and uh the city council uh you know our mission is to protect public health.

And we do that uh by providing safe, effective and economical mosquito and vector control.

Really, what does that mean?

It means we want to have the folks within our community enjoy their community, be able to enjoy their backyard barbecues, enjoy you know their late-night walks or working in their garden.

Um, and mosquitoes can be a big, you know, damper on that.

Not only can they bug you, they bite, make people itch, some people are allergic to them, but of course, there is also the concern for diseases that they can carry and transmit as well.

So that is our main mission is to go out there and control these mosquitoes so they're not impacting your life.

Um, this is timely because mosquito season is really just starting now.

We just had some late rains.

The weather today was beautiful as well as was yesterday, nice and warm.

Um, and you can see uh some of the pictures in the slide here.

These are the things that we're asking the folks uh to take a look at in their own backyards.

Uh, buckets, wheelbarrels.

I myself was walking around my backyard this weekend and found a bucket with egg graphs already uh being produced, so bad me.

Uh I dumped it though, and I'll make sure that doesn't happen again until next year.

But you know, West Nile virus is still the main concern.

It's the main threat that we deal with.

Every year it's here to stay.

It is a bird virus, so the mosquitoes feed on the bird, and then they can transmit that virus to humans.

So one of the things that we're really concerned with is you know, lowering those numbers within our urban areas so that way people aren't getting sick.

And then, of course, we have an invasive mosquito that's coming into the area.

We'll talk about that in a little bit, but that also causes concern for more exotic diseases like dengue, chikinga, and zika.

So this is just a quick overview of some of the sources that our district treats.

You know, Sacciolo, we are really what a lot of people consider a rice district.

You know, any every year we have about 40 to 50,000 acres of rice within our district.

Rice is easy to treat, it's huge, gigantic fields.

An area like Folsom is a little different, right?

We're more concerned with those urban sources like those backyard green pools, those buckets, those flower pots or bird bass, where you may not think that mosquitoes are breeding, but that's where they do, and that's where we come into play to help educate, kind of point these things out to the community and let them know what they can do to protect themselves.

So our district uses an integrated mosquito management approach, which is really a five-pronged approach, public information.

It would be our number one tool, really, is getting the word out there, letting people know we exist.

We have services that we want to offer to the community.

You may see our billboards or hear our radio ads or TV ads, or our you know, internet messages as well.

And really, that's us wanting to be a part of the community, letting them know we're here to help.

We do lots of events.

I believe we've been a longtime vendor at the Folsom Family Fun Expo.

We're doing that again this October.

Looking forward to that.

We do a lot of school presentations as well, trying to educate the youth on the mosquito life cycle, the science behind mosquitoes and how we control them.

Surveillance, we're very proud of our surveillance program.

I match it with anybody in the state or the nation for that matter.

We go out, set traps throughout the area, making sure we have an idea of how many mosquitoes are being produced in the area.

We bring those mosquitoes back, we sort them by sex and species and test them for West Nile virus and other diseases that they may carry.

That kind of points us in the direction of how we need to respond.

So that's something we're really proud of, and we continue to grow.

Biological control is our fish that we use.

Uh, those are everybody's best friends.

You could throw them in a green swimming pool, you can throw them in a pond.

They do a great job because they never stop being hungry.

They eat a lot of mosquito larva for us, they can last throughout the mosquito breeding season and sometimes even throughout the overwinter, and they're ready to go the very next season as well.

Ecological management is another arm of our district where we actually help public and uh private landowners with mosquito issues they may have on their land or property, helping them move water or uh assisting them in coming up with plans on how to not create mosquito sources on their property.

And then control operations is really a big portion of what we do.

It could be anything from our staff, which is the boots on the ground that go out and find those sources, treat those sources, the folks that are in your communities helping uh educate the public, all the way to our aerial services as well.

We have an aerial larvacide component, we have an adult control component, and we even have drones that go out now and treat sources that we just can't get to physically, but still need to be treated for mosquitoes.

And here's probably the most important slide of the night, and this is the city of Folsom, the outline uh areas.

Luckily, Folsom had a very good year last year.

We did not find any positive West Nile virus mosquito samples within the city district or within within the city limits, excuse me.

And we also had no West Nile virus positive birds.

I believe in 24 we did have one bird in the city of Folsom, City Limits, but no uh mosquito samples again.

So that's good, although you can see right on the outskirts.

We do have a couple of positive mosquito samples, and one dead bird was found last year in 2025.

The human cases that are shown here are for the state of California, uh 113 last year, which is a big decrease from 2023.

It kept going down.

Luckily, 2023 was a really bad year.

But something we like to point out with this slide is that CDC says, you know, for every neuroinvasive case uh or you know, positive human case that is reported about 30 to 70 are unreported.

So West Nile virus is severely underreported.

So just something to be aware of if you have a family member or a friend who gets that weird summer flu, and maybe they've been out and have been bit by mosquitoes, just something to consider.

Something that we are really keeping an eye on, especially here in Folsom as well, is we do have the invasive mosquitoes.

And we've been talking about this for a couple of years now.

We first discovered them or detected them rather in our district in 2019, and they have since spread throughout our district.

They are here in Folsom now.

I would say that we have a relatively small infestation, but they tend not to stay small for long.

These mosquitoes are really aggressive day biters, so they will ruin any event that you can plan.

And you know, more than just them biting and being annoying, they are a very competent vector of those diseases we mentioned before, like dengue, chickena.

Uh in California last year, there were 193 travel-related cases, um, but there were also six locally acquired cases of dengue, so that is a main concern of ours.

We have these mosquitoes, which are very competent vector of that disease.

We don't want that to start being passed around locally from these mosquito bonds.

So to combat this, we actually started using a uh innovative technique last year.

It's not new, it's been around for quite a long time, but a sterile insect technique is what we've been using, and you might remember being used like a med fly.

Um this is where we go out and we actually release sterile male mosquitoes.

Uh, male mosquitoes do not bite, they don't have mouth parts, so there is no danger of them transmitting diseases.

They can be a little bit annoying because they'll fly around, but they're not gonna bite you or make you itch.

Um, and once they mate with a female mosquito, the female mosquito will not mate with any other males.

So her progeny from that point on are no good until she is expired.

So we tried this in a very small area in South Matomas last year where we had a very high abundance of 80s egyptie and we saw tremendous results.

Um, really kept those numbers down, which lowered all of the work that we had to do out there and really gave those those residents some relief.

So, something that we're gonna probably continue to expand on as we move forward.

Uh so yeah, as we move forward, we will continue to expand our SIT in other areas that we deem that are you know uh becoming a high problematic area for ADs of chip time.

We'll continue, of course, our surveillance and control efforts.

We'll explore more outreach opportunities.

So if you have anybody who would like us to come out and give a presentation, please reach out to our district.

We'd love to do that.

Um, you know, any of the uh clubs that are in the area, local clubs, schools, that's uh helps us get our message out very much.

We of course encourage the public to report any day piety mosquitoes.

Um that those are typically those 80s Egyptian and also drain all the water on your property.

Um discard those items too because the eggs can actually persist in those items, so it might be good once you dry them to throw them away.

And then, of course, we welcome everybody to go to our website, uh which is fight the bite.net.

You can sign up for our um newsletters.

You can actually sign up for our um our surveillance um outputs, which tells you where we're doing treatments, uh, if we're doing aerial applications, you can get notifications of that through your email.

Um, and it also just gives you a lot more information on the programs that we have.

And with that, I'm done.

I tried to make it quick.

Are there any questions?

Thank you, Mr.

Ramos.

Questions?

If I could, if there are no questions for me, I'd like to actually um introduce Craig Burnett.

He's uh been representing the city of Folsom on our board for for a couple of years now.

I'm sure you guys know him.

I have one question.

Sure, sure.

I'm sorry.

Um, you know, you mentioned the fight the bite um site, and you know I signed up years ago for the notifications.

And um I'm wondering if uh that advertisement goes out to the greater community to sign up for that, because I think some people may be sensitive or concerned about chemicals you know, use in local ponds and wetlands areas.

And if there are uh things that you would recommend that people do to avoid those areas if they're concerned about some kind of exposure.

Sure, yeah.

Um one of the best things you can do is sign up for those uh notifications.

And then if you have a concern, say you you even see something that's being treated, give us a call.

Even during that time, I would stay out of the area if you're concerned for your own personal health, but give our district, our office a call.

We can let you know what's happening in real time, like what that application is being applied for, what type of product it is, how long it should take.

We can give you that information right there in real time.

Great.

So fight the bite.net.

Fight the bite.net.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Good afternoon or good evening.

I'm Craig Burnett.

I've been your representative for a number of years for City of Folsom.

I actually worked for the district when I was going to college in the early 60s, and have been a member of this uh Sacchiolo Mosquito Vector Control Board for 48 years.

So I've cut my teeth on the district and being a representative of Folsom.

And Steve talked about 80s mosquitoes, day biters.

I was in my house on my computer here a couple weeks ago, middle of the day, heard a buzzing, slapped my neck, there's blood.

It was an 80s Egyptian mosquito.

So I contacted the district, the staff came out, searched all around my house.

I don't know if they found the source at my house, but it only takes a bottle cap full of water for these 80s Egypti to lay their eggs, and when the rain or sprinklers fill it up, they'll uh eggs will um germinate and produce mosquitoes.

So you have to be aware any little source around your house or around your yard.

The other thing our district uh does is Steve didn't mention, we do surveillance for ticks because alignment disease is prevalent.

Um, so basically around the river areas, repairing areas.

They check for ticks every year, usually November through about March.

So just wanted to let everybody know, fight the bite, sign up, get more information, and I'm proud to be a member of the City of Folsom and representing City of Folsom on the Sackyola Mosquito and Vector Control Board.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Burnett.

We appreciate your service and your representation.

All right, that takes us.

That takes us to our consent calendar.

Uh colleagues, anyone want to pull any items from consent this evening.

Uh no, I'll move an option of the consent calendar.

Second.

Please call the roll.

Council members, the keynote.

Yes.

Theory, yes.

And rate fill.

Yes.

Uh that takes us to old business.

Please call the next item.

Yeah, old business item number seven is resolution number one one six zero nine.

This is a resolution declaring the results of the Natoma Station maintenance assessment district 25-2 ballot proceedings, approving the final engineers report, confirming the diagram and assessments, and ordering the levying of assessments for maintenance and servicing of improvements within said district.

At the April 28th, 2026 City Council meeting, council um held the public hearing for the Natoma Station Mainness Assessment District number 2025-2.

Council directed staff to tally the ballots on April 29th, 2026 in the large public works conference room at City Hall at 9 a.m.

And return with the result to the next city council meeting May 12th, 2026 tonight.

The city clerk certified the ballot results on April 29, 2026, with the final results being a total of 1,382 ballots were distributed, distributed, a total of 655 valid ballots were tabulated.

Ballots in favor were 467 with a weighted value of assessment ballots totaling 158,976.51 cents, resulting in 71.84% in favor of the assessment.

Ballots and opposition were 188 with a weighted value of assessment ballots totaling 62,301 dollars 16 cents, resulting at 28.16% in opposition of the assessment.

Per Prop 218, the assessment results needed to pass are 50% plus one.

The assessment passed, and the original Natoma Station Landscaping Alliance District will be consolidated with the newly formed Atoma Station Maintenance Assessment District 2025 2 persuade to section 22611 of the Street Stone Highways Code.

All assets, liabilities, revenue, expenses, and installments of the original Toma Station landscape line district will be transferred to and assumed by the Natoma Station Maintenance Assessment District 2025-2 for the continued maintenance and servicing of the improvements.

The new levy won't take effect until fiscal year 2627, which assessment revenues won't be collected until January of 2027.

In the meantime, staff be working with their landscape contractor to formulate a plan on enhancing the aesthetics in the district as funding allows.

With that, staff recommends the city council approved resolution number 11609, a resolution of the city council of the city fulson declaring results of the Notoma Station Maintenance Assessment District number 2025-2 ballot proceeding, approving the final engineers report, confirming the diagram and assessments, and ordering the levying of assessments for the maintenance and servicing of approvements with the said district.

I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you.

It's been a long road, Derek.

We appreciate you.

Appreciate all the work you've done on this.

Uh questions, Mr.

Perez this evening.

Alright, we have no public comments.

We'll entertain a motion.

I'll move resolution one one six zero nine.

Oh that's fine.

That's my district.

I reached it.

Oh, you're retracting.

Yes, you make it.

Okay, I'll so I'll move uh resolution number 11609 resolution of the city council of city uh fulsom declaring results in Natoma Station maintenance district.

Number 2025-2 ballot proceeding.

I'll second that.

And for the public, this is in her district, and that's why we want her to make a question.

And she's she's done a little bit of work on educating uh the residents of Natoba Station on what this means for them.

So thank you so much.

Please call the roll.

Council members Aquino, yes, Leary, yes, Rorba.

Yes, and Rachel.

Yes.

That takes us to new business.

Please call the next item.

Okay, new business item number eight, resolution number one one six zero eight authorizing the city manager to execute an agreement with Michael Roberts construction for the replacement of the Folsom public library low slope roof.

Good evening, Mayor Rethel, members of city council, Ryan Eves, capital project manager in the parks and recreation department.

Happy to give you a brief presentation on this uh project.

Um, so a bit of background the library here in Folsom opened in 2007, and the existing roof is a single ply PVC low slope roof that's original to the building and nearing the end of its um useful life.

We recently had an inspection done uh in December of 2025 that identified several issues with the roof and recommended replacement.

Um moving forward with this project.

We'll build on some recent facility improvements that uh have been undertaken at the library over the last couple years, including some interior improvements, and as well as uh currently underway HVAC replacement, which is anticipated to be completed this month.

The scope of the proposed project is removal of the existing roof system, installation of the new roof, and then testing and then uh documentation and training to city staff, and the um agreement includes a two-year maintenance plan and a 20-year manufacturer warranty for the new roof.

The estimated cost was 1.3 million dollars provided by the inspection company in December.

Um, the city put out uh the construction for bid and received nine bids.

Um, you know, uh good variety there.

The low bidder is uh Michael Roberts construction.

Um, and upon review, there were the low bid responsive bidder, and so uh we recommend uh awarding contract to them.

