Progress.

And welcome to our afternoon session, afternoon session only for today's council meeting, March seventeenth, twenty twenty-six.

Go ahead and call the meeting to order, and I'm going to ask Clementine to do roll call and share announcements with the public.

Councilmember Barber.

Councilmember Garcia.

Councilmember Rash here.

Councilmember Smith.gov agendas.

In person attendees, please keep your electronic devices muted to prevent audio interference.

Consistent with the First Amendment and the Brown Act, individuals have the right to speak at public meetings, which includes the right to criticize or support city policies or actions.

And um do you should I pass it first or should we read the proclamation first?

However, you like to do it.

What do you think flows better?

Proclamation.

Okay.

All right.

So I passed the proclamation over to Councilmember Rash to uh read off the proclamation for us today.

Okay.

This is the proclamation declaring March 2026.

Oh, I got the American Red Cross.

Oh, sorry.

Do that.

I didn't read.

Declaring March 2026 Women's History Month, whereas Women's History Month celebrates women's societal contributions, which are innumerable and crucial.

And whereas the theme of women's history month 2026, declared by the National Women's History Alliance, is leading the change, women shaping a sustainable future.

Because whether developing green technologies, advancing economic justice, strengthening education systems, or building civic power, women are designing blueprints for sustainable transformation.

This theme affirms that shaping a sustainable future means fostering systems that support both people and the planet.

And whereas the city of Monterey recognizes and celebrates the achievements of generations of women who have been an integral part of the fabric of Monterey region for thousands of years, dating back to the native Rumson, Esselin, and Salin and peoples to the Sicilian women who made up a third of Cantery Roe workers in the 1930s and 40s.

And to the present day, when many local businesses, nonprofits, city staff, and political leaders are women.

And whereas labor and civil rights leader Dolores Wertham once said, we do need women in civic life.

We do need women to run for office, to be in political office.

We need a feminist to be at the table when decisions are being made so that the right decisions will be made.

And whereas as a community, we celebrate women's history month and recognize the incredible achievements of a women throughout Monterey, the state of California, and all across the United States.

And now therefore be it proclaimed that I, Tyler Williamson, mayor of the city of Monterey, on behalf of the city council and citizens hereby proclaim the month of March 2026 as women's history month.

Thank you, Jean.

All righty.

And then I think I'll pass it to Lou for a uh staff introductions.

Thank you, Mayor.

Council members, good evening.

Um this afternoon, we're gonna have a very uh interesting and informative presentation from our very own clerk, Miss Bonner Klein.

Yes, I just have a few slides.

Some of them you saw last year update.

So as council member Rash mentioned, there is a theme that's here for pregnancy and sustainable future.

So the first woman city department head of the city and the first city librarian was at part back again in 1907.

We had a woman fish manager in the 1940s.

She was an interim city manager for a year, and prior to that, she was a fifth city manager for vetting year.

And I liked the newspaper article of called a manager.

We had a our first woman city council member was uh Marge Eliason in 1955.

Mini Coyle was our mayor in 1965, and prior to that, I think the council member.

And now we have council member barber and council member Rash on our dias.

And we also have many cities.

It was on.

It went off.

It was on.

Can you all hear me?

Okay.

Uh we have many city firsts um as far as women in positions in the city staff as well.

And we're all very glad to be here.

That's it.

Let's give it up for all of the trailblazers in the city of Monterey.

Oh my gosh.

Came back to me at the wrong time.

Does anybody in the council have any additional comment?

Anyone?

No.

Okay.

All right, we'll open this up for public comment.

So how this process works, and this is specifically public comment on the women's history month proclamation.

So what we do is we identify public speakers at the beginning of the public comment period.

Once those folks are identified, we'll close it off, and then only those folks will be able to speak.

So you can't raise your hand afterwards and then try to jump in.

So we'll check in with folks on Zoom first.

You can navigate your way over to the raise hand function.

Anybody in the chamber wishes speak on this item, just ask that you stand up to the left of the podium.

All right, not seeing any in the chamber.

So I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one.

And nobody on Zoom.

Um I'll bring it back and just say um thank you, Clementine, for um putting that presentation together.

It's helpful to have a reminder of the first of those first.

Um, and a lot of them are sitting in this room today.

And so um I'll end there.

I I have a story that I would share, but we have a long council meeting tonight.

And um I I will defer to a later time.

So with that, we'll go ahead and jump into item two on the agenda, which is to receive a presentation from Central Coast Community Energy.

And with that, I'll pass it back to Lou for introduction of staff.

Thank you.

Um Central Coast Community Energy is uh uh what we refer to as an aggregator, and most folks don't realize it, but their utility bills have bills both from Central Coast Community Energy and PGE, and Central Coast Community Energy contracts for the power and PGE delivers it to our home.

And uh, of course, your council in the city is a member of Central Coast Community Energy as well as in multiple jurisdictions throughout the center uh central coast.

So, Ted uh will introduce 3CE staff and they'll give us a brief presentation this afternoon.

Uh good afternoon, Mayor and uh members of the council.

I am Ted Tarossis.

I'm the sustainability manager for the city and just wanted to give a very quick introduction to 3CE so that uh we defer more time to them.

But just wanted to mention that the city was uh one of the founding members of 3CE back in 2017.

So we're coming up on 10 years now.

Uh pretty exciting.

It does seem like yesterday where we first turned on the switch here.

But the one of the most exciting things is 3CE does support a lot of the initiatives at the city regarding reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and renewable energy goals, especially as they relate to our climate action planning and the information that we found out from from that indicating that a lot of our emissions are coming from transportation and the built environment.

So a lot of their uh planning and funding programs are related to those issues and really supporting the community and member agencies with reducing those impacts, such as purchasing electric vehicles, upgrading homes and things like that.

One of the key things right now I did want to highlight was we're working well with 3C on a couple uh larger projects, one being uh installing some electric vehicles at the corp yard up off high uh Ryan Ranch for our city vehicles that were transitioning our fleet to electric vehicles, and we're also working uh with with 3C on a pretty exciting project that's uh not quite a pilot.

They've they've have ex we have done this in uh San Maria, but the it's more of a turnkey project where 3CE takes the lead and really does a lot of more of the planning and engineering and some of the the work on the front end.

So it's really kind of turnkey for the city, just working on some of the permitting and permissions to make it as easy as possible.

Uh and just one of the last things I wanted to mention.

I know that uh energy resilience is coming up as an issue that a lot of us are concerned with, especially in the public.

And when we talk about uh renewable energy generation or storage or keeping uh facilities functioning in an emergency, uh, there's a lot of space there, I think, in our cooperation and our collaboration with agencies like 3CE in order to get these projects realized in our communities.

So, with that, uh what we're gonna focus on tonight is a uh annual update from 3CE.

They do come by and provide a nice update to our council and our community once a year on their latest projects and programs.

So I will turn it over to their community relations manager, uh sofia schwarzki.

So please go hello, Mayor Williamson and council members.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide an update on behalf of Central Coast Community Energy.

My name is Sophia Schwartzky, and I am a community relations manager at 3CE.

And I'm joined today by the city's account manager, Colleen Courtney, who's sitting right back there.

I am here to share highlights about 3CE's recent activities, programs, and ongoing efforts to support your community.

But before I begin, I would like to thank Mayor Williamson for serving on our policy board and your interim city manager for serving on our operations board.

Your leadership is greatly appreciated.

3CE is the public agency that sources energy for the Central Coast.

We work in partnership with PGE, who manages the delivery of that energy to your homes and businesses.

3CE serves 30 cities and five counties, providing clean and renewable energy to 1.2 million people.

3CE is working to deliver 100% clean energy to our customers.

Last year, we delivered enough renewable energy to power more than 350,000 homes.

By doing so, we avoided emissions equivalent to taking 105,000 gas-powered cars off the road.

3CE has contracts in place to supply 70% of our load with renewable energy by September of 2028, putting us well ahead of California's climate goals.

We've received many questions about the role of battery storage in the clean energy transition.

Battery storage is essential to creating a cleaner, more reliable and affordable energy future by capturing excess renewable energy when the sun is shining and the wind is blowing.

Batteries store power that can be released later when demand is high and solar generation is low.

This reduces our dependence on expensive fossil fuels during peak hours and helps to stabilize electricity rates for everyone.

So I wanted to take a moment to show you a real-world example of this.

During Labor Day weekend in 2022, our state faced an intense heat wave that pushed energy demand to record levels.

To prevent widespread outages, the state issued a flex alert asking everyone to conserve energy.

The graph in front of you shows California's energy mix from that day.

The red area represents fossil fuel generation.

The green area shows renewable sources like solar and wind, which peak during the day but drop sharply at sunset, just when demand remains high.

The thin orange lines tell another part of the story.

At the bottom, batteries charge during daylight hours, and at the top, they discharge that stored energy back to the grid when it's needed most.

Even with these contributions, the grid was stretched to its limit, and that flex alert played a vital role in preventing widespread, widespread outages throughout the state.

So now we're going to take a look at a more recent heat wave.

On July 4th of 2024, California once again experienced extremely high energy demand.

This time, however, there was no flex alert needed to prevent blackouts.

The green bar representing renewable energy grew taller as more solar generation came online, while the red bar for fossil fuel shrank.

Most impressive of all, the orange bar showing battery storage more than tripled.

Batteries charged during the day and discharge discharged in the evening, supplying clean renewable power when the grid needed it most.

And thanks to this rapid growth in battery storage, California was able to keep the lights on without a flex alert.

So before I move on, I'd like to take a moment to share a few quick points.

First, 3CE does not have any power purchase agreements with indoor battery storage facilities like Vistra's Moss Landing Facility was.

Together, these three projects will supply enough clean energy to power the homes of 263,000 3CE customers.

Delivering renewable power is only a portion of 3CE's mission.

Equally as important is connecting with the communities we serve.

You'll see our outreach team active across the region, supporting local events, hosting webinars, and leading workshops that raise awareness and inform our energy programs.

To better meet the needs of our diverse communities, 3CE has developed an action plan focused on supporting underserved populations.

3CE also provides direct support through programs for our customers.

These programs empower customers to electrify their homes, vehicles, and businesses while saving money in the process.

Our electrify your ride program, for example, offers up to $3,500 towards the purchase of an electric vehicle.

Additional programs help to lower the cost of upgrading to electric appliances, installing home battery storage, and advancing electrification in the ag sector.

3CE also offers programs exclusively for member agencies like the City of Monterey.

Through our electrify your fleet and charger fleet programs, $300,000 per year is available to your city for electric fleet vehicles and EV charging stations.

In addition, our plan your fleet program provides no cost technical assistance to support these efforts.

And I am excited to say that the city's public works director is working with our programs team by participating in the Plan Your Fleet program.

Since 2018, thousands of 3CE customers have directly benefited from 3CE's programs.

This slide highlights the City of Monterey's participation to date.

Monterey customers have received more than 700,000 in funding through 3CE's energy programs.

First is the good news.

3CE has recently reduced our cost of service.

And as a result, we have decreased our rates by an average of 24%.

This reflects our ability to procure clean energy at competit prices.

However, customers will still see an increase to the power charge indifference adjustment, otherwise known as the PCIA.

The PCIA is a regulatory fee set by the California Public Utilities Commission, and it is paid to PGE by our customers.

It was originally intended to recover the cost of above market legacy renewable energy contracts that PGE signed before 3CE existed.

But recent CPUC decisions have changed how this contract portfolio is valued and applied those charges retroactively.

So this means that the average residential customer in Monterey can expect to see a net increase of 2% on their total bill costs.

3CE is continuing to actively engage in regulatory and legislative efforts to promote affordability for our customers.

We are sponsors of the bills that you see on your screen here.

AB1761 is a PCIA transparency bill, which would provide greater insight into how the PCIA is calculated.

Senate Bill 1138 would require the CPUC to allow CCAs like 3CE to meet their resource adequacy obligations by buying and selling resource adequacy by the hour.

The CPC recently released a report finding this approach to have affordability benefits.

If you're interested in writing a letter of support for either of these bills, please reach out to me directly, and I can help by providing a draft support letter.

So that is all that I have for you today.

Thank you so much for your time this afternoon, and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Awesome.

Thank you for the presentation, Sophia.

It was wonderful.

And it is a privilege to be on the board for 3CE.

It's fascinating because you were able to articulate a lot of information in regards to what 3CE does, and I think a way that maybe most folks can understand, but there's so much more.

And so yeah, it's it's it's fascinating, and I appreciate you bringing it down for folks to be able to understand today.

So, council, are there any questions?

Please.

Hi, Sophia.

I'm going to this one.

Thank you for your presentation.

It's nice to see you.

Um you mentioned there are 30 cities and five counties that belong.

Then there are some cities that don't belong.

Yes.

So Central Coast Community Energy, we represent the counties of Monterey, San Benito, Santa Cruz, and also San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara.

There are a couple cities within those boundaries that are not a part of 3CE.

King City, for example, I believe they have their own MOU and don't participate in 3CE.

Oh, sorry, King City has their own CCA and then Lompok has an MOU.

So neither of those communities participate in 3CE, but other than that, we represent the Central Coast from Santa Cruz to Santa Barbara.

Okay.

And would you remind people in better words than mine that they don't lose any money by signing up that what we have 94% coverage?

Would you explain that to people and encourage them to sign up?

Yes, absolutely.

So one reason I love to come and present to councils is that sometimes community members will see 3CE on their energy bill and think that it is an additional cost on top of their PGE charges.

But with the chart, what the P the 3CE fees actually are what we are billing you for energy generation.

So before 3CE existed, PG ⁇ E would bill you for both energy transmission, delivery and generation.

But once 3CE um became a part of the picture, we took over the energy generation costs from PGE.

So it is not an additional charge.

And once you are a customer of 3CE, you are able to participate in those energy programs that I highlighted earlier in the presentation.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you for your questions.

Thank you so much.

So a quick question, actually piggybacking on what uh Jean just asked you.

So since C C uh 3CE took over from PGE, that particular cost, have you seen a big change as far as uh in the rates or in the energy and how it's used in clean energy?

Yeah, that's a great question.

So energy bills are increasing.

Uh for example, PG ⁇ E's uh the charge that you see on your energy bill, it's two-thirds coming from PG ⁇ E for the transmission and delivery of that energy.

And a lot of that has to do with wildfire preparedness and um the subsidies from the uh previous solar tariff that the CPUC had in M2.0.

Um, but again, with 3CE, we are committed to providing competitive and affordable rates.

You know, like I mentioned in my presentation, we recently did that 24% uh rate decrease uh because of our ability to lower our operating costs.

Um however, you know, there still are challenges like the PCIA that I mentioned is that regulatory fee uh that is paid to PG ⁇ E by our customers.

And you know, that's one area where we're here soliciting your support um to get greater transparency into how that fee is calculated, because with the PCIA fee, our rate decrease of 24%, the customers are still seeing about a 2% increase for the average customer.

Thank you.

Because that was actually my next question was about the PCF and how that is processing and um what kind of information as far as to the outreach to the public uh can be done to help to be able to support that, support you all and being able to get more transparency in that.

Can you talk about that a little bit?

Yeah, absolutely.

So we know that the PCIA is the um portfolio cost minus the portfolio market value, and that's where you get the indifference amount.

Uh but the problem is is we don't have much transparency into the calculations that are going into those two figures.

So this bill is really the first step to kind of take a peek behind the curtain and see how that fee is being calculated.

Um so for anyone who wants to support, we do have template support letters um for this PCA transparency bill.

It's authored by Assembly Member Chris Rogers, Assembly Bill 1761.

Um, so I'll be sure to reach out to your clerk with my contact information.

And anyone who's interested in learning more and supporting can reach out to me directly.

That'd be great.

We could put it on our website.

That would be wonderful.

Um so that that way the public would be able to get to that very easily.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Hi, Sophia.

Good to see you.

Um couple of things.

Um, and and I'll start with uh just for the benefit of the council and the public.

Um you and I just were at uh a conference, uh uh Civic Well um where many electeds from throughout the state attend and and representatives from a variety of agencies.

And I really appreciated the presence, the three CE presence.

You were there, Spencer, Doss Williams, and I really appreciate the advocacy around this flight.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The advocacy around this effort and the information sharing to all the folks who were in the room and then you doing presentations to the various uh participating jurisdictions.

So just wanted to point that out as and say thank you.

Um the question that I have is around the uh the service portfolio that you shared.

So in terms of like support with fleet, electrification, that kind of thing.

As you um you know, visit the variety or the various jurisdictions.

What are possibly some challenges that you're hearing from jurisdictions in terms of really um taking advantage of these support services?

Yeah, that's a great question.

And I'm very happy that um again, your account manager Colleen Courtney, who's sitting right back here, will be a great resource uh for the city of Monterey to participate more in those plan your fleet, charger fleet.

Um electrify your fleet programs.

Um, I'd love to talk more with our programs team who works directly with our member agencies and businesses to hear what challenges they're seeing.

Uh, but the one that comes to mind for me is um it, you know, it takes a lot of staff time and resources in order to actually uh electrify the feat fleet of a member agency.

So that's why I'm super excited that your city is participating in the plan your fleet program.

And that is the no-cost technical assistance program that kind of walks the city through the process of purchasing electric vehicles and installing electric vehicle charging stations.

Uh, but that's a really good question.

And I'm definitely going to talk to our programs team to see if there's any other insights they can share, and I'll follow up with you.

Um, are you regulated by the PUC?

Yes, that's correct.

So we are regulated by the PUC, and then our rates and programs are set by our policy board and operations board, um, which is made up of local elected officials from the cities and counties we represent, like Mayor Williamson, and then the operations board is made up of city managers and county CEOs, say CAOs.

Right, right, exactly.

Um, I think I was on the first uh the first board when we launched uh many years ago.

Um appreciate the advocacy, and I imagine 3CE has an energy lobbyist that works with state senators and legislators to be able to advocate things that would benefit our ratepayers.

Um the biggest questions I always get is how to interpret the PGE bill.

And so could you say for the public the number that they can contact and get an interpretation of how to interpret the PGE bill because I know it's it's a combined bill that's generated by the Pacific Gas and Electric and is difficult sometimes to interpret.

So do you have a number that you can quote for us?

Yeah, the public can call.

Absolutely.

I don't know if we're able to pull up my last slide, but um the last slide has my email address and then a link to our website.

I don't have the number off the top of my head, but if you scroll to the bottom, you'll see the customer service line.

And uh it really is the best number to call for information on how to interpret your energy bill if you're a three CE customer.

We'll get somebody on the phone within 15 seconds who lives and works in the service area, and they'll be able to walk you through the bill line by line.

Uh, but members of the public are always welcome to reach out to me directly, and I can either help interpret the bill myself or pass them on to a member of our customer accounts team.

And then for city bills, again, Colleen Courtney.

I keep shouting her out, but she will be your point of contact.

Okay, great.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate it.

For the question.

Thanks.

Um, one final question.

I I um remember that there was a program available for e-bikes as well.

Um, could you speak to that?

So sadly, we do not have the e-bike program operating at this time.

However, um, we a new-ish program that we have, it launched last year is the residential battery rebate program.

So this is one of our newer program offerings where we have funding for the purchase in and installation of home battery storage.

Um, another kind of new and improved program is our electrify your home program.

So we recently updated this program as of October of last year to include incentives that are more renter-friendly.

Uh, for example, induction cooktops, uh portable air conditioners, that sort of thing.

Um, and of course, we have our electrify your ride and new construction electrification program.

Awesome.

Thank you for those answers.

Um with that, we'll open it up for the public to take public comment.

So for folks on Zoom, you can use a raise hand function.

Anybody in the chamber wish to speak on this item, just ask that you stand up to the left of the podium.

I only see one taker.

Anyone else in the chamber?

So go ahead and cut it off to the one in the chamber.

I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one.

We have nobody on Zoom.

So we'll go ahead and go with you, Bob.

Mayor, City Council, uh, staff, uh, thank you all for coming and helping us again here in our city.

Um, I just want to speak to the sustainability structure that we do with these batteries.

Too often in a lot of these systems that we're trying to create a better environment, we draw too tight a circle.

We just look at the battery itself.

We don't look at the production of the battery, the moving of the materials.

And then we look at the big high danger that can come from this.

Too much of our thoughts go into the immediate.

Oh, this is a great saving thing.

There might be something better.

Like nuclear is come a long way, and we should do small little nuclear things, maybe.

There's a lot of avenues on that.

Um, I just want to make sure we're cautious and a little more aware of the bigger impact and not just the small picture that it seems like it's good.

Thank you.

Awesome.

Thank you.

With that, we'll go ahead and close uh public comment.

