Okay, I'm gonna now call to order this uh Wednesday, February or Wednesday, May 13th, 2026 meeting of the City of Valley's Parks and Recreation Commission and for the forestry board.

Um, will you please conduct the role?

Commissioner Bryant.

Yes, Chair Dangerous, Commissioner Celester, Chair Summer here, and Chairman.

Here, okay, uh moving on to the minutes, these are the minutes from the April 8th, 2026 meeting.

Uh let's see, is there any public comment on those minutes?

Seeing none, uh, is there a motion?

So moved.

Second, moved by Commissioner Bryant, second by Commissioner Summer.

Okay, Commissioner Bryant, Commissioner Davis, Commissioner Sylvester, yes, Vice Chair Summer.

Yes, Chair.

Yes.

All right.

Uh oral communications from the public.

This portion of the meeting is reserved for persons wishing to address the commission on any matter not on the agenda.

Speakers are limited to three minutes, and state law prohibits the commission from acting on non-agenda items.

If anyone would like to provide public comment, uh please fill out a blue card.

And for those who are online, please use the raise hand feature, and Alison Flynn will recognize you.

Not online.

Not online.

Okay.

I will close public comment.

Uh we are now gonna move on to uh item 5.1, which is the public safety building project 2049.

Uh this is coming back to us uh for a second time.

Uh the process tonight.

Uh we will have a staff report.

Um, then PRC will have opportunity for questions.

Uh we'll have public comment.

Um, then there'll be PRC discussion and deliberation and then a motion and a vote.

And I believe that we need to take care of this one tonight because it's going to council uh early next month.

So with that, I will uh turn it over to I believe uh Naveen Govind and uh David Printy will also be here uh helping out.

Yes, thank you.

Um my name is Naveen Govind, and I'm a senior project manager with the Public Works.

Um, with me here today I have uh David Brenton, the project manager with Public Works as well, and uh Russell Hansen, um, forestry manager.

Um we are um following calling the March 17th PRC meeting uh the design team working with uh the adverse city advers team have addressed uh PRC comments that we've received, and uh tonight we are here to present the revised litigation plan on March 17th uh staff presented uh heritage tree mitigation plan removal of uh to heritage trees, the planting 84 trees at twos to one ratio.

Commissioner reviewed the mitigation plan and directed staff to return to PRC with a devised mitigation plan focusing on canopy replacement with the preponderance of native trees at the two is to one replacement for headphase tree and one is to one for non-heritude tree.

Additionally, uh staff will direct it to explore the placement of mitigation trees, uh, those uh that could not be accommodated within the project site.

Following the mark, uh 13th uh court uh staff uh wanted to point out two corrections.

Umnection was uh 3250 was uh found to have died, and for CP reasons it was removed by the City Average team in fall 2032.

Second correction uh is uh fee number two eleven was a mischaracterized as HD3.

It'll still be removed, but at uh one is to one receive.

So as noted uh in the March 17th uh PRC meeting, due to the constraints, due to the constraints of the construction of the new public safety building, trees will have to be removed for um accommodating the new building as well as maintaining the current uh operation of the existing building.

So for those reasons, 40 phase trees will be removed and 35 non-hit trees as well.

The plan will or the project will preserve 20 health case stream and non-heritage, 10 non-heritage trees.

The project will also select redwood trees and pre-purpose the reclaimed wood and construction of benches along uh villa in public spaces.

The trees selected for mitigation plan was selected from the draft biodiversity and urban forest plan.

The tree selected um is to meet project goals, the design acidic and no water use, as well as addressing long-term concentration commonly associated with making species such as mature height, root system impacts, and partial testing.

So in response to the March 17th BRC meeting comments, as well as the connection made um to the report.

51 sorry the the native species was increased from 9 to 51, and in 2034 trees.

So all the proposed trees were all the proposed trees was able to uh be planted within the project site, and uh staff found opportunities to plant three more trees, increasing the total count to 18 trees that includes 80 mitigation trees.

Tree canopy study was also conducted.

The goal was to make sure that proposed canopy trees, the proposed canopy programs need or exceeds the existing canopy.

So after conducting the analysis, you know, at 10 15 years maturity, the proposed trees will exceed the existing canopy by about 1.5 percent.

Here are the proposed trees.

We have added two native trees, Valley Oak and Tayon to the pallet, and this includes 34 oak trees.

This concludes our presentation.

All right.

Uh any questions from commissioners.

I don't know.

Um on your canopy calculations, how is that performed?

Would you take uh the number of trees times uh radius to come up with the chain figure?

That's fine.

So um typically what uh ultimately the calculation itself was done by the contractor that we had, the landscape designer that was doing this, but typically the way that's calculated is you take the tree at maturity and you estimate kind of when that tree will reach that maturity size, and then you kind of extrapolate out if you want five years, ten years, fifteen years, but 15 is typically what we're using because that's about the half-life.

Absolutely, we get in some of our oaks, we get into some of our other ones, they will get much larger even past that 30 years.

Um, but a lot of the species we're talking about here, 30 years is kind of what they're gonna reach maturity.

So we kind of have what that can be would be at first.

And that was saying that was used for the existing, you counted the trees or multiplied by uh.

No, in terms of the existing, it was just what is actually on site currently 26% or whichever the number was was what is existing.

The potential pardon, what was that calculated on the aerial survey?

The aerial survey.

Correct.

Yeah, it's an existing measurement, and I would just add that while that does not account for some additional growth out of those trees, a lot of those are kind of past that 15 to 20 years or did close to their mature sizes.

So there's gonna be some growth, but not as significant as we see from young trees to that moderate.

And is the percentage case on the higher site boundary or just the un the part without structure?

Do you know the answer to that?

Site boundary.

Yeah, I was gonna say that's typical.

Is you take the site boundary and assess that entire site.

Thanks.

Um, just last question is when would you expect the trees to be remote?

We are targeting to um start demolition end of this year.

So in November is then we're gonna start.

So sometime early spring next year we gotta remove the tweets.

Early spring.

And to be clear, it'll be done in phases.

So the the frontage along the villa, corner of Franklin, that whole frontage is where the initial development will take place.

The remaining site needs to remain in operation.

So we still have police need a place to live in one.

So we're not gonna uh be removing trees generally in those areas initially.

Um so for the ones that are uh marked to be removed would take place in a later phase uh after the initial building was built along Villa, the front edge.

I was um I'm sure my friends with the bird alliance would uh so I noted in the environmental impact statement that according to the federal market for the bird treaty act and the California fishing game code, the contractor has to indicate all nesting birds on the plans, and um during the reading season between February one and August 31.

Certain I think you have to have a active biologist participating in that is that we have provisions in our standard specifications for every project.

Okay, that addresses great.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Go ahead.

Thank you, or no, go ahead, fine.

Um, I also picked um questions about timing, which are partly my lack of clarity and partly questions that that um residents have asked me.

Um so many people thought that this project was kind of sometime in the future, that it wasn't completely funded and there was going to be time to agonize.

So, but so the project is funded, it's moving forward, the construction or the demolition, I guess is the first stage is happening this year.

Yeah, so I can I can walk you through the timeline.

As I explained earlier, this project is being built in and packages.

So the first package is a site, we call it a site preparation and building path preparation package, as well as a temporary parking structure structure parking lot in lot 11 across the street.

So we first have to um clear the area in the frontage along Villa and prepare the site for receiving the new building.

And we before we do that, we also have to build some parking uh capacity across the street and and so that people can continue to access the existing and operational uh admin building during construction.

So we'll build the three-story building along Villa for So there's a site clearing for about six months, and then a two-year plus process uh for building the building, and then and only then once they can move into that building, we can vacate the existing facility and clear the back two-thirds of the site for development for site improvements and the parking crush.

And so the overall timeline is the first uh package with construction would commence on or about this fall of 2026, and the final uh package or of construction would be the parking garage, and that would be completed, we hope around 2031.

So it's it's a lengthy process.

So uh would you mind um bringing up the slide that had um the true possibly this one?

Um the existing trees, yeah.

I mean, existing or new.

No, the existing trees that that uh red and that people are really concerned about, that's not actually the footprint of the building, or is it the second one shows?

That's the existing there's the new layout.

Okay, all right.

Okay.

Okay, that answers that and then um and we're we're we're talking here about uh a hundred trees or so to be planted.

When in the general when is the time frame for doing that planting?

You obviously have demolition and construction to do.

Right, so and again, these are ballpark, of course, time frames um based on the prior uh time frame I explained.

We would probably not plant, we plant maybe some of the trees, the street trees after the main building was completed along uh Villa.

So the trees that are on so we say the left side of the building would be planted um or about uh 2029 brain.

So four years or so, yeah, two and a half, okay, great.

Um, those were my questions.

Summer.

I wanted to uh ask uh Russell to talk a little bit about your experience with that regal prince oak and why it seemed to be a good match for this project.

Sure, sure.

So it's not one that I'm super familiar with.

Ultimately, we planted probably 50 to 100 um of those in the San Jose area before I left San Jose to come here.

So I've got a limited amount of experience.

I'm gonna say for probably close to about six or seven years, they've been in the ground, um, that we've seen them locally in San Jose and how they perform.

Um, but ultimately to kind of get to the nuts and bolts of why we selected those, um, again, as we can kind of look at the drawings that we have there, the one on the right with the proposed tree canopy, you can see the lower right of the diagram, um, that that area in particular is one that's not going to be developed as a part of this project.

And so what we were trying to do is provide that shape for the roadway that goes into the parking garage and to the parking lot to the to the left of that while preserving as much of that space as we can.

And so what we did is we chose columnar trees that rather than taking them.

If we were to plant a corpus agrifolia, that canopy gets to be 70 plus 70 feet feet plus in width.

And so typically we would offset that 35 feet from the garage, then it grows another 35 feet out into that lot.

Ultimately, that would perhaps prohibit construction in the future.

If it's another police building or otherwise, that's gonna prohibit that.

And so what we wanted to do is keeping in mind that we don't want to plant trees to only come back 15, 20, 30 years later and remove them.

We kind of pre-anticipated some development there and chose those regal princes for that reason on their canopy shape.

Above and beyond that, again, semantics or otherwise, we can talk about oak trees and acorns and what the squirrels will like and what they won't like.

Um, but the habitat benefit ultimately is going to be very similar, short of the canopy size in that I'll say nesting habitat.

That is the one limitation that those will have compared to a corpus agrifolio or a post-livo.

Um, but ultimately that was why.

Again, the only other thing I would add on that is there was a limited kind of planting strip on the parking lot side that if we were to plant the agrifolios or otherwise, again, I'm just concerned that 30 40 years down the road, the root systems, the root flares on those are ultimately going to start to eat sidewalks cause damage.

And again, just based on my prior experience, while they're tolerant of some root pruning, significant root pruning of larger roots six, eight, ten, twelve inches, definitely has an impact on the oaks and it requires a lot of mitigation, watering, fertilization, or otherwise to kind of help them recover for from significant root pruning.

Right.

And so it's uh sounds like it's a deciduous tree and it does produce acorns.

Yes, correct.

And so, um, being up there really close to the parking garage, is that all above ground or is some of it extend below ground?

Oh above ground, yeah.

Okay, all right, so that will be foundation to think about that kind of thing.

Yeah, and ultimately that's another consideration while using a columnar tree is going to have a smaller root system, it just does not need to spread as much to get all the nutrients water, et cetera, let alone to stabilize itself that it can hold itself with a little bit tighter root wall.

So that will be a benefit as well.

And um, what what is the spacing that you're showing there?

I didn't get out my little on which ones you talk about.

I can't say for certain because I don't remember the dimensions specifically, but typically what I recommend is about 75% of canopy in maturity.

So in those cases where they're at 20 uh 20 feet-ish of canopy at maturity, we'd look to be about 15 foot on center.

Okay, all right, and so um uh it's probably safe to say that they're doing a fair bit of screening at the ground level of that parking garage, which is can be sort of ugly, you know.

Yeah, correct.

Instead of having a three-story structure, you'll have some good screening on it for six to nine months out of the year.

Where it goes deciduous, not as much, you'll have just the branches, but the last tree gets to be how tall?

I'm gonna say 50 feet.

Okay.

Maybe 40 or so.

It could be and what what's the height of the parking garage?

45 or so for two sides.

Someday it may.

Okay.

So maybe 50 to 60, so it might not cover it completely, but it'll get the majority of it.

Yeah.

All right, and so you were calling out 24 inch box, but it looks like you can get them there.

So those are cheaper usually.

All right.

Uh those were my questions.

Thank you.

Um, sticking with the the regal print theme.

I understand the practicalities of its size and its shape.

Um, but in the report, I think it said that Mountain View prefers oaks or likes oaks.

So it was some nod to preferring oaks as a tree in Mountain View.

Um, I think a lot of members of the public and myself as well would have uh preferred a native tree that had similar physical characteristics.

I completely understand needing to keep open the front area for you know plans TVD.

Um, but I would have loved to have seen a native tree of that that could fit the same requirements.

Understood.

Any other questions?

Well, I I have uh a question, but that's okay.

Uh Russell, what do you mean by competent value?

You mean shade?

Well, ultimately when we look at habitat, is it a food source?

Does it provide shelter?