The uh total project budget would include a 10% construction contingency, so it would be uh the project budget would be for uh nine hundred and for 940,000 forty-five dollars.

The schedule for the work, so we're here tonight to hopefully award the contract.

We'll be working with our library director and team to coordinate the schedule to be most you know least impactful, I should say, to the summer programming.

And so we've identified starting work after August 1st.

And while we don't think it'll take the full time, the number of working days, you know, we expect will the project will be completed before the end of December.

And uh most importantly, the library will remain open during uh during the work.

So with that, uh recommend approval of resolution number one one six zero eight to uh authorize the city manager to execute an agreement with Michael Roberts construction for the replacement of the library roof.

Happy to answer any questions.

Thank you so much.

Any questions for staff this evening?

I just have one for you.

Once our two-year maintenance agreement is up, uh, what's the plan moving forward?

Yeah, so as part of the scope of work, they'll be providing us with the uh some training for our in-house facility staff for what the maintenance recommendations are.

So we would be moving forward with that.

So the idea is our staff would take on the maintenance after two years.

And then uh what's the expected, you know?

This one lasted, looks like barely 20 years, maybe a few years shy of 20 years with proper maintenance about how long should uh this roof last.

I mean, it's warrantied for 20 years, so you know.

I mean, I think that is kind of the design life.

So, you know, we'll hopefully with the proactive maintenance, we'll be able to extend that.

Um, but I think you know, planning is you know 20 years.

Thank you so much.

Yep, and we have no public uh comment this evening.

I can move adoption of resolution number one one six zero eight.

I'll second.

Please call the roll.

Council members Aquino.

Yes, Leary, yes, yes, and Rachel.

Yes.

Please call the next item.

Okay, new business item number nine is resolution number one one six one one authorizing the city manager to execute an agreement with low-end pump maintenance for the replacement of motor and pump and refurbishment of a pump for the 50 meter swimming pool at the aquatic center for a cost not to exceed 88,400.

Excuse me, Mayor, members of council, Tom Hellman with the Parks Recreation Department.

Tonight we bring uh resolution number 11611.

I request to authorize the city manager at execute an agreement with low and pump maintenance.

Uh, the reason for this request, so we have an aquatic center that was built in 2001.

This aquatic center serves over 150,000 participants that enter that facility on annual basis.

The motors for each of these two filtration units are original to the build.

The pumps for each of these filtration units are also original to the build, but those two pumps have been refurbished at least once in their life.

Uh the two you two units that we're talking about tonight are the main filtration equipment that bring the water in from the 50 meter swimming pool to be filtered, heated, and then chemically treated before returning to the swimming pool.

Uh the diagram you see before you are the two units we're speaking of, unit one on the right and unit two on the left.

Um California State Code requires that the entire water volume of the 50-meter pool be recirculated every six hours.

In order to achieve that, both of these units have to operate and move 2,016 gallons of water every minute.

The proposal tonight is to look at dismantling and removing the motor and pump from a unit number one there and replacing it with a brand new motor and pump.

Then the contractor will take that pump and rebuild it off-site and return to install it into unit number two at a later date.

The contractor will then also make sure that all the equipment is tested and working properly before uh finishing out the project.

As we went forward with this, because it is of urgency.

Uh, uh we see failure in unit number one.

Failure is a sign that basically we're getting air in the system.

Um, and so we contacted our utilities department, work with them to identify some additional resources andor vendors, and they provide us with a few that they've worked with.

Uh we reached out to four companies to ask them for a quote, give them back the information by specified date.

Upon that date, we receive three that you see here from these three vendors.

We are choosing to go with low and pump maintenance, which uh to provide this service, and uh get this work done for us, which our utilities department also works with as well.

So tonight I asked for your approval of resolution number one six one one for us to move forward with this and allow the city manager to execute an agreement with low and pump maintenance.

Be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Councilmember Aquino.

Um what's the difference in cost between replacing a unit and refurbishing a unit?

So, refurbishing can be of the pump, but not the motor.

So refurbishing the pump would be about 12 is what they quoted to do for the you know this pull pump number one out, refurbish that, and then put that into pump number two would be about twelve thousand dollars.

Okay.

Okay, uh, okay.

I'm not mechanically inclined, so let me go back to a diagram there.

Yeah, um, I was just thinking, if are you refurbishing instead of replacing in order to save costs?

So two two things.

So unit number one is our problem.

Okay, oh okay.

Okay, so this is the one that's showing most signs of distress because we have a error in the system, and so uh through some preventative maintenance and other work we've done, we've identified that unit number one, the pump is is bad, um, and then the motor is failing, and so pumps can be rebuilt, and you can rebuild those all the time because they pull everything out from the internal and they put all new internal parts in, right?

So we're gonna rebuild that one to place on the unit number two so we get a new working pump.

That motor is working really good.

So unit two is doing fine right now.

But unit one, since we have the opportunity to rebuild all of that, that's why we're taking advantage of this because that one is showing the most failure at this point.

Got it.

Okay, that helps.

Thank you.

Other questions for staff?

Oh, I just have one other question.

Is it possible that there may be some other components that aren't up to par to use for rebuilding?

I don't know how you know in depth you can evaluate these things without taking them apart.

Uh, hopefully not.

We've done work on both the influence so that where it gets pulled in and the effluent where it's going to.

We've replaced some valves also within the plumbing system.

As you also know, we also replaced all eight of the sand filter units that were there.

And so, with better sand filtration, this is also maybe a possibility where our our motor isn't able to keep up with the demand in order to uh filter that water effectively or pull that water in effectively.

So we don't anticipate that there's other things outside of uh before the pump and motor or after the pump and motor at this point.

We just believe that the pump is is failing.

There's some internal problem that's making that happen, which is why you're getting air in the system, and then the motor is failing as well.

So right now you don't anticipate a contingency to complete there's a contingency amount in this of ten percent, yeah, for any for all of our projects.

Not greater than that.

No.

Okay, thank you.

Didn't you blind it?

We have uh no public comment this evening, so I'll entertain a motion.

I'll move on uh uh approval of resolution number one one six one one.

Second, please call the roll.

Council members Aquino, yes, Larry, yes, Zorba, yes, and Rachel.

Yes, and that takes us to our public hearing.

Uh please call next time.

Public hearing item number 10.

This is resolution number one one six one three, a resolution receiving the 2026 ad hoc charter review committee report to city council with recommended amendments and dissolving the committee and direction to staff regarding preparation of potential ballot measures, amending the city charter and or the municipal code for the 2026 general municipal election.

Thank you.

Uh mayor members of the council uh appreciate the opportunity to talk a little bit about the city charter review.

Uh I'm going to do a little introduction about what the charter is, go through some of the history of the charter.

Uh we're grateful to have our um uh charter review committee uh Bill Romanelli, who's here who will be able to talk a little bit about the report.

So just some background on what is a city charter.

A city charter is the foundational governing governing document of a municipality.

Essentially, it's local constitution.

It defines the structure of city government, establishes rules for elections, and terms of office, grants authority on local matters beyond state defaults, can be amended only by a vote of the people, provides transparency and accountability to the residents.

I do want to uh highlight that it can only be amended by a vote of the people.

I couldn't help but notice that there were comments in the community suggesting that we're the council was trying to take away the voters' rights.

That can't be done.

The charter can only be changed by you, the voters.

I think now about 480 cities.

About 357 cities are what they call general law cities.

About 121 are charter cities, which uh Folsom is one of those.

Uh here's just a list of some of the differences, just to highlight a charter city is governed by its own charter for matters of local concern, has greater local control and flexibility.

Uh it can set its own election rules, except for issues of statewide concern, I may set its own contracting rules, home rule on municipal affairs.

Uh I I highlight this.

Uh this is 1990, and it was measure P, and this is the vote that uh approved the charter, the original charter.

Uh we had uh 3100 uh votes for, 2100s against.

Uh, just to uh kind of demonstrate some of the changes that occurred in the November 2024 election.

Uh there were 42,000 uh individuals that voted.

Uh in the 1990 election, 5300 uh voted.

So things have changed a little bit.

Here's some of the amendments to the charter.

Uh we had measure H uh in 1994 and Measure I.

It's kind of a little interesting about the history of the city.

Measure H was uh for a bridge connecting Folsom Boulevard and Folsom Auburn Road, not more than four vehicle lane vehicular lanes.

It passed with 8300 votes.

I guess there was a countermeasure uh alternative bridge extending from northern extension of Oak Avenue to East Natoma Street near Fargo Way.

Uh that item failed.

Uh in 1996, there was Measure L, uh charter enforcement and penalties.

Uh that amended is section to clarify enforcement.

Uh violations of the city charter or city ordinance shall be enforced by any method provided by ordinance, and then uh that passed.

Uh measure P, uh water meter rates and retrofit rules, uh prohibited water meter retrofits on pre-1992 single family residences.

Uh, and that passed with 8,500 votes.

Uh in 2000, there was an ad hoc charter advisory committee, uh special committee was formed, uh reviewed the charter and submitted recommendations for the council consideration.

Uh in 2001, the council uh declined to submit any of those uh 2000, uh any of the recommendations for that uh 2000 ad hoc charter advisory committee forward to the voters, so no amendments were placed on the ballot.

Uh in 2004, uh Measure W.

Uh, this was for uh basically the land south of Highway 50.

Uh it uh required water supply identification, traffic mitigation, 30% open space, school plans, environmental review before annexing land south of Highway 50.

It was approved with 17,000 uh voters uh to eight thousand against.

Uh 2018, there was a charter amendment that went before the uh residents of Folsom.

Uh, was titled Measure C.

Uh basically, the question was uh after serving four consecutive four-year terms, the city council member is not eligible to run or be appointed unless four consecutive years have elapsed since their last service.

That was approved.

23,000 votes to 6100 votes.

Here's just a quick summary of the different uh charter amendments over the 36 year history.

It looks like there has been seven ballot measures, six were approved, and then that kind of brings us to the 2026 ad hoc charter review committee.

The committee uh has been convened.

Uh, it's been looking at the charter.

Uh the last uh full review was in 2000, as I mentioned.

Uh, the charter amendments require voter approval for some residents will have the final say on any proposed changes, as they always have.

So, what's next?

The committee will present findings and recommendations to the city council if approved, measures may be placed on a future ballot for a public vote.

Uh this is more blah blah blah.

You guys uh have heard me a little bit talk about that.

Okay, so uh I think it's important to um highlight uh some of the things that have happened for the ad hoc charter review committee.

Uh the committee met uh two times in March, uh two times in April, and then once in May, and it was interesting.

Uh at the beginning of the charter review process, uh they we had an introduction to the charter, we provided materials to the charter review committee, and uh talked about some of the things that uh the committee members would like to bring back uh for future discussion, and uh ultimately uh the a full review was done of the charter, and all the different uh members of the committee presented ideas, and no idea was just thrown out.

And so here's just a list of all the items that that we started out with.

So they identified 201 areas for potential update.

There was section 2.01, amend language to recognize election by districts, uh section 2.01A, amend language to clarify that you must be a resident registered voter within the district with uh which they represent.

Section 2.01D, amend language to align with staggering of terms based on district, not on year elected.

Section 2.01, uh city council term limits proposed a review of term limits specifically suggesting a reduction to a term to a two term limit.

And so these are just ideas that were presented by the committee members.

Five, uh proposed extending certain terms beyond for ad hoc committees proposed extending certain terms beyond one year.

Uh section 2.03 consider implementing at-large mayor election.

Uh section 2.07B, uh personnel powers proposed reviewing general counsel authority to allow for council approval of department head contracts.

Section 2.07D, franchise authority initiated a discussion on whether the power to franchise should remain with the public vote or be moved to council authority.

Section 2.08B, three council vacancies and forfeiture of office.

Identified the phrase crime involving moral turpitude, noting that more objective, less subjective lanes might be beneficial.

Section 2.11 C audit consider adding a council member to the audit review process, noting a need for more clarity on the specific goals for this review.

Section 3.02, dismissal of a city manager.

Recommended the removal of the 90-day dismissal limitation to provide the council with greater personal personnel flexibility.

Section 4.03, City Attorney proposed reviewing the appointment process, suggesting a shift toward council-led hiring.

Section 4.07, boards and commissions remove restriction of only be advisory to the council.

Article 5 Financial Procedures flag for potential updating.

Section 5.04 purchasing and contracting.

Recommended updating procurement language from lowest bidder to best bidder.

Section 5.08 C.

This was my favorite.

There was a typo warrants and cheeks.

Um I'll let you figure out what that was supposed to be.

We've administratively corrected that typo.

Section 7.02, franchises identified for review specifically regarding water meter retrofits.

Section 7.05, American Bridge Crossing Site proposed for removal, as this was seen outdated.

Section point section 7.07A and 7.07B, water meter retrovits and metered rates identified for review specifically regarding water meter retrofits.

Section 7.08 local control of land south of highway 50, flag for further examination, proposed expansion of the defined area.

Section 9.02, transition of current elected officials, proposal to remove section as outdated and irrelevant as it addresses the transition of elected officials during the 19 during 1990.

Um I wanted to add that because the election process is what it is, that's there are certain timelines that need to be followed so that anything can be presented to the voters.

And so we discussed that at the very first meeting with the uh charter review committee and established kind of a date of the meetings that we needed, and basically understood if something were to ultimately be presented to the city council for consideration to put forward to the voters, we would need to uh work pretty aggressively, and so that's how that that schedule was put together because and we'll kind of go over later on in the presentation of what is left because there's still significant public process that has to happen if anything is to get to the voters.

So we have the recommendations from the ad hoc charter review committee report, and I have this on our screens.

Uh, I don't know if uh our committee chair uh Mr.

Romanelli, if you wanted to come up and talk about these items.

Um, okay.

So I'll go over these and then we'll turn some time over to uh the chair.

Uh so the recommendations of the committee were and there's eight of them is first section 2.01 city council.

Uh, this was to address the transition away from at-large elections.

The committee voted six to one in favor of this recommendation, and um essentially what happened here was they uh removed the language that said at large.

Uh section two point zero one term limits.

Uh this is reducing the maximum number of consecutive terms city council members may serve from four four-year terms to three for your terms.