Thank you for your public comments, Bob.

Well, well taken.

And I think that's partially why maybe more reactionary, but partially why Senator Laird submitted his bill through and and putting tighter regulations there.

Um, and I know that there's a lot of um research being done in work going into actually um uh recycling the different elements associated with with batteries as well.

So lots of work still to do there as we try to navigate a clean energy future.

So did you have any last minute remarks for us as you closed out here?

No, I just would like to say thank you so much for your time this afternoon, and uh I will follow up with your clerk with my contact information for anyone who wants to participate in that.

And we'll take those draft uh templates as well so we can look at those for consideration.

Excellent.

Thank you, Sophia.

Thank you so much.

All right, I think I'll see you tomorrow.

So all righty.

Let me switch here.

I guess I gotta get it together.

Um with that, we were moving on to item three on our agenda, which is recognition of March 2026 as American Red Cross Month.

Um I'm going to pass it to.

I'm going to pass this over to Councilmember Smith, if you wouldn't mind reading that off for us.

The proclamation declaring March 2026 is American Red Cross month, whereas March is American Red Cross Month, a special time to celebrate the humanitarian spirit of Monterey County and reaffirm their commitment to help ensure no one faces a crisis alone in Monterey County across the United States and around the world.

Their dedication touches millions of lives each year as they carry out the organization's 140-year mission of preventing and alleviating suffering.

And whereas caring for one another is at the heart of our community and exemplified by the people of Monterey, whose simple acts of kindness through the Red Cross provides provide help and hope in people's most difficult moments, continuing the life-saving legacy of Clara Barton, who founded the organization more than 140 years ago to prevent and alleviate human suffering.

And whereas Central Coast chapter volunteers, 181 in the county, I'm sorry, in the country, give hope to the most vulnerable in their darkest hours.

Last year in Monterey County, volunteers helped 49 households affected by 30 home fires by addressing their urgent needs like food and lodging, as well as providing recovery support.

In addition, they installed 682 smoke alarms, collected 2,141 blood donations, provided first aid and CPR training to 2,423 residents, and assisted 112 families of our armed forces.

And whereas the Central Coast chapter support volunteerism and generous donations are critical to our community's resilience.

We hereby recognize this month of March in honor of all those who fulfill Clara Barton's noble words.

You must never think of anything except the need and how to meet it, and ask everyone to join in this commitment and bless you.

And now, therefore, be it resolved that Tyler Williamson of the City of Monterey, on behalf of the city council and citizens hereby proclaimed the month of March 2026 as American Red Cross month.

I encourage all Americans to support this organization and its noble humanitarian mission.

Thank you.

Oh said.

Okay.

We'll have you come up in a second.

I know you have a few words to share, but before we pass it over, um, I just say how relevant this is for our community at this time.

As of just last week, I know that the Red Cross reached out to offer some support and assistance.

And I don't want to still um the fire chief's thunder, but he'll come up after your presentation to speak more about that.

But we're just tremendously grateful for your partnership and your willingness to offer a helping hand in a time of need.

So with that, I will pass it to you all for a presentation.

Thank you, Mayor, City Council members and staff.

We really greatly appreciate the recognition.

Um, our volunteers are amazing.

We can't say enough about them.

Uh if it wasn't for them, you know, we get to call at four o'clock in the morning to respond, they're there.

Um, they don't ask, you know, that you know, they can come later, they're coming right there when it's needed.

So, and it's critical.

As you saw the numbers that were rattled off, uh, we're 365 days, 24 hours a day.

So we rely on our volunteers, we rely on the generous generosity of our community to support.

We do not get any government funding, which is really important for folks to know.

It's all private donations.

They keep our work going.

Uh, and this is uh Michelle Averill, our CEO for the American Red Across at Central Coast.

Good afternoon.

I just wanted to say thank you.

Um, we appreciate the proclamation, and it's an honor to be here.

It's also an honor to serve with our um community and our first responders because without our volunteers and our community, um, we couldn't do the work that we do.

So I so appreciate um your support and your kind words, and thank you.

Thank you.

Why don't you come on up and we could take a picture with the proclamation?

We have Matt take a photo, maybe.

Thank you.

Congratulations.

Thank you for your work.

Congratulations.

Thanks so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Others here.

Perfect.

I need to take it to you.

One, two, and three.

That's the moment right there.

That was it.

Absolutely.

Thank you again.

Thank you.

All righty.

And then I'll call up Chief to share present uh uh a brief presentation as well.

Uh Mr.

Mayor Council, thank you for the opportunity to speak.

Um, as regards to uh Red Cross, you know, the incident we had the other day here at Casanova.

Um, they were one of the first phone calls we made.

We call them often for displaced residents, and they're always there to meet the needs.

Um Patsy was engaged from the get-go and has been actively engaged with the displaced residents ever since.

So the service they provide to us and our community is invaluable, and we we really appreciate it.

Um, beyond that, you know, Patsy does come.

We have county chiefs meetings, she comes and engage and offers her support to all of our communities.

So um, thank you to the Red Cross.

Also, um the smoke detector program, they do donate smoke detectors to us.

So if we go to a resident that needs a smoke detector, one's malfunctioning or not working right, we can replace them with the smoke detectors they provide.

So um, we truly appreciate appreciate their work.

Um, but I also wanted to uh talk a little bit about the the fire at 800 Casanova to um to kind of give you a perspective of the challenges we face that day.

You know, that that building is very we're very familiar with it.

We respond there quite often.

A lot of medical emergencies, a lot of fire alarms, poses a lot of challenges.

It's a high density building with residents with a lot of needs, 86 units, three stories as a common attic means that if the fire gets in the attic, it'll spread laterally.

It did that day.

It's got a common, it's got a center hallway construction, meaning that all the residents um exit into the hallway to get out of the business or uh of the of the apartment complex.

So when smoke is in that hallway, they get trapped in their units.

It happened that day.

Also, uh no sprinkler system.

So sprinklers will activate, kind of give us uh time to put the fire in check, but the fire grew unchecked till we got there.

So there's a lot of challenges that day.

So kind of want to give you a little bit about what our units face.

So our first unit on scene was Medic Engine 13, which is um, you know, on Delvina and Montecito.

They were there in less than five minutes.

So while responding, we have pre-plans.

We kind of know the building.

So the crews discuss a plan for what they wanted to do.

So the plan was they want to go down the left driveway because the access to stairwell to that third story unit that was um reported on fire, that was the best access.

When they got there, the streets were filled with people.

They couldn't access that that driveway.

There's so many people in there.

So they had to stop.

They had to go to plan B.

They had to make a decision.

So they stopped in front of the building and access from the front of the building.

So, you know, from the company officers' perspective, that was Kenny Hutchison that day.

He's actually here today.

You know, you have a lot of things going through your mind.

You have a big problem with uh with with limited resources initially.

So our priorities, actual priorities are saving lives, stabilizing the incident, preserving property, and then the environment.

So his decision was, and our decision was we're going to put a line on the fire that do the most good to save the most lives.

And that's 100% the correct decision.

So they got off the engine.

Just think about it, you're getting off the engine, grabbing your tools, equipment, swarmed with people.

My loved ones here, I think it's here, you know, they're and everyone's trying to help, but it's really distracting to the crews.

So they pretty much got swarmed by everybody, which which is natural and normal.

So they ascended the stairwell as they ascended stairwell.

There's people coming down the stairwell, people are being assisted, people with walkers, um, and needed help getting down.

But they they continued up the stairwell.

They met uh smoke in the stairwell said, I mean, excuse me, actually, I had to mask up his stairwell.

They opened the door, smoke conditions were to the ground.

So we have these thermal image cameras that kind of detect uh differences in temperature so you can search for victims.

So Kenny tried to put it up to see it, and you couldn't even see the camera.

That's how bad the visibility was.

So they progressed down the hallway.

So with that, we started having other people arrive.

So other companies came to support that that first in company, so they got more support on that on those hose lines.

Other hose lines were being uh pulled as well.

Um there are people hanging off the balconies on the third floor.

So other companies were throwing ladders to balconies, carrying people down.

We had over eight people rescued off of balconies.

Um roof operation.

So the new truck, which you guys just came to the ceremony.

Thank you for coming.

But the truck went to the roof, so the crews went to the roof.

So you idea it excuse me, you cut a hole in the roof to alleviate the pressure, acts like a chimney.

So you give the victims every chance for survival and our firefighters a chance to see what they're doing.

Um, so we did that and to lift the heat.

Also cut trenches to preserve property.

So the truck company did an outstanding job with that.

Chief officer support.

So we have an on-duty chief officer responded that day.

That was Matt Harris.

He, you know, he had a lot of things going on, but we had chief officers responding from home.

Chief Greenley showed up and helped him in the uh immediately.

Acting division chief Valdez showed up, went to the third floor to run the companies up there.

Um, Chief Cooper showed up to help with investigation and take an interview.

So there's a lot of a lot of effort um on our part on our people support.

Every single unit in our system was there that day.

We had all of 30 people coming in to support the incident as well.

Um, and then we have mutual and auto aid partners.

So we started ordering resources conceptually consect, ordering out.

So, excuse me, um, ordering out, so we got resources coming in.

So it ended up being a uh a third alarm fire with the MCI, which would mass casually incidents.

We had AMR ambulances coming and our own ambulances and from regional.

So it was very challenging event um with support from a lot of agencies as far as way far away as Hollister.

You know, although it was a tragic fire for many reasons.

I'm extremely proud of how we responded.

It was the sheer will and determination of our firefighters that saved lives that day.

And I can honestly stand before you and say that.

We could have very easily lost many more lives or the building, but it doesn't stop there.

We had a lot of other support from our city staff and uh within the city.

Monterey PD police officers got there on scene first.

So they went in uh immediately into the building.

They couldn't make access to the third floor, so they went to the second and first floors, evacuating people.

And just from you know, the people's perspective, you know, that's all they have.

That's their residence.

They have their pets and their medications and their whatever uh assistance they need to get around.

So and they're woken up at 3 50 in the morning.

So they were, you know, the police officers um had to get them out of the units, and so they carried them out of the build out of the building.

They did a phenomenal job and risked a lot to save a lot.

So that's what we like to say.

So um tremendous support for Monterey PD.

So we're very appreciative for that.

City manager's office.

First person I called was was Lou at 350 or 4 o'clock in the morning.

And uh he was immediately on the phone to look talk to Department of Emergency Management, Red Cross, anything he could do to help us, other city staff.

Um, Matt showed up on scene, started gathering information to get information out to the public and to the elected officials so you could answer questions as you start to get them.

Public works, Andrea texted me right away.

Like, what do you need?

Um, at the time I said nothing, which I did need something, but uh she sent Jeff Glass anyway, and he was extremely helpful.

But uh she sent Jeff Glass anyway, and he was extremely helpful.

They blocked off all the streets so to reduce congestion and to make sure we had a safe working environment.

Parks a rec, their their staff.

So we we had all these people in the streets, so we need to find a place to put them.

So we talked about Casanova Oknol and the Rec Center.

Um, so we needed staff to open those up.

So they were there to open them up and provided a van so we could we could do that.

We end up with a different plan, but they were there for us.

And building officials were there first thing in the morning to help uh evaluate the building and see what the conditions are and if we're safe to operate in.

You know, every department in the city assisted us in some way.

So I just want to say thank you to our city staff.

CERT.

So for our incidents, when we have uh larger incidents, uh, we call for cert, and their primary objective mostly on incidents is to provide firefighter rehab.

As you can imagine, this was very taxing event.

Our firefighters and the person and the the first responders were very um taxed.

So we give them breaks and we need hydration and food.

So and CERT did that.

But to that that morning was something very different.

They uh went above and beyond.

They went to help start helping the residents.

They gave them my lar blankets, you know, like those tinfoil blankets you see.

So just to kind of keep them warm if if we can.

They assist them.

So the plan ended up being that Monterey MST provided buses so we could take them to the Hyatt.

So MST, they had a supervisor there right away and helped us with that transport.

But we need to get the residents to the bus.

So CERT was very instrumental in doing that.

And then they went to the Hyatt and helped them off the bus and then stayed there all day to make sure that the residents were getting what they needed from the apartments because there was still a lot of things left behind, as you can imagine, and continue to work with them throughout the week um to gather their belongings and then to assist them to relocate to another facility.

So thank you to CERT.

Dimi and and this team um provided tremendous support for the incident.

And then um last one is is all in uh as a nonprofit who's been very instrumental in helping the residents as well.

Um, but you know, I also want to take the opportunity to thank you, um, the city council for your support and investment into the fire department over the past two and a half years.

You share in the success of this incident.

You know, over the past two and a half years, you've vested into our fleet to make sure that we have the apparatus of tools and equipment to respond to these type of incidents, the technology upgrades.

We have iPads in every vehicle, which helps us to manage and run incidents and track resources.

That's happened recently.

The training, you know, we have someone in charge of our training to develop a training plan to bring training to our department with a facility now, which the mayor got a chance to see um to train.

Um, we brought in subject matter experts to to not only train our firefighters but our surrounding partners as well.

Because as you know, these incidents are going to involve everybody.

So we need everyone on the same page.

And we did that.

We have command and control training.

So how we run an incident.

We had just had training on on search for civilians and extricating people from fires.

All those skills were used that day and culminated in that success.

So, you know, when I arrived that morning, fire was showing through the roof.

You know, from that under from that moment, I really understood what the potential of that fire was.

And now knowing the outcome, I'm extremely grateful for all the hard work that was done at that fire.

The determination will of our firefighters is is inspiring to me.

And we are very grateful for the support we receive so that when the moment comes, we are prepared to do our job.

It was a true team effort that saved lives that day.

And I just want to thank you for the opportunity to sharing the story.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chief.

Um and a special thank you to you, because you were the one leading the team through that, but to our entire city staff.

Um there's not a day that I go by that I continue to be impressed by the work that is done by our city team and everybody's willingness to just dive in and do the job that needs to be done.

And it was displayed last week with this fire.

Um, it's unfortunate that it happened.

And um, you know, we just came from this the push-in ceremony for the for the new fire ladder.

Um, that was a pretty penny.

Um, but it's worth the investment because it's you don't need it until you need it.

And and when you do need it, you want it to be there and you want to have that service provided.

And you all did that.

And I appreciated your recognition of the rest of the city team that jumped in as well.

I was talking to a police officer over the last few days um about them arriving on scene, and their job is not to necessarily go into the building.

That's not part of their job description, but they jumped in and they went into a burning building, literally a burning building, um, without the the same equipment that our our our firefighters use.

Um and maybe I shouldn't be saying this out loud, but it it's it's it's the it's the drive and willingness to make sure that we're doing what we can to protect our our residents.

So thank you to all of our public safety officials and the entire city team.

So please let's give another round of applause to our city staff.

And I'll just um say one close out point on on this topic, which is um we're still working with uh uh the housing authority um as the lead agency to address the displaced um fire victims.

Um and and I just appreciate the the city manager's office for playing such an integral part in a lot of the behind the scenes work that's happening um to to make sure that we're providing the care that's needed to to our residents.

So with that, I will um open it up to the council for questions, comments, please.

So yeah, echoing my colleague, um, the mayor, just a big thank you to the fire department, to the police department, to the emergency team, CERT, our city staff.

I mean, just amazing how quickly everybody moved into action.

And I think that's important for us to remember um how special uh and unique Monterey is because we are always we we were we're about having quality of life, and that means also being there for each other when uh emergencies come up like this.

And I'm really thankful for Red Cross.

I see them just leaving right now because they really they they came in and they they moved quickly to be able to help.

And even all the nonprofits that heard about it, because I remember when everything was coming in, all the nonprofits were stepping in very quickly saying, we want to help.

How can we help?

And that's Monterey, and that's the Monterey way.

So I want to thank the nonprofits as well for how they stepped in.

I'd like to also take the opportunity while we have a good number of folks who were uh part of this um co-effort last week to express gratitude.

Um it was uh it was a very um significant event.

I live about a block away from the fire, and um it just to see how everything unfolded and just the professionalism of everybody involved and and the care and and the uh uh compassion.

Um it was it was something that um was just amazing.

I um later in the morning, I walked over to at least try to get some type of uh visual of uh really what was happening on Casanova, and I came to the um uh the the barricades that were uh equipped with our our cert uh volunteers and uh introduced myself and and I asked politely if I could cross the the barrier there, and they were like, uh, you probably shouldn't go through there.

So they were doing their job, so I appreciated that uh keeping everyone safe.

Um, but again, just uh expressing gratitude to everybody who was involved.

Um, and and I think something that really uh resonates and and and really hits hits home for me.

What Chief was saying that this fire could have gone a lot more different.

So thank you so much for for the care, the attention, um, and and just for the work that you do every day, not just last week.

Thank you.

Um a big thank you to Chief Moore.

You were so calm, and I um I admire that so much.

It it has to be uh a valuable asset to stay calm in uh in a catastrophe like that.

And um, incident commander Harris.

Um, I I don't even know if he's here, but phenomenal job.

And um the cert team with 80 people residing in that apartment.

Um, there was a lot for Cert to do.

If you're with CERT, would you please stand up for a round of applause?

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah, I think it's uh it's all been said, but I want to highlight a couple of things.

Dr.

Barber said it, it it really is the Monterey way.

And and what does that mean?

And some people always ask, Well, what does that mean?

This is a perfect representation where it's it's everybody comes to help in whatever we need to do to solve it at that moment.

Um we're fortunate we have deep re uh resources, but this is why we do, and this was exactly the moment that we we need to have cert, and we need to have public works that answers their phone at night.

We need to have police and fire uh to be able to respond.

So thank thank you for everybody.

Um the Red Cross had a moment and I didn't want to pass that up.

We all see the tragedies that are earthquakes or fires or storms or you know, hurricanes across the country.

And and at times we're we're willing to write that check.

And there's a couple that are popular in in my family and Smaritan's Purse and Red Cross.

They're always the first.

But there's the local chapters that need the support.

These are nonprofits.

So if you find it in your heart, remember your local chapters of all in and Samaritan's Purse is a national effort that helps with national events like Red Cross does.

But our Red Cross local chapter also needs to have our support as a continuation so that they are here to be able to respond.

And so they are a great partner of ours.

For years when I was in the police department, we were always able to rely on the Red Cross, and they're there to serve us all.

So let's remember to help support our nonprofits so they can augment and help our full-time staff when we have that emergency in the middle of the night.

We need to have them survive.

We need to have them thrive.

So remember to help support your choice of your nonprofit to help us as a community.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you.

Um, I'm I'm gonna say two final points.

Um, the the piece around training is I think what allowed to be the success of the events that had occurred last week.

Um, the more you train, the more you're prepared in the moment.

And that goes for um our public safety officials, but but also um our volunteers like like Red Cross.

They're these volunteers are trained and prepared to offer the type of assistance that they are.

So um thank you.

Kudos to um our entire team, both in city and and out um for being prepared for this.

And then I think it's also a moment where we can be a little bit self-reflective around how each of us individually are going to be prepared at home.

Um, and as we heard in their presentation earlier with programs like um smoke detectors, um, it just might be an opportunity for you to just use this as a litmus test, just do a quick check and make sure that everything is is functioning as is at home.

And I'm sure if you contact our fire department, they'd be more than glad to walk through some of those steps with you and get make sure you have access to the appropriate resources.

So with that, I'll open up for public comment for folks on Zoom.

You can use the raise hand function.

If you're in the chamber, just ask that you send up to the left of the podium.

Nope, this is specifically on the Red Cross proclamation.

So we have one in the chamber.

Anyone else?

All right, I'm gonna go ahead and cut it off to the one, and then we'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one.

We have one on Zoom.

Go ahead and start in the chamber.

Good afternoon, everybody.

Esther Malkin, president of the Casan um Laguna Grande Neighborhood Association.

My neighborhood is adjacent to where this happened in uh Kona.

And I got a call from Kate Daniels um first thing in the morning before I I had no idea that was anything that was going on.

And so I started getting calls from other people because Casanova runs along my neighborhood as well.

So people were concerned that it was in my neighborhood, but it wasn't.

Um so when I heard about it, I knew I I have full confidence in our police department, our fire department and cert and everything.

So I didn't want to get too close to what was going on, but I did make some phone calls and I got in touch.

So I wanted to give a shout out specifically to the Hyatt.

They did a phenomenal job in taking people in, sorting them out, figuring out their needs.

I went to the Hyatt because it came over the radio that they needed pet food.

Luckily, people got most of their pets out.

I think there were a couple of injured pets, but the call went out for pet food.

And so I grabbed my neighbors and some of us took our own pet food over to the Hyatt.

And when I got there, it was there was no chaos.