Does it provide things for the environment?

You can also get to the root system ultimately and how that fractures the soil, etc.

That that encourages the microorganisms and all of our little bugs and so forth.

And so that's what I mean by habitat is all of those different aspects.

There's many of them, um, but those are just you know three, four, five of them.

If we go back to kind of the North Bay Shore palette that I think you guys are all kind of familiar with, those are those different columns that we have there that it talks about those different aspects.

Um, you know, in the future we'll have all that stuff for you guys as we develop some of our planting, etc.

We'll give you more specifics on that.

Very good, thanks.

Uh so I just had two quick ones.

Actually, Jonathan sort of got my my first one, but just to I mean, basically since since the existing tree and the canopy coverage calculation, since the existing trees are deemed to not be growing at all.

Um, if anything, the calculation understates a little bit, but it's apples to apples across essentially across the two.

So I mean the 27% might be 0.9% or something like that.

Because it is an S.

Yeah, maybe but I mean they are gonna grow.

Yeah, so um, okay.

And then my other question, this was to follow up on Ronit's question, which I didn't maybe I missed it.

In terms of the funding for the project, um, you talked about the different phases, but is it's funding sources have a funding source been identified for all phases of this project?

Is it yes yes that's what I okay.

I have one question.

Go ahead.

Um, would uh public works staff be able to describe the typical um guarantee that a con a landscape contractor would include um, you know, you would require of them in terms of taking care of the trees after they're planted.

Most uh public works projects have uh usually a 90-day establishment period for all landscaping um but for all public works contracts we have I mean buildings and parks through including the landscaping systems irrigation system and etc.

It's a standard one year from date of uh final acceptance where they have to come back and address any deficiencies if something dies if something is you know deemed to be subpar uh they have to come back and address uh defects we could what we would consider to be a latent defect in land installation so if a tree were to die during that first year the contractor would have to replace it at no cost to the city and then after that I'm assuming it would be turned over to the forestry crews uh you know parks maintenance and who are experienced at taking care of trees and monitoring we involved them early on help this selection okay we don't make them unhappy I actually one question I know it's not part of the plant because it's a tree mitigation strategy but is there a plan for the rest of the landscaping I know there's a big grass area for the canines but is there a plan for like planting more native shrubs and other lower level plants up the trees but the the plant the the full landscape planting plan is it is currently in development and it's being finalized uh and will certainly be uh developed in concert with the recently completed biodiversity plan and so we're taking very close uh you know monitoring that very closely as it's coming to fruition it's just scheduled to be adopted June so uh that'll be perfect timing because we'll we won't be completing the the final plans uh until later in the fall uh through main building and the rest of the site so we have time to incorporate those I have one more question uh really specifically relevant to the basically the development of the plant palettes and the expertise that staff is planning to get on on biodiversity um why would you need to develop the the building of course the question about that the infrastructure for the building the building itself but planting that will not happen for three years why does that planting palette need to be in place rather than a general budget budgetary idea of how much it would cost well I mean you make a good point but um there's a relationship between those two things obviously uh we make a selection based on water use we have to submit plans uh to the building department that include our irrigation system including all our water calculations but we would have to get somewhat specific about what we're planting the density the the general plant types I mean certainly there could be some changes or tweaks but um I think they prefer us to have that sorted out so that we can submit yes we're uh low water use uh and and can prove it uh some level of specificity okay thank you anything else I think you want if you want me to ask you know I can feel it I can feel it so the December 23 council meeting when they review the concept and made all their inputs on this they articulated a preference for curbing landscape forms I think it's a you know naturalistic layout um landscape curves with natural forms contrasting with the building and what I see is a fairly rectilinear uh layout was that disregarded um not remembered, uh decided otherwise.

Well, I and thanks for the question.

I think um what's not shown here, because again, it's just showing the trees, and um I I would preface that by saying um one of the the big challenges of this project is that we had to develop the building, you know we had a certain program for what uh size of building and features.

And then we also had to build it while the other the rest of the site was still in operation, so they didn't afford us uh the ability to have a great deal of that said uh the architect has developed and and unfortunately we can't it's not shown here this in this document, but there is some curved linear uh feeding as well as uh sort of landscape elements and uh planting areas that you know again are actually have more curves to them and are do contrast with the very recolinear uh features of the building, and they're just not represented here on the street tree plan.

We look forward to presenting that to council along with an update to the garage design in the fall, and uh we trust that you'll find that we have addressed the point here, maybe.

Anything else?

Okay, uh, is there any public members of the public who would like to speak to this?

We've gotten a couple of emails and we read those.

Anybody in the room want to speak?

Uh we have one hand up for fruits.

Hello, Bruce.

Hi all.

Um Bruce English was in the station drive and the member of Green Spaces Mountain View.

I'm gonna be very quick.

We've submitted a letter, Green Spaces did, and I hope that you will uh that you've had a chance to look at or will have a chance to look at it and Russell and others too.

Um I think we are pretty aware of the things that the city and Russell are in community services that uh and you PRC, what you're thinking about, and the various kinds of limitations and challenges, we're aware of those and still we think it's important for the community to weigh in and um leverage our own expertise out here and and share it with you.

So I just wanted to highlight that and also to say that I personally support the letter.

Thank you.

Thanks, Bruce.

Um next we have Rashmi.

Hello, Rashmi.

Hello, can you hear me?

Yes.

Great.

Um, yeah, so um Rashmi Sahai, also with Green Spaces Mountain View, um, also kind of speaking to some of the points um of the letter that we submitted.

I um do appreciate the increase from nine to 51 native trees in the plan, but I feel like the since more than half 67 of the 118 mitigation trees are not native, um, I still think there's opportunity for improvement.

Um, I appreciate the discussion and the questions about the regal Prince Oaks, but I'm not quite satisfied with the answer.

Um, I understand that you guys are trying to meet certain shape um preferences um and creating kind of a wall on that side, but um uh with 200 native tree species in California, I feel that there must be um other options out there that could also hopefully meet some of those things that you're looking for um in that space.

Also, I would say that um, you know, it's not necessarily the number of trees that are as important for biodiversity and for shade and all the benefits that we look to from trees.

It's um the canopy that provides the best benefits, and um, you know, I think that there could be there there could be some value in thinking about how do we um maximize the canopy, even if that means that some of not all of the 118 trees will fit on the project boundary, and if that allows to for planting native oaks as opposed to the regal prince oaks, then so much the better.

I also wanted to comment on this comment about create that the uh Regal Prince Oaks are going to be creating habitat.

Um they they probably will be creating habitat for some species like squirrels and other species that thrive in a suburban environment, but um it's they're unlikely to create the same amount of habitat that native plants will um just because these trees have not co evolved with the insects for you know thousands of years and therefore a lot of um a lot of the kind of basis of the two food chain is not there um the insects cannot feed on the leaves and therefore they cannot thrive and the animals that rely on the insects cannot thrive so I just wanted to kind of call that out there that there are levels of habitat and I don't think that the Regal Prince oaks will provide um anywhere close to what um native species will provide um thank you for clarifying the timeline um it sounds like there's going to be some stages in terms of cutting down the trees and replanting the trees so I appreciate that and I would just encourage um that we leave the trees in the ground as long as they can and I appreciate all the other questions that were um answered so thank you so much.

Thank you Rajmi.

Anybody else one more chance in the room okay uh I'm gonna close public comment and bring it back to uh the urban I guess are we on this one where the parks and recognition discussion.

Are we the forestry board on this one?

Yeah I guess it's true sorry.

All right.

I'll be happy to start since nobody else will jump in.

So um I'd like to start by by talking about the legal prince oaks and uh just as a personal my personal reaction to uh having these trees chosen because of the city's preference for oaks that is not what the community was talking about when we mentioned oaks I personally talk about oaks all the time I know it uh and I don't say locally native oaks because it's always seemed completely obvious to me it's not that I want oaks it's that I want locally native oaks which is what belongs here which is what nourishes the soul which is what supports the supports the birds supports the caterpillars supports the insects supports what lives in the soil and so um having an oak tree because it's an oak when it's a hybrid of an English oak and a white swamp oak.

Is really is really contrary to what we have in the biodiversity plan.

To the point where it's almost embarrassing to say the city wants oaks so here's this a hybrid oak um as Roshmi said the these oaks will maybe make the squirrels happy but they will not support the the caterpillars the birds the various insects that live in the soil they also don't even look like oaks you know if I wanted plumps I would get oaks.

So this is pushed push a lot of buttons for me, and I find I find a choice that is very regrettable.

Now on to more positive things.

I'm really happy to see how many native trees have been added.

That's great.

I really appreciate that.

And there is a preponderance of native trees.

There are more native trees, not a huge amount of the native species of native species, but there are more native trees.

My own sense about this plant palette, and it may have been obvious for my questions.

This response to the usual requirements, but as Rashmi said, which I completely agree with, it's not really the number of trees, it's the amount of canopy.

And I looked at the canopy calculations, I didn't use a calculator, but frankly, I always find the canopy calculations very surprising.

The results are never in any way intuitive.

I was on council pushing for canopy calculations to be included in plans, and I thought I would get results that would be really helpful, and I have never found them helpful in any way.

So there we go.

Safety building has needed to be rebuilt or built a new for a very long time.

I have no interest in slowing down the process.

Numbers is fine, but the plant palette is mostly unacceptable to me.

And the good news is that we have a biodiversity plan that I'm expecting council to approve of, and the biodiversity plan is full of immediate action plans that we're all very happy with.

Staff is building plant palette, which is wonderful.

The heritage tree ordinance is going to be looked at again, and we have talked about the difference between trees as numbers and trees as providers of canopy, and that maybe it's not about the numbers, it's about the canopy and the benefits.

And then based on the experience that that staff has gained on the new plants and palettes that the that staff has put together, then it comes back to the PRC in public meetings to discuss a new plant palette.

I to me not an engineer, not public works.

The process continue, but we would end up with a much better result.

This is a 200 million dollar public facility.

This has to be the best.

But it will be visible, it's an important facility, we need to make it as good as possible.

So that's where I am at this point.

Thank you.

Anyone want to follow that?

Go next.

I'll make a couple brief comments.

Um, I meant to say this earlier.

I wanted to thank staff for bringing this back to us after two months.

Um, I think we all really appreciate that we put in.

I just wanted to start with that.

Um, but I also concur with virtually all of what Commissioner Bryant said.

I like the idea of bringing this back to look at the plant pallet before things are finalized, particularly with the regal prints trees, which my understanding would be in that because they're near mostly near the parking garage, would be the last phase or the the second phase of the project.

Um, I really hope we can look at a plant pallet, not just the trees, but the entire planting landscape and take a look through the biodiversity plan lens and a new plant pallet lens instead of just saying, Well, finish what we're doing with trees today and consider this done.

Um I think I'll leave it with that.

Thank you.

Okay.

Anyone?

I think you want me to know my tribes coming.

You can curve my diatribe and you can probably hear it.

Okay, so we swap some uh maples for some valley oaks, and we swap some Carolina cherry laurels from uh line above.

Um so thank you for making some adjustments.

I don't see really materially significant change to the plan.

Um but that's okay.

Um my comments.

First of all, I'd like to acknowledge that the work you've done, very professional.

But really, my comments are directed at council, this one and future ones.

Um, and I know the focus is on mitigation, but uh I probably have a slightly different emphasis than some of my colleagues that are more focused on the activity of the plants.

Um, as previously stated, my concerns are more about the initial site plan and the loss of the redwood load than the mathematics of tree replacements, um, at least until the heritage tree ordinance is revised when ever that may be.

Uh redwoods have a unique status, both in the perception of the public and statutorially in the ordinance.

Um, for many people, these trees are symbols of nature's grandeur and the ecological identity of California.

And we understand that with changing climate, that redwoods probably uh aren't going to be appropriate in many locations, and we probably won't be planting many new ones.

But on this site, we're not talking about individual special tree.

We're talking about growth, a vibrant, healthy redwood grow with roughly a dozen trees clustered together at the edge of the property.

In the middle of downtown Mountain View, and it's an extraordinary environmental resource.

And what makes red woods remarkably uh special is that they don't exist as isolated trees, but they function as a cooperative ecological system.

Um they share structure and ecological support through interconnected root systems, might cool rising fungial networks of this underground system.

The trees literally communicate with each other.

It's it's um an interdependence that is such a powerful symbol of resilience.

And in a highly urbanized downtown environment, this growth is unique, it's a tragedy to cut it down, and I don't see a commensurate mitigation reflected.

Um, the staff memo clearly explains um the constraints.

These have to be removed to accommodate public safety building, and that's modern life.

Um, but the project exposes a broader policy failure, and I'll give council a pass because this plan was conceptually approved before the biodiversity plan was developed.

Um, but at that December 23rd conceptual approval meeting, you know, council deliberated extensively about the architectural motifs and the historical preservation, public art, and the aesthetics.

Um, but as for the environmental site planning, it wasn't really considered other than to stipulate uh preference for some proved plant forms.

That has to change.

This city's spent an enormous amount of resources, hundreds of thousands of, you know, a million dollars on when you consider the eight hundred thousand dollars consultant and many staff hours on this biodiversity and urban forest vision that's intended to define our environmental values and priorities.