The committee voted six to one in favor of this recommendation.

Section 2.06, uh city council compensation and expenses.

Uh, this was to add automatic annual salary adjustments for the city council tied to the consumer price index with a maximum increase of 3% once per fiscal year.

The committee voted 5 to 2 in favor of this recommendation.

Uh section 2.07D restriction on city utility or enterprise franchise authority.

This eliminates uh voter approval requirement before city owned utility or enterprise may be sold leased for more than two years, contracted to or put to franchise to any non-governmental party.

This will allow the city council to franchise or contract for city services without voter approval.

The committee voted four and three in favor of this recommendation.

Five, section four point zero three city attorney to change how the city attorney is appointed from the current system in which the city manager appoints the city attorney to a system in which the city council appoints the city attorney and related procedural structural changes.

The committee voted seven uh zero in favor of this recommendation.

Section 4.07, boards and commissions.

Uh this was to strike language that all city boards and commissions are only advisory to the council, allowing the council to set the powers and duties of commissions and committees by ordinance.

The committee voted seven zero in favor of this recommendation.

Uh section 9.02, transition of elected officials from 1990.

Uh, this was to delete entirely as obsolete.

Uh, the committee voted 7.0 in favor of this recommend recommendation.

The committee also recommends that the council submit to the voters a proposition to amend Folsom Municipal code 2.48.030 campaign contribution limitation to increase the campaign contribution limit in support or opposition to any candidate from 150 to 750.

The committee voted 7.0 in favor of this recommendation.

And that concludes that item.

And then after that, if there's questions, I'll do my best to sort of simply answer them.

So going through the recommended changes for section 2.01 concerning the city council and language that said that the city council will be elected at large, given that this is no longer the case, the committee felt that some corrective action here was needed.

It's not a simple discussion.

Some committee members felt that we should just delete the two words at large from the section, thereby leaving flexibility to move away from district-based elections if pending litigation puts that back on the table.

Others argued that the language should be very specific to record reflect that we are holding district-based elections.

The concern with that was if we ran a ballot measure asking voters to agree on changing the charter to say that council members would be elected by district.

If for any reason the public rejected that on the ballot, then we'd be creating more problems and we're solving.

So in the end, simply deleting the language at large made the most sense.

For section 2.01E related term limits, as you all know, the current limit is four terms.

There was discussion among the committee to keep it at four, to lower it to two, or to set it at three terms.

Most of the discussion centered on striking a balance between institutional wisdom and seniority within regional organizations and the need to make room for fresh ideas and a desire to present entrenched political power.

We considered what other jurisdictions have been have done or are doing, particularly Roseville, and ultimately landed on a recommendation for a term limit of three terms.

My view on that is it came about as a compromise, but that was the number that we decided to put forward as a committee.

Section 2.06 concerning city council compensation and expenses in an effort to present uh prevent another situation where several years, if not decades, go by without any adjustment to council members' pay, and similarly, to avoid any adjustment or um any future council members having to propose and vote on their own raises on a regular basis.

The committee proposed embedding a simple increase connected to the consumer price index with a 3% cap.

It was very interesting for me to note that among the members of the public who were present for this discussion item at our April 30th meeting.

My observation, and again, this is just my observation, was that they agree and believe council members should be fairly inadequately compensated for the job they do.

I was a little surprised at uh the number of people who said something to that effect.

Next, uh section 2.07D franchise authority.

Uh this was really two big discussions in one.

And this was obviously the the subject of biggest uh and the most public interest.

The first issue of discussion on this here was really whether or not to give the city council authority to make these these decisions without them being subject to majority vote at an election.

The majority of the public commenters felt that voters should not be cut out.

Among the committee members, the very slim majority felt that the council should have more flexibility in this area.

And there were examples of other decisions that the council has made without voter approval.

And one member of the public at our April 1st meeting even said this is why we elect the council members to represent us.

Ultimately, one of the strongest arguments that swayed me came from a member of the public who pointed out that private firms are unlikely to even submit bids to provide services if the final agreement remains contingent on the uncertainty of a public vote, which in the best case scenario would be several months away.

The other big issue within this, and one discussed at great length was waste collection in the city and the possibility of that being contracted out.

There were really important considerations on both sides of this, and I'll try to do them justice with this limited time.

On the one hand, there are very real and legitimate concerns related to state mandates for electric vehicles, and what that means in terms of cost to the city, in other words, and cost to in terms of cost to us as the taxpayers of the city.

As you know, these vehicles can be as much as twice as much as the cost of a regular uh gas-powered truck.

And then there's costs and questions related to the infrastructure for charging stations, where that's going to be, and we're talking about millions and millions of dollars all said and done, that would have to be borne by the taxpayers in this situation.

On the other hand, of course, there was a lot of concern over the jobs of our city's truck drivers.

They showed up in large numbers at our later meetings, and I'm sure there's many of them here tonight as well.

They have a lot of important things to say about privatization, and I hope you will hear them on that.

I ultimately supported bringing this idea forward to the council because I believe this conversation should be held in a larger public forum.

I think the drivers need reassurance that even if this council agrees to put this change on the ballot, the public will still need to approve it.

If they do, I myself just want to be on record saying that I will advocate strongly that no future decision about contracting waste hauling should be made without making every effort to protect the jobs of the good people who drive these trucks and provide such high value to our city.

Section 4.03 concerning the city attorney.

The crux of this issue was that the city attorney's client is the city council, not the city manager, and that the charter should be explicit in saying so.

It was also pointed out that Folsom is currently a significant outlier, one of only two cities in the state that have their attorney appointed by the city manager rather than the council.

That being the case, and based on what clearly seemed like best practice, the committee reviewed language proposed by the city attorney and approved it unanimously unanimously for your consideration.

Section 4.07 concerning boards and commissions.

This one was uh much less controversial and was one of the few things we identified as a simple cleanup fix.

Most of you are already aware of why this is important, so I won't belabor it other than to say that everyone on the committee agreed that the current language hinders the council's ability to delegate specific decision-making powers, and that recently litigation highlighted the need for this clarification.

Two things that were important to the committee in making this change.

First, amending this language does not mandate a change to the existing commission structure, but rather provides the council with the legal authority to grant such power if they choose to do so.

Second, any decisions made by commissions would still remain subject to a formal appeal process.

Section 902 was the one dealing with elected officials from 1990.

Not much more I need to say on that.

It was obsolete.

And then finally, we felt the subject of campaign contribution limits should be included in this discussion and that the limit should be increased.

The principal argument and support of this is that it helps level the playing field.

In short, any individual or organization can donate substantial sums of money to a political action committee that may be working for or against a certain candidate for city council.

But the maximum contribution anyone can give directly to a candidate is 150 dollars.

As an example, a single PAC donor can write a check for $15,000 against a candidate, but that candidate must find 100 people to give the 150 max just to match that one PAC contribution.

There was strong argument that this system is out of balance, and then increasing the contribution limit from 150 to 750 dollars would help restore some of that balance.

With all that said, the only other topic I have to present is that one big item that got a lot of discussion was the idea of electing uh an at-large mayor citywide.

The topic comes with a substantial number of questions ranging from what this mayor's actual job would be to whether there would be an elected uh in addition to the city council or part of it, compensation, limitation of powers, and so on.

As the staff report indicates, there just simply was not time uh prior to tonight's meeting to come to any resolution on those matters.

So we all agreed that after this election year, we'd like to recommend that the council convene a new committee to take a more thorough look at that idea.

I want to sincerely thank our city clerk, our city attorney, our city manager for their extraordinary support of the committee over the last eight weeks.

And with that, again, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Mr.

O'Neill.

I appreciate your service and and all the committee members' uh questions uh for either Mr.

Omanelli or City Manager, how about the city attorney?

Or the city attorney.

Well, questions for anyone.

We'll entertain questions for anyone.

So um the committee was tasked with reviewing the charter.

There is nothing in the charter about campaign contribution limits, and so with the recommendation um regarding Fulson Municipal Code 2.48.030 to increase the contribution limit from 150 to 750.

Did the committee exceed its authority?

Well, the committee uh one of the members of the committee asked if that was an item that could be added to the charter, and the answer to that question was yes, but uh the existing campaign contribution limits were added to the Folsom Municipal Code as an initiative passed by the voters in 1994.

So the process to take that from the municipal code and put it into the charter was more complicated than simply doing a proposal to have the voters amend it in the existing ordinance.

So arguably they did, but the request was made to include it within the charter.

But is that the recommendation of the committee to put it in the charter?

Yes.

To put it in the charter, correct?

Okay.

I didn't read that in the staff report the and maybe I need some some clarity here because I don't remember that was the recommendation to put it in the charter.

That was the original proposal, was as to put it in the charter, but the committee said, uh, we can either take this up, you know, we can take we basically we went on the advice of the city attorney.

Okay, okay.

Um with respect to section 4.03 with the city attorney, um, obviously right now we are in a recruitment process for a permanent city attorney.

Um right now we have a system whereby the city attorney is hired by the city manager.

Um, certainly I guess we could notify um the applicants or the finalists that this could potentially be on the ballot and it could potentially pass.

But let's say, let's say we voted to put this change on the ballot and it did pass.

What happens with the the contract agreement with the city attorney?

So um it depends.

Um, I believe the council either way would approve the contract with the city attorney, whether it's under the current system or under a different system that would pass by the voters.

So I believe it would depend on what the council's view is of the contract, but the simplest path would be to amend the contract with whoever is selected as the permanent city attorney to match the city manager's contract in terms of who appoints that position and who that position reports to.

Okay.

Okay.

Um I think that's all my questions were up for now.

Thank you.

Councilman Valerie.

Oh, yeah, I actually had another question about the city attorney, and um, in the materials that I read, it describes that the client of the city attorney is actually the council, however, it also notes that the city attorney um clients include the city manager and other administrative uh department heads.

And uh it's it's a little bit uh unclear because we have had the city manager uh be the supervising uh person for the city attorney, but the city attorney, even in the current position, is uh available to cover issues with both the council and staff.

So, can you kind of clarify why there needs to be a change at this point since I'm not understanding that there's a significant difference in their job um capacities, right?

So the client for clarity, the client of the city attorney is the city as an entity, and just as with any legal entity, any corporation, that entity acts through its board, and in this case the board is the council, the the elected officials.

So the elected officials are the embodiment of the city and the decision makers.

So there's a variety of ethical rules that apply to attorneys, including the rule related to responsiveness to the client, and the city council isn't necessarily going to be involved in every single day-to-day decision.

Those decisions by and large flow from the city manager and in certain cases to the department heads.

So under circumstances like that, the city attorney's client is the city as embodied by the decisions of either the city manager or the department head.

So in terms of whether the change is needed, that is up to the council and ultimately the voters.

But uh the bottom line is the city attorney's client is the city as embodied through elected officials and manager and department heads.

Thank you.

Vice Mayor, any questions?

All right.

Oh, thank you, Mr.

Alamano.

I appreciate you.

Mr.

Mayor, if I could uh before the public hearings open, I wanted to provide some clarity as far as what the action is for tonight and then the next steps uh in the other public meeting process, if that's okay.

Yeah, that'd be great.

So the recommendation tonight is to hold a public hearing and receive public comment and then close the public hearing.

Uh the main action we're hoping tonight is to adopt resolution number one one six one three, a resolution receiving the 2026 ad hoc charter review committee report to the city council with recommended amendments uh and dissolving the committee.

Then looking ahead is uh on May 26th, uh hold an additional charter discussions at the city council meeting and provide direction to city uh to staff regarding preparation of potential ballot measures, amending the city charter and or uh the Folsom Municipal Code for the 2026 general municipal election, and then on June 9th, if needed, hold additional charter discussions at city council meeting to provide additional direction to staff, and then on June 23rd, hold a final public hearing to conduct uh the introduction and first reading of ordinances containing language for the charter amendments to be submitted to the voters, and then finally on July 14th, 2026, council may adopt a resolution authorizing the submission of one or more ballot measures to the voters.

So, I mean, there's substantial public dialogue that's going to take place before it even gets to the voters, and so I just wanted to uh outline that.

And I I think to your comment on history earlier, uh, we've had the one initial adoption of the charter, we've had one charter review commission, all of the other charter amendments were done just through this process without any charter review commission at all, without any public meetings before that, correct?

I don't know the history of of how those got on the ballot.

I know it didn't go through a charter review committee process.

Okay.

Oh, and then I think it's also worth noting in the staff report uh there was a budget uh consideration here also, um, not saying that we can't exceed that or go below that.

Uh, but essentially in the budget this year, we have we have budgeted for three uh items to be placed on.

Obviously, we're in charge of the budget, so we can change that.

Uh, but just kind of to to highlight that portion, uh we've got eight recommendations.

Uh, I think another thing to consider is is that uh if we put eight things on the ballot for the Folsom voters to decide, that's a lot of things for the voters to read through and have opinions on, might be tough to get consensus on the that many items.

Oh, the main reason we're here tonight is the uh public hearing.

Oh, so I'm gonna go ahead and open the public hearing, and so we can take some input from our residents.

Please call the first person.

Okay, just so you know, we have about 15 or 16 people who have requested to speak.

So, what I'll do is I'll call the next speaker and then I'll let you know who's next after that.

So if you hear your name and you know you're on deck, feel free to move down and be ready to proceed to the podium.

And we'll we'll start the three-minute timer when when you begin to speak.

So our first speaker will be Macy Sherman.

Macy will be followed by Teresa Garcia.

And for those that are you're not familiar with the process, when you start seeing the orange light, that means you have 30 seconds.

When you start seeing the red light and start seeing me start to try to interrupt you, and the clock will actually start counting the other way, uh, that means you're out of time.

If we can respect that three minutes so we give everybody an opportunity to speak tonight, I sure would appreciate that.

Macy, the floor is yours.

Thank you.

Um so my name is Macy Sherman, and I represent City of Folsom workers with local 39.

I wanted to come here today to talk about the change of the potential changes to the city charters, specifically section 2.07D, which would remove the voter requirement to privatize public services.

Some of the reasons that the committee gave for wanting to do this, such as fiscal flexibility, meaning the concern that a large company would not want to give a bid to the city because of having to wait for the vote.

