H Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Six.

The time is now one thirty-seven p.m.

And this meeting may come to order.

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

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

Registering to speak via Zoom is now due twenty-four hours prior to the start of this meeting time.

I'm sorry, one forty seven p.m.

We'll now proceed with taking roll.

Councilmember Fife excuse council member Ramachandron.

Present.

Councilmember Unger.

Here.

And Chair Brown.

Present.

Thank you.

We have three members present.

One uh one excused five.

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

Yes.

Thank you so much.

Well, thank you so much for everyone for joining uh the committee meeting today.

Uh look forward to a very uh good discussion on the multiple items that we do have.

And then I did want to make an announcement uh for anyone who is interested.

Um, the Peralta Community Colleges Board will be uh deciding on the merging of Merit College and Laney College this afternoon at at 6 p.m.

And so if that's something that you are interested in um and want to weigh in, that's at six o'clock for their board meeting.

So just wanted to make that announcement.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Starting off with item one approval of the draft minutes from the committee meeting of May 26, 2026.

We have no speakers on this item and just need a motion.

Excellent, thank you.

Um, I'll entertain a motion.

So moved.

Second, second.

Thank you.

We have a motion made by Councilmember Unger, second and by Councilmember Ramachandron to accept the the draft minutes from the committee meeting of May 26, 2026.

Also noting the presence of council member five at 139 p.m.

On roll for the minutes, council member five, aye.

Councilmember Ramachandran.

Aye.

Councilmember Unger.

Aye.

And Chair Rama or sorry, Chair Brown.

Aye.

Thank you.

Item one passes with four eyes to accept the draft minutes from May 26, 2026.

Item two, determination of schedule about standing committee items.

And we have one speaker on this item.

Perfect.

Thank you so much.

Um committee members or the administration.

Anything to add um for the pending list?

Uh do the chair no.

Excellent.

Thank you so much.

We'll hear the public speaker.

Calling in the name that signed up to speak on item number two, Mrs.

Olavala.

Okay, all names have been called.

We just need a motion.

Excellent.

I'll entertain a motion on the pending list.

Thank you.

We have a motion made by Council Member Unger, seconded by Councilmember Ramachandran to accept the determination of schedule of outstanding committee items as is on roll.

Council members five.

Aye.

Ramachandran.

Hi.

Unger.

Aye.

And Chair Brown.

Aye.

Thank you.

Item two passes with four eyes to accept the pending list as is.

Reading in item number three.

Adopt an ordinance authorizing the city administrator to negotiate and execute the following.

Sorry, a lease and management agreement between the city as landlord and sharks ice LLC as tenant to operate the Oakland Ice Center for an initial five-year term with four five-year extension options at a rate of three hundred thirty-five thousand dollars in base rent per year, less uh less than annual capital contribution by the city of one hundred thousand dollars with an annual tenant capital contribution of one hundred thousand dollars and percentage rates uh percentage rent of seven percent of annual gross revenue above four point three million dollars, b an advertising revenue sharing agreement with the tenant retaining the first one hundred thousand dollars and the city receiving fifty percent of the remaining net advertising revenue for a five-year term with four five-year extension options.

C, the use of one million three hundred forty-four thousand nine hundred ten dollars in capital capital reserve buttons and up to five hundred thousand dollars in anticipated net revenue in fiscal year twenty twenty-five to twenty twenty-six to reimburse sharks ice LLC for losses real realized under the current management agreement and D disbursement agreement with the Sharks LL Sharks Ice LLC in an amount of ten million dollars of measure you bond funds for a new refrigeration system and related capital improvements and two making findings that the lease for below fair market rental value is the best interest is in the best interest of the city and adopting appropriate California Environmental Quality Act findings, and we have a number of speakers on this item.

Excellent.

Um, thank you so much.

Um, I believe we will hear from uh our EWD team on this one.

Thank you, Brendan.

Good afternoon.

Um, Brenda Moriarty, Director of Real Estate and Special Projects, um, within the Economic and Workforce Development Department.

I'll do a brief presentation.

Um, here to answer questions as well.

Uh we also have a longtime EWD employee who's been working on this asset for even longer than me, like decades really.

So he's available for deep historical questions as well.

We have some stakeholders here.

Why don't we go ahead with the slides then?

And I'll first just say I'm really excited to be here.

This is a long time in the coming.

We've been negotiating this set of agreements as long as I've been at the city now, about six years.

Let's just start with what the asset we're talking about, where we looking at this is the Oakland Ice Center outlined in red.

It's directly on the other side of the street from the Fox Oakland Theater in downtown.

Takes up most of the block there.

This is a city owned facility.

I meant to put a more current picture now.

There's this really beautiful mural on the side of the building featuring Alyssa Liu.

This is her home training ice, our own Olympic medal gold medalist.

There's a nice mural of her on the front there.

Okay, so let me give a little bit of background on the asset and why we're here today.

So this is one of the city's most heavily used recreational facilities.

It serves nearly 137,000 visitors in a typical one-year period, driving foot traffic really at almost all hours of the day and night because of the high demand for ice time.

There's a portfolio of community benefits and services that are provided through the ice center, including discounts for Oakland residents, about 27,000 served every year in that regard.

Free programming for Oakland Public Schools.

We have over 5,000 public school kids coming into the Ice Center every year.

There's scholarships provided to young people as well.

Employs Oakland residents.

As I said, it's the home of Alyssa Liu.