So I'm certain that if at that time the requirements were put in place, we want to preserve that growth programmatically, you could develop that site.

You could design that site complete with the staging to accommodate that.

It just wasn't done.

And that can't be the case moving forward.

Um otherwise we risk becoming a city that adopts symbols, slogans, paper plans, but doesn't consistently integrate those values into the actual planning decision.

So I wanna emphasize I don't also don't want to delay the problem.

Um and I fully support my fellow commissioners.

They choose to move this project along as we encourage to do the worst encouraged.

But personally, I don't feel comfortable with the objects of the unanimous support uh for the staff resolution.

Um not to say that I'm not trying to be obsolete, but I I feel strongly that this message has to be conveyed, and this is the only way I know how to do it.

So I do thank you for your efforts.

I won't support a mitigation plan uh that's proposed.

I do have other comments about the planting, but um I think my primary point is to send a message to council.

End of diatribe.

Unless you want more comments, whatever you want.

I'll let commissioner summer.

Good.

Okay, thank you.

Um, I completely support the the replacement of the public safety building.

That would be really important for our emergency response going forward.

And with that with that replacement on the same site comes some difficult choices, um, and I am I am troubled by the choice of removing things.

That Redwood Grove is really not only a nice grove, but it's right there at the entrance to the downtown, and it really does have a big visual impact, kind of sets the tone for things.

Um, and that's difficult.

There's also a couple of really nice bally oaks that are right in building footprint, and that's very difficult to support removing those.

Um I think that all along.

So I do agree with Commissioner Davis that all along there's just been sort of more practical look at this and not thinking about what the site design should really be.

You know, we need this many cars, it's been programmatic.

We need this many cars, we need this many square feet of building parking cars.

Like this, we need it.

It was all very programmatic driven.

And um, and I I feel as if we really don't, I don't really have much other choice but to support this mitigation plan.

But um I do also agree with it's sort of strange to me to be because biodiversity requires diversity, but then there we are planting, you know, I forget the count, uh, you know, thirdly of the same plant.

Um, you know, while I was sitting here, I thought of two native species that could substitute fairly easily for some of the uh regal prince.

Oh, there's the Pacific wax myrtle, which is gonna stay smaller, and then the uh Catalina Ironwood, which gets just as big, and yes, it's from the Channel Islands but it's still a California plant that does quite well in Mount View and that will get as tall as those regal oaks it's relatively narrow and it will provide some um bird and animal and you know soil habitat so I think I'm following in sort of the realm that uh Commissioner Bryant described which is that I'm willing to keep it moving but I would like to see a a greater effort um put into the final landscape plan that you know looking at all providing kind of you know an ecology you know we're almost in a post-wild environment so ecologically we need to we need to have the ground plane we need to have the middle plane we need to have kind of the small tree plane and then a canopy plane and we need to look at all of those and how they function and the depth of fruits and that is how you build a biodiverse planting plan is thinking about the size above the ground and the roots below the ground so I realize there's a lot of constraints and I wouldn't expect a native plant to thrive to full extent in the middle of parking lot that's just not you know there will there will be places that's an example that we will need to look to climate adapted you know probably Mediterranean plants um that will survive better.

But I think we can still we can continue the great work progress that we've made between March and now and we can keep going even further by the time that final plan is prepared.

And I don't know where you know is this the last chance for this to be publicly vetted I don't know the answer to that.

Council approves the the heritage tree replacement plan and the public never sees it again I guess that would be nice thing to know the answer to um as we figure out you know how to keep moving.

So I'll just say you know I would be in favor of keeping it moving but finding some way to monitor the evolution port an even better plan.

And right um so just coming to me I again I I appreciate the comments on the commissioners um were in many cases more well versed on on specific specifics of trees than I am so I I learn a lot um you know I appreciate I appreciate the uh revisions to the plan to include more native trees um I also um commissioner sylvester made a statement at the last time we we saw this that um that resonates with me you know that this is a showcase um for us this is a a project um that's uh you know that should model um what we want others to emulate uh in terms of um tree canopies and and using native plantings so um while it's important in all buildings I think this one is especially important um diverting uh just just uh uh um to go in the direction that others haven't found before but uh um you know I like the idea of of the redwood benches um along the perimeters and the notion of um using repurposed wood for um some of the internal furnishings in the the buildings, and sort of along those lines of others have done show and tell.

Um so I um Santa Claire County Parks um recently renovated one of their conference rooms using repurposed wood, and I've got a few pictures of that.

But it was a pretty cool design.

I mean, I mean that was just over there three or four months ago.

So that's the that's the conference room, and so the table is um from a tree.

Um if we go to the next one, so that one, and we'll have a better picture of this later on.

That on the on the far wall, that is a um they call a moss, a moss wall.

So it's actually it's actually living.

Um it's uh, you know, apparently no upkeep, no pruning, no water is needed.

Um again, that's just another picture that the drug uh coasters are, and I think those mats, I can't remember what those mats, what the uh mats are, and then that's a picture of just the I got a pretty nice cut of uh anyway.

When you go into that room, it's it's it's pretty cool.

And I I think that the uh the moss walls also a noise uh um what'd you call it?

It absorbs it absorbs sound, so it so it's it's nice.

It's a striking striking looms.

Anyway, so thanks for showing those.

Um and I have the contacts if you guys want any of those context.

Um, so anyway, uh just maybe a follow-up question as it relates to um several of the commissioners' comments, um, a question to staff, you know, if we were to approve this to keep this moving forward, um, but request that it come back in two to three years um prior to planting for another review of the planting pallet, and it would also be after the biodiversity plan was finalized and we had tree lists and and stuff like that.

Um is that possible and how does that look?

Um would it necessitate going to council again um as well?

Um or could it just be a PRC item?

And maybe that's a director Marsh shot question.

I'm gonna allow us to have to respond to anything else and then I'll get to that.

But there was whether it's uh related to tree species or otherwise.

Um I I can take a stab at it if you will.

Um, as I explained earlier, you know, this project is being bid out in packages.

The first package doesn't involve planting any trees, it does involve removal of some.

Um the second package is the construction of the new building along the village.

Um it most certainly would include planting of the street trees and trees around its perimeter.

It probably would avoid planting anything on the other side because the next phase of that package is development of the site, parking and and other you know elements of the site besides the garage.

Um, typically you want to avoid planting anything until towards the end of that process so as to you know not be damaged.

Um that said, however, if we're putting out a package to bid, and a lot of depending on the tree selection, um uh, you know, in terms of the lead time, getting them if they have building a building for two years and they know oh, be plants in 20 late 2029, they can put in grow orders and so forth.

So it unless these are just literally on the shelf, if you will, so to speak, um, it does present some challenges for the procurement.

Um so that's just a consideration and um as to the as to the policy matters.

I don't I can't speak to that.

I would just add I haven't been here as long as some others, but ultimately I can point to at least two cases where we have constructed projects and alternated species at construction.

I will simply say that.

So there is a possibility we could consider um or reconsider this at a later date because of some of the challenges with availability things along those lines.

That's part of the reason we've changed them previously.

Um again, we're trying to honor the commitments that we make to the PRC to the city council, etc.

So we try not to do that too significantly.

But we have made some changes in the past, is all that I will say.

And to that point and to an earlier point I made, you know, when we go for permit and we put in you know how much of water use and and a lot of those calculations are based on the species and genus of the tree and their characteristics, so it would narrow the field of choices for alternates.

Um generally the billing department is not going to make it, you know, they don't look at the species on the side, but they will know if we plant in, if we you know increase our water usage beyond what we said we would.

So there are things that limit our options, but is the timing of going out to bid for that second phase, it's somewhat next year, somewhere 27.

Do something as part of that in timeline with that, would that be sufficient?

We would be going forward with a plans.

Just to put in context, we're going forward with a plans and spec approval for package one, which is the site clearing, which does not include any trees.

So theoretically, we could go for a plans and spec approval of package two, which includes the new building and site improvements, and uh probably in the fall of 20 or early spring of 2027, uh, at that time, we would need a decision on trees.

You could put in uh spec documents, a number of plantings and a budget and such so a contractor could do uh a bid on unspecified species, could you not?

Generally, yes, if it's you know their equivalent costs and and so forth, depending if they're an exotic, obviously that would be different possibility.

It's a pain, but it's it's interesting you mentioned the so do you um is there a water usage calculation that has to be part of the irrigation system plan?

I mean that's yes, that's interesting.

We have to account for every drop of water that falls on the site and every drop of water that we use on the site.

Any of that estimating been done for this proposal?

Uh, well, for this package, it's not that's not part, there's not much development going on in this first package, which is the site clearing and and building pad preparation.

So it's the next package that has all the you know the building, of course, and the irrigation systems and and the detailed planting plan and uh so forth, but what we're presenting to you is a tree mitigation plan for the entire site because we typically don't go forward in teach meal with these kind of things.

So we're going forward as a total part of the whole project is concerned.

This is the tree count that we've arrived at, and we're requesting what we want.

Let me just point out how that all the trees on the list that you have made now are low one, and that's it makes absolutely no sense to expect that we will subtly because we want native trees at moderate water high water use.

So, in terms of water calculations, I assume it's not specific tree, but it's a category of low water usage.

I'm not a particular expert in that deal, but I'll no, ultimately we do have a list within the industry that is called Wooples, yeah.

Water use conservation, etc.

But if you go into multiple static lines, it there are categories, but they are also species specific.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

Uh do you have any comments on this?

Um, pondering.

So I have a couple things.

If if John, you want to ponder a little bit longer?

Okay, so this I've seen so many times in my career as a landscape architect where nobody ever thinks about the landscape till the end.

And I think what we're suffering from is there is no master site plan with trees, ground plane, paving areas, and this conceptual design is never done.

And the truth is I don't feel like that it's completely the role of the urban forestry board to choose the species.

Ordinarily we leave that to the director when we are talking about vegetation trees.

But if you were doing a schematic design here, you know, master schematic design, you would probably express kind of the design tree.

Wide canopy spreading, you know, habitat tree, right?

You would categorize like that, and you might have multiple options for that to allow for flexibility going forward and to allow for you know unavailability in the trade and let staff to you know flex with things as things change.

Um I feel like something like that would have been an appropriate way to deal with with this project, and um you know get that would give you know allow us to add to the list, but we wouldn't have to like make the final choice because it's not really up to us in the when you get right down to it.

It's up to the council.

So, you know, like I don't know if it's too late to switch to that type of approach.

It probably is, but um I can tell that you know that's what we're suffering from.

Um this is the classic type of project where the municipality will put out a contract growing bid way ahead of their, you know, full construction documents, way ahead of their you know, building plans so that you have five, six, seven years to grow the species, and you can even do that with alternates.

You can you know provide a list and say, you know, 70% of each of these will allow your grower to go fill your plant palette out a bit.

Um again, I that's being given to us as a constraint, but it's actually not a constraint, there's a way to work around it by you using a contract pro grid out ahead of the project, and yeah, it does put the city on the line, but that landscaping bit is gonna be a spec compared to the building.

It's almost, you know, it's trivial to to take the risk of oops, we bought you know too many toy ons.

So um I think the good news that we heard that I want to focus on is that we can fit the mitigation trees on the site, and I think that's fabulous, and also it appears that um we're able to get them to really be at least half native, and that'll be a hope.

I you know, personally I'd like to go farther than that, but because we don't have a master site plan, we don't really know how much farther we're going in the rest of it.

Um was that enough time to ponder?

If I I may within the phase, what we're calling two, package two, package two.

Is that can you explain which set of trees that is?

Is it trees for the entire site, or is it the trees for the it'll be I'm gonna complicate this?

There's package two, which has phases.

So package two, phase one is the building.

So we'll build the building and the frontage along uh villa part of Rango.

And I guess I'll put just you know, once you get to the back of the building, you have phase two of package two, which is clearing of the back lot, which is the existing building, the city, uh you know, all the parking for the marked vehicles and all the secure parking areas.

So that's um the significant phase, and it requires the building to be complete so that staff can move in and we can clear up.

So that's and it's after that that you develop the site, uh everything except for the parking garage, which is package three, um, and that's done last.

So um the and we can help if we put up the graphic if possible that helps visualize what I'm talking about.

So in terms of the trees that are planted first, it would be the ones along Villa, uh, a little bit uh along Oak, although the those ones along oak are mostly existing.

I think we have one new tree there.

So the street trees along uh Villa and the trees in the front along uh Franklin.

Um we would probably stop um at the corner there of the building, um, so that the sec the second half of uh package two is where we build out the public parking lot there to the to the right of the building, and then the secure parking in the upper right hand corner, including the uh uh police uh canine training here.

Is that answer your question?

Well, I think directly my shock's question.

So now we've heard that.

Yeah, so I went back into city code.

I love doing that.

Um so it says capital improvement projects, which propose the removal of any hericks tree, shall be submitted by the project uh project staff to city harborist for reviewing recommendation of appropriate mitigation measures, the artwork recommendations shall be boarded by city project staff to the urban forest board for their recommendation on the number, size, and location of replacement trees.

The recommendation of the urban forest board shall be forwarded to city project staff to the city council for their consideration with the approval of the project.

Um I know we have done above and beyond that in the previous um reviews of our facility.