In my opinion, is speculative.

Um, I somehow doubt that large companies would be deterred by having to wait for a public vote.

Um, what this represents to me is it is a transfer of power from the people of Folsom to the city council, whether that transfer is voted on by the people or not, it that's what it does represent.

I think that privatizing public services often results in higher rates, um, decreased quality of service, and I think that it is something that residents should have the right to vote on.

I think that this provision within the city charter should be protected, and I don't think it should be considered for the November ballot.

I also wanted to highlight the fact that during the committee um the committee meetings, our members, the city residents, you know, the city of Folsom workers did attend those.

And the first time the committee voted on this potential change to the city charter, it was six to one.

And after the public outcry and all of the comments made by the workers and the public, it was the it was the slimmest, it passed by four to three versus all of the other ones.

So I just wanted to point that out and give my comments.

So thank you guys for having me.

Thanks for letting me be first.

Thank you.

Okay, next is Teresa Garcia, who will then be followed by Brad Shelton.

Um, I am also speaking on the same issue, and that is uh the uh ad hoc committee's recommendation to eliminate voter approval requirements before a city owned utility or enterprise may be sold, leased, etc.

Um, my predecessor spoke more eloquently than I did, and I agreed with what she said.

Basically, letting the I don't think we need to uh put this whole thing out to voters to eliminate their need or your requirement or our requirement to vote on specific things.

If we want to try privatizing the waste management, then put that to the voters.

If you want to privatize the park, put that to the voters.

But if you put this out to the voters, I'm not sure that they're gonna understand all the power that they're giving up relative to uh the decisions that could be made by by city council.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, our next speaker is Brad Shelton, and Brad will be followed by Jag Negendra.

Thanks for coming out tonight, Brad.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council members.

Uh, I'm also here to speak on section 2.07D proposed changes.

Um, I you may hear this a whole lot, but it feels like we're just gonna start hitting the same message.

Um, I have a lot of experience talking with legislators and folks about this.

When you outsource inherently government functions, you end up with higher long-term cost, reduced service quality, and lower accountability.

You can look it up, look it up on grok, copilot, whatever you want.

It will give you the same results.

Do not please do not uh like if you're gonna do this, this the people of the city need to vote on it.

And I yes, you're not taking the power away from the voters.

This is why you're all elected.

You are here to make decisions.

Some decisions are big, and you should involve the electorate, not that's it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, our next speaker is Jag Nagendra, and Jag will be followed by Julie Reese.

Good evening, mayor, vice mayor, and members of the council.

I want to thank the Charter Adult Committee for the time and the efforts they invested.

I know it's not an easy task in getting through where we are today.

Overall, I support the several of the recommendations out of the eight.

I support having the city council appoint a city attorney directly because it creates a cleaner accountability to the elected body and representing the residents.

I also support removing obsolete languages and providing some flexibility for boards and commissions as the city evolves over the next two decades or so.

I also appreciate the discussions around campaign contribution limits.

The current 150 limit creates a lot of challenges for the new candidates trying to run a viable campaign, especially those without established political networks.

And I can take a lot of questions on that if anybody has.

However, I do have concerns with three things I want to talk about.

Well, first is on the term limits.

So I appreciate the proposal to reduce the limit from four to three, but I believe the council should go further and adopt a two-term limit.

Eight years is enough time for any council member to contribute meaningfully while still creating opportunities for new leadership, fresh perspectives, and broader civic participation.

Second, I oppose the recommendation to create automatic annual salary increase for city council tied to the CPI.

Folsom is facing financial challenge, and we have relied on reduction in positions, including public safety and IT positions, to address these budget shortfalls.

This is not the right time to establish automatic compensation increase for elected officials.

I am not opposed to the compensation increase in principle, but they should only be considered after the city's financial situation improves and long-term fiscal sustainability is restored.

And finally, I strongly oppose the section 2.07D, which would remove the voter approval requirement for city or utilities or enterprise that can be sold.

To many residents, this feels like taking power away from the people.

These decisions can have a long-term impact on public services, accountability, and transparency.

The ability for residents to vote on major decisions involving public assets is an important democratic safeguard that we have.

At a time when rebuilding trust should be the top priority for the city, reducing public oversight moves in the wrong direction.

Folsom deserves governance that remains transparent, accountable, and grounded in the voices of its residents.

Thank you for your time.

Okay, our next speaker is Julie Reese, and Julie will be followed by Adam Murphy.

Good evening, and thank you for your time.

I just want to say that I'm a local restaurant.

I've been here uh resident for 51 years, and um I'm a local business owner.

I sell homes here in the town, and one of the things I promote so vehemently is the fact that we do have our own police, fire, solid waste, um, all of the you know, city-run entities that make our city great, and that adds a lot of value, and the people that have those jobs really deserve the pay that they receive and our support, and I, for one, support them wholeheartedly.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Okay, next will be Adam Murphy, and Adam will be followed by Shelley Hudson.

Good evening, uh members of the council.

Um, I've I've never done this before, I don't really know what I'm doing, but I thought I thought it was really interesting.

Um, given why most of us are here tonight to speak on this very specific, you know, uh resolution that would um, I think a lot of us feel give up some of our agency and give up some of our political power.

Um, and also because it rely, it's it's so central, like, so such a central part of this um discussion is public works.

Um, and we we began this whole thing with celebrating public works.

And I thought that that was it just struck me as something very fascinating just this idea that we're we're celebrating these people, and now we're we're talking about like potentially um giving up, you know, that uh to people who maybe don't live in this community, maybe don't care about it as much.

Um, and that that's really all I had to say.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, next speaker is Shelley Hudson.

Shelley will be followed by Gwyn Willison.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Shelley Hudson, and I'm a 28-year fulsome resident.

I oppose the proposal recommended in section 2.07D to remove the requirement for voter approval before the sale, lease, or long-term contracting of city owned utilities and enterprises.

These are not routine administrative decisions.

This proposal shifts control of long-term public assets and essential community services from the voters to the city council alone.

Once services are privatized or locked into multi-year contracts, they become difficult and expensive to reverse.

That represents a major reduction in public oversight of public property and essential infrastructure.

For a city of about 95,000 residents, privatization also carries added risk due to limited bargaining power.

A small customer base can mean fewer bidders, weaker negotiating, negotiating leverage over time, and reduced competition among contractors.

Solid waste services are a clear example.

In many cities, privatization has resulted in the loss of stable public jobs, replacement with lower wage private positions, rate increases through contract escalations, and reduced transparency in pricing and service changes.

Once services like solid waste are privatized, the city also loses institutional knowledge and operational capacity, making it far more difficult and costly to bring services back in-house if problems arise.

Residents are then left with less oversight, fewer options, and reduced accountability if service quality declines or costs increase.

Meanwhile, profits go to private corporations and executives while residents take on the long-term financial risk and consequences.

This is precisely why voter approval exists today, to ensure the public has the final say before essential public services and assets are transferred or contracted away.

If these decisions are truly in the public interest, they should be able to earn public approval through a vote.

I urge you to reject this proposal and preserve the requirement for voter approval.

So I'm going to try to address section 2.06 real quickly.

Sure.

I oppose the automatic annual raises for the city council members, which you will cover this evening during this hearing.

As a former city and state employee represented by local 39 and bargaining unit 07, I can assure you that employees do not get automatic raises.

We negotiated justified increases and sometimes went years without them, depending on budgets and economic conditions.

So it is hard to justify why elected officials should receive guaranteed annual increases while the employees doing the day-to-day work of the city do not.

A 3% cap does not make this better.

Automatic is automatic.

If residents, city employees, and taxpayers are expected to live with economic uncertainty, the council members should too.

Setting up a system where your pay rises automatically year after year, especially after a recent major increase sends the wrong message to city employees and the taxpayers paying for it.

That is exactly the kind of policy that erodes public trust.

If you believe you deserve a raise, then vote on it publicly.

Explain why, let the public see it.

This is accountability.

And I urge you also to thank you.

Okay, next, our next speaker will be Gwen Willison, who will then be followed by Colleen Shannon.

Good evening.

Thank you.

Everybody has pretty much said what I'd like to say here tonight.

And the only thing that I want to add that I haven't heard yet about franchising is it's a very slippery slope.

Please don't go there.

Thank you.

Okay, next speaker will be Colleen Shannon, who will then be followed by Chad Vanderveen.

Gwen, you were so fast I wasn't prepared.

Super interesting topic tonight, and I just want to thank the committee for the work that they put in in reviewing the charter.

It is very not sexy to read through the charter.

Although when you talk about warrants and cheeks, that does make it a little more exciting.

So a couple of kind of questions that I wanted to bring up, things to think about.

The commission part was especially interesting to me as I have the privilege of serving on the Library Commission.

And I wonder how the powers that would get delegated to the commissions and committees would be decided on.

Like, does the charter would the charter then limit the scope of what those powers and decisions are?

Would the city council just be like, we need you to decide whether or not the library will be open on Mondays and then the commission gets to decide, or is that right now it's an advisory piece?

And so I kind of leave some questions for me on exactly what that would look like.

Um uh councilmember Aquino, thank you for bringing up the difference between the charter and the municipal code when it comes to campaign contributions.

Um I think that's a really important distinction to make, and I wonder if adding that onto the charter would really confuse the issue and make it really difficult.

So I think that at this time it would probably be best if we address that directly through the municipal code instead of confusing the issue with with the charter.

Um the at-large mayor, I feel like this is kind of bringing up something that we talked about not too long ago when city when uh term limits came up.

Was that in 2018 that that was just discussed and talked about?

Which feels like it was yesterday.

Um, and I'm wondering if it would be possible to just go back and look at the notes from the last debate and discussion that we had on it instead of the city spending the money to go through and kind of rehash the whole entire thing.

Um, I strongly support the city attorney being appointed by the council.

I think that's a really great checks and balance that should be put into place.

Um, the term limits, um, I gotta admit that I really like the idea of four term limits.

I heard a lot of comments tonight talking about giving up agency and choice when it comes to privatization, and I feel like limiting the number of terms that somebody can serve on the city council is actually taking away the voters' agency and choice in that.

Um, if you have a representative that you really like and you really care for, um you should have the opportunity to continue voting that person onto the council.

Um, I don't think that the charter should say that person cannot serve any longer, even if they're doing a really great job.

Um, and likewise with the uh privatization point on it, somebody mentioned earlier it's a really big decision that carries a lot of weight behind it, and I can't help but feel like perhaps that the big decision that carries a lot of weight should be made by the people who are most invested in educating themselves and getting informed on the issues that exist.

So the the voting public um traditionally votes with their emotions.

Um they vote based off the best marketing that they receive, and I think that the council could provide a very interesting kind of buffer to that piece of it.

If you could wrap it up.

That's all I've got.

Thank you very much.

Okay, our next speaker is Chad Vanderveen, who will then be followed by Jolene Livingston.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name's Chad Vandermeen.

I wanted to speak about several of the proposed charter changes, specifically campaign contribution limits, creating automatic council pay increases, and removing voter approval requirements before outsourcing city services.

I get these proposals are being presented as modernization or efficiency gains.

But from the perspective of many ordinary residents, they probably look a lot different than that.

First, while Folsom voters did in 1994 intentionally adopt very strict campaign contribution limit rules, I do agree that uh the limit on uh the campaign contributions should be increased, but I do oppose a five-fold increase from 150 to 750 dollars.

Most working families can't afford to donate hundreds of dollars to a local political campaign, but wealthy donors and special interest groups can afford it.

At a time when political action committees uh are poisoning even our local elections, individuals do need more power, but a 400% increase just reinforces the fact that access and influence belongs to those with the most money.

That said, I suggest the council consider a more modest increase.

Second, I oppose automatic council pay increases.

This council recently adopted a very substantial increase in its own compensation.

Now, whether people agree with that decision or not, it is at least highlighted or heightened public awareness around additional compensation related changes.

At the same time that happened, residents of Folsom are facing skyrocketing fuel costs, and many are barely able to afford their groceries.

A lot of Folsom families are stretching every paycheck just to stay afloat.

So against that backdrop, creating automatic future pay increases for elected officials feels pretty disconnected from the realities many of us in this room are living with every day.

Third and most importantly, I strongly oppose removing voter approval requirements for privatizing city services.

Those protections exist for a reason.

Residents deserve a voice before major decisions are made about essential public services.

We're often told privatization increases efficiency and lowers costs.

But over the long term, this is often not what happens because government is not a business.

Private contractors still need to generate profit, contracts get bigger over time, and oversight becomes more difficult.

And each of you knows that when cities become dependent on outside vendors, residents ultimately end up paying more for worse service and reduced accountability.

This is a disastrous idea that should not ever reach the ballot.

The political action committees are funded by the very same companies that would eagerly take these city contracts and happily spend tens of thousands of dollars to convince voters to vote against their own self-interest.

These proposals increase influence of the wealthy, increase the wealth of the council, and will lead to worse service for Folsom residents and weakened accountability.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, our next speaker is Jolene Livingston, who will then be followed by Julian Serafion.

Good evening, City Council.

I'm just gonna go through some of my messy notes here saying a lot of the same things that have already been said.

Um but it makes me feel better to say it.

So I will uh you can pull that microphone down too.

Sorry, thank you.

I'll start with the city council salaries.

I was against the threefold um jump at this time when the city is struggling financially a bit.

Um but now that's done.

Uh goes into effect after this next election.

I'm uh opposed to the 3% automatic uh increase year over year.

If you think about it, um, after five years, uh we're paying you $3,500 more after 10, $7,700 more, which in 10 years time is more than someone was earning in one year.

All of these years, $7,500.

So I would um prefer to see language that says will be reviewed on a periodic basis, um, that it gets public discussion and review.

We saw it, we just saw that it's possible to do.

Um, franchise authority very much against the change.

Um, I do think that um the right now the discussion is centering around waste, very unexciting, um, but one day it could be centered around the pool, it could be centered on the zoo.

Um, services that uh Folsom holds dear uh near and dear to our hearts, and privatization to bring someone in that might lull you with profitability.

Profitability for the city also would have to entail profitability for the third party, and I would hate to see at some point, without our knowledge and votes, fees for these services being risen up to bar just the average person of Folsom being able to enjoy those things.

