Good morning and welcome to the Finance and Management Committee meeting of Tuesday, February 24th, 2026.

And this meeting may come to order.

Oh, sorry, the time is now 9 30 a.m.

and this meeting may come to order.

Before taking roll, I will provide instructions on how to submit speaker cards for items on this agenda.

If you're here with us in chamber, would like to submit a speaker card, please fill one out and turn one into myself or a clerk representative no later than 10 minutes after the start of this meeting or before the item is read into record.

Registering to speak via Zoom is now due 24 hours prior to the start of this meeting.

Sorry, meeting time.

This meeting came to order at 9 30 a.m.

and speaker cards will no longer be accepted 10 minutes after, making that time 9 40 a.m.

We'll now proceed with taking roll.

Council members Brown.

Present.

Council Member Wong.

Oh, sorry.

Council.

Councilmember Unger.

Here.

Councilmember Wong.

Present.

Thank you.

And Councilmember Wong, um, you're participating virtually.

Will you be using your assembly bill 2449?

Uh, yes.

Okay.

Uh, do you have anyone over the age of 18 in the room with you?

I do not.

Okay.

And can you go ahead and state your reason for using your assembly bill 2449?

Yes, I'm just uh recovering from a cold.

Okay, thank you.

And then Chair Ramachandran.

Present.

Thank you.

We have three members present and then one member present using AB 2449.

Um, before we begin, Chair, do you have any announcements at this time?

Um I do not, but Councilmember Brown does.

Go ahead.

Excellent.

Thank you so much, Chair Ramachandran.

Um I just wanted to um extend a very warm welcome to uh Nivea, who is spending the entire week with my office.

Um she goes to Envision Academy, um, and so she will be putting together um, she's right over here, um, she will be putting together a um an amazing presentation just a week in the life of here at Oakland City Hall.

Um, and so if you all want to stop by and share some insights with her about your role and and all of the things, she'll be with us this entire week.

So welcome, Noveya.

Thank you.

Welcome.

Um any announcements from the administration.

Oh, sorry, no, that's the next item.

Never mind.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Moving on to item one approval of the draft minutes from the committee meeting held on February 10th, 2026.

We do have one speaker that signed up.

Ms.

Sada Olavala.

Oh, sorry, it was two.

Sorry, that was the speaker for the next item.

So we have no speakers on this item.

Okay.

I will undertain a motion.

So moved.

Second.

Thank you.

That was a motion made by Councilmember Brown, seconded by Councilmember Unger to approve the draft minutes from the committee meeting held on February 10th, 2026.

On roll council members Brown.

Aye.

Councilmember Wong.

Aye.

Councilmember Unger.

Aye.

And Chair Ramachandran.

Aye.

Thank you.

Item one passes with four ayes to approve the draft minutes from February 10th, 2026.

Reading in item two, determination of schedule of outstanding committee items.

And we do have one speaker on this item.

Yes.

Um, to the administration.

Uh, through the chairman's body, um, we'd like to withdraw item number four to the pending list, uh, no date specific.

Thank you.

Uh we can move to public speakers.

Okay.

We have to make sure we are ready.

Okay, you got your clock up, Mama.

Okay.

Um, the city administrator is mandated to produce an annual report of his spending up to 250,000 dollars.

The last report was 2023.

Also, I'm seeing in the agenda you have something called the ability of the city administrator to do piggyback contracts with unlimited spending.

You're supposedly changing that today, and we need to have a report on how that's been working as far as accountability and trans and transparency.

We need to have a report on the business license, the annual business license, which is 412.

And I'm asking that report concentrate on the sidewalk vendors that we have all through Oakland with no permitting or licensing.

We need a report on businesses that have not necessarily closed down, but have left Oakland and relocated in other cities, or downsized many business oaklands of downsizing for whatever reason.

We need a report on the improvements of collecting the business tax, we need a report on the macroeconomic uh conditions that are beyond the control of the city.

That's what I heard about.

Okay, that's it.

Thank you for your comments.

Chair that concludes all speakers on this item.

Okay, I will make the motion.

Thank you.

We have a motion made by Chair Ramachandran, seconded by Councilmember Brown to accept the determination of scheduled outstanding committee items.