And also recently announced the new home for the Upstart Minor League Oakland Skates Hockey Team.

They have a representative here today.

The ICE Center is managed by Sharks ITES ICE, which is an affiliate of the San Jose Sharks, the NHL franchise based in San Jose.

And they've managed this facility since 2007.

So deep experience and understanding of the asset.

We have a management agreement that provides for them managing the asset on our behalf.

So it's a fee-for-service kind of arrangement right now.

And that runs through 2027, and there's an extension through 2032 if we'd like to exercise that.

But there's some issues that have caused us to really want to rework how we structure this relationship.

And that's what I'll present today.

One of the key issues here is that the city is exposed to operational complexities and financial risk as a result of the way that things are set up right now.

This is our asset at the end of the day, the losses of the cities to bear.

To that point, the sharks are carrying about 1.8 million dollars in losses on behalf of the city that were incurred really as a result of the pandemic.

Before the pandemic, the asset was producing net positive revenue, and the city was realize realizing profit out of that on the order of 200 to 300,000 a year.

The graph you see here is showing net operating income, not cities take home profit because in these figures, we actually have to subtract out the fee that we pay the sharks to run the facility.

We take out money we set aside for capital expenditures, that sort of thing.

But anyways, you see the trend here that it was positive and looking good prior to the pandemic.

It crashed, there were deep losses for particularly in fiscal year 21, and it's been recovering, but we're not yet at that pre-pandemic uh position.

We're also challenged by what is really kind of an existential issue for this facility.

It uses a refrigerant R22 that is no longer allowed under an international treaty because of its ozone depleting properties.

So the international stockpile of refrigerant supplies is limited, it's getting drawn down, and there will be a point where it won't be possible to operate that system anymore.

And it's also just old.

It breaks down, it's problematic.

The facility also is in need of a facelift overall.

City council in September of last year took an action to authorize the sale of $300 million in measure U bonds that happened in December.

The action was in September, the sale was in December.

And City Council identified the projects that would get funded through that.

This was identified as one of those projects.

$10 million to replace this system.

So what I'm presenting today is to deliver, put that money to work.

So it's consistent with that earlier policy direction.

So what is the actual new agreement gonna look like?

It's a it's a now it would be a lease and management agreement.

So rather than a kind of a fee for service, you're working for us, you're running this on our behalf.

It's rather we're gonna lease the facility to the sharks, we're gonna share in the upside.

It would be a five-year initial term with four five-year options, a fixed annual base rent of three hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars with annual you know increases for inflation.

I should flag here that's three thirty-five fixed.

Whereas today, again, we're not getting anything.

We haven't seen profit since before the pandemic.

So we go from zero to three thirty-five in base rent just on that bullet alone.

In addition, there would be seven percent of gross revenues per year above a threshold of four point three million dollars.

7% of that increment above 0.3 would come to the city in the and by way of revenue share.

That threshold would increase by by inflation every year, that same that same um inflation factor.

The the f just as frame of reference, the facility had 4.4 million in gross revenues in 25.

So if that number held today, there'd be a moderate about $100,000 uh you know revenue share that the 7% would apply to.

We believe the numbers aren't in yet for this fiscal year.

We believe it's gonna climb up to about 4.6, and as the facilities improved, um, you know, that that number is going to continue to grow.

So there will be some real revenue there for the city.

The city would also get 50% of advertising revenue above a hundred thousand dollars per year.

Any naming rights sale, which the sharks would have rights to do, subject to the city's approval of that of that specific naming.

50% of that would contribute to this number.

So 50% of advertising revenue above 100,000 a year would come to the city.

Um the city would provide that $10 million in bond funds, which are sitting in an account.

Again, this the sale happened in December, they're ready to be put to work.

The project would be delivered by the sharks as the expert in sort of ice center operation and capital issues, and it would so be delivered by them with city oversight.

The sharks would then be responsible for the routine maintenance and repair of the facility.

That would just come out of their own operations, their own financial cash flow that they're generating off the facility, be their responsibility.

The city and the sharks would both contribute a hundred thousand dollars every year to a capital uh expenditure reserve so that there's ongoing just upkeep.

So we don't end up in a place, hopefully, in you know, years to come where we have deep, you know, investments that we have to make to modernize the facility.

Um, but overall, we would minimize the city's responsibilities, certainly with respect to day-to-day operation, but also in a kind of a larger management sense, we would be responsible for upkeep of solar panels on the roof.

Or we've just repaired those, they're in good shape now.

We would be responsible for some code compliance um issues if they were if they arose, we discovered any, and then we'd be responsible for extraordinary things like if there was a foundation issue or you know, deep and interior electrical issue.

Um, almost done here.

Um the arrangement would allow for ice center customers to park in the Dow Zeal garage, so that's the basement garage and the city center complex here after hours.

So that keeps that garage active when city workers have typically left for the day, and the sharks would pay their their share of what that costs.

Um, and then they would be continued, they would continue to be on the hook for providing a suite of community benefits, basically would look like like what it looks today, but with a threshold now codified in the contract that says it has to be worth at least those services have to be worth at least $325,000 a year.

In reality, right now they measure about $700,000 a year.

Um, resolution management agreements.

This would be terminated.

The existing agreement would be terminated in on June 30th of this year.

The new lease would take would be effective July 1.

We would wrap up that agreement so that the 1.8 million dollars in losses that the sharks are carrying are settled.

That would just use basically existing net operating incomes that are held in reserve at the facilities today to pay that off.