It was all super organized.

I want to give a shout-out specifically to CERT.

Um, the profettas in particular.

I got there, they were sorting through all kinds of things.

Um, I got into I was in touch with the management of the hotel who had told me they had gotten a list of things that people needed.

I went to Target, brought it back, gave it to the profettas, they distributed it to whoever needed it.

And also the SPCA.

By the time I got there to deliver, you know, what I had collected in half an hour, they were already there on site, ready to take care of the pets and all their needs.

Um, so the coordination was really really seamless.

It was really, really it could have been very chaotic and it wasn't.

So I want to just make sure that everybody understands the role that CERC plays.

And everybody knows we've got budget cuts and stuff coming, but these are things that we really need to pay attention to and make sure that we continue to to fund them because this is an example.

I mean, we haven't had a huge event like this in quite a while.

And so it's really um it's really an example of the professionalism and uh everything else that everyone said.

So, but yeah, shout out to Kate Daniels staff as well and and the high SPCA.

Thank you.

All right, with that, we'll go to our caller on Zoom.

That caller has lowered their hand.

I think maybe they intended to speak on the general comments.

Okay, perfect.

All right, with that, we're gonna go ahead and close this item out.

Thanks again to everybody for the team effort.

Um with that, we'll go to general public comments.

So um, this is an opportunity to speak on items that are not on today's agenda.

So non-agendized items.

I'll check in with first folks on Zoom.

Um, you can navigate your way over to the raise hand function.

Meanwhile, uh checking the chamber.

If you want to speak for general public comments for items that are not on today's agenda, just ask that you stand up to the left of the podium.

Okay, so I have four.

Josh, no, okay.

Five.

Um, okay.

So I've two.

Um I don't know where I got five from.

I got two sitting and two three standing.

Oh, that's why three standing.

All right.

So we're gonna go ahead and cut it off to those five in the chamber, and I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one.

And we have two on Zoom.

We're gonna go ahead and leave it to two minutes.

We'll go ahead and start in the chamber.

One one minute flat.

Uh good afternoon, Mr.

Mayor and uh members of the council.

I just want to let you know three dates.

So get your pencils ready.

Monday, April 13th.

It's Cpring Meeting of Fisherman's Flats Homeowners and Residents Association.

This is our spring meeting and our elections.

April 13th, what time?

Monday, 8 13th, it's 6 30 at the church uh highway 68 in Johnson Canyon.

Meeting starts promptly at 7 o'clock.

That's Monday, 8th 13th.

Sunday, September 13th.

That's Sunday, September 13th, 2 to 4 p.m.

The Fishman's Flats party in the park.

Sunday, September 13th, 2 to 4 p.m.

The final date is Monday, September 28th.

Meeting starts at 7.

Uh, fisherman's flats, Canada's form for Monterey candidates.

That's Monday, September 28th.

Thank you.

What time?

We say time.

Seven.

Thank you.

Doors open at 6:30.

Same so same as the first one.

Yeah.

Thanks, Tom.

Mayor, City Council, um, staff.

Uh firstly, I just want to say, boy, I love this town.

We really are living up to name Monterey, blessed by God.

This is the King's Mountain, what Monterey means.

Um, just for blessed.

Look at the beautiful day outside that we have.

We have weather that's just amazing.

I've had so many people tell me this week, surprisingly, coming back in the Monterey, they feel so blessed they're here.

No matter where they're visiting in the world, they seem to come back and just feel so special here.

And then we see how we respond in these crises.

Um, as you know, I'm developing on Canary Row there.

What a battle over eight years.

It's all about the community for me and trying to build that space out and do things for people.

Um, one thing I have going now will be on uh March 23rd to 25th.

I should be the 25th to the 29th, which is a Wednesday to Sunday.

But the Bible bus coming if you just want to learn a little more about the Bible.

It's like the Bible museum, but it's on wheels traveling the country, just trying to love people and tell them about what the Bible says and help them with history and all that.

I'm also gonna have a WePray Monterey event.

That's an event where we actually bring area churches together that'll be on a Friday evening at six o'clock.

And then finally, I want to invite you and the whole city over to uh National Day of Prayer, put in your calendars May 7th.

We're hosting all the city government people that want to come, any fire chiefs, any choir men, anyone in the uh police department that we're gonna take care of your dinner.

It's probably gonna be at the Filipino Center 7:30 in the morning, about an hour and a half full buffet, and it's hosted, we'll be prepared by the bridge, which is the uh local transitional group here housing that helps people get off drugs.

They got a year culinary program.

They're amazing.

And with them, I'm also gonna be using them.

I'm doing a big uh restaurant now on Canary Row.

I'm not gonna wait for my full development to do.

I've got uh an upstairs four hands diner.

We're gonna do two world class chefs will be preparing, and then pizzas and tapas below, hopefully get that open in three months.

We just had such a battle in doing the ocean front dining with our pizza oven that I'm doing that first, and we'll do the pizza oven later, but I want to bring people to the ocean.

Thank you.

Thanks, Bob.

Hello, mayor, council members, and staff.

Uh my name is Lucas.

I am a student at Middlebury Institute, and I've lived in the area for four years.

I'm here today to show support for the rental inventory.

I know it's on the schedule for later, but uh somewhere to be then.

Um so I just like to uh discuss it here today.

Sorry, Lucas.

I I I apologize.

Um if the item is on the agenda, we only can take public comment when that item is being presented.

Do you know what time that would be?

Um is late.

There's not a specific time.

So it's 30.

Yeah, it's it's a little bit later into 13, 12, 11.

So we have 11, 12.

We have three, we have three items in front of it.

If nothing gets pulled from our consent agenda.

So maybe another half hour, 45 minutes, probably.

Uh that's me being that's me being that's me being optimistic.

But sorry, sorry, Lucas.

Um council members.

Um, I just uh want to come forward and ask that um you guys redouble your efforts in um the streets.

Um my office is on Pearl Street.

I've been there probably I don't know, 25, 30 years, and that roadway in the front has uplifted to the point where it's like this, and it's gonna be hazardous one day, and it run everybody that goes by there doesn't see it, probably has new a final alignment.

And as you I travel all over over town, yeah.

Um that's just my nature because I have properties here, there, and everywhere.

And the streets really really need to be addressed.

It's gonna cost a lot more if you continue to let those just go into deterioration where there's a collapse on some of these places, and then the repairs are uh are uh even going to be worse.

But um, I think you guys should redouble your efforts and really look into the streets because they're there.

That's the first thing people notice when they drive into town and they notice the streets.

What the hell happened here?

Uh you know what I'm saying?

And so it doesn't uh have a good reflection on the city um as a whole when you have sit um roadways that are just in terrible, terrible shape.

Thank you for your time.

Um I I know you came and talked to us about this before.

Did you connect with staff on this?

Yeah, they don't.

Okay.

Okay.

So members.

Once again, subject.

Um, and um this morning I was quite notified that an area that was once large.

And uh conversation about a year and a half ago with the mayor.

Um sooner or later will be remembered for 1906, and then they're kind of a certain that wouldn't happen.

Well, now we're down to 25 percent of the original amount of people today, just notified that the area got even smaller.

Um charging on this other people fees.

Um just come back about three years.

I think the member, and I could be corrected by um by counting office, but it's some about 240,000 collected fees.

Um it's legally um the process is legal now, but um it's um nonprofit.

I'd like to see if that money can be um never hope.

Once again, it's been difficult and working with the city, but I'm doing my best.

Umright, thank you.

I think that was it for the chamber.

Um, so we'll go ahead and go to our callers on Zoom.

First, I'm calling on Suzanne.

You can go ahead.

Okay.

Hello.

Um, my name is Susie Wester.

I live here in Monterey City, and I am a faculty at CHOB.

And I'm calling, I'm talking about the city housing element, specifically the city should accept pure water ones supply, water supply alignment as other cities.

All right, Susie, that's on the agenda.

Yeah, well, we'll come back to that item later in the council.

Do you know again?

Same question about how long.

Yeah, I can't really say it just depends on how long each item takes.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

All right, then our next speaker is Justin.

Hello, can you hear me?

Can hear you?

Okay, uh, good evening, Mayor and Council members.

Um, I came last week to make public comment on this topic.

Um, and I just wanted to add on to it a little bit.

Uh, I have a simple ask tonight, and that is the city not approve parade permits that allow armored vehicles on in the Fourth of July parade.

Um, I've called the business association, uh, the old town, and I've emailed the executive director uh with the same request as well.

They review the permits there and to approve them going um forward.

And I actually don't know how when it comes to the council, if at all.

Uh but if it does, it would be great if you don't approve it.

Yeah, I recognize you're working on really big issues.

And I genuinely appreciate your consideration.

Um, but I do think it goes deeper into our values and culture.

And those are things that shape our behavior over time over the long term.

So we should um prevent those uh vehicles in the parade.

Uh just to let you know what they were in the parade last year.

Um, there was an M3 half rack, half track built for combat, typically armed with heavy machine guns.

It was a Willie's Jeep, sometimes mounted with machine guns for reconnaissance and escort.

There was a GMC C CW truck, occasionally armed for convoy protection.

And there was a Duke W amphibious truck, occasionally armed for beach landings.

And so the concern really is about timing and normalization.

Uh the 4th of July is the wrong moment to get comfortable with uh armored military vehicles on the streets.

It is the right time to fully support the brave men and women of the military, all civil servants, like all of you in the room, and diverse people who make up our community.

Um that's the true definition of what makes our country country great.

Thank you very much for your consideration.

Thanks, Justin.

I think that was it for our public comment here.

So we'll go ahead and close general public comment.

And we will now move to consent agenda.

Um, there's been no items requested to be pulled from staff, is what I understand.

Um, so check in with the council.

Anybody on the council wish to pull anything?

No.

I just make comment on sorry.

We have to pull.

We can't pull it.

Are you sure?

Yeah.

Okay.

Um nothing to pull.

Okay.

All right.

With that, we'll go ahead and go out to public comment.

Um, this is an opportunity for the public to comment on any of our agenda items or request an item be pulled.

So I'll check out first with folks on Zoom.

You can use the raise hand function.

Anybody in the chamber wishes to speak on consent.

All right, I'm not seeing any, so uh go back to folks on Zoom, do account down to five, four, three, two, one.

There's nobody on Zoom.

Bring it back to the council for motion and deliberation.

I'll make a motion that we uh approve and pass uh all of the consent items.

Second.

Okay, it's been moved and seconded.

I'll go ahead and call for the the question.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion passes.

With that, we'll move on to our public hearing item is item number nine on the agenda, which is resolution to modify the Monterey County Tourism Improvement District Management District Plan to add the city of San City to the district.

And with that, I'll pass it to Lou.

And council members.

This item has been before you, and this is another hearing to approve that district.

And your assistant city manager will present the item.

That's right.

And I'll keep this brief.

Uh council is familiar with the uh the process.

The Monterey County Tourism Improvement District has been in place since 2007 and uh different forms, and it's the main vehicle by which there's destination marketing dollars available through an assessment on the lodging properties throughout the county with different assessment rates based on the type of lodging property.

With the addition of two hotels in San City, this uh that opened up earlier this year.

The management district plan uh is being recommended to be adjusted and to add the city of San City to uh the countywide uh MCTID.

And uh this action would uh allow that assessment to begin.

The two properties are the courtyard by Marriott as well as the residents and by Marriott that opened in San City in January.

Uh all the proper lodging businesses have been notified.

There's full support from the San City City Council and their staff, and uh this uh final action is being recommended to you uh today to hold the public hearing and uh resolution of modifying the TID.

Awesome.

Thank you, Nat.

Any questions from the council?

All right.

Seeing none, we'll go ahead and open up for public comment for folks on Zoom.

You can use the raise hand function.

Anyone in the chamber wishes to speak on this item.

All right.

Seeing none, thank you.

Um go ahead and check in with folks on Zoom and do a countdown to five, four, three, two, one.

And there's nobody on Zoom, bring it back to the council for motion and deliberation.

Make a motion to accept the resolution to modify the uh improvement district.

Second.

All right, so moved and seconded.

Any other discussion?

All right.

All those in favor, aye.

Any opposed?

Motion passes unanimously.

With that, we'll move to our public appearance items.

First is item 10, receive subcommittee recommendations, appoint applicants to positions on the appeals hearing board, building and housing appeals board, measure P and S Oversight Committee and other authorize the mayor to sign a letter recommending appointment of a representative to the city on the transportation agency for Monterey County Bicycle and Pedestrian Facilities Advisory Committee.

Um so I I think I'll just jump right into this.

Um so I I want to thank first uh Clementine and City staff for helping to um coordinate all the efforts.

Um, as you can imagine, there's a lot of logistics in the background trying to work with um Vice Mayor uh Smith and I on our availability and then trying to make uh the the uh options work for the applicants.

Um and then there's the entire application process and um and then obviously the interviews and and the uh the recommendations.

Um so we did it very similar to the process last year when um Gino uh was vice mayor.

Um we gave the opportunity for all the applicants um to be interviewed.

And um, and we had a uh set of questions.

There was follow-up questions.

Um it was over a course of two days, and on the second day at the end of um the last interview, um uh Vice Mayor Smith and I went into deliberations, and we both presented um the selections that you see in the staff report.

Um and so there was agreement on um most of the um of the of the seats, but there was um some variance as it relates to um mainly the Tam C Bike and Ped Committee.

Um there was one as it relates to the building and housing appeals board, um, but the one individual that applied for that um was determined to be not qualified by staff.

So I don't think that there's a need to waste energy there.

Um, and since I have the mic, I'll go ahead and share my thoughts as it relates to um the name that I recommend to the council, and then I'll pass it to Vice Mayor Smith, and he can share his thoughts.

Hopefully, you all had a chance to go back and listen to the interviews if you weren't there in person.

Um, and a chance to look at the the applications, but um Susie Bryan was um the the applicant that um I'd like the council to consider pushing forward.

Um she um has lived in a couple of different communities where there has have been initiatives um that she's been engaged in um where they've been really creative and innovative around finding the types of solutions um that address the things that the bike and peg committee um is addressing.

And so she really wants to be able to bring those forward.

Her enthusiasm, her energy, I far exceeded all the other applicants.

We had some good applicants, and I think it's it's tough.

I mean, I I know Diane and Luis and they're both amazing community members that have a lot to offer.

Catherine Edgerton worked with at the Naval Postgraduate School.

And her interview was very enlightening as well.

I think that we had some really good applicants, and this was obviously the toughest one for us to make a decision on.

But I think Susie, if I could just leave it with one word, is her enthusiasm, her energy to lean in and not just digest the information, but have an agenda, help push forward and be collaborative along the way.

So with that, I'll pass it to Councilmember Smith.

Yeah, thank you very much.

Um yeah, I I went back uh and the candidates that we were looking at that uh we're talking about now are the advisory committee for the transportation agency for Monterey County, known as TAMSY.

And there is a bicycle and pedestrian uh facilities advisory committee.

What's created the vacancy is that council member uh Gino Garcia has served on that uh for quite some time and is um stepping down, which creates a vacancy at that advisory committee.

Um so in analyzing the duties, um, if you want to look at the staff report, it's here.

But I want to for the public's read the job description, basically the focus, uh, but the duties and and purpose of the committee.

Advise the transportation agency for Monterey County on safety, community needs, concerns, goals, and objectives with respect to bicycle and pedestrian facilities and travel.

Special reports related to the bicycle and pedestrian planning effort may be made to the TAMSI at any time.

Review local bicycle and pedestrian facility planning documents, review bicycle and pedestrian project funding applications submitted to TAMSY and recommend a priority project list in each funding cycle.

Advocate bicycle use and walking as viable alternative means of transportation, identify future areas for short and long-term improvement strategies for the development of bicycle and pedestrian facilities, and operate as a forum uh forum and a community member uh for communications between the public and private agencies, users, and providers.

And the applicants were um Susie Bryan, Katherine Eckerton, Diane Gazelle, and Luis Sesorio all did very well.

Um, and I think the mayor and I came to the two finalists, uh, Susie Bryan and Katherine Eckerton.

I reviewed both of the videos um again and looked at my notes.

And I have the system where I score one through 10 on the questions.

And um, they both scored well between Catherine and Susie, but Catherine scored better in my process.

Uh I appreciated the energy and the efforts of both the the finalists that we were um having to choose from.

Um for me, I looked at how well they did in their answers to the questions, how well they exercised their understanding of um what would be the process in in this uh advisory role.

And also I'm on TAMSY, I represent this council uh as a TAMSE member.

So I've been on TAMSY for 11 years and I've seen a lot of the work that the various committees do.

And so I am sensitive to the importance of the service of that member.

Um, and there are a variety of things that in advocating for bicycle, but it's also collecting the information from all cities in the county of Monterey.

So I'm a little more sensitive to somebody who expresses uh knowing their role versus just being excited about getting part of being able to advocate for riding a bicycle.

There's a little work to do there.

I liked Catherine's uh work history, what she's done in her professional life um documents, reviewing, writing, uh looking at grants, participating in collaborative efforts with other scholastic efforts that happened at the Navy Postgraduate School with her.

I didn't get a sense that Susie expressed that as well for me.

So I I rated Catherine higher than Susie.

Um they both did well, uh, but when it comes down to it, I look at the performance and depth of the answers and how I rated at the time.

And so to me, I I can't defer to uh selecting somebody who rated lower than the top rated person in the interview for me, which was Catherine.

Okay, um, so at this time, I think I would just open it up to the council for any questions at this point, and then we can deliberate more after public comment.

There are questions at this time.

Okay.

Okay.

All right, with that, we'll go ahead and open up for public comment for folks on Zoom.

You can use the raise hand function.

Anybody in the chamber wish to speak on this item, just ask that you stand up to the left of the podium.

All right, you can come up.

Um I'll cut it off to the two in the chamber and I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one.

There's nobody on Zoom.

Whoever wants to go.

Good afternoon, um, Mayor Tyler Williamson.

Hi, Council and staff.

My name's Elizabeth Yanish, and um I want to just stand here and appreciate uh being able as a public servant to um be part of the governance of these interviews.

I really felt part of uh what we experienced the other day.

And to me, I learned a great deal about not only these candidates who are amazing, truly amazing in their backgrounds and interest in in uh participating in our uh city work.

And so there's nothing quite like being present, you know, to read somebody well.

And I know this forum here is very intimate for you and the and the people that are are being interviewed, but I certainly really valued uh being in person with them.

I think that it's council members, you know.

I would love to see these kinds of interviews and for all of you in the same way, and would hope that maybe at um down the line we'll be able to do that.

Um it's a value for me as a person because I learn more about my community and the people who are interested in serving on these committees.

I think they're vital really to the way that we do our business.

And I feel like it's worthy for more public people to um be present, you know, during these interviews.

I would love to see a 4 p.m.

meeting of city council that in it where you are all able to hear these people speak about themselves.

You all ask beautiful discerning questions for these candidates.

And I think the rest of you would have wonderful um other questions to ask and learn more about these candidates.

So I appreciate uh this ability to be part of this uh process city process, and thank you.

Thank you, Elizabeth.

Well, however, um some of some of them seem like another all the relationship with some of them, and it's like position, it has to be a little bit more neutral, almost like it'd be better to have them put into a raffle to have um some of the conversations with kind of a character of it's good to have a communication and and but it's a little bit more than just business and not um friendship, because that's where the appeals um gets a little bit out of balance and then like as far as an equal spray of the vote.

Um last month um statement to the post board um person that was in charge, but it seemed to be a little bit unfair in the meeting of not being equal.

Um idea of course putting um almost consumer conversations.

And it's not including a selective person of just thank you.

Thank you.

With that, we'll go ahead and close public comment on the item.

And I'll just respond to the last um public comment, which is I think what I articulated was the exact opposite of what you're suggesting.

I have closer relationships with some of the people that applied for these positions, and I'm not putting their name forward because they weren't the best applicant.

So I'm I it's unfortunate that you felt that you walked away feeling that way.

Um I I hope that I came across friendly to everybody that walked in, whether I knew them or not.

Um I don't want to speak for councilmember Smith, but I think that that standard that expectation is shared amongst both of us.

Um that we're really truly just trying to find the best candidates um to fill these positions.

Um that said, open it up to the council for deliberation.

Please I was there for the interviews, and um I feel much the same as Elizabeth Yanish.

I've watched them all since we began doing them publicly, and I'm just always so touched at the quality of the candidates and and the depth of experience people in this town have.

And it's it's always very exciting for me.

I I love it.

I love doing it.

Um, as to this particular question, um, the four candidates were were stellar.

Uh Diane was great.

Um Louis Sosario, to me, he's the king of the city.