Aye.

Councilmember Unger.

Aye.

Councilmember Wong.

Aye.

And Chair Ramachandran.

Aye.

Thank you.

Item number two passes with four eyes to accept the determination of schedule outstanding committee items.

And to the clerk, that includes the removal of item for today.

Yes, so as amended.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Now reading in item three.

Adopt a resolution approving ongoing cooperative purchase agreements exceeding two hundred fifty thousand dollars for citywide commodity goods and services contract as outlined in table one in addition in an additional amount not to exceed eight million forty thousand dollars.

And we do have two speakers that signed up.

Okay, thank you.

The item uh before you today is a staff recommended resolution seeking approval of ongoing citywide cooperative agreements exceeding two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

Uh cooperative agreements are a purchasing a procurement option authorized under uh municipal code 2.04.080.

This provision allows the city to uh take advantage of procurements conducted by other government entities in order to achieve savings and shorten purchasing purchasing timelines.

However, uh the specific code section authorizes uh cooperative agreements sets no limits on uh contracts amounts.

The proposed action would confirm council approval of uh existing cooperative agreements and provide increases to contract amounts.

This would also align with the city's uh practices of cooperative agreements with the with existing uh two hundred fifty thousand dollar limits on contracts approved under the city administrators' authority, or four cooperative agreements or purchasing agreements in the uh tax table one that would effectively serve to support all city departments with hardware industrial supplies, tools, janitorial supplies, and paper products requested actions include both approval of these contracts and additional contract funding.

Staffer recommends approving approval of the proposed resolutions to allow for uninterrupted business operations citywide.

Uh I'd be happy to answer any questions you have.

Thank you.

Colleagues, questions, Councilman Brown.

Excellent.

Um, thank you so much for um the report.

Um, and so I I guess through the chair to the city administration and/or the um presenter.

Um, just kind of reading through the report.

Um, I guess one question that comes to my mind.

These are all folks that we've contracted with in the past.

Is that correct?

That is correct.

Yes.

And is there ever an opportunity to report back on these spending on the spending that occurs under these buckets?

Does that ever come to finance?

Yes, that is currently currently undertaking that.

Can you expound on that?

I'm sorry, what do you mean?

It's um so I guess like in the past to finance, do we receive a report on uh these various vendors and the things that were purchased?

Uh yes, that's correct.

Okay.

You will receive a report.

We're working on that, yes.

Through the chair to Councilmember Brown.

There's a report in progress regarding the city administrators uh contract authority, both under his own authority and general contract spending that is being developed by our contracts and purchasing bureau, and that will be uh we're expecting it to come uh this spring to this body.

Okay, thank you so much, um, director Johnson.

Um can you shed light on when was the last time that report was generated?

There's uh two different uh topics of it.

The there's a report that was generated in 2023 that related to contract authority.

It was not as comprehensive as it needed to be in terms of the total scope of the city manager's authority and all contracts approved.

So we're working to expand the scope to include the full set of contracts, and again, we're trying to deliver that to you guys this spring.

So there is an antecedent report that was developed in 2023.

The scope of that was not broad enough in our estimation to really cover the full set of contracts that have uh been issued, and so we are working to ensure that we have all of that information included in a report, and we're again we're gonna bring it this spring.

Excellent, thank you so much.

And then will the can you um share what the duration of the report like will it be from you know what June of 2023 till uh June of 2024 or how like what's this the scope?

Our contracting and purchasing administrator is here to correct me if I'm incorrect.

I believe we're going from the time standard the last report to the present is what we're looking at, but in our contracting purchasing administrators here.

Oh I'm getting a thumbs up.

That is an accurate statement.

Okay, excellent.

And then my final question.

Um in table one, um, the first vendor, um, it lists citywide con contract office in school supplies.

Is is the assumption um is my assumption correct that that just includes like for our rec centers um purchasing?

Uh through the chair, council member brown.

Yes, I don't include rec centers, but also like head start programs, things of that nature.

So yes, okay, excellent.

Thank you so much.

Yes, Mayor.

Um I don't know if Councilmember Wong has their has her hand raised on Zoom.

Okay.

Um so just to clarify.

