February 4, 2025, 7:00 PM – The City Council convened a hybrid regular meeting at the Ted Adcock Community Center. The meeting featured a presentation on immigrant rights from three local nonprofits, public comments on several topics, approval of the consent calendar, continuation of a public hearing for an affordable farmworker housing project, and an appointment to the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee. The Council also heard a report from the Parks and Recreation Commission and discussed future items.
Good evening, everybody. Thank you for attending our University Council. This Tuesday, February 4th, 2025. We will start with a roll call, please. Councilmember Johnson. Here. Councilmember Penrose. Here. Councilmember Nagengast. Here. Vice Mayor Reddick? Here. Mayor Brownstone. Here. We have a quorum. Thank you. We will begin with a pledge of allegiance, everybody, please. Thank you. Okay. Um, we approve approval of the agenda. So move. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Passed. We were going to start with proclamations and presentations this evening. And we're going to start with a presentation. Um regarding immigrant immigration rights advocacy. And Karen will introduce our presentation. Thank you. Great. Thank you. Good evening, Mayor Brownstone, Council and Community. I'm Karen Decker, Economic and Community Vitality Manager. Also in the Economic and Community Vitality Division is Julisa Acosta and Irma Acosta, my colleagues. The city and certainly our division work very closely with our local nonprofits. I think that's never been truer than the last few years. They are valued partners that provide critical safety net services to co-siders who need it the most. And together we leverage resources and we acknowledge the unique role that we each play. And among the three organizations that you're going to hear from this evening, just among these three, they serve 5,900 individuals a year. So their reach is quite extensive. Sometimes we collaborate around planned work, like letters of support or grant opportunities or project outreach, but many times we collaborate around situations that require community mobilization. The closure of Bay City Flowers, the onset of the pandemic, the CZU fires later that year, our severe winter weather storms, of course, the shooting, and many other examples. So all that to say that our staff know their staff, their staff know our staff, we have each other's cell phones, and it's easy for us to activate around community issues that arise in an oftentimes really dynamic situation. One of the working teams that made up the Coastide Recovery Initiative, Team Thrive, focused on how to support our existing small businesses and nonprofits who were in face who were facing incredible pivots during and coming out of the pandemic. And one of the 15 recommendations from that economic plan is to quote increase and strengthen capacity of coastside safety net providers to connect vulnerable residents to rental, financial, and other public benefits assistance. So there's precedent and community-based data-backed recommendations that acknowledge the critical safety net that our local nonprofits provide. This evening you'll be receiving an update from three of our local nonprofits, Coastide Hope, Alas, and Puente. I believe Rita from Puente got stuck in the floods, and so she's going to be participating via Zoom. Um they are gonna hear you're gonna hear um some of their clients' concerns and experiences and how they're manifesting in the community through the point of view of these three executives, specifically around immigrants' rights and fears of deportation.