Uh planning committee, architectural review.

Um, the man is wise.

Um Catherine and Susie, I thought both did a great job.

Um I'm gonna go with um council member Smith's recommendation, and I'm gonna tell you why.

Um she is uh she bicycles 50 to 80 miles a week on the rec trail and the connecting trails.

So she knows what she's talking about.

She walks to work, so she's also a pedestrian commuter.

I think that's important.

Um, I think Susie is an athlete too.

Um she um does public policy research and communication to me, that's important in that kind of a role.

And that um she has extensive experience in both writing for public policy and grant writing, those are skills that would be very valuable on that committee.

But I'm gonna be honest, the main difference to me is that um council member Smith sits on the TAMC committee for 11 years.

So um I wanna give him the nod as knowing what that committee is about and what they're looking for and the qualities as between the candidates.

So that I'm gonna swing my vote to Kate.

Catherine.

And I don't know her.

So I I watched both interviews, and uh I think they they both did grade uh Kate and Susie.

Um so I'm I'm going to support Susie in um the reason why I support uh her is because uh uh as council member Smith mentioned, I actually have sat in the um bike and ped committee for going on to four years now.

And um I in looking at the composition of the current committee, um most of the folks who sit on that committee don't necessarily bring uh technical knowledge to the conversation, but rather their lived experience as pedestrians, as bicyclists.

Uh sure some may have a little bit of technical knowledge, but it's not really a prerequisite for the type of conversations that happen in that committee.

And in fact, I would say that what Tamsi staff really look for uh is they bring the the technical knowledge for projects uh or programming that happened throughout the county.

That's that's where they specialize, but they're bringing it to the community or rather to the uh committee to get more of a community uh feedback uh from the representatives in that committee, which uh live anywhere from King City up to I would say um probably Selena's Monterey.

Oh, the red barn where the border is.

Yes.

County county.

Well, no, yeah, I know I know countywide, but I'm trying to remember, I don't know that we have representatives currently in the committee to participate from from all the way up there.

Yeah.

So yeah, it's a countywide committee.

Whether we have representatives representing all areas of the county, that's a different story.

So I I really um enjoyed the enthusiasm for sure that Susie brings.

But I I also what what captured my attention is that uh I think that enthusiasm what it really brings is um the and maybe the lacking or or not lacking, but uh not necessarily leaning on technical knowledge.

Um she brings, I think more of um uh potentially innovative and and imaginative uh approach to what our communities could look like with more uh pedestrian infrastructure with more bike infrastructure.

Um versus someone who might be a little bit better versed in in uh just planning in general.

So for that reason, I I I'm gonna go ahead and support Susie.

I think I think they would both be a good fit.

Uh, but I'm I'm leaning more towards Susie and and what I last thing I would add here is I don't remember.

I know if during my 10 tenure, there hasn't been an alternate, but I wonder if maybe that could be an option for Kate as well.

I'm not exactly sure.

So I'll leave it at that.

Thanks.

Well, actually, that's a good question.

Um, I never thought about it that way, but I I did see um what the interviews had, but Mark, I have a lot of respect for both people as far as vice mayor um Smith because he's on Tamsy, but I have respect for you being in the actual position and kind of knowing what you thought was needed and what was bought.

It sounds like you can't go wrong with either one of them.

I would love to see if that's a possibility for one to be an alternate.

If one if if one actually gets it tonight, could the other one be alternate?

Because it sounds like either one is going to be a good uh position.

Um, but because you were actually in the position, I'm gonna go with Susie because I feel like if you were in the position, you kind of know what it's needed uh for that committee directly.

How often do they meet?

Once a month.

First one day of a month.

Um, so I don't believe that they have an alternate plan of that committee because the committee is large enough to typically it doesn't typically have a quorum problem, and they don't have to go through so much of a concern of enough people showing up.

No, sometimes sometimes there are challenges, like we get really close to not meeting quorum.

Um uh Clementine has a thought.

Oh, please.

Oh, you can go ahead, Councilmember Garcia.

Oh, I'll just speak into my own experience.

Um and yeah, so so I don't when I took the role, there wasn't any conversation around an alternate as far as I remember.

Um, and and I want to say that I have seen alternates for other areas or or yeah, agencies, but I'm not sure maybe.

Yeah, I just pulled up their bylaws and they do allow an alternate.

So that solution would work.

Okay.

But would we be allowed to make that decision tonight, or would we have to recruit like recruit for the alternate seat?

I guess it's more of a legal question.

Um I think it's probably okay because this this is just it's a different uh kind of appointment.

It's a recommendation.

You're not actually appointing someone, you're recommending um to the board okay, the consideration of these people.

So I'm gonna make a motion to um accept the recommendations that were made by Vice Mayor uh Smith and myself, um, with the exception of um the bike and ped committee recommendation, um and suggest appointing Suzy Bryan as the rep and Catherine Edgerton as the alternate my motion.

Okay, it's been moved and seconded.

Any other discussion?

Um we haven't really talked about it, but it's in the staff work where the council members have seen the selections, but the public doesn't know who we're selecting for the other positions.

So I feel like we ought to just say those.

Yeah.

No, you have a motion.

So I think we should report.

I hear what you're saying.

Um and this is a conversation that we've had with staff in regards to like meeting efficiency.

Yeah.

Um, we have a lot on the agenda tonight.

And I think if people are that eager to know, um, they can check out the agenda report because it is available.

It's publicly available.

It's not like we're hiding anything.

Um, but for sake of time, I think um we'll go ahead and just move forward with the with the motion.

If that's okay.

That's what you want to do.

Okay.

All right.

So go ahead and call the question.

All those in favor, aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

No.

No.

All right.

Passes three, two.

And with that, we'll move on to item 11.

Authorize the city to enter into a memorandum of understanding with the county of Santa Cruz to coordinate the funding and administration of the local government outer continential shelf coordination program.

Appoint a council member to represent the city and authorize a thousand dollars from planning office professional services budget to support the work effort.

With that, I'll pass it to Lou for staff presentation.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, your community services director will present that this evening.

Um, thank you very much.

Um this evening's um item is to address the federal governments um as you know is considering leasing the California coastline for offshore oil drilling.

Um, and in response to that, the county of Santa Cruz is really taking a leadership role.

And what they've done is they are proposing a memorandum of understanding basically to any jurisdiction that wants to join.

And that the purpose of the um memorandum of understanding would be to create a local government outer continental shelf coordination program.

And the idea would be that this group could provide timely updates, share resources, and help regional coordination on this issue.

So the first item before you is to consider whether or not to um authorize um the city manager to enter into this memorandum of understanding.

If you choose to do that, the second item we're asking you is to appoint a council member to participate with that group.

Um they don't have regular meeting times yet.

Um what I've observed, it's really sort of just at its infancy, this group.

Um they've had a couple meetings during the day.

Um their time is generally been in the afternoon, but I can't share with you a particular meeting schedule yet.

So the person that you appoint would need to be flexible enough to um you know participate maybe with a meeting schedule that's not completely outlined yet.

And the third is to authorize a thousand dollars from the planning um professional services account um to join this group.

Um there is no entry fee.

Um, but they are asking for um uh member contributions to help finance the the work effort.

Um just in comparison, basically agencies are putting in what they can.

Um from the county jurisdictions, Monterey County is um put in 15,000 up to a high of 30,000 from Sonoma County so far.

City of Santa Cruz is putting uh contributing 29,000 due to our budgetary constraints.

We're recommending a thousand.

Um, but that's up to your discretion as well.

So there's three items in front of you.

Um authorization of the memorandum of understanding, the second is appointment of a council member, and the third is the financial contribution.

Thanks, Kim.

At this time, are there any questions from the council?

Any questions for staff?

All right, seeing none, we'll go ahead and open it up for public comment.

Folks on Zoom, you can use the raise hand function.

Anybody in the chamber wishes to speak on this item?

Mr.

Reeves, you're wanting to speak on this one?

Okay.

Anybody else in the chamber?

All right, so we'll cut it off to the one and I'll do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one.

And we have one on Zoom.

We'll go ahead and start in the chamber.

Yeah, just a quick comment.

I I was struck by the uh the small amount of a thousand dollars when everybody else around us is poning up quite a bit more than that.

And here we are right here in the crescent of the most environmentally sensitive part of the bay.

So I would hope that we could scrape some more money together to to help with that.

I mean, I myself will donate to it because I think it's a worthy cause.

A thousand dollars is almost I wouldn't say insulting, but it's it's kind of like putting a dime in the hat, you know, when other people are putting ten dollars in.

That's my only comment.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Right to our caller on Zoom.

Suzanne, you can go ahead.

Yeah, I'm just gonna comment that this is so important.

Why people come to Monterey Bay is because of our water and have a beautiful ocean.

And so I would concur that we should support at a higher level because this is foundational for our city to keep clean water and not have an oil spell.

It would be disastrous.

And so we should do what we can to support.

Thank you.

All right.

With that, we'll go ahead and close public comment, bring it back to the council.

Um I'm gonna start this one off because I've I asked staff to have this put on the agenda.

Um I've been coordinating with uh Supervisor Justin Cummings from his visit down uh during the Save Our Shore event.

And this is a little bit of a follow-up to that as part of our other previous efforts.

There is some items regarding um an MOU and um and then the comments that we submitted to the federal government um around us not wanting to support that project moving forward.

Um so that being said, I I I imagine that we'll get the support from the council.

I think the biggest question is figuring out the appointment piece.

Um, and because I've been coordinating with him, I would just ask the council to consider um appointing me to represent the city um for that.

And then just in response to um Mr.

Reeves in regards to the a thousand dollars.

Um I I shared the same thing with staff and and and um I think it's important for us to be a little bit careful in regards to throwing out too much money right now as it relates to our budget deficit, um, because it's easy to just say, well, a little bit here, a little bit there.

And when we're struggling to find a little bit here, a little bit there for um reduction in expenditures.

Um, it's just trying to find an appropriate way of balancing that.

But I do feel comfortable in saying that when when it comes time when it comes time for it and and the group is ready to take action um that I imagine that the city of Monterey won't have any issue doing our part to contribute towards the the cost of service um to to execute and fight this.

So um with that, I'll open it up to the council.

Please, Councilman Smith.

Yeah, I I support this because it's uh the start of something that may be necessary if this continues to become uh a large scale battle at the at the federal level.

Um, I don't think money is so important right now as membership.

Um, we're we're at the point where we're trying to figure out what our budget's gonna look like, and to commit to a thousand dollars now uh doesn't mean that we can't up that when it's necessary when the group is calling for some financial necessity to do something.

But right now, I don't think there's any financial necessity for anybody to do anything because I'm not hearing that they've hired or retained staff or they've hired a public relationships um where that costs money to advocate, write letters, advocating in the lobbying side of the of the shop and and reaching Congress members.

Um so I think this is an entry level uh that can certainly change as the scope and and the work is more quickly identified by the uh city and county members.

Uh if Sonoma is involved, I can't imagine that many, many other counties in the state of California are not gonna also become involved.

I think when we get a little bit more clear picture of what the demands are for any financial commitment from counties and cities, it that's gonna number in the hundreds.

I I think that then we'll have a framework of what the right number should be.

I just think it's premature to do that until we know what our right number is as we're making decisions on building a budget and also um establishing what areas of uh programs that we may have to cut.

So I I could support the thousand dollars as a start, knowing that this may come back at the right time with some other call.

Anyone else on this side?

Oh, I I agree with Ed.

Um, we need to join the the amount of money is not important.

Uh it should be higher.

Maybe it will be higher.

We don't have the money right now.

Let's just join.

And I imagine the League of California Cities is gonna be actively involved in this, as will the county league.

100%.

So there's gonna be a lot of a lot of things happening um in the short term.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Okay.

Uh may I are we ready for a motion?

Please.

Okay.

Um I'll make a motion and I'm gonna see if I can get this right because staff has outlined it.

Uh, that I we support uh agenda item and the computer 11.

And uh the the motion is to adopt a resolution to authorize the city to enter into a memorandum of understanding with the county of Santa Cruz to coordinate the funding administration of the local government outer continental shelf coordination program uh on a form approach uh approved by the city attorney.

Second, that uh the motion um would appoint uh the mayor for the representation for the city of Monterey.

And thirdly, that we authorize the expenditure of a thousand dollars uh from the account that's listed for the support of local government outer continental shelf coordination program.

Second okay, it's been moved and seconded.

Um I would just offer um if I don't know how this works in the structure of their program, but if there's somebody that would be willing to be an alternate in case there's uh I I would like to be alternate.

I was just named to to the alternate position of the sanctuary commission of ambag.

And it seems like they might go together.

Yeah, that might be a good fit.

Okay.

Um and we don't know when the meetings are yet, right?

Exactly, exactly.

Okay.

Um, there's two folks on the table.

Do you all want to Dr.

Barber and Gene?

Do you all want to talk through it a little bit and see what might work best?

It's the council, it's the council.

I mean, do you do you want to make do you want to make a case to the council, Dr.

Barber?

Just um similar to Dr.

Gene Rash.

I I won't make a case as per se is just a show and interest um in being an alternate because I'm fine with it.

No, as long as we are in it and we have the backup as an alternate.

I think that's the important part because this is too important for us not to be all the way uh informed and by so um I I'm constantly and have been involved in environmental things even from the start when I first got here uh 10 years ago, uh doing things even in the community, but um that's for me it's it's not about what I've done, it's about the city of Monterey being involved.

So for me, it's just an interest.

So if Dean wants to do it, that's fine for me.

Okay.

Um driving to Santa Cruz.

Um yeah well, that's a nice drive, and I like Santa Cruz, but I was on the advisory council for the sanctuary for about seven years, and it's uh it was brutal.

And God bless you for being the alternate.

Um that's just not that's not my path right now.

Okay, and uh it time constraints.

We'll talk later.

Yeah.

Okay.

Do you I would support the AMPAG?

I think that makes a natural connection.

And it's gonna evolve, and it could be that we get precepts that are more identified, and we get some framework of what the coalition is gonna be.

And it we might come back and we might say, you know, ambag's not a good fit because you're busy enough with that, and we bring it back, and then we're this is gonna adapt to you know something that's real a real thing.

This is gonna be on the live action uh uh work here.

Yep, news news 11.

So are you updating your motion?

Um well for for the we need to include the include an alter.

Yeah, I'll up if uh friendly friendly update to the motion already prescribed, and we have a second, right?

Um yes, I think it was Gina Yeah, I think you seconded.

You can okay.

Okay.

So if the uh seconder is um and supported, that I would also, in addition to the mayor being appointed, that our alternate would be uh Miss Rash to this coalition.

Dr.

Rash, I think we just upgraded.

It's Dr.

Rag.

Nurse Rash.

Esquire.

Um, all right, Dr.

Barber, are you good with the as a secondary?

Okay, so we have a motion on the table.

Um questions, any last minute comments?

No.

All right, all those in favor, aye, any opposed.

Motion passes unanimously.

With that, we're gonna go ahead and take a monitor five.

We have four more items to get through before we get to closed session.

So um, I'm just gonna give everybody a moment to get up and stretch their legs.

We're gonna start at six o'clock though.

So yes, a real six or four number 11.

I'm doing it.

Okay.

We're gonna go ahead and pick this back up.

We're at item twelve on the agenda.

Um which is to amend resolution twenty-five dash zero six zero to include the Vasquez Adobe repairs and Gordon House repairs projects in the FY twenty five twenty six capital improvement program and authorize the finance director to appropriate funds from the facility reserve fund to the capital projects fund in the amount of one million ninety-three thousand dollars.

That was a lot of fund.

The fund was repeated several times there.

Anyways, I'm gonna pass it to Ruth.

Thank you, uh Mayor and Council, and uh the senior your general services manager will present this item.

So I'll be reviewing uh the condition of these two historic structures.

Um slides.

Okay.

Um, some of these photos will be hard to see um uh, but some are repeat as we've uh presented them in the twenty twenty four and twenty twenty-five state of the infrastructure presentation.

Uh, this is a more detailed look specifically into these two buildings, uh, as they have seen an accelerated rate of deterioration, unfortunately.

Um, the first one that we'll cover is the Vasquez Adobe built in eighteen thirty-four, uh, so a hundred and ninety-two years, so almost two hundred years old.

Um, and then the second one we'll cover is the Gordon House.

Um, it is uh over a hundred and seventy-five years old.

Um the Vasco's adobe sits uh right behind us to the side of the parking lot, about 175 feet away.

Uh and the Gordon House is uh just right down here around the curve and is about 250 feet away.

So these structures are very close in proximity and obviously are very near and dear to our heart uh for their historic value and their use.

Um so the okay.

So the scope of the Vasquez Adobe, um, one of the major issues that we've seen, and we'll cover this uh is it is not a watertight building anymore.

And as you can imagine, a watertight building becomes a big liability.

Uh, and then we must make efforts to get it watertight very quickly.

Um but unfortunately, to do that, we need to address a lot of the other issues uh that we have with this.

So um the major one is the structural reinforcement, deck floor, roof framing, um, etc.

Uh right now we are not able to occupy the second story balcony at all.

Uh we've cautioned it off and red tagged it.

Um it is not safe to be on.

Um we also need to look at the electrical system, um, HVAC controls, air distribution, um, ADA accessibility, interior wall repairs and restoration, um, and then obviously the complete roof replacement.

So, again, these photos will be hard to see.

I would encourage you to, if you have a moment at some point in the next week or two, go take a look.

Um, you know, a picture's worth a thousand words, but seeing it in person is obviously worth a lot more than a thousand words.

Uh, it'll bring some clarity what these pictures are showing.

Uh, the first picture on the left, it's hard to see, but the deck itself, when you step out onto that patio, which you're not supposed to right now, um, it slopes heavily away from the building.

Um, it is in a state of deterioration and is unsafe, like I mentioned before.

Uh, the roof picture shows broken tiles.

Um, we we do not want to get on the roof out of fear of creating additional roof leaks while we seek the repair.

Um, here are the two major roof leaks that we see right now.

Whenever it rains, staff needs to actually chase the leaks uh with uh trash cans in order to capture the water to minimize the damage.

Um, but this is the state uh in which we're in.

Uh and is important to note that we also have city staff occupying these buildings uh right now as their place of work.

Um here's a close-up view of the deck.

You can see deck boards are rotting uh completely out uh and need to be a complete replacement.

Uh the underside of the deck, uh the paint is long been chipping away, uh, also exposing uh more rot.

This center photo is is much harder to see on this presentation, but it is uh showing a uh structural crack uh that is running through the side of the building.

Uh and then as well as this restroom, obviously is not ADA accessible as we look to address those items as well.

Uh moving on to the Gordon House.

Um, this one is a bit different.

It's only a single level.

Uh, it also needs structural repairs.

Uh the foundation itself uh has failed.

Um, one of the large rooms, you can actually put a tennis ball on the ground.

It'll roll by itself from one side to the other.

Uh you can also see that through structural cracks.

Uh, so it needs similar work with structural repair.

Uh the exterior deck replacement is the most obvious when you approach the building.

It is um a pretty pretty bad shape.

Uh, it needs a partial roof replacement, uh, not a full one.

Uh, and it needs uh interior repairs and restoration.

Um also look at the HVA system and then some ADA improvements.

Um, as you can see, uh, this is the outside we'll cover first.

Uh, these are the upright posts, these first two photos on the left.

Uh, these are what sit on top of the deck and they support the patio overhang.

Uh, we've had termite issues in this building.

We have fumigated um about 10 years ago.

We need to refumigate, but the damage remains.

Uh, and now the rot is setting in to the point where these um pillars are essentially uh also failing.

Uh the siding is also falling off.

Um, and we have had extensive issues with um wildlife uh entering, specifically issues with possums that we've had to chase down on multiple occasions across the years that are making up residence underneath.

Uh the deck, uh this you know used to have your plank style deck uh years ago, we had to do a temporary repair.

We covered it in plywood and painted it.

Um, but now you can see that the railing itself uh has fallen.

Uh, we have uh blocked that off for staff use, so we are not allowed to use it.

Uh, the only portion of the deck that is accessible is the front entryway for staff to enter and then the um rear side for staff to exit.

The rest of the deck is is not in usable uh fashion.

Uh more picture of the siding is also the uh deck boards that have rotted out, hence why we needed to plywood over them.

Uh electrical system is undersized, also needs to be looked at.

And we also have uh failing seals on the skylights.

Uh interior, we have a massive amount of flaking paint.

Um doors that are failing.

Um obviously things are coming out of alignment due to the foundational issues on a slew of of other items.

Um the roof has had some temporary repairs that we need to address.

Um, but predominantly the tar and uh gravel roof on the back.