Um the some of the increases are pretty steep, like the last one for janitorial supplies from 250 to 1.2 million.

Um, is there a reason that the original amount was not anticipated to be as high, but then we're we're needing that higher amount.

Uh when the uh contract was put into place uh that was only uh sort of like a placeholder uh knowing that they would have to go come back later and increase the contract.

That was to accommodate uh mostly our fire departments.

Okay.

Um are all four of these companies used by our neighboring cities.

Is that the basis of the cooperative agreement?

Yes.

Okay.

Um can you give examples of which cities or counties are involved in this cooperative agreement?

Um I know that Blazedales uh they also have a heavy presence in uh Sacramento, uh Cogent in uh Valleo, I believe.

Uh Fast and all, uh Berkeley, um, also Hayward, and um JC Nelson, I believe they're in fair uh fairfield.

Uh they have a heavy presence there.

I wouldn't know any uh offhand any other city that you okay, thank you.

And could you just explain what the benefit of going through this cooperative agreement is with these other cities that are not necessarily our neighbors or ones we work with rather than a separate contract with them for these services?

Well, as we are pointed out, uh it does shorten the uh contracting um time to put a contract in place.

Uh the um competitive bid uh situation takes um uh a bit of time to put together with these contracts with the co-op contract is it allows us to uh go into a contract that's already been uh competitively bid.

Okay, and are any of these local businesses?

Blazeddale's is a local business.

Um they've been local business uh working with us for quite a while.

Okay, um, these any additional questions?

Uh council member uh councilmember Wong and Councilmember Brown.

Uh thank you through the chair.

Um I just want to echo some of my colleagues' remarks on the concern of the the steepness of the amount.

And this is I will say not just directed at you, it's sort of a global comment on when we as council are being asked to approve high dollar uh contract amounts.

Um I don't see a lot of you know past performance data.

Uh I mean I sounds like the cooperative agreement is going to lower down the cost, but we're also at a time when we need to tighten our our belts and we're told that on one hand, and then I think on the other hand, um, you know, in some ways I feel very forced to just rubber stamp essentially what is status quote stuff, because uh as noted in the report, it says if we don't approve this contract that we're going to you know interrupt the business operations of a lot of the city departments, but um I just so in some ways I feel like I have to vote for this, and at the same time, I don't feel like I have the data that um gives me the responsible decision making that has assurances that you know there isn't going to be waste associated with this particular resolution, uh, so that's the comment, yeah.

Again, uh this is for uh citywide use, and the uh the contract's amounts are not um amounts that we are paying out.

Uh it would depend on each department's capacity uh that they have to uh purchase any of these goods.

And I I do you have any reason to I've worked in a government office, it's kind of like I don't know if this is necessarily what's happening here, but sometimes it's like oh we gotta use up our use up our budget, so let's just buy all these things just to justify using up the budget.

Do we have any data on you know how our various departments are using these cooperative agreements?

Um I noticed that we can get office furniture.

I, for example, would want to make sure that nobody's out here buying like plush couches.

I'm just this is an egregious example that I doubt I doubtful is happening, and nonetheless, I feel like it deserves some scrutiny.

Councilmember Brown.

Um, sorry, uh City, you had a comment first.

Okay, okay.

Um, I guess to add to Councilmember Wang's statement, um, and in also comparing what I read in the report, potentially, as I'm reading the report, I think what would be helpful for me um would be um because I think someone mentioned that uh JC Nelson supply company that is a um that is used by the fire department, right?

Um and so in in reading the report, perhaps it could be helpful that when items like this come before us, maybe it's outlining like who are some of the key departments that are taking advantage of these services um so that we're able to really like piece together um you know the amount that's being requested and then you know um just like how I asked the question oh school supplies and so I was brainstorming in my mind like okay well who would need that right um so so um so I think that would just be my my my comment and if this item is forwarded to the city the full city council for approval I guess I would be interested in seeing maybe a uh uh an addition to the report where it outlines um who will you know who are some of the city departments that are actually taking advantage of these particular services thank you um I will echo that um it is a little sparse on details this report and if um if a supplemental could be added on a little details about what Councilman Brown mentioned uh what departments utilize these services um as well as my question of what other cities utilize these um these companies as part of the cooperative um that would be ideal or examples of cities or counties that do um councilmember brown and then I guess my last point is because I do recognize the need that we want to be supportive of the different needs that the departments have like I have heard firsthand where you know some of our city departments are trying to get some of these services completed but then the contract is expired or like it takes a long time for these you know vendors to get paid and so I so I I see both both sides of what we're trying to to tackle in this moment.