So I just wanted to start with what that says.

Um we're in a new situation here.

Um, because typically while it says the number size and location of the placement trees is approved by the PRC, the species would be included as part of that bid package to go out.

So, I'm trying to understand if there are, if there are concerns from the PRC with what is considered to be the like the first planting that would be happening of that species and locations, is where I'm trying to get so that we can move forward and assistant public works director.

Not sure if you want to jump in on this.

Um I've been hearing the conversation, I understand.

Um, the inputs um so there's some amount of certainty that we do need, um, as kind of mentioned as we develop these packages, put them on the bid, um, we get certainty when the contractors bids on our project, we hold them accountable.

So that gives us the we are what we're proposing is what we're gonna pay for in for the life of the project construction project so if it takes them two years to build it there will honor that price that they give us I'm also weighing in this um complexity of uh the planting effort um we will be closely coordinating with community service regarding this the urban forestry biodiversity urbus forest it will be approved it's gonna be close coordination and we staff you know very clear direction on what we're going to to help us with this planting that will really guide us and as we're developing as again this next year is this plan development it's this you're hearing about package one just demo package tube that's the big project of the main building um and that's where we're gonna get the true um that's a large amount so this time next year we're hoping to get approval of those plans we council to put that one out to bid before that there's a there's a runway to get there we need to get our plans approved uh ready for approval so that way once we get council authorization we can put it up again we're gonna be coordinating over this next year with staff to help us um develop that plan and I hear this sort of ground cover you know mid-plane high canopy very clear I think we can get there coordinating closely to staff um community services staff that has been integrated into this uh biodiversity urban forest plan coordinating with you and the community so we're hearing that loud and clear um I think my my takeaway is that it's you're further reinforcing the importance which we'll do thank you thanks we'll go back to Commissioner Bryant you want to take a shot at some kind of a motion or something like that no not yet I'd like um the first phase which is the street tree and presumably the trees that are closest to the building um the building is graced at the front by four I guess off the Royal Prince Oaks.

The um the valley of the appearance of which on the list I greatly appreciate are actually on the whole going to be quite hidden from public view as well um it's true that we the TRC should not be choosing flat species we we have staff to do that for us on the other hand as we were walking you know through the process of the biodiversity blend we were talking about a paradigm change changing the way we look at plants changing the way we look at nature in the city at the at the environments at the natural environments in which we live and we are working on that but we are still teaching we haven't reached that yet this is work for many years um so what what we're not we we we didn't choose this design, but what the community is getting is a redwood growth gone, a big building on the streets, and four oars which are they don't look like oaks, they're hybrid oaks, they possibly will cross uh, you know, cross-pollinate with our oaks and and and bring up some new hybrids, which we don't want.

Uh this really goes against what we have worked on for years in the biodiversity plan.

So even if we just talk about the first packet, those four oaks are it's a strong word, but fancy.

Because it's like saying to the community, yes, we did a biodiversity plant.

I love these cute little oaks.

They're exotic, they're lovely.

It's not what you meant, but they they cannot support this.

Would you want to swap out those four for right now?

I mean, we could do it on the fly.

I mean, I don't know what their alternatives.

They need we need to communicate to a resident that we need what we say.

And not just, yes, we have a lovely plan, which I bet we will submit to any kind of conventions and get lots of awards for because it's a lovely plan.

But in actual life, this isn't.

Yes, if we found native trees there, and because these are supposed to be little oaks, colittle trees, columnar tree, shouldn't be difficult at all.

And it faces west, north, no, it's faces out.

Um it shouldn't be that difficult to find four trees that can actually talk to the community about this is this is what you said, this is the plan we built based on that.

We actually meant it.

And this is this 200 million dollar building, and we're looking at all the details among the biodiversity.

So that is one concern for me.

Um I think that what what you uh what you were reading about what the PRC is supposed to do is I read it before the May, whatever before the March 13 was it, 17.

Yeah.

Uh, and it seemed to me that the the species was part of the appropriate litigation okay, not a lawyer of 15 hours.

To me it seemed that the PRC had all these.

I will not be comfortable just saying, yes, fine, I trust staff to figure out figure this out, like I should stop talking, figure this out.

And and trust that this will happen without being part of the public process, and I would want to add that to any motion that we made.

Otherwise, I don't think we'd be able to take something from my throat.

If I may have asked a question, Fishner by it, is it those four specific trees, or is it that type of tree on the whole property?

I'm a little unclear.

So, because it's phase one.

Right.

Exactly.

Right.

Exactly, but it probably matters in creating emotion.

Right, but but I'm just you know, can we do something in phase one where we say we want to swap out those four and also say we want in prior to phase two or whatever the phase two A is, um, we would like to see this again.

I I'm just throwing stuff out.

Yeah, something in that direction.

So either a swap out or a review before that next phase.

I think that language matters.

That language does matter.

Because yeah.

It matters both things fine.

Yes.

So just to make sure I'm understanding phase one, what I'm imagining based on what I heard was that if you were to draw a line, I don't know three feet off the back off the uh train track side of the new public safety building.

That's probably everything toward Villa is phase one.

Yes, it's kind of probably the first because that will be built first.

Yeah, and so nothing in the back part of the site would have even been demolished.

No, because they need to they need to move.

Okay, so but there's a lot of tree removal for that first phase, and it looks like we're not even mitigating all those trees in the first phase.

A lot of the trees are being the mitigation trees are happening in the second phase.

I I'm not sure what to think about that, and then I still can't completely tell.

I thought I remembered something from March that the parking garage was still not a hundred percent.

It is it is now received a full fully pumped up, go ahead.

Okay, all right.

Is that given if you draw that vertical line and I mean there is almost nowhere to plant anything, phase one.

There's basically not, and there's gonna have to be a ton of utility work in that area to support the new building, and um all we're really left with is street trees to be planted.

Yeah, I mean it looks to me in phase one, you're you're looking at four regal print rows and then a bunch of sweep sweep A's.

I mean, yeah, and the thing about that little thin space, you know.

So the street trees, that's pretty big tree.

The the tree that is in between the street trees and the building has almost no space to grow.

It has to be a small tree.

And it's and it's going to be shaded.

That's the south side, and you know, the sun when it hits a fairly big tree is just gonna cast a shadow.

And then the other part that could be in phase one is the stuff on um Franklin in the corner there, and those are red buds which are native.

So I presume those are okay.

Those are the native.

Uh Occidentalis is the native.

I mean, they're not really needed for Russian.

Okay.

So I'm trying to find a path for you.

Um, I'm gonna give Russell an opportunity to talk about kind of the location of some of those trees that we're referencing, the size of the actual planting area that we have, and the question is.

Do you have recommendations to um provide a different species for those locations that meet the planting requirements that you're working with in?

So are we keeping this to kind of phase one or we keep it to the project?

So uh ultimately again um it's not a good example, the photograph that we have up there or the drawing that we have up there in terms of what we're dealing with in terms of site constraints.

Sandy kind of or commissioner, sorry, somewhere, um, ultimately kind of reference that along the front of the building, but even along that back side, even in that parking lot, we are very, very restricted in terms of the space that we have available to plant trees again, trying to balance that development while keeping the other building going.

There are just so many challenges here.

But even once we get the buildings laid out on the property or otherwise, we still have to provide sidewalks, we still have to provide all of these other little amenities, benches, etc.

They all take up space.

Yes, I'm sure if we sat down and we went through this 50 different times, we could probably come up with some other alternative species.

Um it just ultimately we're going to have some of the similar challenges, and we're still gonna have some that aren't happy with those species because of certain constraints or otherwise.

And so this is a balancing act.

Um again, I'm open to consideration on some of these, um, where we could perhaps identify some alternative species.

Um I just don't know as though it's going to be enough that it's going to fatify everyone, is where I'm coming from.

That's going to be the challenge.

Um, and also in terms of the Catalina Airwood Act, I absolutely agree with you in terms of some of the locations, but again, that's one of those species that I just know historically when I've tried to find them or otherwise, they're very difficult to obtain.

Doesn't mean we can't do a contract growth.

Again, we can talk about some of those things as we move forward.

Um, but we're just trying to do the best that we can to ultimately, and there are just so many site constraints in this situation.

I don't know as though we can do much to add much more canopy.

I don't know, you know, native-wise, yes, absolutely.

I think there are some other opportunities.

I just don't know as though they're the best choice.

Um, you know, again, that's a personal preference, it's subjective, I'll say.

Um, and so that's part of the challenge is that subjectivity of it all.

Um I mean, because I think the part of the case that was making is that you know, were this a park development where we're doing wide open, you know, green spaces, then we would have more opportunity for large canopies where we didn't need the turf area for for playing fields.

We have we could reserve an area where we have a lot of mulch, you know, like the if you go to you know heritage park, there's a nice lawn, but then there's very large swaths of mulch that you know or that live under the oak, and you you wouldn't want that in an area where you want to have uh a turf area for say canine training or an area for uh recreation.

So this site again is is very constrained, and planting a valley oak in a in some of these areas would be a disservice to that oak because it wouldn't be in its best environment to thrive, it wouldn't reach its full potential because of the constraints or it would be cut back or the root running and what have you.

So that's part of why we come up forward with this palette.

So yes, it would be lovely to have the body oaks that are coastal.

I I don't that's not what I personally am talking about.

Okay, though.

The royal prince, though, the the toyons are great, the red bodies are fine.

I think the up in the in the corner, we have got some on the top corner, there's a lot of toilets.

Um that's great.

I I'm not thrilled about the about the um the straight trees, but the royal oak is for me though, I'm sorry, is is a problem because of well, mainly because it's a hybrid oak that doesn't need a log here, we should not be planting hybrid boats that don't want.

We should not be doing that.

The site is very constrained, absolutely.

I'm sure you none of you would have chosen to do this, and it's it's on council to have chosen this to not have thought about the redwood growth, or maybe too.

We maybe should if it have all been there and said, Why don't you think about the redwood grove?

And then they might have thought about it.

Because you know, with with all due respect, council has endless stuff to do, and if if people from the community and advocates don't come and point things out to them, they don't always see it on the on on the road.

That's that's that's how busy they are um so brain it sounds like the the biggest hurdle to get over is this royal prince yep okay for me okay and Russell I don't know if you're in a position now to provide an alternative that may get us over the that hurdle or not john are you just talking about the first four at phase one or you talk about the whole the whole I'm looking at the whole at this point I would recommend we look at because we're designing this as a whole calling it built within a relatively short period of years but yes so my short answer would be no I off the cuff.

Absolutely I think Catalina is something that we could consider um but I would also want to look at some other classes I think that just off the top of my head I don't want to try and make that commitment this year.

So if I may interrupt I really respect what you just said because you know pull pull out of pull out of your hat I mean nobody would want to do that especially as you are working on a platform at right now I mean that that's partial the action on this that we are happy with the council I'm sure will will uh will support so um that that can't Commissioner Brain is language that would satisfy your concerns over the royal prints and whether that is to direct staff to identify a native tree that fits in that a a what wording will get us over the finish line to to try to meet what it is that you're looking for.

So we with all due respect to to planning this as a um as a as a unit as a whole which which seems the only way to go the four trees the forums in front of the building are not critical to be the same as the other so just in terms of making phase one possible finding a solution which I don't think would be difficult to do for for the trees that are public facing that make an important statement to the community and in the on the building doesn't have to be a tree to be a big shrub which frankly some people would say that that uh the toyons are also shrubs some people say that uh the street trees are are shrubs so uh so that that should not be a difficult choice so long as they they are part of plan for it that we are looking forward with as natives in the biodiversity plan and then I would like to see language that says that the rest of these hybrid oaks will we'll will we'll pass through another round of thinking because that's not gonna happen right now that their planting is not happening right now and you know those will be low water trees.

But they won't call themselves oaks and tell the community that maybe we don't we haven't actually heard what they're saying.

What do you mean for a the past revolution?

You need four or three.

Three.

Can my colleagues agree to the size location and number and add with continued um or consideration by the city arborist of the specific oak species?

Or language that meets the groups, yes.

That's that's more along the lines of right.

I mean, that's my thing.

It's just whether we do a phase one that says the calls out specifically for trees, and then also says phase two wants to come back to the it sounds like the if we can find language that gets us through the site, that would be very helpful.

So I have a couple thoughts, um the one of the challenges of this paradigm shift to what is expressed in our biodiversity and urban forestry plan, is influencing the nursery industry to produce the kind of plants that meet our needs, and they aren't there right now.

This is going to be a publicly bid project, the standards are different, it's not like walking down to your summer winds and buying a tree.

The nursery industry does not produce the kind of natives that we are looking for right now.

They don't, and they haven't forever.

I mean, they never have.

I think there are issues where they aren't as profitable because they require slightly more specialized care.

Sometimes they require the mic the appropriate microhizal funding guide, grow correctly.

Anyway, it but that said, I do think we would be able to find four Catalina ironwood uh lion of thamas between the in the state of California.

I mean, I do actually think that being an example that would meet our standard spec for a 24-inch box.

I mean, they might even be some in the state of Oregon, too.

Where they grow a lot of stuff, a lot of our plant material that gets planted is coming from Oregon.