So because of those reasons and more, I'd like to leave those kinds of changes to a vote.

Um I did read Carrie Howells' former council members in the Folsom Times.

I agree with a lot of what she stated in her opinion piece.

And one thing that caught my eye is I'm aware in our waste uh monthly bill, there's been for a while a nine dollar fee for SB 1383, and she's indicated in her opinion piece that it's for a state service we're not using.

So I'm thinking if we're not really receiving some service for that nine dollar monthly surcharge, that would be an immediate way to reduce our waste cost for residents.

Um city boards and commissions.

I may be the only person out here today that really feels like I'd like people appointed to boards and commissions to re retain that advisory status.

I'd like the decisions, and could be important decisions to be made by the people we've elected versus someone that was just appointed, you don't know their allegiance or loyalty.

Um, and again, I'm thinking developers.

Um last one a campaign contributions.

I really do uh the gentleman that spoke here earlier, I do appreciate 150.

I think it's a great leveler in the right direction.

There's certain districts where there's homes, uh, like if you could wrap up.

So I think 150 or a modest increase is a leveler, and to me, I think the problem would be the pack money, not the individual donations.

Thank you.

Okay, our next speaker is Julian Serafhian, who will then be followed by Jocelyn Schrage.

Good evening.

My name is Julian Serafian.

I speak today in opposition to the proposed Charter Amendment 2.07 that would disempower Folsom residents from voting on matters related to privatization of city services.

Fellow residents have already and many will continue to speak about the harms that privatization creates, and these concerns are real.

But I'd like to use my time to speak about a deeper concern about this proposal, and that it represents a transfer of power from Folsom's voters to the Folsom City Council.

This amendment, as we know, is considering removing our power, fulsom citizens' power, from deciding whether or not we want the city to privatize services.

This means one less check on the Folsom City Council's power to act without the will of voters in mind.

But voters in Folsom deserve to have a say in matters as important as privatizing our town's services, and voters' will is especially important when the council's decisions have diverged from the preferences of our town's residents in the past, like Measure G in 2024, which was supported by the council and yet was defeated at the ballot box by a wide margin.

Carry on, please.

AI can answer that one for us.

I recognize that at this point in time the city council has not voted on whether to move forward with this charter amendment, and that it's only the recommendation of the charter committee.

And I hope it remains just that.

A recommendation for which no further action is taken, especially given that it passed by the slimmest margin of all proposals.

But if the council moves forward with this amendment, then I assure you that myself, the Folsom Area Democratic Club, and many others in town will mobilize to defeat it at the ballot box.

Because the power of privatization should remain with the voters.

And we will prove that to you at the ballot box if we must.

Thank you.

The next speaker is Jesselin Schrage.

I'm sorry if I'm pronouncing that incorrectly.

Who will then be followed by Paul Kerfeld?

I'm also here to voice my um my reasons for disagreement for the section 2.07D, um, taking away voters um taking away voter power for city owned utilities being sold to private entities.

I'm highly against it.

Don't agree with it at all.

100% disagree.

Um basically, my main argument is that private companies and entities are notorious for either breaking or only following bare minimum EPA laws.

Our city has lakes, rivers, wetlands that us humans, plants, animals, we all depend on with great importance.

How can we trust that private companies to perform waste management, water management, or anything that is under city-owned utility or enterprise to be both cost effective and a proper quality under those private companies?

AKA, how can you guarantee costs won't go up with quality going down?

You know, we live here in Folsom because we love the nature and we love our community that's very, you know, pro-nature, pro-environment, pro clean water, pro-clean air.

That's another reason we live in California, not just Folsom.

Um, it was also interesting that it was saying that the committee found the limited time available for deliberation, review, and analysis.

It was not able to reach consensus on probose language and amendments for these sections.

I don't know if that applies to all of these sections, but I would definitely recommend the council taking a lot longer to even consider moving forward on this because it sounds like there's more research time needed to research the fiscal and quality of life impacts on citizens in regards to privatizing public services, and also the term city-owned utility enterprises needs a more detailed definition.

What exactly falls under that we need to know so we can you know vote as appropriate.

Um also in what changes recommended and why.

Nothing in that language even answered the why.

It just said this is what we want to do, but there was no why behind it.

So I guess we're all probably in a misunderstanding of why this is even coming forward.

Um to end on that, you know, if this does go to you know the the voter ballots, I will be voting no, and it sounds like everyone here will be voting no.

And more importantly, I would like to know because I know this committee voted four and three in favor of this recommendation, and I think it would be great to know who those four are.

So I might consider not voting for them ever again.

And the three who were against it, I will vote for you again.

Thank you.

No, we're not ready to be able to do it.

Okay.

Before you start the clock.

Our final no, our final speaker this evening is Paul Kerfeld.

Hi, Krista, thank you.

Hi, Paul, thank you.

Hey, um, I heard you say two different things.

One was there was a four to three vote to bypass voters, and the other thing you said was we would never bypass the voters on franchising something out.

There was a four or three vote to recommend that the city council consider placing this question to the voters.

That you could franchise out a department.

Right.

Yeah, all of this, uh, the only way it can even see the light of day is for the voters to approve it.

Like it will never happen unless the voters okay.

I just wanted to make sure because I thought I heard two different things.

You probably did.

Okay, that's okay.

Uh, a lot of great stuff tonight.

Uh that young man who came up for I don't know what district he lives in, but he should run for city council.

And the other guy who came up and said hi, Alronic is Public Works Week's coming up, and we're talking about privatizing part of our public works.

You know, pretty crazy stuff.

Um, I'm a longtime resident.

Um, I'm here just to speak on that matter.

You can't take the vote away from the people.

You start doing that, you're gonna be out of a job because everybody would be impeaching you.

I won't get claps for this, but um, you brought it up at the ad hoc committee, vice mayor.

Our utility cost for our garbage is way too high.

Why is that?

You guys are supposed to be overseeing that department heads are supposed to be.

Why are we paying?

I pay 152 something a month.

When I moved to town, it was 35 bucks a month.

There's no reason my garbage bill should be 152 dollars a month, and I see another other price increases coming with water, sewer, and I get it.

A lot of our um utilities need some love, they've been sitting there for a long time, but you need to look at these departments and how they're being ran.

I know there's a couple of people from South Solid Waste here that are in leadership uh roles.

What are you getting for the money you're paying them?

Where's the accountability within the manager of solid waste and the people who are running solid waste and the department head who is allegedly overseeing solid waste?

And I think that the council should take a good look at that and how my money's being spent 152 bucks for my utility bill, because I believe we could bring our cost down, which everybody would be a hero in any department if they could bring their cost down instead of raising them.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

All right, uh, that ends our cards up here, but I want to open it up before I close the public hearing.

Does anybody else want to make a comment tonight that has not submitted a card?

Now's your time.

Going once, going twice.

All right, we're gonna go ahead and close the public hearing.

I heard a number of questions uh that came about, so I'm just gonna take a moment um and have staff uh address those questions if we could.

Uh, I think the and you guys may have been taking notes too.

Uh, but the first one I heard was powers delegated by the commission.

Um, Colleen had a question specifically about the library.

If we could address that one, or or I can't I can, but if you guys can, I think it'd be better for staff.

So the council uh currently dictates the powers of the various committees and commissions by ordinance, and the proposed amendment to the charter would just confirm that the council retains that authority to do so by ordinance.

The language in the charter right now says that all commissions and committees are only advisory to the council, and there are certain committees and commissions, most importantly the planning commission, and also of interest, the historic district commission that previously had final decision-making authority on certain items.

Um, and so that was really the focus.

But the council retains the authority, um, if this were to pass, the council would retain the authority to um direct the role of the various commissions and committees via via ordinance.

Cool.

Uh next one was SB 1383, the nine dollar charge associated with state organics.

State mandated organics recycling.

Right.

Um I appreciate the question.

Uh I'll ask Marcus Yasutaki to answer that one.

Thank you.

I think the specific question is is why aren't we opting out of it?

Oh, it sounded like there was some confusion.

Is that is that correct, Julie?

All right.

Mayor Ethel, members of the council, Marcus Yasataki, Utilities Director.

Uh I'm slightly new to the operations of solid waste and waste and recycling, but it's my understanding talking to staff that you know the nine dollars isn't a wasted fee that is paid per month for our utility bills.

It's all part of the compliance with the regulation of SB 1383.

Now we have talked internally as a staff, and the last rate study I believe was adopted in 21, going into effect in 2022.

And so we're on the cusp of reevaluating what that would look like probably next fiscal year to identify okay, are there areas in which that $9 or the rate as a whole might be modified to better identify and better contain what we've learned over the last four years in terms of the organic recycling, plus what we here at the city are proposing or would plan to do in terms of the electrification of our large and medium duty vehicles, because as you are probably all well aware, the electrification not only from the supply of the power side and the infrastructure side, but also the availability of just the type of vehicles that would be needed are not existent, or if they are existent, as we saw several months ago when we had to cancel the contract, just do not meet the necessary requirements to do the job within the city.

And so we would reevaluate all of that as part of a cost of service analysis to determine okay, if those types of projects or those types of vehicles were included, the education, the outreach of SB 1383, you know, and understanding the program now four years into it, along with the rest of the city of California and our regional partners, there would be probably opportunities to look at the city's overall rate from a solid waste perspective.

Thank you, Marcus.

So in summary, there's no way to opt out of that fee that is money we are spending every day on actually having the organics recycled.

Correct.

There's not like a California opt-in opt-out fee for some utilities, just some solid waste services just include that in your base fee.

They don't line item it out.

We get a number of state mandates that we do without calling it out as a separate fee.

It's just this one was very substantial.

I think which is why the decision it was before my time, but my understanding was the reason it was it was line itemed was because it was substantial.

Yes, and it was to truly show this is what we, the the city have to do as residents or customers, um myself being a customer, uh, have to pay in order to comply with that specific mandate.

Thank you.

Next question I heard, maybe it wasn't a question, but there was a little bit of a challenge from the DIA.

So I just want to clear the air on that.

Um there the council did not take a position on measure G.

Is that correct?

That is correct.

Okay.

And it was not city sponsored.

Not city sponsored, it's a citizens initiative that went on the ballot previously.

Uh and then um I think the only other thing is is you know, uh, I heard a question of like how can we take away the vote of the people?

Um I think what's what's on the discussion tonight, oh, is do we ask the voters to take away the vote of the people?

Oh, right.

And it and it's a matter of do we want to ask the voters to have more efficiency in local government, or do we not want them to have that efficiency?

I think that's what the real question is.

Oh, and so I just want to so I just want to make sure it's clear that we could put this our vote on any thing will be to put it on the ballot or to not put it on the ballot.

The ultimate deciders will be the voters of Folsom at the ballot box uh in November to choose whether to take away that option or not.

Oh so I just want to make sure there seemed to be some confusion on whether us making an action on it could could give us that power.

That is no way we could give us ourselves that power.

Those are the questions that I heard.

Um were there other questions that anyone that staff heard that needed to be addressed before I go to council deliberation?

I didn't have a question, but there are a lot of I think there's a lot of fear out there that um this um speaking of the franchise item that um this would take away the power in your hands to, you know, to privatize the aquatic center that well, pool, fire, police, zoo.

Um can you explain, Brian, how um that actually doesn't any of those don't have to go to the vote of the people at this moment.

The only ones that we're discussing and that are in our charter that has restrictions is water and um garbage.

Uh yeah, so I I um when you read through the charter, uh, it talks about city services.

So uh I mean I think uh as I read it, and the city attorney can uh correct me on this is any city service if we were to privatize it would have to go to the vote of the people.

So, you know, some of the dialogue that we've heard is it's a slippery slope if we were to privatize or allow for privatization that was afforded, you know, uh the authority to the council that one would fall over and over and over.

And so uh it would be solid waste and water and sewer.

And I I do want to uh just uh not that this is I mean, this is just a statement of uh there's 480 or so cities, um, and many of them do not have this provision, and we don't see all of those cities just franchising out because in many cases it doesn't make sense.

So, uh right now the current charter uh basically any of those changes would have to go to the voted people, vote of the people.

One example where we've contracted out and it didn't need a vote because it wasn't uh it was another government agency was our transit.

So the city had a transit operation and then now it uh contracts out with STA to provide that.

So um that that's how it is now.

So maybe I don't understand um because we had an ad hoc committee, I think it was last year to kind of evaluate our fire compared to Metro and how we could maybe partner with them on a few different things.

Would that have to go to a vote of the people?

No, that would not because it's a another government governmental entity, it wouldn't be a private franchise.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions from public comment we want to address?

All right.

Uh so the myself and the vice mayor served um on the ad hoc committee uh tonight was to me really about uh one receiving the report uh from the committee, oh, and then dissolving that committee.

So there's one action there.

Um, and then the second part is giving direction uh to staff going forward.

So I think if we could just start with each council member uh saying, hey, these are the priorities for me, if any, uh, to put before the voters in November.

I think that would help uh with the discussion.

Uh I'm I'm happy to turn the floor over to one of my colleagues or start on my own uh priorities, but Councilmember Aquino, you want to kick us off?

All right, I I I'm happy to kick us off.

Oh so I think for me, uh the first and foremost uh priority is the city attorney.

Oh change.

I think it's uh really important.

We are an outlier.

Oh, there's one of only two cities, and we're one of them.

Uh the other option for a city attorney is a directly elected city attorney.

Some large cities have in their charter that they directly elect uh the city attorney.

That doesn't make any sense for us.

Uh really what makes sense I think for us is to have that city attorney report directed to us.

So that's a priority for me.

Oh, to put uh before the voters.

Uh, and then I think the next one for me is the boards and commissions and resolving that conflict uh in our charter.

Right now, the planning commission and the parks commission have uh authority that is clear, uh, but then this next section talks about all boards and commissions, even though that section to me is very clearly not the parks and and planning commission.

Oh, and so to me it it does open us up uh for litigation, which we've already had uh on it, and so clearing up that section in our charter makes a whole lot of sense uh to me.

I've served on a number of commissions, both those uh that were really purely advisory and also our planning commission in the past.

Um, I've also served at the county planning commission, and that has even more authority than our planning commission.