Um we've had some some leaks around the chimney uh that we also we need to look at.

Uh and then this picture obviously a crack is hard to uh see on a photo like this, but this is an interior crack uh within within the walls.

Obviously, when you have the foundation failing, you you tend to see these throughout the facility.

So that was a quick rundown.

Uh obviously I hate to be the bearer of bad news and really highlight the condition that these are in, uh, but given that these are historic properties, um, it's in my scope of responsibility to maintain these properties.

Uh it it seemed prudent to come to you all to seek uh approval to get these funds to make the necessary repairs.

And with that, I'll answer any questions.

Thanks, Chris.

Um I guess I would only ask if we do this, that we add a possum's crossing sign.

Just kidding.

All right, open up to the council for questions.

Please, Dr.

Barber.

Thanks so much.

Um, we just a quick question.

I noticed that um with taking if this is approved tonight, it'll be $7,000 left in the reserve.

So my question would be for you, since this is in your purview, do you see any other um I guess needs that would come out of the that would have to come out of the facility emergency fund um with only $7,000 being left for the fiscal year?

Yes, um, obviously that is a risk um, you know, to in depleting those funds.

Um, but g given the state of these buildings, I'd say these really rose to the urgent category very quickly.

Um, those things can always happen.

And if that were to happen, then we would have to um speak with the other departments in order to find you know, finance city management office in order to hopefully to get additional funding for any other emergencies that might happen um while we wait if this reserve is replenished or not.

So do you so since you were saying that this kind of rose to the emergency level, and this is in your purview.

Do you see any that's in your list now that you have an idea or that would rise to that in this fiscal year?

Um not to this level.

Um, not to this level.

I think the other emergency issues that we've had, we've been able to either temporary repair um or we've been able to find other funding sources to take care of them on a smaller level.

But that being said, um, things can happen.

So I don't I don't want to lean you one direction or the other.

Um it's definitely a mixed back.

So are there grants available?

Last question.

Yeah, um, we've looked into that.

Um, unfortunately, uh not of anything to the magnitude.

Um, but Brian can uh further elaborate on some grant possibilities.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah, so I'll um Brian Edwards Laboral Museums Director.

And so one of the major grants that has been out there for years is Save America's Treasures, and that has actually been canceled over the past couple of years um during the federal administration, because those are done by national administered by National Park Service.

Save America's Treasures works on sites like um First Theater.

It did the renovation first theater was closed for 20 plus years and it was renovated.

Um, did work at Cooper Molera Adobe and also at Carmel Mission and other missions out there, but those grants have ended as far as we don't have any sense that those are coming back.

Um Community Foundation, Monterey County, CFMC, we work with them on historic preservation and grants, but those are the grants we are working on for the tile mural.

So we're also, you know, we're seeing other projects out there where funding is needed.

And that one is a $50,000 cap over two years, you know, $50,000 each year.

So that's 100,000, not enough to do the work that we need.

Um, and the other grant that we looked at is similar, you know, for some of the folks here were at the Wharf 2 presentation with um Congressman Panetta, and those we had that grant that was the uh thinking on that with the community project funding.

And this those two buildings are actually not eligible for community project funding because the grant guidelines for CDBG HUD state that general conduction of government or museums are not eligible for those grants.

And so for that grant, we did identify the library and we submitted a project one million dollars for the library for that.

So we are still looking for these other grants and federal grants, but a lot of the federal and state funding has decreased.

And there's a lot of very small grants you know, the $5,000, $7,000 kind of ones.

And also just if I didn't mention the Save America's treasures, also is a one-to-one matching grant.

Meaning if you asked for a million dollars, you have to put up a million dollars.

And typically, you know, they would most years they would they would cap it at $750,000.

So if you put in, if you ask for $750,000 from the federal government, you also have to put up $750,000.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Any other questions from the council?

Please, controversia.

So I'm looking at the uh agenda report here that uh breaks down the um various estimates for the different things needed, but I don't see any estimates for the um historic preservation study.

Yeah, that is uh lumped into the first item um that captures that.

So they are um it's part of the architectural evaluation, so it's lumped in with that group.

So we we condense kind of that for the language of the agenda report, but yes, got it.

There's a million things that are gonna need to go into repairing those buildings, and so these are just kind of the top line items.

Uh-huh.

Uh-huh.

And I'm not too familiar with these studies.

Um, there's an estimate for that, a specific estimate for the uh preservation study.

What like what I guess I'm trying to um think about how close to the final amount would that estimate be?

Um it's hard to tell right now because these are just our preliminary estimates.

Um, you know, obviously, if we get the go-ahead, we're gonna see seek hard numbers um that we'll be able to uh go off of.

Um and obviously if if we have any money that that is left over after the completion, then they would be put back into the reserve.

Um, but for right now, these are our best uh educated estimates um based on a facility condition assessment report that we've done uh back in uh over 2024 to 2025.

Um, staff expertise as well as some contractor estimates that we've been able to acquire while we look into uh what what it's gonna take for these two structures.

Okay, thank you.

Where will staff work?

Yeah, that's uh um uh it's those two buildings are a collection of staff, it's not just one department, if you will.

So you know, it will be up to the department heads in order to temporarily reassign their staff while these renovations happen.

Um, and so I don't have an answer for that tonight.

Um, but yes, we will have to make temporary accommodations.

We we have identified uh locations and there are other sites, temporary sites within the city's current portfolio where they can remove to.

Can I ask a poll question to that?

Could you speak to that a little bit more?

Where some of these other sites are specifically uh one of the considerations for uh staff.

Uh we've talked about the Wave Street uh uh site.

Uh, this is the Bave Street Garage where staff uh was maybe up to two years ago.

Uh we have museum staff currently in Gordon House, they could go back and relocate to the library second floor and join the rest of the library and museums team with Brian and then uh parks and rec staff uh have also other options as well, including the sports center temporarily.

Can I presume that we're as far into the deterioration of these buildings as we can go that that there's not gonna be anything to save if we don't do this?

We are at the act now point, yeah.

For my my ex my opinion.

Okay, thanks.

Thank you, Mark.

Um, I think you said the Gordon House, based on the dates, it's about 176 years old.

The Vasquez, um 192 years old.

Correct.

And we purchased it for $20,000.

Yes.

Um, and and obviously when we look at the photos, um the deferred maintenance, we've been deferring it a long time.

Yes.

Um I think the Vasquez had its roof done, or was that the one that you showed the tile that it needed roof?

It needs a roof.

The Gordon House had its roof done.

Okay, that's what it was.

Okay.

Um I think most of my questions were answered.

Um, the concern I have is that the building codes and the way that uh the Vasquez was built 192 years ago is certainly not going to be the same way that they're gonna have to go through.

Um are we gonna open up where we have to do earthquake proofing on the construction or the the remodeling that involves the Vasquez that suddenly as we open it up, we have to secure it as far as the earthquake proofing, which then goes to uh additional.

Does it trigger that's a great question?

That's a great question.

So we did have some recommendations as part of the assessment report.

Uh as we start to go into pulling building permits, we'll actually have to balance uh some of the historic preservation requirements with the current building code requirements.

So we'll we'll work with our building official.

Uh, but yeah, there's current building codes is going to have some seismic standards incorporated into that.

And so I think there is going to be a balance, and we'll have to work with our our building department to figure out exactly what takes precedent, whether it's gonna be historic preservation and um you know different dimensional lumber, it or if it's gonna be you know, upgrading things to current building standards.

I I think that's a balance wouldn't we'll get into those details once we start pulling permits.

Yeah.

Um, and and so if we were to act tonight going forward, what would your first couple of moves be if we were to say, yeah, the funding you get the council to approve of it.

What is the next month or two look like in terms of execution?

Yeah, that's a great question.

Um we can all show up with our hammers, uh, but you obviously need skilled people.

Um, first the historic preservation report.

Um, we'd start to get those studies underway to make sure that we we know what we're doing there.

Um, and then some temporary stabilization.

Um, but again, we you know, we don't want to put too much money in if we're gonna redo it all.

Um, and then obviously going through the permitting process, like Andrew mentioned to understand what that balance is between the historic preservation and and new code.

Um, and then preliminary design and detailed scope development.

So then we'd be able to have real hard, fast numbers, real good timelines.

Yeah, um, things things would then accelerate off quicker.

Yeah, then you can go out to bid, get prices, and you know what the numbers cost.

And then the work will start.

Yeah, okay.

Um, obviously looking at the photographs, um, where I think it was the Gordon House, uh where you had the varmints coming in and you had some you had the posts that you pretty much could put your fingers through.

It looks like that post is sitting on top of the the deck, and that's supporting the building, or is that a decorative post?

Um, it is supporting the overhang for the porch.

Okay.

Yes.

Okay.

And we know that's not the way you build it now.

No.

That post has to go down to concrete footing, dirt, soil.

Um, and how many employees are in the Gordon house?

Or right now just four.

Okay.

Um, okay, that's the all the questions I have.

Okay.

Um, I just have one question in it, and it may be a rhetorical question.

It probably is actually a rhetorical question.

Um, but it's like, how did we get here?

How how did we allow any city facility to fall to this state?

Um, yeah.

I don't you don't have to answer that.

I'm just I'm just putting it out there.

Um I'll save the rest of my comments for when we get back from public comment.

Thank you, Chris, for the presentation and answering those questions.

Chris, thanks.

All right, folks on Zoom, you can use a raise hand function.

Anybody in the chamber wishes speak on this item?

Mr.

Reeves, anybody else?

All right, so we'll cut it off to the one speaker in the chamber.

Do a countdown for folks on Zoom to five, four, three, two, one.

Nobody on Zoom.

So we'll go ahead and go to Mr.

Reeves.

So just real quick.

Um, I was involved in the uh Vasquez Adobe many years ago.

I'm gonna say around the year 2000.

And that's actually when the tile roof was added prior to that, it had a split shake roof on it.

And I believe it was so what you see there today is not the Vasquez Adobe.

The Vasquez Adobe is entombed inside of another building, the second story addition came later on.

So just uh a thought would be that since they're taking the the tile off the roof, maybe you want to consider not putting the tile back on again, go back with a different kind of roofing that's lighter weight because the tile is not good from a seismic perspective, and it might be more expensive also.

So what was there before was a split shake, which obviously fire resistivity is not as good.

But anyhow, I just thought I'd throw that out there because if you look back into history books, it it didn't have a tile roof on it.

And there was quite a bit of discussion back when we put that on about the aesthetics versus the historic accuracy of it.

So thank you, Mr.

Reeves.

With that, we'll go ahead and close public comment, bring it back to the council for motion and deliberation.

Um I I don't need to deliberate anymore.

I think uh, you know, it's it's always a difficult one when you're expending money at a point where you know you're gonna uh take the reserves down to almost nothing.

But we have two very valuable assets that would not sell in this condition, would not be uh something that we can count on for any long-term occupancy for our employees.

Our employees deserve to be able to work in a in a place that they don't have to have buckets on their desk and get out of the rain.

Um it's as Chris has said, this is this is a uh a decision that must be done.

Uh, but the only other alternative is that we don't do it and we sell it as is, and and then we create another problem with displacement employees right in the umbrella in the footprint of of the city uh city campus.

I think these two buildings are essential to fix.

Um they're necessary to house our employees.

They're both public access interfacing with the public.

Um they have handicap access issues, they have safety issues, they have real structural deficits that have that have mounted.

And and we all know when you defer maintenance, it just gets worse worse and compounds time.

Um we've waited the absolute longest time that we can wait to act on this.

So I'll entertain a motion.

I don't want to cut anybody else off, but now might be the time to move us forward to um see other council's opinions.

Um I'll make the motion.

Uh let me get back here to the top here.

Um the motion is to adopt a resolution.

Um we're being asked to amend the resolution 25-060 to include the Vasquez Adobe repairs and the Gordon House repairs projects in the FY25-26 capital improvement.

Um the motion includes authorizing the finance director uh to move ahead with $640,000 um as a an approximate from the fact of facility reserve fund and move that to the capital projects fund and for uh the Vasquez Adobe Repairs Project.

And then also move that transfer of funds to the same location for the Gordon House repairs, the amount of 453,000.

Second.

Okay, so moved and seconded.

Any other discussion?

Um, I'm just gonna say a few things.

Um so for anybody that's paid um close attention to um our discussions, particularly as it relates to our budget.

I'm a stickler for our reserves and trying to maintain those.

So it gives me a lot of heartburn to use it, but I'm thankful that the funding is there so that we can use it for a need like this.

But now it's less money that we have available towards um whatever else that might be.

So now that we've kind of exhausted our reserve fund, we're back in the same position that we were in before.

Um, and um, we all see what's happening in the world right now.

Um, and so I I am just like stating this now as it relates to the budget discussion that's coming up.

Um I this is exactly why I'm hesitant for us to address the issues as it relates to um using the reserves to get us out of the fiscal deficit.

Um if we go into a recession, um, I'm thinking about our city workforce and trying to make sure that we have as much funding available to try to keep the city operating as long as we can.

And even if it's an extra million dollars, um, that little bit can help go a long way.

So um I I support the motion, um, but we we really need to think hard about um how do we ensure that we're maintaining our our reserve levels and prioritizing that when additional funding does become available to get that back to where the council policy is on our reserve levels.

Um then the and the question about how how did we get here?

This is again, this is a um I I think that there's been a different way of managing the city in the past.

It was it's I think traditionally has been let's just pay things as we go along.

And that's what it was like when I got on to the council.

Um, so we recreated these reserve funds in order to move us in a new direction.

And not only do we need to maintain these reserves, but we have to take care of all this deferred maintenance.

Um, and and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

There's so many other things that are being deferred in the city of Monterey.

Our city facilities are falling apart, the bathroom in the police department, and we're we're we're all scared of making these hard decisions.

We have some tough decisions to make, not just as a council, but as a community.

And we got to make these decisions.

So I hope that folks that are paying attention and listening to this conversation stand with the city as hopefully the council can move forward with trying to push forward some initiatives to help right sides the ship.

And then the last piece I'll speak to is uh I'm I'm worried about what it is like for our city workforce that's in those buildings now.

Um if there's water leaking from the roof, I imagine that there's some level of mold in those buildings.

And so I don't know how safe that is for people to even be working in today.

So I would just encourage staff to just think about how we might want to move more quickly in regards to moving our staff around to make sure that we're working in appropriate conditions.

Um providing some flexibility for people to work from home.

I don't think we need all of our staff in person all the time.

So I would just encourage some workplace flexibility as we navigate this experience and in trying to to provide some adjustments here.

So can I make another additional comment?

Um, I meant to say this before.

Um we have midpin, that project is still alive.

We still plan on the apartments right behind us.

I can't imagine that we can have that under construction at the same time as we have repairs going on for the Vasquez, Adobe, and the Gordon Adobe.

So everything is about timing.

So I think if we are able to move the staff, get our assessments, get it through all of the things that Chris talked about in terms of execution.

Um this is almost like there's code three and there's code two.

The fire in Casanova was code three plus plus plus.

This is a code two, because we don't want to be stepping all over another construction company that's right next door building a building.

And I don't know the timing of that.

Maybe it's six months, maybe it's a year, maybe it's two years.

But we can't stand by and wait while we're doing the repairs on the Vasquez and the Gordon with the thought that we're going to have other construction going on to these two assets.

So I just think there's there's never a good time for doing major expenses in our home repairs when you got to do a roof and you know, God forbid you've got plumbing and then you got a foundation problem.

But this is one of those things where you just can't wait any longer, and we have to execute this while while we're capable of executing it.

So we are not going to prolong the longer you wait on construction, the more expensive it is.

Awesome.

With that, we'll go ahead and call the question.

All those in favor?

Hi.

Any opposed?

Motion passes unanimously.

With that, we'll move to item 13, receive rental inventory program annual report without a passage to Lou for staff presentation.

Um, thank you very much.

We're gonna try to move through this presentation fairly quickly.

So if there are things you want us to come back to at the end, we're happy to do that.

Um these city municipal code requires annually that we report to the city council on the rental inventory program.

Just a brief overview, just to remember where we started.

In November of 2023, the city council um created this program.

We launched it in January of 2024.

So we're in year two of implementation.

And I'm really happy to report um that we feel that we have really worked diligently to um comply with the city council vision in year one, which was 2024.

Um, we registered um over 5,000 housing units.

We've been able to increase that now to over 6,000 housing units.

We're looking at a compliance rate of about 83%.

And I'll have to say that's a theoretical compliance rate because what we're basing that on is a number from the US census of um what we think our rental population is or rental units are.

But we don't know, there's no other database that really provides great information on um the location of our rentals and how many there are, except for the database that we've created through this program.

And with that, I'm gonna turn it over um to Maknara Basi who works um on this program, and she'll share with you the key findings um from the study.

Thank you, Kim.

Good afternoon, honorable mayor and members of the council.

Thank you for having me here today.

I will be walking you over the key findings in our 2025 EPS study.

So we found out that our city's rental inventory data in Dolomin provides a comprehensive property level coverage.

So we are able to capture about 6,205 rental units in the city that larger aggregators like CoStar or Yardy Matrix miss.

For example, we were able to capture 637 more units in 2025 as compared to 2024.

So there was about an 11% increase in the number of units that uh registrations that we received in 2025.

Next slide, please.

Oh, sorry about that.

So what does the rent look like for us grouped by the neighborhood?

Um if you see the next slide.

Thank you.

There's a comparison.

Uh so the brown bars are the rents that are being charged by the neighborhoods in 2025.

And the blue bars are the rents that are being charged by the neighborhoods from 2024.

So you'll notice that Alta Mesa, Deer Flats, and Skyline are the highest charging uh highest rent charging neighborhoods.

Next slide, please.

On the contrary, you see Glenwood being the neighborhood with the lowest rent amounts.

Next slide, please.

So moving on, the property agent type drive rental characteristics.

For example, 25% of units were built pre-1960.

37% were built between 1960 and 1979, and only 2% were built in the 21st century.

We also found out that about 80% of all rentals in the city are dominated by small uh small landlords.

Next slide, please.

And so this gives you an overview of we just what we just talked about.

As you can see that pre-1960, and I'm sorry, I know it's hard to read, but um the housing production dwindled down to 21st century, there is less than 2% um housing being built.

Next slide, please.

Um, and this is giving you an overview of the monthly rent by landlord type and structure.

And if we go to the next slide, we can see that there is a trend pre-1960, medium out of down landlords were charging the highest rents.

The average rent was about 2,000 uh dollars.

And if you move on to the next slide, and we can just move through these three next slides quickly, so we can just get an estimate and an idea of how the trend has changed over the years.

And uh next slide, please.

And then at the moment, um sorry, do you mind going back one slide?

I apologize.

Um, the the medium local landlords are the highest charging landlords um presently from 2015 to 2025.

And um, if we go on to the next slide.

So now we have precise data available.

For example, we can now collect data about Rubs.

Rubs is racial utility billing system, which gives us information on the additional utility costs that are being charged.

In addition to that, there is now ownership and management transparency.

For example, we now know how many LLCs or corporations or partnerships own how many units or properties in the city.

We found out that about 10% higher housing costs are being charged by LLCs, despite the fact that they own units that are uh 11% smaller as compared to other owners.

Next slide, please.

And so I just wanted to give you an example of how we can um visualize data using building blocks.

So building blocks is one of the applications of Ptolemy, the software that we use.

So this is uh please be mindful, not all of the properties, but this is just an example of one property with multiple units, and you can see that it'll highlight for you that this property is charging rubs.

So if you move on to the next slide, you can also see data visualized by NCIP neighborhood.

For example, um, the how how many properties our units are charging rubs data by um NCIP neighborhood, by which NCIP neighborhood.

If you go to the next slide, um you can see the rub's data visualized by council district.

Next slide, please.

And so now we have locally relevant geographic analysis.

So data, we can map data by neighborhoods, council districts, as we were able to see, and fire hazard zones.

And this way uh data is able to capture rent variations across neighborhoods.

Uh, we've noticed market stability with marginal rent increases between 2024 and 2025.

And if we look at the ownership patterns, they shape rental costs.

For example, nearly half of the units that we see in our housing stock that are registered are owned by trusts.

And at the same time, large out of down landlords charge the highest rents.

And this is just a map showing you the residential owner type.

So if you go to building blocks, the application that I just mentioned for our software Polemy, you can see how many homeowners there are in the city.

You can see how many large local landlords, which are in blue.

You'll see a lot of yellow ones.

So those are the small local landlords.

So this gives you a really complete picture of what our rental housing stock looks like in the city, which, and this is the information that is now available to you that you cannot access using CoStar or YARDI.

Next slide, please.