So we have those those net proceeds are sitting reserved for the OIC, they were generated from OIC operations, they were dedicated for capital expenditures.

We're gonna basically take that to settle out this agreement.

Um okay, so basically the final slide here.

So staff does recommend that we go ahead with these agreements because it would preserve the ICenter, would address that sort of existential issue with the $10 million capital repair.

It would preserve its community and economic benefits as a driver of activity in downtown, a place where a lot of kind of community and athletic activity happens.

It would remove the city from day-to-day operational complexities and financial exposure.

It would establish a predictable annual revenue.

So that's that base rent, but also establish upside potential for the city.

So and then finally, we think that's a fair resolution of the management agreement using the remaining funds that are on hand at the facility to settle the outstanding losses.

So that is the presentation again available for for questions.

Thank you for your patience.

Excellent.

Thank you so much, Brendan, for walking us through the uh details so easily.

Thank you.

Um any questions?

Um Councilmember Fife.

Yes, Brendan.

I think through the chair, we've been working on this the entire time we've both been here.

So I just can't say enough about the work that's gone into this project in terms of being a win-win for for all parties involved.

I just wanted to get clear.

I I didn't see it, but maybe you can help me.

The the revenues that will come into the city, will they go into the general purpose fund or will they be set aside with the the revenue sharing and all of the different revenues that are now going to be generated?

Will they go to the general purpose fund or will a portion or can a portion be set aside for the operations in that general footprint?

Because I do want to say that Glenn has been an amazing partner too and has talked about supporting with just being a brain trust for the First Friday activities.

So I just wonder what that would look like in terms of the revenues.

Right.

Got a good question.

So through the chair, the facility was originally built using a loan of redevelopment bond funds.

So because that was originating source of money to create this asset, the revenues generated off of it can't go to the general fund.

They have to be dedicated for uh redevelopment purposes.

So that means we can use them to care, you take care of our responsibilities at this asset.

So if there is an issue with the solar panels, those revenues could be used.

We could use it to address issues at the Fox Theater, the Scotland Convention Center, uh any redevelopment purpose that could even include affordable housing.

So any redevelopment purpose through the entire city of Oakland.

Let me just confirm that.

Okay, got it.

Yeah, so the back there.

That was Jens Helmer.

I thought that was you know that guy?

Yes.

Come on.

He's held this asset together for the city for so long.

Um, so the redevelopment, if you're if we're gonna spend that money on redevelopment purposes, not for put up affordable housing aside for a second, just other uh redevelopment purposes, that has to be in the central district of the city.

So that's like Scotland, Fox, etc.

Affordable housing could be anywhere in the city, though.

Understood.

So it in general it's the footprint of the facility, but if it's specifically housing, it's anywhere.

Housing can be anywhere.

Affordable housing can be anywhere in the city.

And then, Chair, if I may ask if uh Jens could come up.

Hi, and so when we're in WD.

Hello, it's been it's been a minute.

And I know we worked on something like this around the Marriott as well, just in terms of deferred maintenance and their need to uh keep up with um, you know, some of the repairs that were needed.

Um, and I just I just want to be absolutely sure that if if there are needs that come up, does it that do the funds have to go into a specific line item?

No, they cannot pay for operations, but they can pay for anything else.

So they can pay for capital improvement, which is what the money would be used for, primarily capital improvements either at the Fox or at the Scotland or hopefully at the ice rink.

That's what we would like to target those funds.

Does is the Paramount included?

The Paramount is in the central district and would be a recipient, but the Paramount Board I believe is sort of self-managing that facility and has thus far not relied on any city subsidies for that project.

I feel like they've asked, but we'll we can just talk offline about about what the needs are in that particular footprint.

Thank you so much for all your help.

Thank you very much.

Excellent.

Um, thank you.

Um so much, uh Council Member Fife for answer asking that question.

That was one of my questions around where the funds go.

Um so that definitely provided some clarity.

Um I just have three questions.

Um so one question that I had was what would be the impacts um on services during the capital uh like during the initial um the capital project um that is being done.

I would want to defer to the sharks because they have the the operational plan there, but um I do believe the facility would need to be shut down for a period of time.

This is a pretty profound capital project.

You drain the um the ice out of the rinks, you have to rebuild the piping underneath the rings that run the refrigerant and provide the cooling, um, you know, electrical systems, plumbing systems, um and they can speak more to that.

So if you're interested, they can we can call them up for that.

John, you're available.

Okay.

Uh John Guslison's senior vice president of shark sports entertainment.

Uh, in response to your question, uh, we would have to close a facility for roughly four months, and we would traditionally do that in the slowest ice time, so in the middle of the summer, uh, to allow us to uh expedite all the uh uh construction process that we need to do so we're back up and running to hit when traditional ice sports is at its peak, which is in September.

Excellent.

And and since you're there, uh, I think my one of the questions that I had, uh maybe you can answer it.

Um, this the report mentions that the sharks will um basically choose the vendors to do this work, and then I had this question around like is it kind of more of a niche project?

And so will we be able to select a local vendor or how does that work?

So it's the ice system in itself is very very specialized.

So we've used uh a company out of uh Minnesota, which again specializes in this, and we'd want to bring the very best to make sure that uh we get all the things that we needed.

Okay, excellent.

Um thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Okay, and then my last question was just um from the PowerPoint, um, Brendan.

You mentioned that the there is a reimbursement for um losses that we would need to do.

How much is that?