Uh at least in this in the Bay Area, um, yeah, so I feel like I would like to see I I would like to see, I don't know if you want to call it a gesture to kind of commit to a different species for those four that are going to have to be small because they're in the shade.

We don't have to identify that tonight, but to commit to, you know, putting on our thinking cap and making a different choice.

Then the rest of it, I realize that the urban forestry board and PRC don't really have a role, but it's a it would be a great chance for I don't know what you want to call it, community open house, uh, something where the city is sort of taking this opportunity to bring to harmonize this plan for this wonderful wonderful facility with the the wonderful biodiversity plan, and we're all just gonna you know figure it out together kind of thing, like it's still for the public because that's I think what we're seeing is that there's a lot of members of the public who still have not just some commissioners, but members of the public who still have concerns that they want to raise and they kind of want to be part of it.

So I don't know, concoct whatever works for the CSD, but some kind of way to get that plan out in the in and not in not a um critical path, like it's outside the critical path of this project.

This project goes forward, but we're still going to share and think about together how to bring the two projects, you know, the biodiversity into this first facility that's coming in.

So it's not a hearing, it's uh co-creation.

So um I personally would be ready to move forward if we could make a commitment about the uh trees along the villa.

And um, I'm okay with the rest of the plan because I think it's gonna change over time because they've listened to us for now two hours, at least that so I I agree with everything you said, um the the co-creation, the working with the community, I feel that needs to be part of the motion, okay.

If that were part of the motion, I'd be fine with that because that's really what I want.

Okay, so those those portraits, yes, and they don't have to be ironic, they don't have to be fine.

You can't make it a lot of forester, they need to be visibly visibly native, visibly attractive, visibly something to decorate the building and to tell people yes, we heard we agree in doing it together, and then the process that we're embarked on figuring out a proof trees, um, but that needs to be part of what we're asking for, or what we're recommending to city council, and I could easily go with that.

So I guess I I need to have a better picture of what you mean about working with the community.

Um, is working with the community, is it sufficient to have it come back through PRC one more time?

Um I don't envision a stick the dots on a I mean I don't know if that's what you what you what you see for this um but I just want to be a little bit more clear on you know because the community was involved in the biodiversity plan.

Um so I don't know if it maybe there's language about that, it needs to adhere strictly to the biodiversity plan or something like that.

What I heard from staff when we uh had a meeting on your box, but um, was working on the tree lists and working on the planned collects with the PRC with um with local groups with volunteer groups.

That's what I mean by working with the community.

I don't mean 400 people putting dots on maps.

I'm never too thrilled with that, but the the actual work that Russell was describing to me, that sounded right, and that's that's already in the process of planning, as I understood in the process of implementing that.

It is not our radar screen for this fall winter, yes.

But that's it.

That's what I want.

I just want it to be clear that this is the process we're going to be using.

These will be discussions that will happen, and then it'll come back to the VRC.

We're like saying, Yay, so what is uh let's let commissioner block you take a shot at what you what you would like.

And if you want us to all the pause for and be quiet for a little bit, can I just weigh out?

I'm just gonna weigh in with the comment on that.

But the axe I'm grinding has to do with the site planning process that needs, at least at the conceptual level, needs to hit the council in a different way than that.

That's not what this resolution is going to tell.

I have a nice right.

My vote's probably gonna be supplying.

Otherwise, I would be perfectly comfortable with putting it under the purview of the city arborist you know so we we approve the location number size and by the way I don't think they'll be in box but that's not um I would otherwise be comfortable city arborist being that point of uh community cohesion can be put by whatever we need the city finds acceptable to look at those four trees on the oceans so like I said we're gonna go anywhere we're gonna hope I appreciate it so I appreciate that work that you store in and also you can see things from our first so thank you but you want no that's good.

Well so we know that city staff is planning an interdepartmental group to tackle this issue and the city forester is gonna be critical part of that I'm sure there'll be people from public works and planning and everything.

I don't know it's a either has barely kicked off or hasn't kicked off yet and so it has not been able to influence this plan and um I'm you know I want to be sure that it gets to influence this plan that's kind of where I'm at and I and I also want to make sure that there's a few touch points with the public as a part of that because you almost could create an advisory committee that involved you know some of our partners you know canopies the you know various groups that we've all heard mostly at the uh March meeting but um you know folks that submitted letters um you almost could do that but yeah I know that there's you know tons of stuff on the plate so I guess commissioner brought you to take a shot at it no no I want to respond to what commissioner summer said my understanding for what you also told me was the creation of such an advisory committee a staff interdepartmental working group is not what I'm looking for because we all know that staff is still building expertise in this that's why we had consultants that's like um so staff isn't quite there yet but there are people in the community that are there yet and that are there already that have professional expertise in this and that have and an advisory group such as is being set up as I understood what Russia said is what it was looking for and the work of such a group to work on the plant palette give it a year it should be enough and it's it's scheduled to start if that groups looks at the plant palette appropriately for the city that that that conform to the biodiversity plan and to the to the goals that that biodiversity plan um has has specified.

They should do that work of preparing the palettes, and out of those palettes the trees should be chosen.

And if they're not all native, they're not all native.

Not all of the street trees are native, but maybe at least some of them are ponderance is what we wanted to be native.

And when that group is done, it'll come back to the PRC, and then the recommendation can be made to council.

Um so two things that should be part of the motion.

One of them is to move forward with staff's recommendation, exchange support, here we go.

In the front of the building with appropriate native trees, and use the plant palettes recommended by the advice report that staff has moved to it together.

That's the correct wording for it to choose um to replace the the preponderance of the non-native trees in the um for the planting for the mitigation planting of the safety building site.

If I may so we hang on just a second, I just want to make sure we capture this so in that little gap that there was in the gap between alternatives and two.

Um it was the notion of working with the uh working group?

No, no, hold on.

That's the sounds, oh, in on the on the unfrankly.

I'm sorry, is the frontage villa?

Yes, of course, which is with appropriate uh native trees, locally native, well, native trees, okay, and then um or no then you'll so after Arboras a full stop, and the second part of it is these four.

Is this where you want to mention the working group advisory file?

Yes, that has community members, not just staff members, yes.

Um that result will filter in and have the PRC review again.

Okay, yeah, there's not one, yeah.

Staff's been thinking so far.

I think we're and so maybe if you just Commissioner Brain, yes, I'm sorry.

Creation of some um alternative plant pallets and the timing of this project.

I don't know how those are going to coincide right now, and that's where I'm having a hard time.

Okay, that's what I question.

What if and please tell me what if we looked at the site, we worked with canopy, we can name another group, and um, in concert with public works, city arborists, that and within the within the context of the biodiversity and urban forest plan that we'll be able to make a recommendation for those trees, and I'm saying that I I like where you're going.

It's the timing for me is the issue right now, and I think we'll be in a place to do that in the future.

We are in this crossroads of a site plan that's already been developed.

Yeah.

We're trying to fit information, a plan that we've been developing, but hasn't we haven't done a lot of work on it yet.

It's not it's not adopted.

But that the and but the spirit is there, right?

It is.

I get it.

And so I'm trying to figure out if it's a matter of working with others to come up with a plant palette that is specific to this site before we get to the larger palettes.

That's fine.

But I'm I'm I'm having a hard time trying to work within the confines of this larger group that we're going to be working into and the timing thereof.

So I'm trying to find a win-win, but I'm and I'm I can't support looking at that as the solution.

If you think that's not realistic, is that fine?

Okay.

Thank you for saying that.

Oh well, the one question about the it's almost like doubling the word developing flag to a ledge for that specific site.

But we have the majority, we have the street trees.

I think it's a matter of just coming up with better alternatives and and some that we have right now.

Canopy are not experts on the D plan here, but we do have the little space shore of the and little face shore is not that far away from Villa Street.

I mean, we we have a basic, we have plant.

So if you wanted to work with the little facial plant, let you canopy and bring it back to the PRC.

So I need to understand whether there's a the rest of your members feel they need to come back.

I arose um some of my question was just answered.

My question was going to be given the working group or whatever it's going to be called, won't even start until the earliest the fall.

It just felt like the timing would line up.

So you confirmed my suspicion about that.

Um I think I just lost the train of thought on my second part of the question about timing.

Um yeah, come back to.

I for one, I'm comfortable with the general phrasing of putting this on a city arborist and not over-specifying complex classes.

So would you would you take that first sentence and then just add a second sentence that um city arborists will reevaluate or whatever the right word is, the remaining part of the plant palette or have it come back to the PRC?

Um I'm sorry, my question was the feasibility of coming back to BRC because this is go this needs to go to council.

So ASAP is the whole plant palette working group.

Oh, as a separate project.

I don't know.

I mean, that was part of whether whether or whether you need to be done in item, we never see this again.

I mean, that's what the question is.

Um, because there's this, and then there's a separate plant pallet for the city.

Oh, that's just I'm not even talking about that.

That's a different so if it if this came back with a different plant palette to the PRC, is that even feasible?

Plant you mean tree palette?

Tree palette.

So it was here for now after phase one, right?

So next, and I'll defer to I'll let Ed speak to that.

I can just share the timing as I've shared before.

Package one is site prep removal of trees along Villa and building pad prep.

No trees are in that package two is going to council for consideration of approval in the spring of 2027.

Uh for bidding out the main building and the front edge and and actually the rest of the site developed.

So that's package two, and I'll let that speak to this preference about how to go.

Um I'm just gonna speak about just timing and you know, feasibility.

Um, I'm gonna bring you into a little bit of our world on developing plants, so it's very much an iterative process.

Um, we go through sort of stages of plans, um, we get to like a 50% stage, a 75% stage, and then a hundred percent stage, and we're developing the plans as we get there.

Um by the time spring hits of 2027, you're hearing this.

We're gonna go to council for approval of the main building, the site, the plans are complete, they're fully complete, which allows us to bid out the project or contract.

Um so we need the runway in front of that to prepare the details.

So we're preparing the details this whole time.

So over the next in realistically over the next May, um essentially by about February, March, we're pretty much done.

This is the only time frame that we have to do it because we were wrapping everything up at the end, and then we're going to council.

So just to give you a timing of framing, it's it isn't that next year we'll be in front of council, and then there's gonna be an opportunity just to just uh yeah, sign in a new whole new set of plans, uh, you know, irrigation may change, other specificities, so it really complicates our efforts.

Um, and so and you know, speaking to uh John's comment about the feasibility, the timing just it doesn't work, but I again I we're we're absolutely hearing what you're saying, working closely with staff and how we can incorporate kind of the best planting plan palette for the site that is in concert with what we've been hearing.

Sounds right, so thank you.

Thank you.

So I was going to say, uh you gave me the metaphor.

The horse is out of the barn, you guys would this doesn't get to be perfectly harmonized with the biodiversity and urban forest plan.

It's too late.

And I think the progress that we've made is fabulous, and there'll still be the actual full planting plan that will get done.

Um I don't see any reason to come back to the parks and record commission, the urban forestry board.

There's nothing in the city's ordinances that requires it.

We are we're talking about species, and that's not even in there.

So what I guess what I was trying to come up with was something that would sort of satisfy the this this intense public interest in the subject, without throwing a big old monkey wrench into this process that's well on the way and has uh already spent a lot of the city's money to get there, so um, yeah, the this isn't an ideal process, and um I'm I'm very disappointed about that, but there's also no format for it except the city council and the input of citizens as commissioner Bryant raised.

There's no other NP that can um make those decisions.

So, what are you proposing?

I'm proposing that we Alison, can you please put that back?

We make changes that are kind of simple, this the four trees along Villa, and then we trust the city's arborist to hear what we said, which I I do trust the city's arborists or we put in a second sentence of we would have a preference to uh on the other regal oaks um the well, my to my mind, I my thinking is that's I would like to see some of them changed to a native species, but I there is a place for that tree on this site plan.

It's a hybrid oak.

It could, but that doesn't make it an impropriate plant to plant in a difficult situation.

It it could also pollinate with our native oaks.

It is truly a risk that is not worth taking.

I I disagree about that, Renee.

And we aren't experts, so I think we should leave it to technical people with technical expertise to make a decision.

So I wouldn't support a motion that that micromanaged that to that level.

I would change exchange for the two exchange several species with appropriate native trees to be determined by the CPRs.

And others if possible.

Well, that's several.

I think the four I think the four prints oaks.

Well, I don't know.

Those are coming up.

Well, maybe they're not.

It's the first phase.

They're gonna be really prominent.

They are part of the showcase.

Back to my language about just where they are, right?

Not when they are Prince Oaks on Villa Street and other potential species.

Alright, so I'm gonna make a motion and I guess it'll we'll see how it does.

So you get three out of four, so I understand.

I move that we forward a recommendation to the city council to approve the mitigation of the 40 heritage trees at a two to one replacement ratio with the planting of 80 24 inch box trees within the project site, and that we recommend that they that the plan be brought forward to the council with the replacement or you know exchange of the four prints oaks on villa with and substituting another um native tree in that location to be determined by the city arborist.

Do you want to put the word showcase native tree for something like that?

I don't know what it means.

I'm just trying to deep.

We don't want just any okay, okay.

I'm getting I would correct the name of the the oak just so it's specific, but I guess they're requiring oil, regal.

Regalus, yeah, what is it?

So what I was suggesting is that the plan that be brought forward to the council include that replacement.