So how does the data that we now have through our rental inventory program compare to other data sources?

So our data provides comprehensive, precise, and robust data that is not available elsewhere.

It captures all units and types.

For example, CoStar data captures larger properties and identifies only 81 properties with five or fewer.

Similarly, Yardy Matrix is able to pick up with properties that have at least 50 units.

So it misses smaller units.

But with our program, we're able to capture not only the smaller units, but also the larger units as well, giving you a full complete picture of our housing rental housing stock.

Next slide, please.

So what are the benefits of our rental inventory program?

Why is this so important?

First of all, it allows us to help focus our educational efforts towards our landlords and tenants about very housing issues.

For example, in September of 2025, the housing office hosted a AB 1482 workshop.

And we were able to inform our tenants and landlords about their responsibilities and rights.

And secondly, we can detect fraud by cross-verifying data from rental assistance applications because if the properties already registered, we can cross-verify and see whether the uh information being provided by the rental assistance seeking applicant is correct or not.

So moving on.

There are some indirect benefits of our program.

And what are those?

Um, first of all, we have been now able to create an electronic geo referenced database.

It's a really powerful data analysis tool.

And this is helping us modernize our processes and system.

Um, for example, we can now track the city's affordable housing inventory.

We can map out and see how many affordable units uh there are in the city.

And I just want to be mindful that we're still working on this module, and um, this is under progress, but once completed, you'll be able to see the affordability agreements, the expiration dates, everything in one place.

So we can plan ahead and sustain our limited affordable housing stock that we have in the city.

And um now we can also see how many properties except uh Section 8 vouchers in the city, which is really really important for us to know.

And other issues that our program can also help us with is detecting whether lead-based paint is has been used in certain properties or not, and whether certain properties fall under fire hazard zones.

Next slide, please.

So this is giving you an example.

Um, I know it's a little hard to see, maybe, but it the it's sort of highlighted the blue lines.

There it's hard to see, but those are the properties in fire hazard zones.

So you can go to building blocks and you can see which properties that are registered with us fall under the fire hazard zone.

So we can be more proactive when needed.

Next slide, please.

And you can also see all of the units that have been registered through the city's uh rental inventory program.

Of those, 1,262 are located in a high fire hazard zone.

Um, and of the total units registered, 278 of them are uh located in a very high fire hazard zone, and we can get this data through building blocks.

Next slide, please.

And so moving on, talking about the expenditures and revenues of our program.

We noticed that our program operating costs have reduced as the program matures.

And also our cost recovery has slightly increased.

And I also here want to remind the council and mayor that we are still only collecting rental uh registration fees from landlords who have four or more rental units.

So if you have three or less, we're not collecting registration fees at the moment.

Um, next slide, please.

And this gives you an overview, a comparison of the expenditures and revenues in year one versus year due.

And you can look at the staff costs, the software costs, outreach materials in the EPS report, and there's a net difference.

And so we are at a better cost recovery rate in the second year of our program.

Next slide, please.

So what are the next steps regarding our program?

Um we will be renewing our registrations beginning May 1st, 2026.

So part RC ordinance, it requires that all of the registrations are updated annually.

So moving um starting or beginning May 1st is when we will reopen our uh registration renewal process.

And anyone who has not still registered, they they're able to register their property.

We will be conducting outreach.

We'll be meeting with the property managers and we'll be sending out mailers as well as holding a help desk at the Monterey Public Library.

So staff will be available every Tuesday and Thursday from one to four p.m.

at the library beginning May 5th through July 30th, 2026.

And we will also be available in our office and taking phone calls and be there should anyone need us.

With that, I would like to conclude my presentation.

And thank you so much for your time.

Um wow, okay.

Thank you, Maknur, for the presentation.

And I and I do have to say um that she is passionate about her job, and you can hear it in the presentation.

So um kudos to you for that.

But additionally, um, as many folks know, I live in in Old Town, and I can't remember what I was doing.

If I was walking my dog or yeah, I was walking my dog.

And um, and she was walking around the neighborhood.

And I ran to her a couple of times because as part of the uh rental inventory program, she was canvassing and trying to scope out of uh some a list of properties that were um registered that were not registered and and so making sure that we kind of shook the tree as much as possible.

So she was literally out there on foot making it happen.

So um kudos to you for your efforts there.

And thanks again for your presentation.

With that, we'll open it up to the council for questions.

Thank you for the uh presentation.

I have uh a couple questions here in terms of the uh rubs data.

Uh I think I I kind of missed the rhythm there.

Um could you explain a little bit more of the graphs or the graph that was on the uh slide deck?

I and I think it was separating various districts.

I think it was yeah, yeah, yeah.

So just to give you an example, um, I use those screenshots from our software is when um so we can not only like map out how many properties or units are charging rubs across the city now because we've started collecting this data.

You can also visualize this data based on the council district.

So if you're interested to know how many properties or units are charging rubs in your district, we can give that information to you.

So this is just an example.

Sorry, go ahead.

So this is that's what uh this graph is showing how many properties are charging rubs in each district.

Yes.

With the group uh district two being the highest.

Yes, correct.

Okay.

That answers my question.

Thank you.

Um, and just uh to confirm, I I'm not uh uh familiar with Ptolemy.

Um is that a system that you would say is similar to other systems like Zillow?

No.

Okay.

So uh so Dolomy is really powerful and robust.

And the reason why is because it captures not only the smaller units, but the larger units as well.

And so, and it has different applications, so it's like the main software, right?

And then so the the rubs um chart that you saw, or the graph, excuse me, that is from building blocks.

So you can visualize data that you cannot do from CoStar or Yardi Matrix or Zillow.

Zillow only gives you a fraction of the information that we now have available through Dolomy.

So Dolomy is really powerful, and it's giving you this um opportunity to really get to know your community and how many rentals we have in the city, which you cannot extract from Zillow.

Okay, thank you for that.

Can I just add one thing?

So we went out during that October or November to January.

We did a request for proposals, and we went out and interviewed firms to get software to do what we wanted.

And by far, the company that you know produced the Ptolemy Slate platform is being used in Scratton um, and yeah, so and it was sort of the lead, sort of just started.

And I have to say there are many other cities now that are calling us to look at this platform as a way to create a data platform for its rental inventory.

So it is a custom platform, and it's not commercially available like Coastar Yardi.

Got it.

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

And um, I mean, I was bringing that up because I remember when we were first looking at um the rental inventory, there was some um suggestion that the same type of data could be found in systems like Zillow, but it obviously sounds like this is you cannot way more powerful.

So I'm I'm happy to hear that.

Thank you.

Um actually I think that's all I have.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Council Member Rash.

So you mentioned the other programs, coastar yard and and the deficiencies.

Um can I presume that what they found that you didn't you incorporated in?

I mean you you captured all the data that they had as well.

Um I would say yes.

Okay, yes, we do.

Kind of presumed that.

Yes.

Um and one of the graphs, you mentioned that the large out of town landlord, excuse me, it's on page 290.

It wasn't, I don't think in your slides.

Uh, is 1.5% of the units.

Am I seeing that correctly?

Large out-of-town landlord, 1.5% of the total units.

And the reason I'm bringing this up while you get organized is when we when we did it last year, it was 90.5% were um were in county or small, which which tells me that the large out of county uh were what 8.5%, and now we're down to one point five percent.

But you noticed that the large the large um holders had sold.

There was a mention that 53 units or something were sold.

So is am I seeing it correctly?

We have fewer large out of town landholders that are landlords.

Yes, and so that is also the result of sometimes we get a lot of phone calls, and I I shouldn't say a lot of, but every now and then we get phone calls, and the owners they inform us that they've sold the property.

So it happens, and then what we can do is we're able to uh tag that property and say property sold.

So if the property does not become a rental again, we follow up with the new owner, and and if it's not a rental anymore, then that you know it's not a rental, and also the question of the ownership change, which happens every now and then.

Okay, so some are sold, some are taken out of the rental market.

Okay, and out of town means so that means that they own the property, the rental property, which may have one to three or however many units, but they live in a different city or they can live in a different state, and we can get that data through Dolemy because it links to the uh county assessors data, so we can see whether it's their secondary residence where they live.

So it's out of the city of Monterey.

Correct.

Okay, and again, that's only 1.5%.

Yes, okay.

Um this program didn't um this for Kim.

We we didn't sunset this when we first started it, didn't that sunset?

Okay, great.

Um, well, actually we did.

Uh that council action was a sunset in five years.

That's what I remember, but I can't find it anywhere.

It's in the in the motion uh that was council action at the time we authorized the program to start was a five-year sunset.

Yeah, I I remember that as well.

Okay, all right.

Um so what I am hearing, especially given the the budget predicament that we're in.

What I'm hearing that the public wants to know is the cost benefit ratio in terms of expenses, and so I want to drill down on that.

The the expenditures in year one were 230, 234,000 year two, 192.

Well it's staff cost.

So the subtotal is 285 first year, 235.

Right.

Right.

Second year.

So what's the breakdown on staff cost?

I mean, how many employees do we Kim?

How many employees do we have?

Or is that a calculation of salaries, benefits, um health insurance, uh cost of where they're working, the value of their office space?

So the staff costs were determined.

We have people fill out their time cards and code it to rental inventory.

And then it was their fully burdened cost.

And um what I've learned about this program, year one, it sort of lasted all year, the registrations.

We were trying to get the word out.

We did a really good job between May and July 1st last year.

We got at least half the units registered in a two-month period, and then the rest of the year, you know, we were working through some.

So the um the May, May and June are fairly intensive for this program.

So we'll bring um, you know, Macknur and maybe another employee into the library to help with the registrations, but then that really eases up the rest of the year.

So what we did to calculate the cost is we used actual time on time cards.

And then in regards to office space, I thought about that question.

Um so our our housing staff sits on the right side bottom bottom um light side of Colton Hall.

Um there's a total of four desk, five desks in that space.

I don't know how to quantify this the value of that space.

Right.

Right.

Um we believe this the costs we gave you are all encompassing because we gave you staff costs, the software is the Ptolemy costs, the outreach materials, and then the EPS report is the economic report.

If we ever pause the rental registry, is it possible to maintain the software in the state it's in?

I know I could do this in my in my law office, and and and pause it and pay the fee for the software cost and maintain that inventory to that point, and then pick up from there three years later, five years later for an update.

Um, I would say yes, that's possible.

It's an IT question.

Okay, I would say the one thing we're doing sort of an unintended benefit is we're modernizing the program.

Yeah, everything was in paper files, everything was sort of old school.

We're creating a one-stop computer system where we can create all these data data layers so they we can give it to the next generation.

Right, right.

Um I I think that's it.

I may have a few questions as we move along.

Thank you.

Um, so thank you.

You did a great job presenting, first of all.

Thank you.

Um, yeah, I I can definitely see that um a lot of streamlining has gone um uh has gone into the place from 2024 to 2025, as we're seeing the cost um coming down significantly uh to only 23,000 uh 465 dollars as far as um what the actual difference is and what it was before when it started out.

Um so a kudos to you guys for that.

Thank you.

Um the the EPS report that you have on here, I know initially in 2024, you had it for 5,000 now.

It's like basically 6, 152.

Well um, so I guess I'm looking at I'm looking at a different number for 2025.

It says 11,999.

Is that a different number?

Um that do you mind sharing where uh which number you're looking at?

Or um year two, 2025 ETS report, and I'm on uh page number or uh two, I mean item number um item page two packet page 259.

259 uh the 11,000 the 11,000 numbers the correct number.

I'm sorry, say again, please.

The 11,999 number is the correct number.

Okay, so that is the correct number.

Yes, and so with the EPS uh going from the 5,000 to the 11,009.

uh page number uh two i mean item number um item page two packet page two fifty nine two fifty nine uh the eleven the the 11000 numbers the correct number i'm sorry say again please the 11999 number is the correct number okay so that is the correct number yes and so with the eps uh going from the 5000 to the 11,999 i'm just curious as to i mean why it like basically more than doubled i would say there was a lot of lessons learned and that first economic report about data sources and trying to refine information and that's how much it it costs to really do the study that we prepared we had year one and that's a cost that we see increasing okay so that would be the you would think that would be the same where you see that cost increasing even um I would say it'll at least be the same it might could be a little bit more next year yeah sure I'm sorry and Dr.

Barber to just elaborate on that this year we we wanted to do that comparison between Coastar and YARTI data so I connected with YARTI and we were able to get the data directly from Yarty um they kind of did me a favor and gave it to me this year and then we also um connected with EPS had CoStar.

So EPS collected the co star data so we could do a more comprehensive uh comparison between YARTI CoSTAR and our our own inventory and we did we were able to say wow look okay they only capture the larger units because they're intended for big cities like LA you know San Francisco Monterey is a small market so um we need to understand our market very differently than the larger aggregators like your ERD and co star so they were able to pull that data so that did cost more I also had like tons of other requests and that I could have asked for more data that was like oh could you do this could you compare this to this and um you know that would have cost more so I had to cut myself off there but uh you know and all the things that we could have done with this data and compared even more so that is why it costs more we were comparing more data in this report and we had more data so it's fantastic to compare also the prior year to this year and we also compared ACS census data so the most recent ACS data so it was really more comprehensive it was a lot more work we were going back and forth um to determine okay what what was why was this different this year why was that different and um this doesn't seem to be lining up you know there was a lot of back and forth on this report because we have more information so that's pretty much what happened okay thank you for the explanation uh that's impressive that you were that that went up and you were able to still save money and go down and and decrease and and and the actual um subtotal and then looking at the difference so that's pretty impressive and I I um I understand that a lot of the verifications you're able to work with rental assistance program to verify a lot of the applicants of what they're saying to make sure that it is verified.

Correct okay yeah and then I know you had one that was on the fire fire hazard zones the fire yeah uh the fire hazard zones so are you working with a fire department um on the the fire hazard zones how does or how can that be utilized?

So not at the moment we're not working with the fire department but if it is needed in the future we're happy to do that.

Okay.

And then we're also looking working with housing authority so uh dealing with the vouchers we're able to see how many vouchers are in the city specifically so that we can be able to know how we can be able to work and partner with the housing authority to see correct how much how many more we can ask for to show the data um so uh I didn't understand the second half of your question do you mind reading that with housing authority by showing like saying we know we have x amount of vouchers and then they say that okay we have you on the on the books for X amount of vouchers that have been uh distributed for the city of Monterey we can be able to kind of compare and see in contrast because I know a lot of times with housing vouchers they're trying to see who's using them and who's not yes so they can be able to streamline that more because I know the housing authority has been working with that for the last year.

Yes so it it so before we did not have this data we couldn't see where in the city vouchers are being accepted and it's also a a great resource for people sometimes they get the voucher and they struggle to find the place and you have a limited amount of time to get a get into a place which would accept the voucher so we're better understanding where in the city there are certain properties who accept vouchers.

Okay.

All right thank you thank you uh thank you the only comment I was gonna have is on um calling out on packet page 284 it's item page 27 I think it's true I was going to check is it a comment or a question?

No I I just want to point point this out and not a question but could could we come back to that after just so that we can stay consistent because no let me just address it now.

vouchers okay all right thank you thank you uh thank you uh the only comment I was gonna have is on um calling out on packet page 284 it's item page 27 I think it's real quick I just want to check that is it a comment or a question no I I just want to point point this out and not a question but could could we come back to that after just so that we can stay consistent because no let me just address it now I'll put an informal question so the the question I have is on packet page um 284 and the comparison is rental unit ownership shared by landlord type and the data I'm wondering where the data is from and it's comparing it's got the two circles 25 and then 2024 you can't see it because it's run off the page sorry about what's the source of the of the data and that is EPS so EPS and they also extracted the data from Dolome.

So EPS is getting the data from Dolemy to see how many um what type of ownership what is the percentage of that ownership.

Okay.

So as this is a produced report for us and a lot of people will see it is there a way to adjust this yes so people will be able to see both 2024 and 2025.

Yes we have the corrected version and we can provide it.

Okay and that was uh the source of the information on that page was from who Ptolemy or the software that we use okay thank you um the report notes that LLC's owned units charged roughly 10% higher rents um and also that these units are on average smaller um so that's helpful context but I'm wondering whether the staff um has accounted for other factors such as like location neighborhood characteristics um property age or amenities that could also influence the rent levels is it possible to conduct a more controlled apples to apples analysis that isolates ownership type while holding these variables constant I believe we should be able to but I would like to defer this um to Anastasia housing manager and see if she has additional information so mayor's age didn't factor out in this study as having any influence on because there's so little new inventory that you there's nothing to compare to everything's quite old.

We I think I'm trying to think about the data um in the next could you repeat the next part of your question?

Um essentially if there is a way that we can do some kind of statistical analysis that allows us to do an apples to apples comparison of units whether they're LLC owned or or not I'll I'll say that it's not surprising to hear that but I but I want to make sure that the that if we're utilizing data to make policy decisions that we're taking into account all the factors associated with why the cost of those units might be higher.

So we're we're on the one hand saying that they're smaller which kind of almost furthers the point of there being an issue with the LLC owned units but how are we factoring in the neighborhood that's in it is it are do they tend to be in wealthier parts of town um are they do they tend to be newer units might cause them to be higher um so how are we how are we in uh analysing or assessing these units in a way that gives us a true reflection of where the problem is yeah that's a good question.

Um I think on page 287 of your packet it does talk about housing costs by unit size and property owner type so at least it's comparing that um overall with the data they did not see anything with regarding age but we can definitely you know probably cost me more we have no idea but seem a little excited about that I'm like oh I got a problem it it's it's so interesting now that you have the data to look at it.

Yeah but um I think we might have that information we can even ask Ptolemy um to look at that a little bit more in depth but I don't um I would say we'll we'll look at that question a little bit more for sure and I think we might already have the answers I just need to look in more depth in the data.

Awesome yeah thank you for that and then small um the data also showed that small landlords dominate the market we were looking at somewhere around 80% um do we know how many of those are managed by property management companies and how many of those are considered more of mom and pop units.

Yes so we can uh pull a report from Dolome and we can provide that data to you if if needed off the top of my head I don't know but it's an anal it's a data analysis tool that we can utilize through our software if needed.

So we've started um tracking the rent increase as compared to 2024.

We were not we did not have this question in the registration before.

So yes, we can track it.

Um, but under AB 1482, there are some units that are exempt.

100%.

Um so does that help sort of answer?

Yeah, so just the ones that would would are required to comply with AB 1482, it would be helpful to see that data.

And then I guess the second question to that, the follow-on question to that is is the city able to take any action as it relates to the lack of compliance with AB 1482.

At the moment, we have no um enforcement mechanism.

We're just collecting data, but if that is something that's needed, it's it's up to your discretion.

Okay.

And then um, last question is um I think just this kind of general question around the rental inventory budget.

Um we're seeing for the last two years that we're not fully recovering the cost borne by the program.

So one question is, and I guess this might go counter to Anastasia's point of wanting to have more funding to for the analysis.

But are does staff see any opportunities to continue to cut down on the expenditures?

Um, so that's one part of the question.

And then the other part is if not, then can we have something presented to the council that looks at an appropriate rate to set to ensure that the program is paying for itself?

Um, I think that we have made progress.

We've become way more efficient in the second year of our program.

So we're having to spend less, as you can see on the um outreach materials.

We spent way less and the staff costs were less.

So I think we'll continue doing better.

But if um additional information is needed, or if you would like us to present to the council, um, we're happy to do that.

And but would Anastasia, would you like to add something?

Just make sure.

Yeah, I I think you know, we we do extensive out library outreach, which takes a lot of hours.

So I think that's a lot of staff time that we're using.

So that would be one way we could reduce the costs.

Um that's for the property owners to get assist them in and going through the registration process.

Right.

One thing it does do is it does help us define our time to really assist the community and be there for the community.

Um and answer questions and I think people really like it.

Uh so I I think it's beneficial, but we could cut back on that because it is extensive.

We we spent three months in the library.

Makner was there all last year.

Um, we're going out, you know, we could not have as much enforcement um capacity.

So there's a lot of there are some ways we could cut the program costs down for sure.

Um I would I would say the library office hours would be my first cut um in time.

Okay.

Awesome.

Yep.

That's it for my questions.

Um so thank you for the presentation again.

It was um it was wonderful.

And you can you can see and feel how the program is maturing.

So um kudos to the entire team for the efforts in in getting this presented to the council.

So thank you.

And I just want to make one comment.

I appreciate everybody who has worked with us, all the property owners and the property managers.

We've gotten to know so many people in our community, and I'm really, really grateful that they every year uh work with us and they register the units or they renew them.

And it's honestly a pleasure and an honor to get to know the people in our community.