The chair and maybe to the members of the body in general is the request for supplemental maybe to make it clear a breakdown of the departments that have used these listed contracts over the past year or two time span so that you can see the spending departments and which other cities are participating in these particular co-ops specifically I just want to make sure we're clear on what you need in terms of supplemental information.

Yes thank you so much um at this time I'm only focused on like what we're doing as a city for Oakland so I'm I'm fine with you know we don't need I don't need a comparison of what other cities are doing but just more of an analysis if we just focus on the table and um some of the the vendors that are listed and then what are the city departments that are utilizing these services and if you happen to have uh you know um for maybe the last year what were some of the things that were purchased that could be helpful okay thank you um and council member wonk um uh thanks through the chair and uh director jobton just to add to that um I would like to see just maybe a sampling and some of some of the products that are most used just the cost that we're procuring these particular supplies for are they within you know are are they are we getting kind of the the economies of scale that we're getting uh through the through the report as the report states.

To councilman Wong's question and to my staff and finance can we provide an attachment of the itemized amounts in these contractual I know these are basically catalog contracts can we attach and append the catalogs that are been negotiated like catalogs?

Yes so just the sample of what can be ordered off of for instance for play sales.

Oh absolutely um it would be extensive but yes we have that available so councilman wong I'm happy to include that as an attachment to your report.

Perfect.

Thank you so much.

Yes.

Calling in the names that signed up for item number two.

If you're here with us in chamber, you can come up to the podium, Mrs.

Sada Olabala and Kevin Dali.

Okay, you got your timer.

This is unbelievable.

If you read the report, what you are primarily trying to do is to change the practice the city administrator had that unlimited spending related to piggyback contracts, no limit spending.

You want to now introduce the practice that the city administrator has the authority to enter into contracts up to 250,000.

So with the piggyback contracts or cooperative agreement, the city administrator can only spend up to 250,000 on piggyback contracts.

Any contracts hard in 250,000 has to come to council for approval.

That's the issue.

Not what departments are getting whatever.

You should be very much concerned that in the past you had a city administrator with the capacity for unlimited spending.

Under the issue of coming under the umbrella of sustainability, you have to have no unlimited capacities for any department.

So why is this general conversation about who's getting what department, and you're not looking at the proposal that the city administrator will be limited in his spending because in the past the city administrator has had unlimited, no limited spending on piggyback contracts, and nobody's bringing it up.

That's called irresponsibility, dereliction of your duty to deal with the deficit that we have had and to create sustainability in the budget practice.

That's my time.

This is ridiculous.

Kevin Daly from Lower District 4 just speaking for myself today.

I do appreciate the desire to move contracts along more quickly.

I know sometimes the city can get stuck with endless approval of contracts.

I would like to examine the report that's coming to council soon, the 2024 City of Oakland disparity study final report.

I know that also discusses issues related to contract reform.

It'd be good to have that discussed along with the attempt to improving, improving the speed of contracts.

If we could put those together, I think that would make contract reform an easier process.

Looking forward to the full report to city council coming up soon.

Thanks.

Thank you for your comments.

Chair, that concludes all speakers on this item.

Thank you.

Okay.

I will entertain a motion with that includes a request for supplemental information before going to council.

So moved.

I'll second that.

Thank you.

We have a motion made by council members Brown, seconded by Unger, to approve the recommendations of staff and to forward this item to the March 3rd City Council agenda with the request for supplemental report.

Providing the following information.

Who are some of the city departments that are actually taking it taking advantage of the particular services?

What other cities utilize these companies as part of the cooperative?

Some of the vendors that are listed, and what are the city departments that are utilizing those services.

And sorry, a sampling of some of the products that are most used.

Uh unroll, sorry, with that information.

Unroll council members Brown.