Yep.

So I don't know that that's clear there, yeah.

Uh the uh the and other what comes after that's a little confusing to me, but I don't know how to simplify that.

Yeah, I would take out the and other potential species that the motion is making other species on the site.

Right, but it's it's the other non-native species on the site.

Including the other terms be explore.

Sure, explore other species, not demand because we can't get we're not prepared to guarantee that we can find suitable for every other tree that we've recommended.

I think it's fair to imagine that four trees could be you could make that with with some thought you could select a species that you could find four of, but to ask for all the other non-native plants.

I I'm not making that motion.

So it just where it says explore other potential species with the program.

I think it doesn's automatically.

I would like to take that out of my motion.

And um so other substitutions, yeah, or deemed feasible by the arbitration.

Yeah.

So a next sentence would be explore other substitutions.

Within the plan.

Sorry, where where are we?

Substitution.

And explore this part.

At the discretion of the city armors.

Yeah.

I'm not sure what you're asking.

Yeah, just go too fast.

After substitution.

I'm sorry.

Oh after.

Okay.

Then what?

I think so.

That reads.

Clearly.

Okay.

So um, so nail expenditures okay.

Oh yeah.

So at the end of that prior to council review.

And can you do that?

And can you do that?

Can I consider the alternatives before we go to council?

More than just the form.

I think that's reasonable, yes.

All right.

Yeah, again, ultimately when we're talking about going back towns where otherwise it might be gonna be spring of next year.

So while we may not be done with the working lists or otherwise, this is something that absolutely we can spend some additional time.

I would very much like to request that when the report goes to council.

If you do choose, if you do decide to keep the regal prints, don't explain their presence there as because the city wants oaks.

Understood.

Take that out because that.

I understand.

Is that a good point to say?

Understood.

So we have a motion.

Is that the motion?

I think it's pretty close, but so this is a little bit different.

You feel satisfied with it, but if somebody wants to make a friendly amendment, so do we have a second?

I think unfortunately, I think you'll have to read it again because it's worded different from what you would think about.

Okay, so I move that we uh forward a recommendation to the city council to approve the litigation of 40 heritage trees at a two to one replacement ratio with the planting of 80 24 inch box trees within the project site, and to exchange the four regal prints oaks on Villa Street and explore other substitutions with appropriate native trees to be determined by the city arborist prior to council review.

That's what's on the table.

Yeah, that's fine.

I'm just trying to when you exchange, you need to exchange something for something.

No, I think substitute.

To exchange the full regal prints oaks on Villa Street with appropriate native ones.

Yeah, that's that phrase or substitute on the okay on Villa Street.

Say after Villa Street say with appropriate native trees.

Just after Villa Street, just say it's just gonna cut it and paste it.

It's very good.

That was a okay, yeah.

And put that and explore other substitutions right, yeah, right there.

I think that a couple of substitutions.

Yeah.

Yeah, native trees, comma, otherwise we're getting the ground.

So slows down here.

Okay.

Is there a second?

Do we need to reread it?

Oh, wait, I have one more.

So after substitutions, it needs a comma.

All right.

Now I we're punctuated.

Well, you think I have to reread it, so right.

Or you can you can get rid of the and explore and you could just put a period after trees and then start a new sentence with explore other substitutions to be determined.

Well, yeah, I would prefer that, but we seem to like run on sentences and motions.

Whatever you prefer to it's your motion.

Okay.

So you haven't read it at least, change it and the and before explore other substitutions.

Put a period after two and then make that.

And instead of exchange, since we're on a roll, I would like to say substitute.

And that makes sense.

All right.

Would you like to read it?

Yeah.

Shouldn't we add explore other substitutions with a preference for native trees?

Yes.

Are there native plant substitutions?

Native tree substitutions.

Explore out of the substitutions, comma with the preference for native trees, comma.

Yeah, I think we just lost that when we made a new sentence.

Yes.

Preference four.

Okay, yeah.

I think we're there.

Okay, sure.

But you're gonna vote for it.

Yes.

Just one whole house.

So does it need to be done orally?

Okay.

Alright, so the revised motion with all everyone's assistance is to forward a recommendation to the city council to approve the mitigation of 40 heritage trees at a two to one replacement ratio with the planting of 80 24 inch box trees within the project site.

And to substitute the four regal prints oaks on the street with appropriate native trees.

Explore other substitutions with a preference for native trees to be determined by the city arborist prior to council review.

Okay, we have a motion.

Is there a second?

Sure, I'll second it since I'm going to vote for it.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

And there's discussion before, but I've thought we can have discussion.

So I I commend you and I actually really support this.

Uh I will not vote for it simply as a symbolic measure.

I want to say something about frustration.

I'm optimistic.

I think changing city policy is like turning a battleship.

I think that's the analogy.

And I think we're we are gonna get there.

My um vote is a symbolic vote only because I think having there be a semblance of concern is important.

It worked the last time we got news ink on it, and um I think that the visibility helps in change and I I am optimistic that we are changing policy, so um I I appreciate what you guys come on.

Thank you, and thank you for your instructive policy to be getting to the change.

Um any further comments, quick comment.

Um we haven't fully addressed Commissioner Davis's comments.

I just want to commend you for your moral stance.

Um, I really wish we had seen this earlier or been involved in a way that we could have saved the redwood grove.

I agree with everything you said about it symbolic and other importance.

I just wanted to say that.

Okay.

Any other comments before we have Ms.

Flynn conduct the vote?

All right, let's vote.

Okay, Commissioner Bryan.

Yes, sir Davis.

Commissioner Sylvester, yes, Vice Chair Summer.

Yes, and that passes four to one.

It's the irony is killing me.

You know, this is Oak Street.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

How do we give us a hug How do we give us a h do we give us a hug And then we're going to do that.

Okay.

Okay.

So, you know.

So, I don't know.

Um, I think your other option is a mitigation fee act, and so we're looking to utilize both of those frameworks uh moving forward based on those decisions that have been made at the court level.

Um, and so that's why we're going through um this policy change, if you will, and going through this process.

In addition, um there's uh some language in the housing element, of which there is a desire to reduce some of the fees, um, and so what the nexus study does, it creates a maximum fee, it determines what your maximum fee is, but then through city policy, this city policy can actually further reduce that.

We just can't charge more than the maximum of the nexus study, and so those are some of the things we're working on right now.

So who is Nexus that sets the I mean that has highest cloud?

I mean, so no, it's it's the the nexus study determines what the direct nexus of net new residents and their cost and impact to our parks and recreational facilities, and so there they can they through a set of data, they look at what the uh what we have is a cost of um purchasing land and then also maintaining land, and they create this um data set that helps identify what those maximum fees are, right?

But you can't exceed that.

So I mean, but there must be some law that is there's some law that says this is the maximum and you can't exceed it.

I mean, no, it's by it's by each jurisdiction based on what your costs are.

That's the engineer's report.

Okay, anyway, I've jumped in.

Other questions, questions?

My questions were regarding your study.

So do you um foresee what kind of change do you foresee in funding and broader bill?

I think there will be a slight reduction in the fees we receive.

There is a concern long term, depending on how far um California law wants to go in trying to increase housing supply versus having parks and and facilities to keep up with that demand.

There is concern that there is going to be a shift, a further shift, possibly if there is that dynamic takes place.

So the obviously parkland fees and other fees, it's not just parkland fees that are applied to new development, but um that's one of the fees that are seen as a hindrance or a barrier to more affordable housing.

What do you park commissions and other jurisdictions that you're aware of do to help um assure funding spread?

So we do work with a firm at a city level, and they help us communicate to the state when we see assembly bills coming through.

We will and through the mayor will send communication to legislature and legislators that we're not, you know, we wouldn't support that action.

So we have done that in the past.

Uh, from your level, um, it's hard.

Um I don't have a good answer.

Thanks for the report.

So I know a few questions.

I with the with the um parkland fees, you know, it sounds like the residential is going to go down.

Was there is there an opportunity for there to be some fees linked with commercial development?

Because to me, they benefit from work planning as well.

So the answer is yes.

Uh while it is a increase in funds that we would anticipate, I can't say it's significant.

Um, it just depends on the size and number of employees coming in because it's based on number of people, not the size of the development.

Could it offset or will it not quite offset?

Well, quite offset.

I was hoping.

So was I.

Okay.

Um another question.

Uh uh with the uh on the two projects, you just put those up real quick.

The ones that are the future, those guys.

Um any estimate on when we might be able to when the design might start.

I mean, even though that two acres is gonna just as uh staging, that does that preclude us from starting to work on the design.

No, it doesn't preclude us um for design.

Um it precludes us from actually going out for construction bidding.

Right.

Um so I I would not expect we have to, and again, I I'll explain a little bit that as Brenda was stating when it's a significant project, such as the two-acre park, we have to rely on our project managers and public works.

They have a each of them.

There's a limited supply of those project managers, and so we have to wait for project managers to complete projects and then have uh an opening to bring in a new project.

So while we might be ready as CSD to move those project managers are not quite ready, so given that and then the number of projects in the queue right now, I probably wouldn't expect to see um a park design here for at least a year.

About a year.

Are these two?

Yeah, so you know, neither of those two, then so I guess a little bit of what if I'm looking forward or I'm looking ahead to the PRC and the work plan will come to us later, but um for the next year.

Are we gonna have an opportunity to do a part design at any meeting in the next year?

Okay, yeah, it's also a year, okay.

Um and then uh the Villa Chiquita is opening this summer.

I guess you don't have a date, but we'll will we be notified, there'll be a uh ceremony and stuff.

I believe we're looking late summer at this point.

Okay, and then I'll just tell a quick story.

This is it neither here nor there on automatic lights.

So I was it there's a game at McKelby Park.

There was a little league game.

Is it was an all-star game?

Winner moves on to the next day, losers eliminated and and the there's a schedule that needs to anyway, two outs the last inning, fly ball gets hit, it's in the air.

I was at the game.

Lights go lights go off.

And so yeah, they had to bring all the teams back and and the next day just to finish, you know, on one I bet I get it.

The automatic lights are did he catch it?

No, yes, yeah.

Anyway, um, but that's a true story because I was actually there.

Right at 10 o'clock, they go on.

So, okay, um, so I think that's it for the questions.

Uh is there any public comment?

None online.

All right, I'll close public comment and just come back to us and if there's any other comments you want to make or go ahead.

Well, I'll just say I'm um glad to see all these long planned projects moving along.

Um, and it's nice to see the renovations on the CIP as well, because we want to keep those moving along.

Um it feels like maybe we're taking a pause, and that's probably okay.

I think there's more in the works.

There's more in the works.

Okay.

Trying to make room in the make pass that okay.

Okay, because you know we do have, well I think the just to say this I think I was reading the new park and recreation strategic plan which is going to council next week.

And I really like some of the wording that you know that I'm seeing in there about you know relating to the deficit in certain planning areas.

But um I think we did a good job.

Yeah yeah and and hopefully we'll you know these renovations and the other projects are taking care of some of those but I think I just wanted to say you know we want to be able to make the connection in the future from this to that the strategies.

So that'll work on over the next year and as we do this next year.

And I know I don't think staff feels like we're taking a pause.

I don't know what I should mention as I we are trying to come up with some creative solutions forward and waiting in the queue for public works to take on new projects was was getting frustrating for us because we understand there's only so much you know only so much on workload on your plate.

And so we worked with public works to try to figure out how CSD could lead some of these projects again within those guardrails and that's how we came up the San Barone Park and Sierra Bis to work closely with them where we can lead those projects but we do have limitations.

We do also I'm gonna point out we do have Golly Besson in our in our audience.

She is our new parks project coordinator we're very excited to have her on and she's been leading some even smaller sort of internal projects which make a big impact and do respond to the Parks and rec strategic plan and the biodiversity plan that aren't gonna be listed necessarily on these you know slides but that we'll be bringing to you and giving you updates on improvements that we're making and while I say they're not these big improvements they're still impactful improvements that are on a smaller scale but benefit our residents benefit our habitat benefit our park so yeah we're excited to have her and she's just jumped right in and she's already been working on some of these renovation projects so I think also just to add to that so again this does seem like just a small slice of projects but in it in addition to some of these smaller projects that Brenda's mentioning there are other CIPs in CSD that are funded with other funding sources that aren't mentioned here.

So there are like shoreline projects that use a different funding source there's um other park renovation forestry maintenance CIPs where we are constantly doing other work but it's just not parkland fund.

Great all right if there are no further questions thank you very much Lindsay and uh we'll be we're conclude this this particular thanks thank you uh we'll now move on to our item 5.3 recent part design evaluation and assistant community service director from the Sylvia will be uh presenting on this again on the process on this we'll have the staff presentation uh opportunity for questions then public comment and then just some discussion and again we will not on this one be uh voting on this um staff will be listening to PRC directions and comments and taking notes and I think this will circle back to us again at some point.

So I went old school and provided hand out for this because it is a discussion um so in response to PRC express a desire to come up with some kind of a park design evaluation process um we staff got together and over the last few months have come up with a draft process that we wanted to go over with you see how you feel about this we can make some tweaks to it um I'll be leading establishing the process and then once the process is established, we will hand it over to Golly to work with you and and um carry it out.