So um thank you to everyone who's worked with us on our program.

And thank you for having us here today.

Thank you.

And I'm sure it helps that when you have a friendly voice on the other side of the line.

So thank you for your work with that.

Thank you.

Um that we'll go ahead and take public comment for folks on Zoom.

You can use the raise hand function for those in the chamber.

Just ask that you stand to the left of the podium.

I see two takers.

Anyone else?

All right, we're gonna cut it off to those two speakers, and then we'll go to check in with folks on Zoom, do a countdown to five, four, three, two, one.

We have two on Zoom.

We'll go ahead and start in the chamber.

Good evening, everybody.

Um, Esther Malkin, Monterey County Renters United founder.

Um, some of you will remember that when I started talking about the renter issue and the rental market almost a decade ago now, we just had anecdotal data.

We didn't have anything other than what we were hearing from residents.

And it went as far as uh I was personally accused of inventing phantom renters stories.

This data shows that we we don't have to rely on anecdotal data anymore, um, whether it has to do with renter information that we're seeing from the renter assistance program or from the rental inventory program.

Um that we have this data, we also have United Way that has a real cost measure um study that they do on the actual costs of what it is to live here and not what the federal government says that it should cost to live here, or what anybody else that wants to believe the federal government telling us what it costs to live here.

Um thank you to staff.

This is this is really invaluable data, and I can't imagine anybody having any way of denying denying that simple fact.

There's no way we would have this kind of data to be able to move forward creating policy or understanding the needs of our residents, especially with 66% of them being renters in our city.

Um, so staff has been wonderful to work with to gather this data, they're enthusiastic.

You can see they're seeing the value in it.

I can see and feel over the years how um those of them that have been working on this way back didn't really get it as much as they understand the problem now for a variety of reasons.

Um, that said, um, I'm curious about how you guys are going to talk about what happens when the sunsets in five uh five years, because AB 1482 ends in 2030.

So all of these property management companies and everybody that the argument that they constantly bring forward is we don't need any rent, any any ordinances, any stabilization, anything on rents because we have state policy in place.

Well, that goes away, and nobody is talking about it at state level.

So it is vital for individual jurisdictions to use data like this to move forward before AB 1482 expires.

And if this goes away in a couple of years, you need to start talking about how you're going to handle that now so that you don't end up caught with the ramifications of putting that off.

And thank you again to staff and and for counsel for moving forward on this, even though you guys got a lot of flack for doing so.

Good timing.

So I have a series of questions I'd like to get some answers to.

Um, one of them is was any data gathered on how many people uh get a housing allowance from the military and what effect does that have on rents in in the city?

Um, so that's question number one.

Were vacation rentals counted?

And if not, why not?

And if yes, how does this affect the statistics, especially in terms of cost?

My own personal knowledge of it is there's a house down the street from me that's a 30-day rental, and it's oftentimes occupied for two weeks, maybe three weeks.

The person obviously pays the full 30 days worth of rent, but they don't care because they're just here for ATT week and then they leave and they're willing to pay 5k or so for the month.

Um I know this isn't very scientific, so that's question number two.

I use Google AI and I asked what percentage are housing units in Monterey or rentals, and the answer came back 64 to 65%.

And then I asked Google AI, how many total units are there in the city?

And it said between 13,760 and 14,136.

And so when you do a little bit of math, uh that comes out to roughly 9,067 rental units, not 6,205.

So it's quite possible Google AI is off base, but it seems like that's a pretty significant delta there, you know, 50% difference.

So I'd like to see if somebody could explain the difference there.

Uh now when I read uh on page 43 of the report, table 13, it says that uh this is a very informative table.

It shows rents from 20 uh from 2000 to 2025, taking into account inflation.

So it's inflation inflation adjusted amounts for the rent.

And actually, it appears to be saying that rents actually come down in that 25-year period.

Am I misinterpreting that?

Uh so I think the last comment, and this is a comment, not a question, is that at the end of the day, you know, this this whole program is to help out renters.

It's to help protect renters from abuses from gouging from unsanitary conditions.

So I mean, yeah, there's a lot of nice numbers in here, colorful graphs.

Numbers are, you know, presented in all kinds of different ways.

But I'm wondering, though, you know, for a half a million dollars and then continuing out in the future, we have to maintain our focus on how is this helping our rental community in this city?

And what are some of the hero stories?

And I'm sure there are some out there, but I would love to hear them about um discoveries that came about as a part of this uh study that's being done of potential abuses that were thwarted because of this.

Thank you.

All right, let's take our callers on Zoom.

First speaker is Adam.

Adam, we can't hear you if you're speaking.

Still can't hear you.

Um if you could check out your technology, I will come back to you.

I'm going to call on the other speaker.

Lori, you can go ahead.

Hi.

Um I don't have my notes or anything in front of me.

I had to walk the dog before it was too late.

Um, uh some of my questions may be more of a deep dive when we get into budgets.

Um, but I just kind of can't wrap my head around that.

We said with this program, we were starting with two staff.

I know at one point the two were hired, and then there were at least two more hired.

Uh, and I had a conversation with Hans and said, are these also for the rental registry?

And he said, Yes, they will be helping with that too.

And so ultimately, if you look at the budget page for the housing section, and maybe this would be something that Kim could speak to.

Uh, it's increased by five to seven people.

So I'm kind of wondering we hired that many more people in the housing department.

My understanding from Hans was that yes, they were working with the rental assistance and rental registry, but that just doesn't capture only 200,000 in the the table that was shown today.

And also last year, I know there was going to be an effort made toward enforcement, and I thought enforcement staff were going to be hired as well.

And I don't see any kind of enforcement captured in there, and maybe that's all just staff time, but it just doesn't seem like it all captures it.

And let's see, I know one other thing that I might not I might not be able to remember, but um well, playing on Tom Reeves's uh hero stories.

I had an issue trying to help a friend, and I not under maybe the gal who gave the presentation can speak to this.

I was trying to help her negotiate a lower rent in a neighborhood per unit that went to a property manager because of this rental registry, and the owner didn't want to deal with it anymore.

So he raised it quite a bit, and I was trying to show her that hey, these people only pay 15 to 1600 per unit.

Now they're they they doubled the rent, so it was going to be 3200.

And I tried to pull up this database and help her look to help to negotiate with the property manager what the others were paying, and the prior tenant was paying, and we couldn't get it working.

And for two weeks it didn't work.

Um, and I thought this data, so she I said, Well, call the support people.

So she sent an email to support, she got a message back from somebody in Boston, Massachusetts from Ptolemy.

So nobody from the city, and they said, Oh, yeah, no, we don't we don't visualize that.

That that's a bit not not data available to you, but yet I know that was the whole part of this rental registry was it's supposed to be able to do any rental unit and see how much they were charging.

I don't know there's just backout times, but anyway, she lost the apartment and the ability to model, which I thought was sad.

I'm not advice.

Thank you, Lori.

And let's try again with Adam.

Hi, sorry about that.

Um, technical difficulties on my side.

Thank you for letting me speak.

Um, uh I I just bring this up because it's been brought up to me.

You know, it's it's uh obviously uh one program to another.

It's it's not apples to apples.

Um, but uh particular uh property managers and owners who own in both Salitas and Monterey can't help but notice that oh, there was this cost savings and refunds from the city of Salinas uh for their program, right?

And so so naturally they're asking some are asking, well, you know, isn't there then cost savings to be had in Monterey?

Uh and obviously I'm not the person to answer their questions on that, right?

I uh you know they need to uh go and ask the city.

Um so but just because I know it's coming up and and uh because I I know it's important to convey the differences uh between the two programs and just communicate to to the stakeholders involved.

Um you know what they're getting out of it.

Maybe they can even uh log in and use some of those tools, right?

Uh I I don't recall the city of Salinas presenting those as options.

So um just so that people understand uh what the difference is uh and and don't just have unanswered questions about that.

I'd appreciate looking into it.

Thanks.

Okay, with that, we'll go ahead and close public comment and bring it back to the council for a motion deliberation first.

Though I would like to check in with Chrissy, I think um on the expiration date and enforcement pieces.

Sure.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um the city code section eight two point oh six provides that the rental registry inventory program will sunset automatically on January 1st, 2029, unless it is um extended or renewed by the city council.

Um also the city can enforce um the failure to register.

Um there's an enforcement section in our code that could be done by an administrative citation or by um a civil action seeking an injunction that's set forth in section eight-2.05.

And then finally, with respect to the tenant protection act and how that can be enforced, the civil code um gives remedies specific to tenants, which include damages and injunction injunctive relief, attorney's fees and costs.

So there's um remedies that are specific that a tenant can pursue for a violation of that uh protection act.

And in addition, uh more limited uh remedies are offered and available for the city to enforce along with the attorney general or accounting council in the jurisdiction in which the unit is rented um to enforce the provisions of the tenant protection act and get injunctive relief.

So it isn't as broad of a as a remedy as provided to a tenant, but there is uh an avenue there.

I haven't looked into it extensively, but okay.

No, that's really helpful.

Thank you for it.

Um a quick follow-up on um the question of enforcement.

Um have we seen have have we had to use the enforcement mechanism?

Have folks been charged and and what is that?

What kind of response is that usually what what what are we seeing?

What is that?

What is the story there?

Are we seeing folks like staking their claim in the ground and it's a moral issue for them and they're just gonna pay the fee that they're that the the fines that are being imposed by the city, or are we seeing it um getting people to comply with with the requirement?

Um if I'm understanding your um question correctly, so at the moment, I feel like most of the people, which is uh we're at 82.8% compliance rate.

So most of the people have complied and they register, but every now and then we so there's two categories.

Sometimes we get registrations, but there's incomplete information and for the city ordinance and city code, we need to have complete information for us to approve that registration.

So that's that one category.

And the second is every now and then we'll run into someone who won't uh who hasn't registered yet.

And so um, so those are two categories.

And so as far as enforcement is concerned, um, we have implemented late fees.

So by July 1st, the payment that is the payment deadline each year for the registration fee.

So if someone has not met that deadline, then we begin enforcing the late fee.

And then what what are we saying?

Like how much have we collected in late fees?

Do we know that number?

So it's a um off the top of my head.

Um I I can see it in my head, but I just uh I want to make sure I give you the right information.

So in Dolamine, when someone registers their um property and it has multiple units for or more, they have to submit the registration fee.

And if it's not submitted by the deadline, the system starts calculating.

Um, and I believe that's bur the city code, I believe.

So there's like um, I don't want to get the percentage wrong, uh, but it so that is by do what the city ordinance says.

So it starts calculating the question's less about the actual cost or percentage and more about how much has the city overall collected in late fees.

Um I don't have that number right now, but I can provide that to you.

Perfect.

Yes.

Okay, and then yeah, yeah.

Um okay, and then there was a few questions from the public that I was hoping that staff could maybe follow up on.

Um there was I'll I'll go through them one by one just to make it easier.

So that data gathered on how many people get housing allowance from military.

I'm assuming that's not something that's part of the data collection, but that's correct.

That's not and also um it's something that Kim did mention is we also removed 708 military rentals from our housing stock because they're not subject to the rental registration requirement.

And so we're not collecting that data, but I believe that on the Department of Defense, their website, that information is available.

How much um is allocated for the BAH, the housing allowance?

Yes, um, vacation rentals.

Um, is that included data collected on that?

That's yes.

So that's I know that the uh rentals less than 30 days are prohibited in the city, but every now and then we've registered properties that are called vacation rentals, but they're more than 30 days.

Uh so what I do is um there's a way to tag that property.

So if you need that data or information, we can pull a report from Dolomy and give you information on how many vacation rentals have been registered um through the database.

And then are we taking that and then using the enforcement mechanism as it relates to the vacation rental?

So most of those, they're uh more than 30 days, so that uh that there we shouldn't have to enforce.

Okay.

Um Mr.

Reeves also talked about how he did his analysis with Google AI and that 6,000 or so versus 9,000 or so number discrepancy.

Um, I'm not sure if you had any thoughts on that.

So um it I I think it's a great uh question because when AI is pulling data, it's pulling data from ACS or anything that's publicly available, and so that is it takes time for that to be updated, like ACS data, it takes about a year.

It's so it lags behind.

So the data that we're collecting is the data collected in real time.

We're talking to the landlords and the property managers, and that is something that no other program is able to do for the city of Monterey.

So we're collecting real-time data and we're talking to people, and that's how we're getting accurate information.

Okay, okay.

I still think there's a question there, but I'm I won't continue to push it, and I would just encourage Mr.

Reeves to maybe talk to staff, maybe afterwards to follow up more specifically on that question.

Um, rents coming down in the period of from 2020 to 2025.

He was saying that there was like a drop when the when the rents were um updated to account for inflation.

Did you have a thought on that one?

Um, so I would like to know what table that was.

Um that way I can see table 13.

If I remember correctly 40.

Oh, I'm sorry, page 43, too.

Okay, correct.

Uh what page number?

Uh 43 of the actual report, and it was 2000 2025.

So that's 25 year period.

2000, but my apologies.

Mayor, so that this is the co star data.

Um so it's it's one data source, and like we talked about before, COSTARS looking at larger data patterns rather than the entire encompassing uh rental inventory of the city.

So now we finally have all of the data comparing all of the rents across the board.

So um this is co-star data.

So it's different.

We won't have a full analysis in 10, 20 years if we keep this inventory around, but we can do this with most of our information.

Okay, and and I would just say regarding the data um that was pulled on AI.

We use ACS data.

That is what is standard in the housing industry because that is most reliable data.

So pulling data from AI may pull so many different sources and may not get that ACS data, but when we look at the housing element, when we look at all of our our analysis of impediments, when we look at the consolidated plan, all of our HUD documents, we use ACS data.

That is the standard for our industry.

So that is what we use.

And that data does show the number of units that we that is discussed in the report.

And that's why we use that as the baseline for comparison.

Okay.

Yep.

Okay.

And then I think the last question from Mr.

Reeves was just the question around how this is helping renters, if there's those hero stories that maybe you all have experienced along the way that might be available.

Yeah, it I could let Muckner talk about anything that she has, but you know what we do.

I'll have two off the bat.

Like today, I was talking to the housing authority executive director regarding the 800 Casanova fire.

Um we were talking about, I said we can offer up to pull our um our database.

We have, as Mocknor mentioned, we have a relationships now with all of our property managers because of this inventory.

Um she spoke to one property manager that had 21 units available.

And I said we can call other properties to see and property managers because we know them.

We can call them to see how can we do you have any available units?

Would you be willing to take a voucher?

We did our AB, you know, our our workshop on um AB 1482 and um and also on our vouchers.

So we're trying to get the community ready and for a crisis like this.

Can you take more um people on if you have empty units?

Would you prioritize them?

Would you help us out in this case?

So she was really grateful for that um suggestion.

I think uh we can move forward with that.

Doesn't it's gonna just take us time to call our property managers and ask them?

Um so I think that's a really good the other thing I told her that we've learned through our rental inventory and rental assistance programs because they really work together.

I have to just tell you that like it's an amazing.

We're we're seeing things that renters are telling us in our rental assistance why they can't afford their units, and we go into the rental inventory.

One of them is is the rubs issue.

So we have people in affordable units or people with a voucher who uh can't afford their rubs because the the voucher doesn't cover cover rubs.

So if rubs can be anywhere from 30 to 500.

So now that we know that, I I talked to Zulika Boykin, um, the director of the housing authority, and I said, when you're negotiating these contracts, if we're able to get people into local units, a lot of our landlords are charging rubs.

So you need to explain to them, you need to knock that out of the contract immediately.

You need to negotiate that out of the contract.

They they're getting the voucher, they're getting a fair market rent, which is pretty good rent if you look on the website.

They don't need to charge rubs in addition.

So negotiate that.

And I know that there were some questions um from the public in regards to rubs.

And can you just reiterate what rubs is for folks?

She's got this down.

Thank you.

So rubs is um racial utility billing system, and it's a long name, but um, in essence, it's a system of allocating your utility costs um in a multifamily property.

If there is if there are no individual meters, um, I can I can explain it again if I didn't make it clear.

But for example, if um if it's a multifamily property and there are uh let's say 10 units, and there's only one meter that the landlord operates or controls.

And so uh the landlord will use a formula and divide, for example, a thousand dollar utilities per um per unit.

So that'll be a hundred um dollars for um per unit.

So and that that the formula that is used, sometimes it's not that clear cut, and um, I also don't know how that formula works.

Um, and then did you have any hero stories that you wanted to share as part of that part of that question?

I I'm not so sure what what that means.

Um, the hero stories.

Can you can you clarify that?

Yeah, but anything that's exciting and like anything.

Um through rental assistance, a lot of people have helped.

Um, I know it's um I don't want to digress, but last month in February, when we reopened our rental assistance program, um, some of the applicants that I was reviewing to single mothers, they were not related to each other, but at the same property, both of them were struggling, really, really struggling to pay rubs.

And it just hurts to see us, um, especially just hurts to see people who are struggling to get by and they're trying to pay rubs, and it just keeps on adding if they're not able to catch up on one payment, and they're um I I don't want to reveal too much of their confidential information, but um, if they're struggling and we we see it that it they're just it keeps adding up, and it just keeps pushing them to this state where it's just really hard for them to survive in the city.

But um, if they're struggling and we we see it that it they're just it keeps adding up, and it just keeps pushing them to this state where it's just really hard for them to survive in the city.

And I really hope that we can continue helping them.

Appreciate that.

Um, and then there was two questions presented by Lori.

So she asked the question around um staff hired for enforcement.

Um, and then her just overall question around the number of staff identified in the agenda report and how that how we get to the number.

And I think Kim, you spoke to that earlier um in that it's not necessarily full-time people dedicated to it.

Um, but maybe you could just help clarify to answer the question.

So for the rental inventory program, we took actual hours.

We have four employees in the housing office.

Um, and when we ramp up this program, it's more intensive in May and June.

So we took the actual hours of the team participated on the program.

Perfect.

Thank you for that.

All right.

Back to the council for last minute comments.

This is just a presentation, so no action is required, but um open it up, please.

Yeah, comment.

So while I'm watching the presentation and looking at the report uh this weekend, I keep asking myself what is the housing policy that we are able to get clarity on that we would now act on because we have two years' worth of data.

And frankly, I can't I can't find an actionable policy that allows us to take two years worth of reporting and say, aha.

Now we can do something.

I'm just really struggling to figure out what we're continuing to do with this.

It's data that that feeds housing advocates and it and it gives more clarity on the housing problem.

We already know we have a shortage of units.

We need more housing units built.

But at the end of the day, we're tracking something that does not equate to actionable policies that equate to get more units built.

So I just still am struck by the fact that we are collecting from those that own through their property manager or the owners.

It was 25, now it's 50 a year.

That gets passed on.

The fear of us getting involved in this and looking, I think contributed to rent increases and fear and panic in the community.

This sunsets after five years, I look forward to the time when we can say it's time to sunset this and roll those rental contributions back and get out of the business of tracking something that does not need to be tracked anymore.

What we proved by looking at this report was that we have far fewer LLCs and out-of-town owners, and the majority of our property owners that rent and enter into those relationships with our tenants, are mom and pops and local owners.

And I'm just still struck with the fact that those are strong numbers.

And that's a good thing.

And we should never do any policy that's going to cause fear in the community that causes rents to arbitrarily go up and impact the tenants because the tenants that I've talked to sense and believe that the mere talking about this and the threat of possible rent control with this rental registry actually did them harm and caused their rents to go up.

Compounded by the fact that we were coming out of COVID.

Rents went up.

Now some of the data shows in certain neighborhoods, the rents are actually a little flat.

Uh well, that's encouraging.

But I still can't figure out what what we're gonna do with this data and create any policy.

So that's that's just me.

I know I'm probably gonna disagree with many on the council and many of the staff, but I hear it from a lot of the community members that they don't understand why we're continuing with a rental registry, when in fact we could lower the costs, we could help contribute with a cut in the budget, and we could get out of the game of scaring people with no policy that's come out of this that's gonna help renters.

Okay, and real quick, I real quick, I just want to identify that we're gonna do one round.

So we're not going to deliberate too much here because it's a presentation.

And I imagine that this item will come back up again.

I'll get more to that in a second, but I just wanted to clarify that as we get going here.

So who wants to go next, please, Dr.

Barber?

So I really appreciate you saying that you know you were able to see how we have more LLCs and everything else, because that's something we couldn't say before, the rental registry.

So thank you for that.

Um, because now because of the rental registry, we're able to see exactly what we have and where we have and who we have, and that we have more small landlord uh owners.

Um also uh we're able to see, even working with our arena numbers of how and where we're able to meet them, and we can prove it and show it, we can be able to talk with them more intelligently with the range of numbers in the vouchers because of the rental registry.