Aye.

Councilmember Unger.

Aye.

Councilmember Wong.

Um, no.

I'm I just think it's important to establish that when the administration asks for high dollar contract amendments that I need more data in order to vote yes.

Thank you.

And Chair Ramachandran.

Aye.

Thank you.

Item number three passes with three ayes, one no wong, to forward this item to the city council agenda on non-consent.

Consent.

Since it's not unanimous, it would be non-consent.

Okay, it's as recommendation of the chair to rules.

I will say consent.

Uh good morning.

This is the Lily McPherson with the City Attorney's Office.

I can read the rule with regard to non-consent or consent designation.

It says with respect to items that are standing committee forwards to the council.

The committee chair may designate such items as consent items only if the standing committee's recommendation was unanimous, provided that the rules and legislation committee has authority to make the final determination of consent or non-consent items.

Okay, then non-consent is a recommendation.

Okay, thank you.

Item three passes with three ayes, one no wong, to be forwarded to the March 3rd City Council agenda on non-consent.

Now reading in item number four.

Receive an informational report from the budget advisory commission on the proposed June 2026 40 million dollar parcel tax measure to support essential city services and fiscal stability, and there are three speakers that signed up to speak.

Okay.

The chair, this is the item that we asked to be moved to the pending list, no date specific.

Um I understand that you need to hear public speakers, but we're not uh delivering report at this time.

Understood.

We can move to public speakers.

Calling in the names that sign up for item four, Missisada Olabala, Kevin Dali, and Derek Barnes.

If you're here with us in chamber, you can come up to the podium or if you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to be easily identified.

So I I think you need to be reminded of the fiscal obligations of uh property owners in this city, besides besides paying city of Oakland property taxes, or partial taxes, they pay taxes related to OUSD.

They pay AC transit and bought taxes, they pay county taxes, but related to your city taxes, there's the property owners' annual tax, the real estate transfer tax, the annual rent adjustment fee, that's $137 per unit, the business license tax, $95, the mandatory soft story retrofix program, that's a fee, the vacant property tax, which was anywhere from $3,000 to $6,000 per year, the costs for tenant move out agreement.

That's a payment, security deposit documentation, that's a payment, maintenance and utility costs that includes mortgage, insurance, homeowners' insurance, fire insurance, earthly earthly uh insurance, flood insurance, uh sure water sewage payment, electric uh waste management payments.

Do you realize how much money people have to put out in this city?

The minimum annual Oakland tax bill is anywhere from over $7,453 to over $5,000, higher than any other national minimum property tax bill of average in this country is two thousand four hundred dollars, and now you want to talk about another tax, make it make sense.

Maybe it makes sense.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comments, Ms.

Olabala.

And we are putting taxes on 11% of the polls.

Thank you.

Uh Chair, all names have been called.

Okay, thank you.

And then noting that this item was withdrawn and placed on the pending list, no date specific.

Now reading in item number five, receive an informational report.

Sorry, an informational cash management report for fiscal year 2025-2026.

Second quarter ended December 31st, 2025.

And we have three speakers that signed up for this item.

Good morning, Chair Ramashandran and fellow committee members on David Jones with the Treasury Bureau.

Before I do this uh this morning is an informational cash management report uh for the second quarter of fiscal year 25-26, ending December 31st, 2025.

Um it's our traditional quarterly report.

Uh just go through a couple items.

Highlights on page one show that the portfolio had a balance of approximately 2.17 billion dollars as compared to September, which was about $2.09 billion, so a slight increase.

Uh the days of maturity on the portfolio are about 244 days.

Uh, portfolio had a yield of 3.68% versus a yield in September of about 3.98%, and the portfolio had daily liquidity of 20% and a hundred-day liquidity of a little over 66%.

Um, portfolio is in full compliance with the city's investment policy, and the city still invests with priorities of safety, liquidity, and yield, and that uh concludes my report this morning.

Thank you, colleagues.

Questions, comments?

Councilmanger.

Yeah, thank you.

Um, could you talk a little bit about the seasonality of our cash flow?

There's been some reporting that I don't find incredibly accurate, which compares one quarter to the previous quarter.

Would we be better off comparing at the exact same time every year to year?