In total that is um one point eight four four this is a million, one million eight hundred forty-four thousand nine hundred and ten dollars, uh uh up to that amount.

We actually um actually that's the authorization for funds that we can use to pay it down.

Let me see if we have the f the actual number of losses there.

It's on the order of 1.8 million dollars.

1.8.

Okay, all right, thank you.

Um colleagues, any questions?

Okay, we can hear the public speakers.

Calling in the names that signed up to speak on item number three in no particular order.

You can come up to the podium, state your name for the record before beginning, or if you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to be easily identified.

Kieran Kiki Flat Flatter T.

Sorry if I am mispronouncing your names.

Zach Sayer, Arthur Liu, John Gutterson, Asada Olavala, Daniel Witt, and Glenn Martin.

Um view of New Mount's bankruptcy, um, as the counter controller and cowler and Del Monte, um, I uh Princess England chose to challenge Carl Mazzetti in the view of the right of the ownership agreement as two principal owners of the Seattle Kraken, and in this bid have challenged the right of review as the ownership group with um Edward Foley and Michael Johnson, um, for the view of the lease agreement.

I wish to propose an application to move into theater a request for the Oakland for an Oakland hockey team called the Oakland Dragons as an ECHL of validity.

As a private individual within the allocation of the Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Melinda Gates is buying of my 51% ownership of the Seattle Kraken.

Um the compliary term of the indictment or the agreement was to look at the JW Marriott building as a potential home for the ECHL expansion.

I am interested as the fiduciary agent counter controller of bringing in what is known as the Oakland Dragons as a parent team in to England upon arrival as the next monarch.

I am asking that in view of this proposal that the city considered a tax abatement, where this is a bond proposal and an expansion, using the tickets as a free way to use the bus on the back of the ticket in a way to uh drive economic revenue downtown.

Where the playing field as the center is where they practice, and there's a little bit more community outreach for the school system.

Thank you for your comments.

Your time is up.

Good afternoon.

Uh my name is Kiki Flaherty, and I've been a resident for of Oakland for 22 years.

I'm also a member of the Dyer Wolves, which is a hockey team that plays on Sundays at Oakland Ice, and I'm also a player and president of the San Francisco Earthquakes, LGBTQ Plus Ice Hockey Club.

The earthquakes are a diverse, all-inclusive hockey team, welcoming LGBTQ and other players who traditionally have not played hockey.

We create a safe, inclusive space for all to enjoy the recreation, inspiration, community, and just plain fun that hockey offers.

Oakland Ice Center has welcomed my team for two of our marquee events, which were generously funded by the Sharks Foundation.

The California Pride Invitational, which brought over 80 players and fans from throughout California to the facility and to downtown Oakland for the entire weekend, and hockey with Pride, which is a hockey outreach scrimmage and mixer to bring even more hockey players from Oakland and the East Bay to our team and let them know about the programs that Oakland Ice offers.

Without this facility and the Shark support, we'd have to have we would have had to look beyond Oakland for ice for these events, and we were so welcomed and supported by the staff at Sharks Ice in Oakland that we decided to locate our next team in Oakland at Oakland Ice.

Uh, but we can only do this with ice.

And the refrigeration system, as you know, is uh a necessary and big deal.

So your support to make this happen would be very greatly appreciated.

The facility badly needs the capital improvements, as you know.

On a personal note, I had the fortune of being in Milan and seeing Alyssa Liu skate.

It talk about a fantastic representation of Oakland and special thanks to the assembly to Councilmember Fife.

Sorry about that.

Councilmember Fife and Councilmembers, uh, good afternoon.

Um, I'm Arthur Liu.

I'm the proud father of Alisa Lee and four other wonderful children.

Uh I can't forget about them.

Well, Alisa and all my children grew up in the Oakland Ice Center.

Alisa started desk skating there at age five, and since I'm a single father, so when they go, I usually bring all the kids there.

So Oakland Ice Center is our second home.

So I'm here today to ask for your continuous support for um uh Sharks on Ice and the Oakland Ice Center.

It's so very important.

Uh without this facility, I would not have been able to raise an Olympic champion.

So thanks to your support, and also thanks to Sharks on Ice.

Uh they have treated us so well.

Thank you so much.

Pretty hard to follow that.

Uh John Guslison, Senior Vice President of Shark Sports Entertainment.

Um, I really want to thank staff.

Um, Jans and I have had the opportunity to work together for 19 years, and of course, Brendan for bringing this forth because this is uh truly a big thing for our organization.

Um, you know, during that time that we've been operating, you know, we've worked together to create a facility that serves thousands of Oakland residents and families each year through youth hockey, figure skating, public session, learn to skate, and other recreational opportunities.

We're proud of what we've accomplished together, and we remain committed to providing these opportunities for years to come.

The lease agreement before you today represents a significant commitment by the Sharks organization to Oakland.

Not only does it secure our presence and operations at the Oakland Ice Center for up to 25 years, but it also provides the framework for the much needed infrastructure and facility improvements that will allow this building to continue to serve the community well into the future.

The long-term partnership provides stability for our customers, our employees, and many youth and community programs that rely on this facility each and every day.

We respectfully ask for your support, staff's recommendation and approval of the lease agreement before you today.

Thank you for your time, consideration, and of course, I'm here to answer any questions.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, Council members.

My name is Daniel Witt.

I'm an Oakland resident with two kids attending Redwood Heights Elementary.