So I think having the the elected body set to that authority level, which is pretty limited, um, makes a lot of sense for our city that's our size.

Uh, those are the two um real priorities for me.

Um, from the franchise standpoint, um, I could see uh putting this in the voters.

Uh, I think the main challenge, and it was brought up.

Um, sorry, I forgot.

Is it is it Fred?

Oh.

Sorry.

Anyway, one of the last comment, the last commenter.

Oh, sorry, Paul, Paul, uh, brought it up.

Uh, I think our solid waste services are really high.

Uh, and I think that is where part of the challenge is coming from.

Uh, I look forward to the next rate study.

I think we can put this in front of the voters if we need to, but I think that's where the pressure is coming from uh for me, uh, is is my trash bill has gone up substantially.

When I look back at the 2021 rate study, uh, we are the highest in the region.

Uh we were given comparisons, and this was before I was on the council, but the comparisons are like Santa Clara and Napa.

Oh, it doesn't make any sense.

So everybody else in our region has a much higher or much lower um solid waste service.

Uh, I think we can put that in front of the voters, uh, you know, and ask the voters personally.

Uh, not this time, uh, I don't think we could get it for the ballot together.

Um, I also think there's a rate study coming up.

There's an opportunity for efficiencies there.

Um, there's an option to bring in, you know, an auditor uh or some sort of consultant to improve operations there.

I think there's a lot of opportunities there.

That to me is really the only service that is an or an enterprise that's a that's an outlier uh here from a cost standpoint, and I think that would um if we could get that cleaned up, maybe that that pressure goes away, and if it doesn't, we could bring it to the voters in the future.

Uh and I I think you know, I'm not uh arguing for anything, I'm just kind of laying out where I'm at uh on it.

I know uh when I talked to voters uh about measure G, and in my own campaign, um I heard a lot about the significant increase.

It had been uh I want to say almost 20 years before since the solid rate waste rates had gone up, uh, and they went up substantially overnight.

I want to say it was like 70%.

Uh they went up substantially back in 2021.

Uh and the voters uh, you know, we talk about affordability and we talk about cost, uh, and I'm hearing a lot of concerns uh in our community about that.

You know, thank you, Mr.

Vanderveen, for bringing that up.

I think that's one of the challenges we're dealing with.

I love our refuse drivers.

I love the great service we provide.

I didn't hear anything at the charter review about concerns with quality.

I heard all positive about that, but I have heard concerns about cost.

I wasn't on this commission or on the council for the last rate study.

Um, so I think that to me is is, you know, if if we want to keep the voter authority in there, I could I could go that way.

Um, and if we want, if the voters say, hey, we're fine with paying an extra couple hundred bucks a year uh in order to maintain that service.

Works for me, great.

We'll we'll keep at it all day long.

Just knowing, you know, I also think we need to get a handle on what this electrification cost is gonna look like for a small entity like the city of Folsom uh to move forward with electrification.

We are going to be an outlier.

And so we just need to make our residents really, really aware oh, that we're gonna be an outlier, and costs are going to go up.

Uh, if we're operating an electric fleet, solid waste fleet, and other folks have the economies of scale to do that, um, totally fine with putting that before the voters, but we'll have to put it together with numbers um that they can understand and what they're voting for.

So I'm totally fine with, you know, kind of going a different direction on that one.

Um, or I'm fine with moving forward with with striking that and letting the voters weigh in at a council process.

Um the last one for me is is the the change in contribution limit.

Uh I could see how people would say 750 is a high.

I think it was on the ballot last time for 500 uh and was relatively close to passing.

I don't I didn't look up the numbers before this.

That's just my recollection of what it was.

Um, and so you know, I think that makes a lot of sense.

I think the PACs do have an outsized influence uh just with the Citizens United decision.

The PACs do have an outside influence uh on campaigns, and we need to be, you know, I I'd love to be an idealist and and say this is a great way to limit money in politics is to keep that campaign contribution limit.

But the Supreme Court took that decision out of our hands.

Citizens United changed the game uh and allowed basically unlimited money in politics through political action committees, and so uh I would be supportive of raising that.

750 is fine, I could go for a lower number two if 750.

I get I get the point 750 sounds high and may might uh feel um too much.

I I do want to say also the original proponent of that uh Tom Asa Tuno was my appointee to the Charter Review Commission.

He was the original person that actually helped get this in to the municipal code um and the campaign.

Uh you know, his preference I think was to eliminate it completely.

Oh, but he said that might not fly with the voters, and so we kind of ended up with a compromise.

There was a lot of discussion about, you know, whether this makes sense um in this day and age.

It made sense when it got passed, but it doesn't make sense anymore.

So a bit long-winded, um, but those are my priorities, uh, for what we asked the staff to bring back at a future date and take more public input on.

So I'll I'll go ahead and try to.

There's a couple that I would I'm not interested in continuing a conversation on.

That's basically the first three that were suggested the taking out out large.

I don't think that's just striking those two words is gonna make a difference, even though it is, I mean, it's a language change.

Um it is in conflict with our ordinance and state law, but I don't think this is moves the needle on anything.

So it's it's not that important for me to spend $9,000 to get it on the ballot, um, unless we can do a bigger, broader one that cleans up other languages, then I would be fine with that.

The um the next two, the term limits, um uh yeah, I'm not interested in um, I'm not interested in putting this on the ballot, and I'm especially not interested in putting the third one, the 2.06, um, the increase in salary pay, CPI, and putting a cap on it as well.

So those are the three I would take off right away.

Um I do agree with Justin on 4.03, the city attorney should be appointed, um, should be hired um by the city council.

Um and then I do also agreed with the boards of commissions due to the some lawsuits that we are currently undergoing right now because of the languaging.

Um this is uh simple cleanup.

Um it doesn't take away any, it doesn't change anything in our boards and commissions right now, but it gives the council flexibility to, and I think back to Colleen's question, um, to appoint different things if we want to in the future.

So um and then the third thing I would say that I would probably be supportive is the um, and it is just to clear that up, it is the um donation levels, but this would not change the charter.

That was not our uh I don't believe that was what we were suggesting.

It was because the municipal code was voted on by the public, the only way to change that particular code is to go back to the public for a vote.

Um and so we were talking as a whole, um, it came up because of the charter discussion, but um, you know, the council can decide to put that on the ballot or not.

I also agree that I think 750 would be too big of a jump.

Um I would say a hundred from going from a hundred and fifty dollar limit to three hundred or five hundred would be much more amenable.

And I do the important part about this is, you know, when I ran four years ago, um, you know, I didn't know a lot of people either, and the PACs were very, very, very um influential.

And their IEs as already stated, they can spend thousands, if not even hundreds of thousands sometimes, um, against or for a particular um candidate.

And while that is not something that we can control, limiting 150 for each can each person to donate to a candidate does hamstring us getting new voices on a city council, for example.

So I do believe some um I think the intent was good in the f in the beginning, but what it actually did is give PACs and I independent expenditures more power, not less.

And that is what I want to shift.

Um, so that's where I would be, you know, and I think that would be great to have a council discussion on if there's a majority of people that want to put that on the ballot.

Um, where is that number?

What is that number?

One thing that was mentioned at the beginning is we did have a few conversations about out large uh at large, uh not at large, I'm sorry, elected mayor.

And the reason that the committee did not decide to go forward with that at the time is because it would require redistricting, most likely.

Um, if we had an at-large mayor, then what how do we how do we figure out where they're coming from?

What do we do with the other?

Do we add a mayor?

Do we add a position?

Um, and then the the duties and roles was gonna be way more complicated than we could get done by May, and even this council, even to get done by November.

So I think that what we were what was kind of suggested and talked about, and this would be up for the council in the future to decide, so this would be only my opinion, is that we start having these conversations now about our elected mayor because we have to by law redistrict anyways by 32032, I believe.

And so starting those discussions now and by 28, maybe putting Alan Valor, maybe even 30, it would be a much easier, bigger conversation with our public on how we would go about that.

So that was kind of that transparency part.

So that's where I'm at on that so far, but I would really like to hear from especially the two of you that weren't a part of the committee, and where what you feel because one of the things that I think was great is the committee was making suggestions only, recommendations, and it's really up to the council.

And I was kind of dying to hear what my counterparts were.

What did you say about section 2.07D?

I didn't.

Oh, yeah.

Okay, okay.

I can go.

Um I'm not gonna address um the campaign contribution limits because as I said, um, this was the charter review committee, and there's nothing in the charter about campaign contribution limits.

So I'm skipping that one.

Um things that I would be generally okay with, but but I do want to have more information about how much each of these ballot measures is going to cost um the city to make a final decision.

Um removing the words at large from how the council members are elected would be okay with me to put on the ballot.

Um deleting the section that is obsolete now because it refers to elected officials from the 1990s would be okay with me putting on the ballot.

Um section of 4.07 to strike the language that all city boards and commissions are only advisory to the city council, I'd be okay with putting on the ballot.

Um I don't feel a need to put um the term limits one on the ballot that was just voted on in 2018.

I I don't think we need to spend the money to do that again.

Also, when you go back and look at the history of everybody who served on the city council, the average number of terms that people serve is well under three terms.

It is only in recent history that people have served three, four or more terms.

So I I don't think it's necessarily to reduce that even more.

Um city attorney, I can go either way.

I do understand that we're an outlier, but there is a provision existing in our charter that, for example, if there's a conflict between the council and the city manager, and we want to bring in outside council who doesn't report to the city manager, we can do that.

The other thing is we always have the ability as a council to say to the city manager, look, you get rid of the city attorney, or we're getting rid of you, you know.

I mean, so I I don't I don't think it's a um it's not a make or break for me.

Um the two I absolutely will not support putting on the ballot is city council compensation the automatic increase.

I agree with what was said that you know there's a lot a lot of people in this world, especially those in the private sector, who do not get automatic cost of living adjustments, our employees don't get an automatic, you know, we have to um negotiate that every few years.

Um, and if we put that in the charter, there is no way for the council to say, you know, we don't want to do this this year or next year or whatever, so I I'm not in favor of that.

And I'm not in favor of um putting section uh 2.07 D about the outsourcing of city services on the ballot.

Um I agree with the comments that were made that to outsource solid waste or any other service that the city currently provides is a really big deal, and I think that does warrant um the public weighing in.

The other thing is um I I take a little bit of issue with this idea that that no, for example, just with solid waste, that a private company wouldn't bid because we have this extra step in the process.

If you look at a city like Citrus Heights or Rancho Cordova or West Sack that already has privatized solid waste service, they are going out to bid 18 months or more before their current contract expires.

So to add four to six months to say, hey, we got to go to a vote of the people, I don't think is a huge deal.

Then when they actually are choosing their solid waste provider and they're signing a contract, they're signing a 10-year contract.

So it's not like you know, we're we're dealing with you know contracts that are executed very quickly and and you know um short term.

Um the other thing is, you know, those those solid waste providers when they are um bidding on an RFP, they're spending time and money and resources with no guarantee that they're gonna get the contract.

Same as it would be with us.

Yes, it's an extra step, yes, it adds some complexity.

I don't think it's a deal breaker.

Um I I do agree, you know, we do have the highest rates.

Um I think there are some opportunities for savings.

I've actually received messages from multiple solid waste drivers with their with their suggestions, and I think we ought to explore those and listen to those, but I will say unequivocally, no one, no one complains to me about their solid waste service.

So those are my thoughts.

Thank you.

There's already been a lot said here tonight, and I really appreciate the people that showed up to express their concerns.

Um it's great to actually see the council chambers full of people that are actively wanting to be involved in how we make decisions.

Um I think one of the things that I struggle with, and I think a lot of people here did is that that's you know, a lot of the language in this charter is um relatively vague, or and you know, specifically in terms of this um the proposed language on um enterprises, and you know, clearly states restriction on city utility or enterprise, no city owned utility or enterprise or any portion there of rich lies within the corporate boundaries of city may be sold least uh for more than two years, contracted to or put to franchised any non-governmental party without complying with the procedures requiring uh an election.

Uh, that goes to the people, and one of the questions that came up was when our city manager mentioned that there have been things that we have not um sent to the public, and this is uh creating a lot of um concern.

I'm concerned about this, and I agree with what council member uh Aquino had to say about our current garbage services.

Uh the other piece of uh information, you know, some of these other pieces of information are missing is though we're the highest in the region.

It would be nice to see money outlined on a table of what everybody's spending in different regions within the area, whether it's the county or the other cities.

Um I don't see that this is necessary to put forward to the voters at this time as these kinds of lack of information and confusion about the wording exists, and uh I haven't heard any complaints either about our existing garbage service.

I do uh hear a lot of concerns about our other uh utilities and enterprises, and I don't want us to end up on a slippery slope where the interpretation here is made to cover something you know that could be independently decided by the council without taking it to the vote.

Um of these are absolutely necessary, and I think that's a question for our city attorney, and that was addressing the change about at-large elections and the change uh regarding boards and commissions, you know, so that we're actually uh compliant with uh state law and able to function, you know, allowing our boards and commissions as they have previously done, make decisions.

And right now, I believe that there are um right now we've we've had to go back to having everything come to the council, and uh previously there were definitions of what had to come to the council uh from the Planning commission or the Historic District commission or the parks commission, and so those kinds of constraints have already been put in place, so it seems uh logical to go ahead and bring this up about the boards and commissions.

Is that can you clarify a little bit on that?

What kinds of constraints are already there about what those commissions decide or don't decide?

Sure.

So in the Folsom Municipal Code, each existing commission is laid out in its own section.

Which it still today existing language in the Folsom Municipal Code, which was drafted and approved by the council, gives the Historic District Commission the authority to make final decisions, much like the Planning Commission, within the boundaries of the historic district.

It is effectively the planning commission for the historic district.

However, based on the language in the charter, a court found uh last fall that that was inappropriate, and as a result, uh the Historic District Commission uh has maintained its purview, but it can only recommend final decisions which then come to the council for approval.

But previously it has been making decisions.

Correct.

It went into effect I believe in uh the late 80s, uh possibly the late 90s.

I can't remember at this time, but um, you know, for more than 20 years, the historic district commission was making final decision on most of the planning matters within the boundaries of the historic district.

Can I clarify something about that?