Is the seasonality of our you know cash flows as traditionally in the middle of April, we receive our property tax.

Okay, a large chunk.

We also receive a large chunk in the uh middle of December.

And then between the period of I would say mid mid-Febru.

Well no, mid-January to the beginning of March, we receive a significant amount of our business tax, because that's our business tax renewal.

Um with regards to the outflows, um, we obviously pay the ports debt service in April and in October, so those are pretty big uh layouts as or you know, expenditures as well as our debt service payments, and then we have our regular taxes and biweekly payrolls.

But as far as the seasonality, it's pretty consistent, you know, because we get a big chunk of cash in the middle of April and another you know big chunk in December, and that happens every year.

Um, we can move to public speakers, calling in the names that sign up for item number five, Mississippi Olobala, Kevin Daly, and Derek Barnes.

If you're in chamber, you can come up to the podium, or if you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to be easily identified.

Okay, Chair, at this time all names have been called.

Okay, I will entertain a motion.

Um I'll make the motion to receive and file.

Second.

Thank you.

We have a motion made by Councilmember Brown, seconded by Councilmember Unger to approve the recommendations of staff and to receive and file this informational report in committee on roll.

Council members Brown.

Aye.

Unger.

Aye.

Long?

Aye.

And Chair Ramachandran.

Aye.

Thank you.

Item five passes with four ayes to receive and file this informational report in committee.

Moving on to open forum.

Calling in the names that signed up to speak, Mrs.

Olabala and Kevin Dali.

Kevin Daly speaking for myself.

I appreciated two weeks ago.

Um Bradley Johnson gave a presentation saying his goal was to uh take some of the income from the sugar sweetened beverage tax and use it for the purposes that it was originally planned for.

And I think that's great.

My wife worked on getting the tax out there.

I would like to look at some other issues that have been approved by council that where income for the money has been suggested for a certain purpose.

In 2021, the council unanimously approved the reimagining public safety task force with some recommendations, and one of those was to use a certain amount of the income from street parking revenue and from the citations to fund traffic services.

And obviously, when we have budget problems, we can't do that.

But I'm hoping that we can put that on the list of being used.

I was glad to see Councilmember Brown's former policy director on that particular recommendation.

Some possibilities are replaced by bus benches and shelters.

Councilmember Wong is on the AC Transit Oakland Interagency Liaison committee, and I think she understands that we're removing shelters in the middle of the rainy season for people who are taking buses.

We're not going to get them put in this season, but maybe for next year we could use some of the extra income.

Of course, this is also the recommendation that says move parking enforcement to the Department of Transportation.

And I know that not everyone likes that idea, but I think we should do both this recommendation for the money and keep the parking enforcement in transportation.

Thank you.

One of the things you are comfortable with saying is that uh illegal immigrants contribute uh to the economic uh stability of this country, and that's not necessarily true.

Um, we we need to have an opportunity to look at the fact that not all undocumented uh immigrants pay taxes, some work under the table and do not pay income taxes, some work in off-the-books jobs.

I don't know what that means.

Illegal immigrants can put economic strains on state and local budgets by causing negative fiscal impacts.

The city of New York spent 12 billion dollars over the next three years on housing, food, health, care, and other securities for illegal services, illegal immigrants.

Chicago in 2023 spent 361 billion dollars on illegal immigrants having the needs for the same things I just mentioned, housing education.

Illegal immigrants make up expenses with the use of welfare, with the use of public education, uh, significant fiscal costs with the use of emergency medical services.

So don't come here and say that uh that you are a sanctuary city, you have an economic responsibility to some people that you don't give to African Americans, and we're gonna continue to have this confrontation conversation until you bring a report of the economic impact of being a sanctuary city.

When that happens, then we can move from there.

But you are making assumptions about your sanctuary city status, doesn't have any impact negatively.

African Americans are 9% of unemployment in in the city of Oakland and 14% unemployment in the city of California.

Low-level scale jobs, Barbara Jordan told y'all, that's my time, my baby.

I'll tell y'all again.

Thank you for your comments, Chair.

That concludes all speakers for open for Open Forum.

Thank you, everyone.

The meetings adjourned.