So listed the goals in the front.

It would gather community feedback to evaluate how well completed park projects align with community needs and identified priorities, create consistent and predictable opportunities for post-opening evaluation once parks are in active use.

We we could establish whether it's six to nine months after opening, we can we can work with that.

Provide multiple ways for the public to share feedback, ensure that PRC members are meaningfully engaged, meaningfully engaged, understanding how park designs perform in real-world use, translate evaluation findings into clear lessons learned and actionable considerations for future park planning and design, and then maintain a process that is simple, repeatable, and transparent to build confidence in park design decision making among PRC staff in the community.

These are some of the things that we heard, we heard from you that you really wanted.

So we base our process off of these goals.

So we like sort of that copy with a cop concept, and Christine came up with park it with the commissioner, which I thought was really cute.

So I wrote that down.

Um that would the park it with the commissioner is an interactive evaluation approach that brings PRC members into newly completed parks to hear directly from park users.

Uh it emphasizes that relationship building, visibility, real-time learning, collaboration, and connecting you with our community members and then connecting with us.

So six to nine months uh after a new park opens, the city launches a short approximately five question evaluation survey.

Surveys promoted through QR codes.

We can have A-frames in the park, we can have it on our city website, create a park project page, uh, social media and other outreach channels.

During that evaluation period, each PRC member would host one scheduled park it with a commissioner engagement day at the park.

Um, like we said, similar to coffee with a pop.

On those engagement days, the PRC member would host an informal table in the park.

Doesn't have to be a table, you can walk around.

We were just sort of spitballing ideas here.

Uh, encouraging users to complete the survey.

We can have um the survey in um on a clipboard, like actually hard copies, or we can have that QR code available if someone wants to scan it with their phone, and then also engaging in dialogue with the park users and commissioners can be noting that feedback.

So you're documenting the themes, any unexpected outcomes or surprises, strong alignment with park design and areas of misalignment that we can do better on next time.

Uh the engagement days would be uh scheduled on various days and times, so a weekend, middle of the day, a weekend in the morning, we could do a weekday and the afternoon after school is out, those types of things, trying to capture all the diverse user groups.

Staff would compile the survey results, PRC's engagement notes, and any other operational observations that our maintenance crew, our programming team could take a look at, and then we would present a summary report to the PRC identifying those key findings and the design lessons learned.

So the benefits of this program, it provides both quantitative and qualitative feedback, it strengthens that community connection, makes PRC visible to our community, allows commissioner to see firsthand the users and the design functions, creates a documented loop that we can always be looking back on and use it to inform future park projects, and again reinforces that transparency and accountability in that design process.

And then we don't need to go through this necessarily, but this is an example of the survey, and what we did was we we tried to make it very short, easy for people to answer, but we also base each evaluation category is based on the parks strategic plan.

So those areas of assessment were access and connectivity, condition, functionality, safety and comfort, and biodiversity.

So we based it off of the parks and strategic plan.

And uh, you know, the questions how easy is it to get to and move around within the park?

That one addresses your access and connectivity.

Um, so we can create the survey, it's real easy.

But these were just some example questions that we have found that um are easy to answer that address those assessment categories that we could have some open-ended questions.

We've got some some flexibility with all this, but we just wanted to kind of give you an idea and give you a flavor of what we were thinking of, and we figured we could open this up for a discussion and see how you feel about market with the commissioner.

I think it's fantastic.

I'm I'd be delighted to work in that role, understanding that that role would be pretty early.

So the sceptical friend, but not, you know, we're not going to be there debating things with the public.

Um I would say, I think my look for parts, one of the challenges for me would be language.

Um, with novel, uh not for me, but it's a lot of people that speak language that I don't speak well.

So that would be one challenge.

I think the concept's great.

I think it could be augmented with the neighborhood associations or great intervals.

Um they all need ice cream socials or things in the way.

Um I'd be, you know, as a commissioner, I'd be happy to work with a couple neighborhood associations and go to their events and kind of be a representative, not a representative, but uh a conduit for communication.

So that's just my other is the don't discount the building in the neighborhood associations, particularly for the smaller, you know, the particular parts, uh, but other than that, I think it's great.

I uh love that we're doing the uh post design documents, which I think is really important part of the process.

Okay.

Um I love it.

It sounds like a great way for commissioners to really hear what's going on in the community and for the more importantly for the community to feel like it's being heard.

A couple of questions though.

Um, it seems like a lot of the feedback would be about would be used in thinking about designing few future parks, but how much of the feedback because people will ask.

Well, I've told you that the trash can isn't good enough.

So, how much of the feedback could go into improving that current part?

Sure, we can because I know people will ask.

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

That that feedback, that sounds like it's operational.

We might uh we would love to hear that because we should be always improving ourselves on operations and maintenance.

So absolutely just think about how to make you know how to message it to people and going up to them.

You know, we're trying to improve your your park, we're trying to improve future parks.

I think people might be more interested if they thought there was something immediate immediately in it for them.

Some people would certainly be motivated by hey, I'm gonna help other parks too.

So just something to think about, and we could test that messaging when we got talk to people.

Um, my second question is a comment is this would be amazing to do in some of our existing parks, especially the ones that are in the um the parks plan to be considered for renovation or um renewal in the near future.

Um, like some of the parks would you these questions would be great.

Like what's working in your park before we go redesign it or refurbish it, you know.

What's working?

What do you like about it?

What's good with the upkeep?

I think this would be a phenomenal tool to use.

Um, we're looking at refurbishing renovating programs.

And again, I will remind you when we we do that, we we have to replace like for life or it's a new project, and so try again.

I'm just trying to manage expectations.

She might be talking about you know, if if you look at the action items on the strategic plan, there's there's a bunch of parks coming up.

Yeah, yeah.

We were looking at um kind of launching this for Evelyn Park because Evelyn Park has been open for about a year now.

If we wanted to go as far back, we could also do Fayette, but we were kind of looking at those two parks or something we could we could you know get going with right away, and then of course the next one up would be Villa Chaquita, get that one open, and then we could we can look at that one as well.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah, sounds like a lot of fun, sure.

Go ahead.

Uh, so when we first talked about it, it was more um kind of a learning for the commission, uh, which I think is it's very valuable.

Um doing doing the uh kind of asking people uh get this bring in a question uh do we have a budget for small changes?

Because once you start asking people questions, you'll get answers and if you can't do something small about it, you could create we do and it would depend on what it is.

Um I I'll give you an example.

We're updating some of our outdated signage in some of our parks and that we have the budget for it's not a huge split.

We were able to carve out some funds.

Golly's been kind of working on that.

So it would depend on what those are um but yeah we we've got some we can certainly respond and I I hear you you're right because it then all of a sudden it's setting expectations here we are asking you about the park and and we're not going to do anything.

So yeah I think if we can get creative with what those are and take a look at what we've heard and where we could identify things that we could do internally.

So part of of the conversation about the strategic plan was ways of improving making small changes all over time.

And I'm not I'm just saying this is the direction to think about you know that there's places where there's a participant to participatory budget with small amounts of small amounts for different neighborhoods of different parks or whatever where people can can say this is what our neighborhood association or group or block really wants and the city has money set aside for things like that.

And there'd be an interesting direction to to go another thought I had uh the question of language and the city manager's office has the multicultural whatever they're they're called these days but they have multilingual multilingual um it might be interesting perhaps for certain parks to to make contact with rent see maybe oh yeah we had intended to with the biodiversity plan every survey we put out was in multiple languages we even had the hard copies in multiple languages so whatever we would do in outreach we had um we had it in Mandarin we had it in Spanish we we had in Russian we had multiple we had those at the ready oh yeah I I completely I didn't even ask about that actually I was sure you would need to do that that's probably the kind of the DNA of the city but even in in going out it might be maybe a commissioner could go with with some multicultural people that's going to make interaction easier.

I think the idea of using the neighborhood associations or various neighborhood events to to have a table of the PRC why not tell us about the park tell us you know how you feel about it.

I mean there's this many ways to get kind of conversations going I I think this is great this is I mean there's all kinds of new ideas could be problems the only problems there but wonderful to start it and see what happens so some of the themes I'm hearing do we just take out the word new and design it's just a park evaluation process.

I'm hearing that going to the neighborhood association that for existing parks talking about some of the maintenance that the existing maintenance and operations and some of the improvements that can be made this should this could just be a park evaluation process that could be any old park.

Can I respond to that I think that's really actually my original comments are really in my head more on the frame of general I do think it's important for doing a post-design evaluation to be most meaningful it should be held up against the goals, you know, what did we set up to achieve do we achieve that?

Other inputs, great, you know, additional thoughts, but I think for a a design evaluation, hold up against what the commission would do, and the council said we were trying to do it again design.

Well, we could we could always do two surveys, one for just existing parks that's a little bit more about making those improvements and tweaks, and we could have a survey that's really specifically for like that new park design, and did we hit the mark?

Did we meet those goals?

So we could kind of have those two specific surveys depending on what we're evaluating.

So I think what the commissioner summer has been patient, I just have a shot.

Um I think this is fabulous.

I remember back when I was a chalk, the professor uh Claire Cooper Marcus who just passed away, her whole thing was park post occupancy evaluation.

She sort of started it back in the 60s, and so there's a lot of you know material about how to interact with people about that.

Uh yeah, the goals are I mean, everything about this is wonderful, and so you know things are just kind of flying around in my head, like how would you deal with this?

What about that?

So, you know, I'll just say what those are.

Um, you know, so a lot of sports teams are very seasonal.

Like if you were going to go to a park in the middle of you know, late late spring, you wouldn't catch any soccer players, let's say, right?

So they're playing soccer.

You probably would catch the pickup soccer, but not the organized sports.

So there may need to be you we talked about the topic of the neighborhood associations was mentioned, but the sports organized sports, youth sports, adult sports, whatever, and might need to be part of it somehow.

Um, and then also what about the open spaces?

The quest to annex, uh shoreline.

I don't even know if you would tackle that all in what at once.

Um, for example, when the when the um scal gets replaced when that project happens, you know, would you just sort of draw a dotted line around that and say, Yeah, let's go out and have uh uh evaluation of the scale, or when you know, Michael's gonna replaced so that's when you think about how would you deal with the larger parks.

You're gonna take it all at once, that's a pretty big chunk.

Um, then with the open spaces, I think the questions are a little bit different, so that might be worth it about and then have a different evaluation.

Also, are you taking it to some recreation?

You know, the golf, for example.

So that's a question.

And then the other thing seems to me that it would be wonderful to have a service component to this, um, as part of what's happening the day that the survey is happening.

You know, there's uh March 3 day of service in January, is that when that is, um, and you know, so like a lot of the parks have kind of almost a cleanup day that the neighborhood associations run.

And I don't know, sometimes people find it more meaningful to do something instead of just talking.

Not everyone would probably be turned on by that, but it's a great way to get publicity for the event too, is like, hey, we're gonna have this day of service, so I could see you know, show the park some love and then tell us what you think.

It's all wrapped up into it, um, and that way you're connecting your like and getting the people invested in the park too, not just asking them about their thoughts.

Um, yeah, this is great, and I could so obviously you gotta start somewhere, and I like the idea of starting with new parks, but figuring out how it fits in, I think to the the broader topic parks, also you're gonna have to be kind of forced to confront that with this.

So let me throw out some other.

So, first of all, I think this is great.

Um I like that it that you link the category strategic plan.

I think that's good.

Um I think, yeah, any park.

Um, but again, you have to start somewhere, so I'd start on the newest ones because those can be things that we can learn from.

Um, things that personally I'd like to see captured in the surveys is the proximity, and this is especially with regard to many to many neighborhood parks, um, the proximity of the responder to to the park.

We have we have lots of people in our community that have strong opinions on parks in general, and could you do that?

Things out of my neighborhood.

Well, and they they weigh in frequently, and they can they can drown out in the they could drown out.

I want to hear the users, the users of this park, especially again with with neighborhood little not neighborhood, I'm using the wrong term.

Pocket parks or any smaller mini parks.

Yeah, the small parks that are just to serve um a neighborhood.

I really want to hear from those people that use those parks on a daily basis, as opposed to sort of more general um comments and that somebody might have to just have opinions on parks citywide.

So there's a way to capture that type of thing.

But I think this is um, just want to so when you do the tabling, you know.

Do we do we come with our own table, or would there be no person?

We were talking about like a little to-go box where it's like a little box, and we could potentially, you know, if we can gather up staff, I mean, these are some of the logistics, but we would, you know, this is what we do.

We're parks and wrap people.

We would we'll figure that out.

Have a little table, have a little chair, or if you want to walk around, but we'd have clipboards and get a box, and would there be a staff person there as well, or would it just be the PRC?

We haven't even gotten that far.

Um, we had talked about could we have one of our parks guys meet out there if you wanted a table and a chair to set it up, but to help, but we that was very yeah, that was getting into weekly one of us.

So yeah, just operation, operationally, there may be questions that we don't know that it's sure.

And we didn't know how you would respond to did you want to sit at a table, would you prefer to walk around?

That was some of the things we wanted to kind of vet with with you.

Some people might want to sit at a table, and some people there's benches, there's also game tables there, so we were if that was a little bit more comfortable as opposed to this formal, but we can certainly put out a table, you know, a table call.