Final decision, but the decision was always able to be appealed to the city council, correct?

Correct.

So that actually the city council did have the final authority if you appeal the planning commission or the historic district commission's decision.

Correct, and that happened multiple times.

Okay, thank you.

So uh council member, you know, also brought up that the cost of the election, and you know, so I feel like we have to pick wisely off this list of what we're going to send.

Um, so things that are um can you cite with the cost, or maybe the city manager the clerk can uh remind me of what she told me, uh, but I believe it's between eight and nine thousand dollars per each ballot initiative.

Well, um, thank you, City Manager.

The county of Sacramento sets the fees for any item that the city puts on the ballot, and they have kind of a somewhat confusing schedule of how the fees go, but essentially they charge a certain rate for your base setup fee for your first question or ballot measure, and then there's a reduced rate for each ballot measure after that, and it's set up on a per registered voter fee.

So the first ballot measure question, the county is telling us it's gonna be about $83,000 and about 80, I'm sorry, $10,000 for each ballot measure after that.

So it sounds like I was spot on.

Well, in your defense, that this is a significant change from how the 2024 election fees were charged.

So our experience just two years ago was quite different than the fees that they have restructured going forward.

So to answer your question, it's about eighty-three thousand dollars for the first ballot measure, about ten thousand seven hundred dollars for each one thereafter.

Mr.

Mayor, can I ask a question?

So as it relates to the normal election that will occur with the three council seats.

That's different.

Is that what you're saying is that we would have our normal charges for that, and it would be that $83,000 charge would only be if another item was added or or a ballot measure was added.

That's correct.

That additional $83,000 would just come into play with the first ballot measure that's added to the to the ballot.

The charge for each district election is distinctly separate from any charge for ballot measures.

Thank you.

So I'm I'm gonna go back here and ask the city attorney's more.

So it seems that it's that we need to correct the section 2.01 about addressing uh the transition away from at large elections just by eliminating some of the verbiage in there.

That is um at the will of the the council and the voters.

Um state law is has required the process that we are currently in engaged with, and our ordinance is being followed with respect to the district elections.

Okay, thank you.

Uh term limits uh I agree uh with others that they were just recently changed, and I don't see a need to change that again.

Um city council compensation and expension and expenses.

I um I'm opposed to moving forward with that.

Uh I'm opposed to moving forward with section 2.07 on the restriction on city utility or enterprise franchise authority without um a vote of of the residents, and I I think it was made pretty clear that if that this the process can move along slowly and there's an election every two years, so that if we're planning ahead, we could plan ahead enough time to get this on the ballot if there's a particular enterprise or utility that the city wants to um have privatized.

So I'm opposed to that.

Uh city attorney, I don't see that it's necessary to put that on the ballot, given the explanation earlier about how that functions about the city attorney's function.

Um boards and commissions that appears to be necessary if we want to continue as we have for uh uh decades uh now with having our boards and commission make recommendations and they still can be appealed to the city council if uh residents feel it's necessary.

Uh transition of elected officials from 1990, it sounds like that needs to be eliminated, and we can't do that by making an administrative change that wouldn't need to go to the ballot.

Um, this is too big for just to treat like the warrants in cheeks.

Um, in terms of whether in terms of whether you have to do it, um, if it has been existing in the charter for many years without uh causing any problems.

Yeah, and um item eight about changing the donations um for candidates for individuals from 150 to 750.

I think that number could potentially be negotiated, but it is difficult when you're collecting um donations of a maximum of 150, and not everybody can afford to get uh even, you know, give you a donation of 150 that there are um during the last election there was more than uh one independent um, or I guess more than one candidate that received independent expenditures that amounted to more than 80 or 100,000 dollars, which is a significant amount of money when you're thinking about electing a council member uh to cover about 5,500 houses uh in each district.

Um, so I'm I'm plus minus on that one, but uh I think it I think we've narrowed this list down between everybody's votes and uh wishes to somewhere about around maybe three items being placed on the ballot.

Thank you uh to my colleagues for your input on this.

Uh I do have a couple of clarifying questions before I try to summarize and see if I've gotten it correct.

Um and first off, I want to go to you, Councilmember Aquino on the campaign contributions.

I recognize the challenge.

Um I think the reason this was in there was is because it's one of those weird situations where we have a municipal code that was put in place not by the city council, right?

It was put in place by the voters.

Oh, and so we also asked all of the committee members uh, are there things that are not in the charter right now that should be?

Like it wasn't just a are there things that we should change or delete from the charter, but it's also are there things that we should add to the charter?

Right, but I thought you clarified earlier that that was not what you were asking to do.

Well, I think the city attorney gave that advice to the committee.

Okay.

That it makes sense to kind of do this in the process, but but I'm open to bringing this back as a separate item at a future.

We have time, and so if it makes you more comfortable, I'm happy to bring this back as a separate item.

I think it should be brought back as a separate item.

I would support a modest increase.

I think maybe going from 150 to 250.

I agree that five-fold is is too much.

Um you're correct that it was put on the ballot in 2018 at 500, it narrowly lost.

It was very close.

But I I think 150 to 250 is a reasonable jump, in my opinion.

So maybe we can can that be direction to come back in a couple weeks on that particular item with some of those proposed changes.

Yeah, and and staff, if you could separate that item out from the charter review and just bring it back as a city council item, that would be great.

Uh a new business item.

Uh and it sounds like we probably need more discussion on the dollar amount.

Um, I just I just look oftentimes to our neighbors.

Does that work for you, Clerk?

Also, I just saw some eyes going back and forth.

So uh if we're not gonna be able to bring it back in time, then I will take this direction this discussion in another direction.

Well, I think we can bring it back.

We're uh trying to figure out if it has to be a public hearing or just a new business item.

Oh, sorry.

With respect to the public noticing and all of those, that's our pause.

But we we'll bring it back.

We have time for a public hearing for that.

If I could ask a clarification under the current process that we have, since we've listed the item, uh it's covered under the current public hearing that we have.

Correct.

So so one thing we can do, I mean, if we wanted to keep going through the process, you know, so um although it's not necessarily tied to the ultimate charter, I think you could probably have a discussion where it's a separate resolution that is specific to that outside of the charter changes.

So it just as a reminder, we're having this meeting May 26 as an option, June 9th, June 23rd, and then uh that will be our final public hearing.

So I guess in some ways, just to keep it simple.

I appreciate Councilmember Zucchino's comments because it is separate, but as we tie it to this hearing process, we can list it out differently in a in the report.

Just as a suggestion.

I don't know, council member if that works for you.

All right.

So I think we're clear on that.

The other question I think that's important that we uh that we kind of address head on, um, is uh the cost, right?

Um we have sections of the charter uh that are obsolete, that are clearly obsolete, uh and that make no impact uh to the daily runnings of the city.

Oh, and so if is it the will of this council to put it to the voters to possibly be very confusing of like why am I deleting this section on water meters or you know, and why am I deleting this section on transition of elected officials?

Why does it matter uh to the voters?

And so I just kind of want to get people's thoughts on whether we should even bother with the cleanups, and I and I think you look at all these charter cities that are out there, there is a lot of extra language uh that is in all of these charters because this process is very cumbersome.

Uh so I just want to kind of get a straw poll on whether it even makes sense to do any cleanup.

To me, I'm kind of leaning toward no.

Just because it's $10,000 we could put to a park renovation or fixing up a trail or you know, right.

I mean, I guess I would kind of defer to the city attorney about what you know legally what we need to do.

The thing that we need to keep in mind is the county's fees are not going to decrease, right?

They're only gonna go up from here, and it's the first charge that is so expensive.

The other ones are nominal compared to the 85,000, 83,000.

So yes, while I agree with what you're saying, I there's I think there's also an if we have five things, don't put you know four on this one in one two years from now, because then that's gonna cost you more in the long run, also.

Is there a way to combine like some of those that you know it wouldn't seem like there's no conflict here?

The voters probably wouldn't have conflict with taking off out.

Well, I don't know, actually, I don't know.

Um, but some of the obsolete sections, is there a way to combine any of those into one?

Theoretically, yes, but based on the list that we have here, the only one that I think truly counts as a cleanup item would be number seven, section 9.02 transition of elected officials from 1990.

So uh that one I think could be considered cleanup, but I think everything else um would need to be a standalone.

Are there other cleanup items in the charter that you guys did not bring forward as recommendations?

There was some conflict on them, uh, because like certain things like the bridge one was discussed, right?

Uh um one of the things that was in the charter that was passed by the will of the people was is that is limited to not being a beltway.

Oh, so it's limited right now to four lanes uh and bike lanes.

Oh, and so if we were delete to delete that entire section, um, you know, the people once said we're fine with this bridge being in this place, but we don't want it to be six lanes later on.

Oh, and so there's just like those little nuances.

Oh, the water meter one was the other one.

Largely that's obsolete and state law has superseded it, uh, but uh there was enough conflict still around it uh and some confusion of like, well, if I vote against this, does that mean I get to go back to my flat?

We all miss our flat, those of us that had flat water rates in Folsom and didn't have a meter, we all miss those.

And so then you put it on the ballot and people vote against it, and then you go, well, sorry, you still don't get your flat water rates back because state law supersedes you.

So that's the challenge with these cleanups is trying to explain it to uh all the voters in a way that makes sense that like you can vote for or against this, but your vote really doesn't matter because state law has superseded you.

Yeah, that I wouldn't want to spend 40,000 or whatever on things that the city will operate just fine, whether the thing's in there or not, yeah.

And I think our goal was to um anything that is affecting what we're we're trying to do or what we what the council can do in the future, that's what we addressed.

And so some of those that may be a little unusual because of the just the change in time or the passage of time, we just it hasn't negatively impacted anything that we're doing, so it may not be worth that effort.

So I'm fine with not going for with the obsolete section and the at large for those reasons.

Um, but that I mean that's that's not unheated debate, is it?

Um, one of the things that Justin, I think you said that you would like to continue discuss.

Well, it seems to be first of all clear that there's some negotiation or discussion maybe to bring forward about the city attorney.

I think all of us here agreed about the boards and commissions one, right?

That's what I wrote down anyways.

And then the other one, and then we're already gonna bring the code of code suggestion back.

Um, so I think we're narrowing it down.

I think we're doing a good job.

Um, the other one is the franchise one, which you brought up.

Um, you know, I guess I'm I'm conflicted on that one because I'm concerned about, you know, four years ago when I was campaigning, I met a lot of people on fixed incomes and they kept saying, I don't want my rates to increase.

They they mentioned garbage.

They mentioned everything.

Um, and so it's interesting that we're looking at comparisons, and I I saw some comparisons today where we're like $20, $30 more a month for our garbage um service than our um our community um neighbors.

Um, and while this doesn't really, you know, like I don't have an issue with this too much, but I'm I'm concerned that you know, if we tried to go out to a vote of the people to um franchise out, for example, how would we get that data?

Like, how would that RFP process work?

And you mean because there's a public process and then there's a you know, when they're putting their bids in, that's a very private process until it's at the end.

So how would the companies feel about bidding and then how would we even be able to decide to put it on the ballot if we can't compare?

So I'm I appreciate Barbara, you kind of started this of a table of cost comparison.

Um I would be interested in that kind of some real data to really see where we're if we're off base, how we're off base.

Um, and then what is that information about that bidding process?

How would we go about that to put it on the ballot?

And if that is something a future council wanted to do, and I'm not saying that I want to do this or not, but what if they want to do it in four years?

Like how how would that process work?

Well, I mean, I think it it wouldn't be a terribly difficult process.

It would we would follow our normal kind of a either a request for qualifications or a request for proposals, uh, and then we would get to an end point where we'd identify who um the the uh selected vendor would be and what the price point would be, and then you would put it on the ballot, much like what we have the opportunity to do now.

And then it as part of that, the the vendors would just have to determine um their rates based on having to wait a certain period of time uh before they would be awarded or not awarded.

And that would be probably like a nine month waiting period.

It could be, and you know, you know, council member Aquino uh brought up some points that you know uh related to franchises uh or or uh companies that deal with franchises because it's such a big operation that maybe it would be okay right in the in that realm.

So I don't think it would be overly difficult if this were not to go forward on a ballot, just posing the question uh that if we went forward with a more specific question later on, the council could do that, where you know the the question actually in some ways would be very clear as opposed to this question is not very clear to make the change to the franchise.

It would be simply imagine question if if it actually panned out that you would do it for company X was the lowest bidder in this privatization effort.

Citizens of Folsom, do you want to proceed in this manner?

And then they would vote on it.

I think you brought a good point up uh in the beginning, kind of when you started this whole conversation, um, that the amount of people that voted on this charter or vote on things were so small compared to we have 95,000 people residents in fulsom now.

You know, I I would look at putting this on the ballot not to go out for a franchise, but go out to see what the public wants us to do.

Kind of like the citizens, not the cities, the citizen sales tax measure.

Um that was really informative.

That wasn't a true poll of where our public really wanted us to stay and live within our means.

So you know, I I appreciate everyone that came in here and who came to the charter review um committee, especially those last two meetings, because there was a lot of opposition to this, but I'm not looking to this as a as a reason to, oh, I want to go out and I want to privatize everything.

I really want to hear from the voters, so I'm conflicted because I understand the fear around it.

Um so I guess maybe I would like to continue the conversation, maybe at the next meeting.

Um, and if I could just describe uh the process, you know, so tonight I I mean was mainly to introduce the item.

Uh our goal uh would be uh, you know, the staff's recommendation is that the council would adopt resolution one one six one three, a resolution receiving the 2026 ad hoc charter review committee report to the city council and recommend that we dissolve the committee, and then we would also recommend um you know that you know, do you want to follow the schedule that's outlined, have additional conversation on May 26th, and then uh at the May 26th meeting, you can get to kind of decide where you're at if you want to move forward with the June 9th meeting if needed, and then we already have schedule June 23 for a final public hearing.

Uh and then July 24th would be the date you'd have to approve any language that would ultimately go on the ballot.

So my recommendation would be that if you're comfortable adopting the resolution and in uh dissolving the committee, and then uh just saying, hey, we're we're we're closing today's public hearing, which is done, and but there's more public comment coming at the future council meetings, and then we just put that on the schedule.