Uh, but today I come before you as a co-founder and president of the Oakland Hockey Project and Oakland's newest sports team, a hockey team called the Oakland Skates.

We're launching this year as a semi-professional team rooted in Oakland, built to reflect the diversity, energy, and pride of this community.

Our goal isn't just to compete, it's to create a new accessible sports culture in Oakland, one where families can easily afford to attend games, where local youth can more than just see themselves on the ice, and where hockey can once again become part of this city's identity.

The Oakland Ice Center will be the home rink for the skates inaugural season starting this fall, and for this reason and many more, that's why I'm here in strong support of the proposed lease and capital investments that are under consideration.

This investment takes the ice center to the next level.

The upgraded facility will allow us to host regional tournaments and within the next few years the playoffs for the Mountain Hockey League, which is the league that the skates will be joining for this inaugural season this fall.

This means bringing visiting teams, families, fans from across California and beyond, filling hotels, restaurants, and shops, and generating new revenue for the city.

It also positions the ice center alongside other successful sports catalysts we're seeing in Oakland helping to anchor continued economic revitalization, specifically in downtown.

The San Jose Sharks have been a strong and consistent supporter of the skates during our launch and of the community with their management of the ring to date.

Their leadership and investment in East Bay have helped to expand access to on ice sports, and passing this measure will ensure that future growth is both sustainable and community focused.

I respectfully urge your support of this item, and I invite each of you to join us for inaugural season starting this fall at the Oakland Ice Center.

Thank you.

Hopefully I can bring it home for us.

I'm Glenn Martin, the general manager of the Oakland Ice Center.

Councilmember.

Approval of this term sheet also creates the opportunity for monerizing monerizing the renovation of the facility for 30 years of service that it's provided.

This is need badly needed.

The investment also preserves the community asset, supporting future generations, ensuring the Oakland Lake Center continues as a source of pride for the decades to come.

Thank you.

So it's it's a good thing that you have this facility, but everybody can't use it.

Uh it works for certain people if you got money.

So the sharks agree to pay for field trips for at least a thousand Oakland student uh school district students, as well as offer every student enroll in after school programs free ice time.

Is that in the new contract that was in the old contract?

Uh the old contract says that you would supply a hundred thousand dollars annually for maintenance.

The new contractual arrangement says that you have a hundred thousand dollars for capital reserves.

What does that mean?

Uh it's good that you have a commitment for capital projects related to this facility.

You still haven't made a commitment to the Oakland police administrative building related to the necessity of that capital project being put in place.

You need to make clear how the free parking is paid for.

When I read it, I assumed that the city was playing for free parking.

There's nowhere in the documentation that I read that said the pre-parking will be paid for by the uh sharks organization.

Uh you also have uh something that said how we get revenue previously, the shark managed uh ring rank had a fee, uh, did not take a pay a fee, but would pay 70% of all revenues would go to them, and then we would get some kind of revenues.

I think it's different, it's different now.

What is the exact amount of revenue we're gonna get?

It's not clear.

Okay, so I I'm concerned about clarity of the maintenance that they're gonna take care of.

They say solar panels and foundations.

Lastly, you advertise for the hiring of a refrigeration engineer who paid for their salary to the take care of whatever needed to be done related to the thank you for your comments.

Chair, that concludes all speakers on this item.

Excellent.

Um, thank you so much.

Um, so definitely um happy to support this item.

Um, thank you so much to staff and everyone that had a hand in bringing and working on this comprehensive agreement.

Um, and um I will refer to um council member Fife, you know, since you've had the opportunity to work on this item.

I I do I would like it to be stated for the public about the participation of of the public school youth um at the Oakland Ice Center and how that's gonna work moving forward.

I do know several schools in West Oakland that utilize the center, so if staff or maybe someone um uh Glenn or John could speak to that, I would appreciate that.

Okay.

The question specifically around will OUSD students still have the ability to access the ice center.

Yes, they will.

Well, nothing changes going forward.

Can that be confirmed from staff in the report?

That's right.

Uh through the chair, we're taking the existing community set of community benefits required in the management agreement, which includes that as well as a whole bunch of other things, and we're moving it into this agreement too.

Thank you.

And then and through the chair, if we Dan, if you could talk about the Oakland Skates program and try because I know that's something we've talked about in the past, about accessibility for Oakland residents to participate.

Yes, so um the Oakland hockey project is technically the parent organization of the Oakland skates, and that's really meant to be indicative of our uh sort of entrenchment and commitment to the community through the nonprofit uh side of that entity.

We intend to inject a lot of the revenues that uh we get from not just this inaugural season but from continued uh uh continued uh seasons at the Oakland Ice Center to uh address some of the cost barriers, not just for the equipment, but also uh ice to enable uh Oakland youth to access the facility more regularly, going back to some of the recent studies that have been done about OUSD and specifically sports.

We know that on ice sports, not just hockey, by the way, are some of the most desired sports for Oakland youth.

That is our sweet spot.

That is where we intend to focus our time and attention.

Thank you for sharing that.

And if you have not been to a game, I definitely encourage folks to go, super exciting.

I played hockey as a kid, and I think it's important for kids to have other opportunities outside of sports where they hit their heads and get concussions and things like that.

So although this could happen in hockey, but we're gonna we're gonna keep it safe for Oakland youth.

So thank you for sharing that, and I will make a motion to move this to for the first read um because it's an ordinance to the uh Tuesday, next Tuesday city council meeting on June 16th.

Excellent.

Second.