Um, I think there's a lot of policy pieces that can even go through there.

Um the rubs data by itself, I mean, to me, it's just amazing to hear what is even um being done with the rubs registry and I mean with the rough data and being able to see exactly uh even district wide who's using it and who's not.

And then I think also some of the stories that they talked about as far as having the information to be able to know and verify some of the housing assistance pieces and where people are having a lot more issues or trouble.

I mean, they were they were able to verify that one was coming from one particular uh unit, not unit, but uh property, because they had two different um applicants that were having the same issue.

So I think um I think it's coming up with a lot more data than and reasons than I thought, even from the beginning.

Um, not only dealing with uh that pace, the proactive piece, working with the fire hazard uh zones.

I think those are different other pieces as well.

And I think you know, just remembering too, all of this data and all of these different um numbers are actually filling voids that a lot of the bigger platforms and systems like that we're talking about before, even Zillow and all the others that they couldn't even touch to have the accurate and the unique um data that we would have for our city.

And so with that information, we can do a lot even working with other agencies outside the city, including the county.

So I think it's a good thing.

Um I'm gonna ask uh staff this question now, just so that maybe it could be ready by the time it comes back around to me.

But I'm wondering if we can pull up the CPI increase that was used for our area for AB 1480 regarding 1482.

If you have that on hand, great.

If not, if you could just maybe do some quick research, that'd be great.

Thank you.

For which parody time last year, too, as it relates to the last year's data.

So for me, this has always been uh data capturing experience uh or exercise.

Um because we've heard um quite a bit of uh feedback from from our community uh on all sides.

Um, and that's all important.

Uh, but I think for policy purposes, it is important to have this kind of data.

So, I mean, we're tonight learning um metrics that we probably didn't even imagine at the beginning of this process.

Um I'm hearing that um there's there's uh first more data available to us through this process than other systems could offer.

Um I saw in the report that rent increases are higher or are documented to be higher compared to what other systems are showing.

Um in uh detail that also stuck with me was that um now we know or have a better idea of uh how many landlords don't even live in the city, and those who don't live in the city are charging even more for rents, which to me that um raises a uh major flag.

Um I I think we're I know that we're getting data that eventually will inform uh good policy that will not only benefit our our renters in the city, but also our landlords.

I mean, this is all information that we can use to really craft something that's not cookie cutter, that is very unique to Monterey and that it's aiming to uh help our residents, property owners, and renters alike.

So I fully support it.

Uh I think it's worth the investment, and I really look forward to uh the day when we can start really digging into what policy works best for all of us.

Well, it's not an action item, so I don't really have a whole lot to say.

Um that's it.

Okay.

Um I I just wanted to circle back around and we talk about hero stories.

I think highlighting the fact that we were able to utilize the data to support the fire victims um from the Casanova fire um is is enlightening to me.

And I know that there might be some.

I don't I don't know how to say this.

Um one of the things that we could look at hypothetically is what type of income levels are these individuals in um so that we can try to match them up with the similar um income level unit somewhere else in the city.

So um just kind of further expanding on the points that um Anastasia was raising about that.

I think it's um I I I want to echo Gino's point, which is at the end of the day, the most foundational way of not making this sound political or conjecture is the data.

We have data that helps support uh information that can help inform the council and inform the public in regards to future policymaking.

And and and I echo um Councilman Garcia's point in regards to really digging into that policy piece.

Um did you have that available?

Should be able to Google it.

It's mayor, it's not that simple.

Okay.

Um I just I've I've seen different CPI increases.

We go by the San Francisco CPI um increase.

Uh I will have to get you the exact numbers.

I don't feel like super comfortable right now about the the numbers, but I will say it's between seven to eight percent increase, maybe eight point six percent.

Um the reason it's so confusing and difficult.

The state doesn't give it to us, which you would think they would.

So I I will continue to work with, I've been working with Echo Fair Housing on getting the exact number, and I want to continue to make sure it gets on our website every six months when it's updated.

That sounds perfect.

And then um, so either way, it sounds like landlords were able to go to the max 10% this year.

It sounds like CPI was high enough to where it doesn't really matter what the number was that they would be able to do the 10%.

I I don't think the CPI was near the increase was near 10%.

Correct.

I'm just trying to clarify that what landlords were able to charge up to.

Yeah, what they could have done.

They can go up to 10% or maybe 14 aging.

You're correct.

Yep, thank you.

Yeah, but the chat the challenge becomes the CPI.

Does it include housing?

Does it not include so there's several brackets?

But yeah, I'm surprised the state doesn't provide us something.

Yeah, yeah.

Um I would like to request that an item come back around next with next steps with the program.

And I trust staff to kind of take what they've heard today and put it into something that might work for council's consideration.

Um, what I'm hearing is, you know, whether we even continue the program, um the program cost and how do we appropriately do cost recovery.

Um, any recommended changes to the program based off of maybe various things that we've heard or your own experiences in in the implementation of the program.

So um I I'll throw that out as as a request.

Um and I just want to clarify a few points of kind of misinformation that's being pushed out there.

The argument is being made that people are hiking the rents double.

I think Lori kind of made this in her example that she gave with a neighbor that she was working with from 1,500 to 3,000 something because of the registry.

And then Ed, you're you kind of alluded to it again, where it's like people are seeing cost their rents go up because of the registry.

And this is where this is where it becomes combatitive unnecessarily, because you can't blame the registry for you hiking somebody's rent up $1,500 when the registry costs you $4.17 a month.

So don't give me that baloney.

It's crap.

And you're you're misleading the public, you're misleading renters, and it's unfortunate.

Just speak factually.

It's one thing if you say, and you kind of alluded to this Ed a little bit, but it it's one thing to say, hey, I'm a landlord and I'm scared what's gonna happen.

So let me just increase it so I can protect myself.

But it's a different thing to say that it's it's directly contributed to the cost of the registry.

So I just want to make sure that we're being really careful with our words, and it's not the registry that's causing this.

Um in fact, I I appreciate hearing staff's perspective on it because it seems like there's a lot of property management companies that are being um collegial with staff and working with us, and actually we're finding value and benefit of that relationship that's being established from that.

So let's keep moving in that direction.

Let's keep finding partnerships and work together as a community, because at the end of the day, this is about taking care of monetary residents and not doing an us versus them.

Um then I just wanted to clarify too that the cost didn't go up from 25 to 50.

It's been 50 dollars the program started.

So just a clarification on the cost of the program.

So that's it.

I think my my request is that we just have this come back at some point.

Ideally before the program starts, because specifically on the point of the cost, if we're gonna do better cost recovery, we might want to have that figured out before the payments start coming in from the property managers and the landlords.

I apologize.

Um I think we're good.

Um all right, with that, we are going to rotate to our next item.

14 is to receive the 2025 general plan annual update for review and comment.

Thank you, everybody, for that one.

Mr.

Way longer.

I mayor Williamson and council members.

I'll be presenting tonight.

Would you like the quick version or just my standard?

Uh I'm happy to give.

I mean, if you were to ask me, I'll take, I'll take the whole thing, but I know that the capacity is probably burning low.

So I want the whole thing.

Uh um, let's let's take a poll of the council.

What do you guys want?

Well, no, just do your thing.

Yeah, okay.

Do your thing.

Downtown.

All right.

Here I do.

Okay.

So the California government code uh requires cities and counties to re prepare an annual progress report by April 1st of each year, describing their progress implementing the housing element and the general plan.

This report is submitted to the California Department of Housing and Community Development or HCD and the Governor's Office of Land Use and Climate Umnovation.

So the annual progress report is a standardized form required by the state, summarizing a jurisdiction's progress and implementing its housing element over the prior year.

And in this case, it's 2025.

It reports on housing production by affordability levels, status of programs and policies, and progress towards meeting the jurisdiction's arena goals.

And also it covers every general plan goal, policy, and program, and how we are implementing those as well.

So we have 12 general plan elements, the ones highlighted, um seven are those required by the state.

Um the general plan was originally adopted in 2005, but the most recent updates were in 2024, um, which coincided with the sixth um the sixth cycle housing element.

And then we had land use circulation and safety elements.

Um on October 4th, 2024, HCD certified the City of Monterey's 2023-2031 housing element, which includes housing goals and implementation programs that would help the city fulfill the regional housing need of 3,654 housing units assigned to the city.

Um as you can see by this table here, that the city's greatest housing needs are for units serving the very low income, which is um for households with a zero to 50% of the area median income, and also above moderate, which is 81 to 120% of the area median income.

So here's just a snapshot of the annual progress report for 2025.

Um and of course, I can't read that.

It's too small for me.

Oh, I I summarized it.

That's great.

So for 2025, the planning permits that were entitled.

There's 116 of them.

We issued 77 building permits for housing units and 96 housing units received building occupancy.

And of the um of all of the housing units that were permitted entitled or received building occupancy, the majority of those units were five plus units per structure, and then followed by ADUs, and then two to four units per structure, and then finally the least was single family detached.

So I'm just going to run through a couple examples of zoning entitlements, those that receive building permits and then building occupancy, just to get an idea of what we issued here.

So for zoning entitlements, we have 60 Gordon Court.

It's a phase one and two project, uh conversion of commercial to housing, and the phase one and two has 70 total units.

And then we have the CAS Street conversion of office to apartments, uh seven total housing units and one low income, one moderate income, and five above moderate.

Then we have the 1008th Street mixed use remodel converting existing commercial building over a parking garage into a mixed-use project.

So there's two residential on the second floor, one new ADU on the lower floor while maintaining the medical offices on that first floor as well.

And then also zoning entitlements is uh 225 uh cannery row, which is conversion of the second and third floors to four new residential units.

Oof, and go back one.

Okay, sorry.

Uh, and then building permits issued.

We had the first phase of garden court, which was 47 total housing units, five low income, five moderate, and 37 above moderate.

Um then we have 2300 garden court, included the conversion of commercial space to multifamily residential.

Uh, 64 apartments were included in this development, and the Monterey Peninsula Unified School District purchased this property to create workforce housing for district employees with the goal of supporting and retaining their staff.

Water availability remains a barrier to making significant progress towards meeting our arena goals.

So the 2023 31 housing action plan is part of our housing element.

It's an eight uh year implementation plan for the city, has 53 housing programs.

So some of the programs are ongoing programs.

Um you have to implement each year and report on the progress.

Um, some of them are reported by a certain year that you have to complete um, like 2026, the whole entire program needs to be completed, or um, sorry, I lost my train of thought.

There was like certain elements of the program.

Yes.

Um, so there's we have to keep track of um when they need to be implemented by and report those to the state.

So this is reporting on our 53 housing programs.

So this year, or sorry, last year, 2025, uh, we've completed 77% of our programs in terms of um I should say restate that and say 77% were either in progress, completed or continuous housing programs, and as compared to 43% in 2024.

So breaking that down, we completed 15% of the programs in 2025, 19% are continuous reporting, and then 43% are in progress currently.

And I keep double flipping.

Um, so I'm gonna run through just a couple housing programs that we um completed.

So the first one is local density program, which establish a local city bonus for multi-family projects that include lot consolidation, two and three bedroom units, and or moderate income units.

And these projects um can obtain a 10% density bonus.

Um that's in addition to the state density progress density bonus program.

And then we also have implementation of the SB9 housing ordinance, um, which added urban lot splits in single family zoning districts.

And then the city council established a policy in November of 2025.

Uh it's a water distribution policy establishing priorities and procedures for water.

Affordable housing was described as the city's top priority for water allocation and will be issued a water permit prior to other permit types.

And the priority of water allocation is based on the overall size of the project, number of affordable units proposed, and the level of affordability not to be issued until the cease and assist order is lifted.

And then some of the continuous reporting programs include um the inventory of available sites.

We have to report on that every year with our annual progress report, ADU and JADU awareness on the building and safety division, um, had um a couple of outreach opportunities for contractors and architects.

Um fair education, the housing division um provided some fair housing um outreach in 2025.

And then here are here's a list of the um programs that are in progress currently.

It's not a complete list, but um, those that are we're moving forward with, and you will be seeing shortly.

And then we also have our local coastal program um that's in progress.

Uh staff is hard at work uh working with a consultant on that, um, reviewing all the chapters are prepared.

Staff's just um reviewing those, and then um we'll be bringing them um to the public for public review to the hearing bodies, and it also has to be reviewed by the coastal commission.

So on March 10th, the planning commission received the 2025 report and provided an opportunity for public comment.

Um, two written comments were received uh by Landwatch and Julie Gorman.

Verbal comments were received in person.

Uh the topics of those comments were the city's water policy adopted by the city council, and then the window on the Bay Park General Plan Policy A2.

Now the planning commission made a motion um including a statement um that they'd like the city to hold up in the release of water allocations of the characterized, sorry, I should just read this verbatim since it's a motion.

Included the statement that the commission is concerned about what the commissioners characterize as the holdup and the release of water allocations and directed staff to dialogue with the city attorney about the issue.

Uh and then they adopted the resolution accepting the 2025 annual report.

Um staff recommends that the city council receive this report.

Uh we do have to submit it to the state by April 1st.

Um staff's available for any questions.

It's me.

Thank you, Chrissy, for the presentation.

Um council questions.

Yes, uh, Dr.

Barber.

Sorry, I saw your hand go up first.

That's your leaves first.

That's right.

Thank you.

Um, so thank you so much um for all your hard work.

I know that you guys are working hard with this.

Um I wanted to just get clarification when looking at the um diagrams.

What is the difference between continuous and in progress?

Yeah, continuous means there's annual reporting.

So, like for example, with the the ADU and JADU awareness, that should likely happen.

I I'd have to look at it, but annually.

And so you have to report every year what you've done for that program.

But those that are in progress, um, as soon as they're done, they're they're gonna be completed.

They're not, we don't have to repeat them every year.

So it's a certain amount uh that will be continuous no matter what.

Yes.

Um, so is it safe to say that the continuous block is essentially done?

We're just having to reinitiate every year.

Correct.

Okay.

That's it.

Thank you.

That's it.

Perfect, perfect.

All right, um, Councilman Smith.

Where am I at?

Uh this is a question for the city attorney combined with what you presented here.

Uh, that last slide that you showed.

If you could go back planning commission March 10th.

Yes.

Um, I'm getting there.

Yeah, there we go.

That's it.

Uh so a motion by the plan and commission.

I think it was um a majority or unanimous that they're concerned, um, characterizing it as a holdup in the release of water and allocations and directed staff to dialogue with the city attorney about the issue.

And and so from a procedural steps here, we have a water disdistribution policy that the city council acted on.

So the question is is this planning commission not aware of what our policy was that we acted on just I guess it was just about December 2025, if I recall.

So are they aware of what we wrote in our water distribution policy?

They are, and it seems the intent was um asking the city council to reconsider that.

All right, that's that's the only question I have.

I have a lot of comments, but I'll wait.

Please.

Thank you, Christy, for the uh presentation.

I I have a question about uh on the uh uh the the land use element um section um packet page 337.

There's uh a response there that says throughout 2025, the city has proactively engaged property owners to further facilitate development in these areas.

So uh I it caught my attention because uh I know you also uh represent um the city, city staff on the uh North Fremont specific um sorry, North Fremont Business District.

Um, and there have been recent requests, right, to uh bring more information to property owners there to talk about development and and all that kind of information.

So my question is I see here that information talk about what happened in 2025.

Are there plans to continue that uh into 2026 and beyond?

And and I guess I would just take it a step further.

Um, in general, all the programming in the general plan is is that that the idea to continue these types of I guess conversations or or engagement with their programs in the general plan, we do need to continue to implement them in terms of um what staff's gonna do moving if maybe Levi wants to talk our planning manager in terms of um our engagement um with that program moving forward for the year.

Sure.

Good evening.

Thank you for that question, Councilmember Garcia.

Uh that specific section of the report is speaking specifically to uh property zone, our multifamily uh residential overlay.

So that's the uh garden rows outside of garden road area as well as the specific Munris Cass area.

Uh to answer a question, we do intend to continue to uh proactively engage developers, property owners, uh, and see what we can do as staff to further facilitate development and ease that process.

So okay, thank you.

And and I mean what I see here in the blurb, maybe maybe we were looking at two different sections is that uh uh this response was specific to the specific plan areas.

So lighthouse downtown North Fremont.

So it's in response to the policy B2 is to promote contact sensitive design within mixed-use neighborhoods that includes or specific plan areas as well as now the multifamily overlays.

That last sentence is specifically uh speaking to conversations we've had with Revision West, uh, the Slama Development Group, Orosco Development Group, that all are property owners in those overlay areas that are have projects that are in the works right now.

Got it.

Thank you for the uh clarification.

Um and that's all I have.

Thank you.

Thanks for your your report, Christy.

Sure.

Um some of these are very intriguing to me.

So where are where are we with policy 2.6 single room occupancy?

It seems like we really could develop that for our very lowest income people.

Uh it's so popular in Europe.

Probably everyone in this room knows that that you can go and get a room having arrived in a European country, and um, it's very common, and you stay for a little while and you transition, and you get your permanent housing, and that that seems like such a rational thing to do.

And I don't see that as much in the United States, nor in Monterey, though we have things that are close.

Sure.

So is there hope for this?

I mean, what are the barriers and how do we get rid of them for a single room occupancy?

Um so that's actually one of the programs that we have uh and works right now for this calendar year.

So we actually have Diambatia, you may remember, who helped us out with the original housing element.

So they're gonna help us uh basically with that program is to recognize that as a residential use in all of our zoning districts as required by state law.

Uh it's worth noting, we actually have a pending project or development on Figaroa Street that is going to be a single room occupancy development.

So we do have developers in the city that are interested in that path.

Um, I think what's kind of driving that right now, and our city is potentially related to the water issue and whether or not they can do a full unit with full facilities.

But we do have uh developers in the city that do find that to be uh potentially a viable uh development path.

But really, what the program is to do is to bring us in line with state law requirements for recognizing that as residential use.

Okay, that's that's helpful.

Sure.

Hey, and you mentioned in program 1H Gordored Ryan Ranch specific plan, there's a reference to uh adjacent Ryan Ranch home to a regional medical center and office park south of the airport.

Is that just uh tell me about this regional medical center?

I believe that's referring to the montage facility in Ryan Ranch.

Oh, okay, and and Ohana and everything that we have now, they aren't talking about anything bigger yet.

Correct.

I don't believe we're looking at any expansions in the Ryan Ranch Park at this time.

Okay.

Um thank you for getting me the um locations of the religious sites for overlay and development.

So this is more uh this is more a theoretical question or in the future.

So we just did our 2431 uh 2031 housing plan.

And what are we gonna do for the next eight eight year cycle?

I mean, if if we take as an example, if we take our religious sites and and they've already been allocated to this eight-year arena, where are we gonna get 12 more?

I mean, do we have more?

Do you know it's kind of like taking from the reserves?

How how much can we take from our capacity to overlay and develop?

Yeah, that's an excellent question.

I think that's something that uh, you know, 2031, whenever we begin that next cycle uh statewide for housing elements.

I think that's the question that a lot of cities are gonna have.

I think the reality is is a lot of cities were given a very aggressive RENA allocation throughout the state.

Most are not on par with achieving that re now, uh actually constructing those units.

So I think that's a big question that a lot of cities have for the state is what the plan is moving forward.

Is it going to be a rolling tab?

Do you just keep adding to that number, even though you're not seeing those units get get constructed, or what really the state's approach to that's going to be?

Uh it's likely they'll be looking for more aggressive rezoning uh initiatives and programs, much like what we're implementing now.

Uh, but yeah, we're it's kind of a wait and see right now to see, but I don't think we're alone in that in that situation.

Be interesting.

Thank you.

Sure.

Uh so the you mentioned in the under ordinance uh number 3710, my beloved ornament, um, that it it uses the words um for that extra additional unit for a long-term affordability agreement.

Um I thought that the sixth unit, if I'm not confused, it's been a long night.

Um, that sixth unit was more than a long-term affordability agreement.

It was permanent, it was deed restricted.

Is that can you bring me up to date on that?

I would have to go back and revisit the specific language of the ordinance before saying it's my recollection that it was uh in line with our our other uh affordability requirements in the city, but I don't want to speculate.

Which um well, just review that for me.

Those are deed restricted.

Yes, they are.

I mean, I'm I'm my only question is the time frame seems to be what you're asking.

Is it in perpetuity or is it uh now I have to go back and look at the language in the ordinance?

Yeah, at your leisure, if you would, because I read it and I think it's deed restricted as permanent.

And um if we're gonna bother upzoning private property, I I want the I personally want these permanent.