Well, I I'm interested in hearing uh more.

Hopefully, people would come out in two weeks because I want to I want to know if people really want us to the city council to have the authority to look at every option available to us to avoid a sales tax measure, to avoid, you know, what what do you want us to do to actually um save you money, you know, going forward?

Um, because it's it's a little I I feel a little conflict there, and what I'm hearing on one hand and hearing on another.

Um so that would be the question I want if we continue if we move forward in a couple weeks and even in the next meeting, that's what I kind of want to hear.

Are you guys you want us to have um take the time and the effort and look at overturn every rock that we can't to make sure that we can live within our means as we are?

That's kind of what I'm curious about right now.

I think it's really difficult for me to keep hearing this live within our means, because that's not really what the voters said, they said they didn't want to increase the sales tax, they didn't pick out certain things they don't want to have or want to franchise out.

Um, that it's just a broad deposition and it can be used just to make an argument in uh in any direction, and I agree that we need to be able to afford to pay for what we currently have.

Uh, but I I think unless we have a better idea about what people really um want to franchise out or what kinds of services they give up, I don't think it should be um a unilateral decision made by the city council about what uh kinds of services we are um are doing that with, even though it's open to a public comment, it's not, you know, the public doesn't always show up.

The public uh always doesn't, you know, they don't read the agendas every meeting, and so I I think that we're missing a piece there in making a decision about what we want to franchise or privatize, um, if move if we move forward with doing that.

Yeah, I think there's uh Brian, a comment you made of like it's asking to remove asking the voters to remove voter approval is very vague uh and unclear, and I don't think we'll be understood.

Uh um uh although, you know, in a technical body like a charter review commission uh or here at city council where we nerd out every couple weeks on uh public policy um and talk to residents constantly about what's our what's best for our our city, like it it can we can understand it.

Uh, but it's gonna be really tough for our voters to understand that.

Whereas if we um if we were to go forward with something that's very specific, uh, and that hey, we can't get costs down, hey, this electoral vehicle mandate is gonna kill us, uh, or drive up costs significantly more than and we have to either partner with another agency, which wouldn't require you know, partner with another public agency which wouldn't require charter approval, or privatize uh which would we would then go to the voters, right?

If that's the case with a very clear, like, hey, here's what it is.

Um, you guys make the decision, it's your pocketbooks uh that are gonna pay for it uh going forward.

So I I think there is some something to be said for the clarity uh of a ballot resolution, uh, and that we get um, you know, hey, it this is this this is the clear option.

Like we've gotten bids, oh, and and here's what the savings are, uh, or hey, we've done this efficiency on operations, and if we go out to bid, oh, and the bids aren't any better than the service we are providing.

That could have happened too, right?

Hey, we we open bids, oh, and they're no different, right?

Oh, hey, this is the efficiency or we're asking for 10 or 20 year commitment from somebody.

Um we open those bids and it doesn't look like it's going, hey, putting us on the ballot, oh, you know, doesn't even make any sense.

We can even put that in our RFP.

Like, hey, if if costs aren't, you know, 20% below or something significantly below, then we don't even bring it to the voters, right?

We don't even ask them for their opinion because we know that they're gonna be fine with this great service they provide if it's relatively close.

I think we've just got a gap right that needs to be closed.

So I that's where I'm kind of leaning on it.

So do we have three that we've kind of circled around?

I think the city attorney towards the commission.

So if I could offer a suggestion, because uh I mean, I think it staff may be able to help for the public conversation and for the council conversation for us to come back with kind of a report highlighting some of the conversations today, but even coming up with you know uh costs for the ballot, right?

So we can say, hey, here are the costs.

If we're going to do the initial ballot 80,000, and then this is what your options are, so you can fit see clear, we can put it up on the screen, and and then also we could put together a matrix of the eight options, and then we can kind of just go through the the conversation and uh you know maybe uh we'll have uh council member Kozlowski here as well that can kind of help you know uh be a part of that conversation in in the fact that we're gonna have to talk about this at least two or three more times.

Anyway, I don't think we lose anything by um you know, I do want to make a suggestion though.

There were two the term limits and the salary that no not one of us is supporting really, so I don't think that you even need to the staff needs to bring that back.

Well, I'd be fine with that.

Less is more for me.

Yeah, so all right.

So I'm gonna entertain a motion to accept the report and dissolve the committee.

So moved.

Second.

We have a motion and a second.

Please call the roll.

Council members Aquino, yes, Leary, yes, Rora, yes, and Rathel.

Yes.

Uh and now I'm gonna look to staff.

We've provided a lot of direction tonight.

Uh I think we've been crystal clear.

Just kidding.

Uh, do you guys need further direction uh from the council on how to move forward at the next meeting?

Well, well, from my perspective, I mean what what let me describe what I think we will do, and you can tell me if that makes sense, is we would bring back mainly uh kind of the the eight items and um if you would like we can kind of include in there.

I I would probably prefer to wait to to do this, but almost come up the matrix and we can kind of um double check with you at that meeting that hey, where do you stand on item one through eight?

You know, like hey, we want to keep these or we don't want to keep these, or hey, let's have more conversation about that.

I think it'll become clear when we get some of the budget figures, and I think I'd like to cover uh have conversations with our city attorney as well as far as the cleanup language.

Uh, you know, so we can make it just a definitive statement, like yeah, we're not gonna go forward with at large or um I guess that was the main one there.

Uh but I think we can there's there's so much information out there that I think if we come forward, it'll just be a more narrowly focused conversation.

I think you just bring six back, not the term and the salary.

Okay, so so if that's the case, then we would need a motion to remove the term limits and the salary.

ISO move.

Second.

Please call the roll.

Council members Aquino, yes, Leary, yes, Roarbah, yes, and Rachel.

Yes, okay.

Thank you.

Are there any before we uh before we move on to the next item?

Uh will I also entertain motions to remove anything else from the discussion?

Let's let's make uh our city manager and staff's job easier if we can't.

Well, just for the sake of um financial reasons, I would move to not uh put forward section 2.01 removing at large and section 9.02 deleting the language from the 1990s.

I second it.

We have a motion and a second, please call the roll.

Council members Aquino, yes, Leary.

And Rachel.

Yes.

Sorry.

I love it.

All right.

And we will now move.

Can I do one more?

Yeah, of course.

Um I move to um not bring back anything, so reject the committee's recommendation on section 2.07 D, outsourcing of city services.

Second.

All right.

We have a motion and a second, please call the roll.

Council members Aquino, yes, Leary, yes.

Rorabah, yes.

And Rathel.

Yes.

Motion passes.

Going once.

Uh hold on.

I I gotta.

So we're taking out the at large, we're taking out the 1990s.

I think we only have what you're left with is um number five city attorney, number six boards and commissions, and the minifigure.

Okay.

Yeah, the contribution limits.

Okay.

All right.

Oh, okay.

And that's that right?

No, because we voted.

Yeah, eight has not been addressed.

The contribution limits has not been addressed.

Five, six, and eight.

Right.

But eight we're just bringing back as something standalone, correct?

Yes.

Okay.

Well, we would bring it as part of this item so it would fall under the public hearing requirements.

But it would be a separate okay.

That works.

So basically our report next time we'll uh have discussions on the city attorney item, boards and commissions, and the uh contribution limits.

Is that correct?

Okay.

We were being very respectful of staff's time and all the time they've put into this already.

Thank you for the late nights.

Uh city manager's report.

Okay, thank you.

Uh mayor, members of the council.

I just wanted to provide uh an update related to Castle Park.

Uh there's been a lot of interest.

You know, we really appreciate everyone's efforts to uh in the community build to get that moving forward.

If uh you were one of the volunteers out there, I'm sure uh you got to experience some rain.

And the reason why I know that is because there was a lot of rain, which uh limited the number of people who were able to come out and even the amount of work that was done.

So uh with the goal of completing the project during that week, we were unfortunately not able to complete it.

Leathers and associates, which is uh kind of our guide, the company behind and supervising that effort.

They only had on their calendar that week to be with us, and so they had to leave and handle other jobs, and they came back uh just this uh last week to do additional work, and so we're really close to getting it finished, and our goal is to fine-tune everything, get everything in place, to have kind of a grand opening kind of mid-June.

So that's what we're uh that's what we're uh shooting for.

So we'll have more information related to that.

Uh also just a big thank you to everyone involved.

Uh Kelly, did you want to comment on that at all?

Okay, uh, then uh uh just big thanks to all the uh volunteers, city council, city staff, uh community members that were involved in the 80th anniversary, and then uh uh birthday party, then Folsom Bike Park Grand Opening.

We have on May 16th, uh Folsom Parks and Recreation and Fat Track will host a grand reopening celebration for the redesign Folsom bike park on May 16th from 10 a.m.

to 2 p.m.

The event will include professional rider demos.

I'm not one of those.

Uh a jump jam, bike safety checks, raffles, and family friendly activities.

Uh more than 31,000 was raised through community support to help rebuild and sustain this park, and we're extremely grateful.

Uh City Works Day is on May 20th during national uh public works week.

Uh the free community event will feature interactive exhibits, work vehicles, public safety demonstrations, and hands-on activities.

Uh more information is on the city's website.

We also have uh battle the uh battle of the badges uh blood drive, the Folsom Fire Department and Folsom Police Department will host the annual Battle of the Badges Blood Drive on June 3rd from 10 a.m.

to 2 30 p.m.

at the Folsom Community Center.

Uh so we involve uh everyone who can participate to participate.

Uh fire station 36.

Uh, some information uh we've temporarily relocated the staff at station 36 um as a result of a water leak that damaged portions of the facility, and so we're doing the environmental cleanup to make sure it's a safe location for our uh employees, so personnel and apparatus assigned to station 36 are temporarily operating from fire station 39 and Empire Ranch while repairs are completed.

Um emergency response service and community coverage will continue without interruption.

Uh that concludes my report.

Thank you.

Councilmember Keenough.

Uh I would just echo um the thanks to everybody involved in the city's 80th birthday party.

I heard nothing but positive feedback from folks.

I think it's one of those things that helps our growing city um kind of maintain that small town feel.

So thank you to all the city staff to the vendors to the volunteers, um, to our community partners and to everybody who came out.

It was a great time.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Leary.

Uh I was just gonna go over a list of some of the things that I've been involved with in the last two weeks, and uh one was uh the Indian community um in the region, has a uh presentation called Guru Vandana I'm not sure if I said that correctly but it's to honor our all of our teachers and it was really nice celebration and I'd encourage council members to go again next year.

We all uh participated in a Folsom Cordova Unified School District joint meeting uh to understand uh some of their focuses on programming um the mayor and I visited the Sacramento food bank facility which distributes I couldn't tell you how many pounds of food uh tons throughout the region and uh it's an amazing facility and they also um help provide a lot of the food for our um uh twin lakes food bank here in this region um tree foundation had their annual kickoff uh for a fundraiser but they are um also uh one of the sources for providing trees uh for people's lawns at home and also throughout our city when there's uh some tree planning projects with the uh friends of Folsom Parkways and um I just I'll just add one more I had a couple but I'm not gonna keep you all longer um uh the mayor and I and our utilities manager Marcus Yasutaki attended the um signing of the water former forum agreement for the region which ensures that we continue to work on collaborative um water um efforts and uh have water both to drink and to recreate on in our region uh yeah this agreement goes through 2050 so it was nice to be there last night thank you thank you vice mayor uh just yeah the 80th celebration was super fun I know the mayor and I were both on the dunk tank um you were really cold I was um it was really fun um I mean honestly that whole event just as Sarah said it you know just walking in that whole environment and just all the kids running around it was such a it was a free event um several people showed me their snails I did not care to touch them it was creepy but you know love a snail um but that was just I mean I hope we do it every year I mean I wish we could but maybe not sorry staff sorry Kelly uh never mind every five years maybe um I but on that with Parks and Recks department I managed to make it out to uh Leathers was in town for three days I believe it was and managed to make it out to help out on one of the days and I was there when the cranes were lifting the turrets I guess you would call it um up on the top and that was really fun to watch um I just want to acknowledge how hard our parks and rest staff is working and I'm sure public works is involved too um they just worked really hard from the time that we ended the community build to this last weekend as well there's still more to do um I'm just really proud of your whole staff Kelly so thank you and that's it thanks so much uh I'll echo the thank yous on on Castle Park and also the 80th birthday I was really excited to see that the the final winners of the snail races were all children uh holding that giant trophy it really really made my Saturday so thanks thanks to staff so thanks to those folks that came out and the vendors uh it really was uh a special day and the organizations that that helped us run it it was really very much appreciated um we got the opportunity to participate in the fire promotion ceremony on May 6th so thank you so for those uh folks that stepped up uh into higher roles uh we couldn't do that job uh without those folks uh in leadership and stepping up and and promoting to the next level so congratulations to those that that promoted and we appreciate your service to Folsom uh I want to say the I was honored to sign the water forum agreement uh but I didn't participate in the water forum uh and so I was probably the wrong person to sign the water forum I just had my mayor hat on uh really just want to give a big shout out to Councilmember Leary and Marcus Yasataki for all the work they put in uh to get that agreement uh it was a long time in the making and a long time in the renewal.

So thank you both uh I did get a chance to go down uh and just want to give a shout out to Sutter Health.

They're the new healthcare partner for the Sacramento Kings.

Um, they gave me a giant cowbell today, and it's luckily in the other room.

I uh but the it's pretty exciting for them.

Uh, and just want to congratulate them.

The Sutter Health Facility is coming along uh at East Bidwell and Iron Point.

It's uh looking beautiful.

Um, so congratulations to them.

Uh May 15th.

Uh we've had 60,000 votes uh so far for ideas for change on almost 400 ideas uh submitted by our residents.

Uh that is over one percent uh right now of the population of Folsom that's participated.

Uh and I would encourage you that we still have two more days.

Uh so ideas for change.org forward slash fulsom, still time, submit your ideas, go make your votes uh heard, uh, and we appreciate your participation in that.

Uh and finally, I want to give a big shout out to my mom who's in the front row.

She came in town for Mother's Day.

And she stayed awake for the entire city council member meeting.

So with that, we're adjourned at 9 28.

Have a great night.