Thank you.

We have a motion made by Councilmember Five, seconded by Chair Brown to approve the recommendations of staff and support this item to the June 16th, 2026 City Council agenda on roll council members five.

Aye.

Rama Chandran.

Aye, Anger, and Chair Brown, aye.

Thank you.

Item number three passes with war.

I support this item to the June 16th City Council agenda on consent.

Reading in item number four, adopt an ordinance as recommended by the planning commission amending title 17 of the Oakland Municipal Code, updating the assess accessory dwelling unit regulations for consistency with state law and providing written findings pursuant to government code 66326B.

Two revising discontinue discontinuance standards for non-conforming activities, three.

Excellent.

Thank you so much.

And we will hear from staff on this item.

Good afternoon.

Um excuse me.

Rosan Philippa, on behalf of uh Strategic Planning, uh Planning Bureau.

Um I'm here to present a summary of the proposed planning code amendments package.

If I may ask K Top to bring up the presentation, thank you so much.

Okay.

So I'll begin uh with the proposed ADU related amendments followed by the substantive non-ADU code changes, and then highlight some key uh conforming and clerical uh revisions and uh conclude with the stuff recommendation.

So uh the city's um ATU ordinance has evolved over time uh to remain consistent with the state law.

Uh the regional ordinance was adopted in January 2022 and uh later updated in both 2024 and 2025.

Um most recently in December of last year, uh 2025, the city received a findings letter from uh state um HCD included with the staff report.

Uh in response, planning staff outlined the changes necessary to maintain full compliance with the state law.

Um so following our uh three recommended minor changes um that we're proposing.

First one is a clerical change to update statute numbers to reflect the current statute numbers.

Second is to remove subjective visibility criteria, and third to remove subjective predominant um criteria and replace it with more objective visually similar with visually matching.

There are also two HCD findings for which staff does not recommend any changes.

So the first one, state HCD claims that the ADU regulations in S9 zone are inconsistent with state law and gives the city two options.

One is to amend the ordinance to comply with state law, and two to adopt the ordinance with findings, so supporting the city's determination that the regulations comply with state law.

So staff recommendation and response to HCD was that the city has already satisfied the second option by adopting findings supporting its ADU regulations in AS9 combining zone.

The findings were adopted with the original ADU ordinance in January 2022 and then reaffirmed in uh in ordinance adopted in June 2024.

And therefore, city has complied with state law and no changes are proposed.

Um finding state HCD claims that uh creating a preference for ADU location other than uh the front setback first as specified in uh code section uh is in confluent with the government code with the state law because it precludes an ADU of at least 800 square feet.

Um staff recommendation and response uh in a meeting with HCD on April uh 2026.

Uh planning staff clarified that the state HCD and uh state HCD acknowledged that while ordinance establishes preferred ADU locations, it does not prohibit front yard ATUs when uh no other feasible locations exist on the site.

And the city is also making additional findings in the proposed ordinance to establish that um ADUs are not prohibited in uh front setback.

Um and so the city is compliant with the state law.

Um staff also um met uh with um, as I mentioned, with the state HCD staff uh on April 20th, and we also um uh showed the HCD the existing findings for um uh item number one.

Um so I'll briefly um summarize the proposed substantive and non-ADU code changes.

Um the first change is to revise discontinuance standards for non-conforming activities.

Um, we propose to eliminate ambiguous purposeful abandonment standard in the planning code and establish a clear 60-day time frame for cessation of these non-conforming operations.

Um, second change uh is impacting the S10 zone, just to clarify that uh only objective standards apply to Ministerial Design Review uh projects and uh but discretionary criteria will continue to apply to regular design review projects.

Um next proposal is regarding Wood Street, allowing recreational assembly activities such as plazas, community gardens, and so on in uh DWS uh 9 zone without a conditional use permit.

Um, next change is uh um regarding Coliseum uh providing a consistent 10-foot front setback along the west side of uh Hegenberger Road.

Um, next change is to um remove a review deadline for development agreements uh that does not align with the DA approval process.

So finally, here are just several examples of clerical and conforming revisions.

These include revising maximum residential density in DDT, height areas five and six in downtown and updating the maximum height in DDT height area nine.

There were some errors made previously, and we're just correcting those errors.

Other things such as replacing dwelling units with leaving units throughout the planning code in some instances to be more inclusive.

This brings me to the end of the presentation.

I'll just leave the staff recommendation up here and we'll welcome any questions from city council in the moment.

Excellent.

Thank you so much for the report.

I know that it takes a lot of due diligence to bring the city into some of the state regulations, and so thank you for your work on that.

Colleagues, any questions or comments?

We can go to the public speakers.

Calling in the names that signed up to speak on item number four, Victor Adjay and Asado Olavala.

Good afternoon.

Appreciate the opportunity to comment.

But we want to make sure the proposed legislation does not unintentionally penalize property owners who are acting in good faith to continue an existing lawful industrial use.

Our comments are focused on the proposed changes to Section 17.114.050 point C regarding discontinuance of a non-conforming truck-related industrial activity.

As we understand it, the proposed language would provide that the right to continue a non-conforming truck-related industrial activity immediately expires if the use discontinues active operation for more than 60 days.

The proposed language can causes concern because in practice a gap in tenant occupancy does not mean the owner has discontinued the use.

When a tenant vacates or lease terminates, that is often outside the control of the property owner.

During that period, the owner may be actively marketing the site, negotiating with replacement tenants, making repairs, and so on.