We can do that.

We've got a lot of options, though.

Well, some of these will be interesting.

You know, for example, Evelyn and maybe to a little lesser extent, Fed.

I mean, we those were designed before people lived there, and and so you know, we're going to so it'll be interesting to hear what the people who are living there now.

Um, what they think of it, yeah.

So that that one question that kind of relates to that is, you know, how did you get there to get here today?

Or do you is this somebody who's going to close?

Did they walk?

They bike, do they drive?

Yeah, that first question, it the evaluation categories, the actors and connectivity that the proximity question could go right along with that as well.

Right.

But no, but no, just gonna be some people may be filling up that online too, right?

Right, right.

Sure, but they can still answer.

As long as the questions are pretty easy to answer, you make it really, really easy.

You just don't want to exceed, you know, seven questions.

Sometimes people don't want to fill out beyond that.

You guys can make them real easy to answer, but we can just hack on another one about proximity.

That's yeah, but you know, we don't want to redo the strategic plan process.

We we don't want to kind of have people say, oh, we need a lot more thinking about it.

Or this looming pool was too small, we want to be pool.

I think we started from the thought of here.

We are actively helping think out what a park in this neighborhood should look like, and at least some of the parks that we were working with uh designers or staff on, we go to them and say, Oh my god, this is wonderful, and so we say, uh oh, this was not at all thinking of.

And this isn't about how where the people come from who use the park, but what kind of questions should we be asking as the PRC while we are engaged in the process of communal park design?

Uh and I'm I'm I'm afraid that our search for data is leading us into repeating the all the questionnaires of the uh secure plan.

So I get just as I did with everyone else who thought of sitting in the park talking to people and saying how is this working for you?

And you know, maybe this trash can is broken and staff hasn't seen that that's something the city can do, but we we don't want to go too much into online data gathering.

We we want to look at the park that we that the city and the PRC and the community design and see what were things we needed to think about, what questions we needed to think about to teach us about what's in the next park.

Uh it's so I I so I would I would try to focus on that.

I would also focus on new parks and smaller parks because again, once you get to quest the park, we need more tennis courts, we need more pickleball, we need this, we need that.

That's not what I mean.

We did a strategic plan, we spent two years of three years, five years.

We did it.

Okay, we now have steps forward, we have goals, we have strategies, action plans, everything.

What new thing are we looking for in this process?

I mean, this is beginning.

This sounds great in the in the looking for feedback, but we don't want to go overboard to collect this data.

Let's let's decide first what is it that we really want.

Well, that was when these goals came out.

Was again what I was hearing, and I was writing down, I would be looking at my notes, it was the design.

Yes, and then with the design evaluation process, yeah.

This conversation has been about sort of park evaluations just in general, but it was initially born out of the design process.

Yes, if I was gonna look at this through a corporate analogy, you've got customer satisfaction surveys and process improvements, and they're they're kind of distinct.

They're both valuable, and I think you know the process would, you know, are we evaluating a process?

You know the design process, that's really important.

And in that scenario, I think you really do want to go with this is what the design goals were.

Do we achieve them?

What are we guessed?

How would you have done it differently?

And that's different than how do you like this park?

And how far did we, you know, you know what I mean?

All the satisfaction-related things.

Yeah, you know, I think the road is pointing to generate a whole lot of data and input, and well, we get started.

But I mean, that was a little bit of a Mr.

Sylvester's point, I think is that this can do both, right?

I mean, can we do it can accomplish?

I mean, some of these again, Evelyn Park.

Nobody, nobody who's gonna fill one of these out, had anything to do with the design, right?

Right.

I mean, we mean nobody was living there yet.

I mean, some of those meetings, I think we're only like three people that came out, so I think you get a level of of polls like that.

What happens if somebody tells you I really would have wanted a basketball court here?

What do you do then?

Is that useful information?

For designing a future park?

Maybe.

Yeah, if enough people tell you about it in enough places, yes.

It's yeah, well, and so you have to start grappling with, you know, uh, or so do you use are we talking about a whole court?

I mean, pickup can be played really well on an informal half court.

I mean, I think the other part of the side, I think we gotta do one of these and then see what happens.

Yeah, and then we can adjust it afterwards.

And I mean, if people want to tell us that, then they could tell us that it doesn't mean we have to do anything about it.

And I think that one of the things that we had talked about as a group, um, staff talked about was the one of those interesting outcomes, I think will be hearing from each different commissioner what those conversations were because there's gonna be very interesting and different sort of, you know, um responses and outtakes and interpretation of the feedback received, and that's gonna be really interesting to kind of take a look at and dive into and assess afterwards.

That's actually what wasn't for you.

Like, so far, such three removal, we all troop off to look at the tree alone, you know, each one individually.

Was that how you were thinking of this?

Or was it like one commission of the park or no?

It was so it was that every commissioner, let's just use Evelyn, goes to Evelyn Park at a different time on a different day, so you have a different lens, right?

You did you get a different experience, and that we would still have the survey so that we would provide an opportunity for it was an easy way to kind of start conversation with people.

If you were to the park and you wanted to participate in the survey, you can answer the survey, but ultimately that we have that survey data, but we also got to hear from each PRC member and what their experience was and what they took from you know being in the park and seeing and having conversations, which is gonna be very different, right?

And that's gonna be very valuable.

Well, except for the strong-minded Mrs.

X is it every, you know, it's one of two people who shows up every time.

Sure, and I can't tell her that it was Mrs.

X.

We can take a moment and uh look for public comment, please.

Oh, yeah, sorry.

Yeah, we we gripped it from questions.

Um is there uh any public comment on this?

You can introduce yourself.

Sorry about that.

My name is Bill Lambert.

I'm speaking on my behalf of myself as a resident of Waterloma neighborhood.

Um I think it's uh interesting uh uh plan.

My one recommendation is is to I think it would be interesting to approach it like uh um understanding what a day in the life of a park looks like and the reason that is is that you show up at any given hour, let's say during the day, you're gonna see a certain cross section of people there.

Six a.m.

in the morning, 10 p.m.

at night.

They're gonna be different people all through the day, and a weekend is going to look different than a weekday, and uh, you know, so um takes a lot of time, and I I think too, you learn a lot by just not even talking to people, but just watching and see what people do and how they're used and where people come and go.

Um it's a great education, right?

You shouldn't you're making decisions for the community.

You should understand uh what's going on in the parks.

Um so uh yeah, I think it's a good idea and good luck.

Thank you.

Um any online public comment.

Yes, we have just inland.

Hi, Bruce.

Sorry, sorry for the delay in getting to you.

Oh, that's okay.

I was um making dinner and listening to you all in the background, so all work back.

I'm one of the two people who show up every time.

So me and Bill.

Um, this is interesting um information.

Um however, the um, just trying to find my notes here.

Yeah, the um there was no uh file in the packet.

I saw that you all were looking at something in front of you, but um we didn't have the advantage of being able to see that information.

So um hope uh uh in future discussions we could see that.

Um so we have something to look at ahead of time.

In any case, this all sounds great.

I just wanted to comment on um the communities that are using our park.

So the neighborhood associations, that sounds important.

I know uh Bill uh is interested in the monoloma area.

There are people who use the parks not only at all times of the day, as Bill pointed out, um, but also in different kinds of communities.

So the active transportation community, for example.

Um, people are moving across all these different park locations and using them as stopping points and not really hanging out at an individual park, but stopping off there to use the restrooms, use the water fountain um if they want to sit on a bench or something like that, they can take advantage of shade that hopefully will be provided in our parks by uh tree canopy and things like that.

So I just wanted to bring that up.

That I brought it up many times, but having the amenities strong in all of our parks means having conversations with people who um care about those things, and I think the active transportation community would be um strong in that.

So that could come through Mountain View Coalition for Sustainable Planning or Green Spaces or the Bike Coalition, for example, and I don't mean to make that exclusive, but I think it's an important community to talk to.

And then lastly, um bringing up the lighting strategies for parks is something else we bring up a lot with the dark skies ordinance coming up in mind that as you're making changes to existing parks and planning for new parks to be mindful about how lighting is handled.

Uh lighting has to be safe, that's true, but it also needs to be sensitive to uh biodiversity now with the biodiversity plan um coming on board.

It's gonna be important to pay attention to those things and also the dark sky ordinances which haven't been fully fleshed out.

Yeah, thanks.

Thank you, Bruce.

Anyone else?

That's it.

All right, we'll close public comment.

Um we've already sort of done a lot of our deliberation.

Anybody else any other comments before we close this?

And I'll just say this is this was a touch point, and I don't want to thank Brenda.

She really did put a lot of time and effort into creating a framework.

Um, so we this is our first touch point with you to try to get some initial feedback.

We weren't sure if this was exactly what you were looking for.

I'm happy to hear that there's overall support for what we brought forward, not me.

Um with some good feedback, so um, I just wanted to say this was this is a starting point, and if you want to.

Yeah, yeah.

So I just wanted to, did we hit the market?

That's what we wanted to know.

So um I know that it wasn't anything we were going to include because we were not making a recommendation, it was really just a discussion on is this something that you're interested in doing.

Should we be moving forward?

We can formalize the process, bring back some of the feedback that we heard.

Um, it sounds like we're shifting a little bit back to this new park design, kind of starting with that, and then we can refine it as we go, but at least we can kind of um put something in place, and um we can bring this back uh in early early fall, like in the first slide.

Yeah, and we can we can get started right away.

We can make some of these updates and um formalize that process and then Golly will take the ball and run with it and say, Yay, let's go.

We can figure out some of the logistics um about kind of figuring out who wants to go when, where, that kind of thing.

So we're not all to Bill's point like going at the same time because you're right.

Staying alive at the park is gonna be very different at very different times.

So appreciate the feedback.

I'm happy to hear that that uh you're as excited about park it with the commissioner as we are.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for bringing this to us for the work.

Sure, sure.

Okay, uh, we'll now move on to item six.

Uh commission staff announcements.

Uh director Marshawn, do you have any?

We have two more meetings.

Um in June.

The first meeting will be two here's tree appeals, and then uh we'll be looking at the uh operating budget for the next fiscal year.

And then the second meeting is another two heritage tree appeals and our work plan.

So that's what's on the app.

Was already mentioned that our um the updated um person recreation strategic plan is posted, and that'll be going to city council um next week.

Oh, that's right.

Yeah, yeah, can you presentation be coming to um and I'll turn it over to Brendan?

Yeah, so uh biodiversity plan is going to the council for uh adoption on June 23rd, really excited about that.

And uh as part of just uh summarize real quick, uh our Arbor Day efforts.

We did a whole Arbor month in April.

Um, we had a lot going on, and we planted approximately 70 trees.

So really excited about those efforts.

And again, that was also in partnership with Canopy and our um neighborhood associations.

We reached out to them and our community.

We're looking forward to continuing that work and getting more folks involved.

Any commissioner updates or um did you reach out to open situations?

The ones where we did uh the plantings, we did Samborone, um, wine dot.

We did a couple, I think, which out for those.

And uh the other one, we got some some letter from a um community member, it was like last month perhaps about the restrooms at Yadot.

And uh I've actually heard similar comments about the restrooms that the um the hope's corner, the the church there, they have restrooms in the parking lot, and uh I've heard comments from neighbors about how those restrooms are used during the night, really disturbing the neighbors and just turning the location into something different from what it was meant to be, and I don't know what the city can do about it.

What's a possible, you know?

I mean, the idea of having restrooms and parts was was a good idea if they could you know not take up too spay.

Uh, but I mean, these comments are a little concerning, not a little concerning, they're concerning.

We we are looking at the why and dot one looking for a longer-term solution compared to what's there now.

So with it's on your radar, it's on the radar, yes.

And that's it's it's an effort out of the human services department division, so it's not it wasn't led by community services, but the cities, yeah, yeah.

So we're we're looking at how we can figure out some solutions with that.

Thank you.

You said yeah, two things.

Yeah, I guess for a question I just said.

Anyone else?

All right.

Um, our next meeting is Wednesday, June 10th at 6 o'clock, and then that is followed by an extra meeting uh on Wednesday, June 17th, uh, just because we have some things we need to get through.

Um that one's at six o'clock, and that one will be at the plaza conference room at City Hall.

So June 10th here, June 17th, City City Hall, Plaza Conference Room.

Okay, maybe just uh the plaza is really small.

There was no no way to find something, I guess.

Unfortunately, no tree.

That'll just be two heritage trees and the board plan, correct?

For the seven office seventeen.

So hopefully they won't be a large.

Well, not hopefully there may not be the first time.

Well, that's the one upstairs, right?

It's pretty good.

You can put one chairs in that one.

All right, if there's nothing, looks like you're thinking about something.

Why don't you join the meeting for this?

Okay.

Or maybe I can do that.

Um, just real quick, just because you're stimulate these productions, another concept uh is one of doses.

So many facilities, whatever have docents, volunteers that go and are basically stewards that help users, and doses could be kids, adults, whatever.

I could, you know, train and that's just another variation of tech um.

So, the program at Deer Hall of Farm.

Yep, yep.

Anyway, sorry, go ahead, slam the gap.

There you go.

Anyway, oh, I'm going to like an auctioneer at the last min