Maintenance repair and construction work are also part of actively operating this type of facility.

These good faith activities are part of active operation of the industrial use and can easily take longer than 60 days.

For those reasons, we are seeking confirmation that in applying the proposed legislation, the city would interpret active operation to include good faith efforts by a property owner to continue the same lawful industrial use, including retenanting efforts and maintenance repairs and construction.

This confirmation is important because reinvestment in these properties often requires construction.

This is what I understood.

You submitted some documents to the state, and the state identified that you had you needed to correct errors and inconsistencies within certain issues had to be addressed.

Errors, and it's a lot, it's a lot.

One of the things that stood out to me around the free safety adequate evacuation and attachment C staff identified that South Piedmont is served well with bus stops, and they identified buses 646, 652, and 682 bus uses.

Those three buses are for the school district.

This is misleading.

So I'm concerned.

If staff was intentionally misleading, or staff didn't know what the hell they were doing.

One of the two.

That needs to be corrected.

You also had limited permitting with AUSU ADUs.

Thank you for your comments, Ms.

Olavala.

Chair, that concludes all speakers on this item.

Excellent.

Thank you so much.

Did um the District 7 office have a question?

Go ahead, Evelyn.

There you go.

Evelyn Vegan, behalf of uh, apologies.

Um regarding uh his concern for this item uh the setback of 10 feet off of Hemingberger, he would like to hold on this item as he believes their concern regarding the development in that area.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Thank you so much for the comment.

Um, so um I have two questions for staff.

Um so the first one, um, can you I guess we'll I'll start with the district seven office one.

It's under in my notes.

I have it under um, what is it, 17.101 H.03?

Footnote number two, um, establishes a consistent 10 foot medium setback along Hagenburger Road, aligning with all other zones along this gateway corridor that already require a 10-foot um front setback.

Um so Hagenburger Road and Oak Park Oakport Street.

When I talked to Councilmember Houston about this item, I think he was specifically asking.

Does the Porter of Oakland also have to uh also have those same requirements?

Um so this only applies to a very small area because this is a um the this zone, it only applies to the area is just south of the Coliseum on the west side of Hagenberger, and actually one of the parcels is owned by the city of Oakland itself.

So, and then two of the other parcels that already have developments on them currently, so that would not affect those parcels.

South of the Coliseum.

And so is that the the city-owned site?

Is that where youth um where there's a housing um group uh I'm blanking on the name youth?

Yeah, youth spirit artworks.

Is that the site?

Or like am I in the right area?

Yes.

Okay.

Um, so I um I'm not sure how the committee wants to um take the feedback from the D7 office um but I think that my recommendation if um we move the item along can planning and building be sure to meet with council member Houston to kind of explain the specifics and why um this recommendation is on the table um if that seems appropriate to my colleagues um and then the other question that we heard from the public speaker uh I believe that's on section 17 point uh one one four point zero five zero candy I'm thinking that the the question is around so it basically states clarifies the standard um when uh nonconforming truck activities and it basically says it eliminates the undefined purposeful abandonment standard and establishes a 60 day time frame and I feel like the public speaker is just asking for some clarity around like I guess you know what is a true definition of um I guess being active like um versus purposeful abandonment that we are now removing right I I can start and then maybe also our city attorney can um add to that uh but essentially this you know this item stems from our environmental justice element that basically wants you know the city to look at nonconforming uses that are in residential neighborhoods that are causing harm of you know either pollution or um lots of trucks going through residential neighborhoods and so this is something that has you know been an objective of the city as well as the residents and was adopted by the city council and so the right what previously had been done originally was there was actually a zero day standard for nonconforming uses in this and there was the purposeful abandonment was what was stated in that code section and um there was an appeal on that it was um decided that wasn't clear what purposeful abandonment meant so that is the change we are proposing so we're no longer talking about purposeful abandonment but that after 60 days um that this um these businesses would then no longer be reinstated this is similar to language we have for all of our other types of nonconforming uses um which we've had for for years and and most cities have this as well and so it's more that the use is not being used for 60 days and not whether a business owner or a property owner is still trying to lease the property for another use the purpose is that we actually want this use to stop in these areas.

I see and then just to make sure I'm understanding it correctly um at first the standard was zero was it zero day it was zero and now it's sixty now it's sixty okay and I don't know if Mike Branson wants to add to this I'll just add a little bit actually several years ago it was 90 days uh and then after the environmental justice element was adopted uh there was a proposal to um be a little tighter on that um out of a concern about certain trucking uses near residential neighborhoods so that's when it was revised down to zero days um under state law you need to have an intention uh aspect to um removing nonconforming so there was a purposeful abandonment language added uh but it wasn't a defined term and it became very difficult to implement as we saw um on an appeal at planning commission and so the 60 days is really intended to you know continue to uh move in the direction that the environmental justice element uh directs uh while also offering something that is a little bit uh easier for both staff and the public to understand what the expectation is around it.

Um I I know that there's still conversations perhaps about amortization uh language and um I'm sure that there will be further explanation or exploration around the topic of legal nonconforming but right now um staff need something that can be um more regularly implementable.

Excellent.

Thank you um thank you for that um so to the public speaker um my someone from my team is happy to connect with you.

And then we can also identify uh if there's a where the specific location is, and we can connect you with the district team as well.

And chances are they're probably there on the side there that they can assist you.

So thank you so much for showing up and for the question as well.

So colleagues, any um council member five?

If we could through the chair, have the speaker uh tell us where the business is located, and if you've read if you've contacted our departments, our staff yet.

Thank you.

We're located at 4831 Tidewater here in Oakland.

Um I think we contest that it's not driving through a residential area.

Um it's it's very much an industrial um road there and uh in the broader area.

Um thank you for the response.

Uh we we are just trying to clarify um as well what active operation means, and I think our clarification here is that um as property owners, we are putting an investment into the building, and that investment sometimes takes more than 60 days.

And so if you are clarifying that our um active operation stops 60 days after we have a tenant in there that we feel is too restrictive.

I understand.

I just wanted to to understand where the district what district this was located and definitely encourage you to talk to those people over there.

Yeah, I think it's district seven, right?

Yeah, yeah.

Thank you.

Excellent.

All right.

Any other additional questions or comments on this item?

Okay.

I'll I'll make the motion to move this to the full council meeting.

June the 16th.

Now, second.

Thank you.

We have a motion made by Chair Brown, seconded by Council Member Five, to approve the recommendations of staff and to forward this item to the June 16th 2026 City Council agenda on rule council members five.

Aye.

Ramachandron.

Aye.

Unger.

Aye.

And Chair Brown.

Aye.

Thank you.

Item number four passes with four I support this item to the June 16th City Council agenda.

And to the chair, is that on consent?

Yes.

Thank you.

Okay, now reading in item five.

Receive an informational report on the City of Oakland's general plan and housing element annual progress reports for calendar year 2025, and we have three speakers that signed up to speak.

Excellent.

Um we'll hear from staff on this item.

Uh good afternoon, council members and the public.

My name is Laura Kaminsky.

I'm the strategic planning manager.

And uh K-Top, if you can have the presentation, please.

I'm also here with Caleb Smith who's with the housing community development department.

So we're gonna be doing a joint presentation.

So um the purpose of the housing element annual progress report is to assess the city's progress implementing the housing programs and meeting the regional housing needs allocation or the arena committed to the six-cycle housing element.

Oakland's total arena is 26,251 units.

And the annual progress report is required pursuant to the California law, and the APR must be submitted to the California Office of Land Use and Climate Innovation and the California Department of Housing Community Development by April 1st of every year.

At this meeting, I'll be providing an overview of the content reported to the 2025 General Plan Annual Progress Report and the 2025 housing element annual progress report.

So, first gonna um go over the content for the 2025 general plan annual progress report.

As you as I'm sure you're aware, we're currently working on the general plan phase two update, which focuses on four elements shown here.

Uh the 2025 general plan annual progress report includes updates from staff regarding general plan implementation and update activity that occurred during the calendar year of 2025.

The city conducted extensive committee engagement to inform the phase two of the general plan update.

These are a number of the uh other initiatives that happened um during the 2025 that are listed on this screen, such as um, you know, over the years we've also adopted the downtown Oakland Specific Plan and various other specific plans.

We have a safety element, and we're as we're also updating the open space conservation recreation element.

These include the Brooklyn Basin, West Oakland BART, TOD, Lake Merit Bart, TOD, and Oaknal Mixed Use Community.

So now I'm going to provide an overview of the content reported in the 2025 housing annual progress report.

So the annual progress report form provided by the California State HCD HCD, collects information on housing units proposed, entitled and permitted and completed in the reporting year.

Definitions of these include proposed is when you is for a planning permit that's been applied for.

So there was 1,007 units that were proposed in 2025, 1,944 units that were entitled, and 7212 units that were permitted, and 1, about 391 that were completed.

So now I'm going to go over some of the definitions of affordable.

Oh, sorry.

In fact, I'm gonna leave this to Caleb who's gonna take over this part of presentation.

Thank you, Laura.

Caleb Smith for the City of Oakland's housing community development department.

So in the annual progress report, we're not just looking at the total amount of housing production permitting and such like, we're also looking at how this is related across the different income bands.

And the state of California uses a standard based off of area median income.

In 2025, the year that's relevant for this information for family for that was 159,800.

We see that area median income is based on a countywide level, so it's often affected by some of our nearby communities with higher incomes than Oakland.

Now there's six different standards that the state uses.

Some of these may be a little newer because the state has added these recently.

Acutely low income is for households that are in less than 50% of area median income, extremely low income is between 15 and 30, very low income between 30 and 50, low income between 51 and 80, moderate income between 81 and 120 percent, and then a market rate or also known as above moderate income is over 120% of area median income.

Now, when our regional housing needs assessment was originally assigned, only four of these categories were specifically assigned targets for very low income, low income, moderate income, and above moderate income.

These other two categories, acutely low income and extremely low income, are more recent additions that show up in our reporting.

However, they don't have a separate target, those are considered to be part of the very low-income target.

So area median income is again the midpoint.

Half of the families earn more, half of them earn less.

This is available for different household sizes.

There's a state lookup chart the state publishes every year.

Now, to provide a bit of a sense for what this means in a practical level, we see that there is a variety of different incomes across this spectrum.

We see that above moderate income can be skilled professionals, like doctors in some of the higher earning professions.

Moderate income, a lot of teachers fit into that.

Um low income, it could be a wide variety of white-collar and skilled blue-collar jobs, and we see that there's again a lot of working-class Oaklanders who fit into very low income, or even extremely low income, and acutely low income, those are often people on fixed income, people with part-time employment, that manner of thing.

So now I'm going to turn it back over to Laura to talk a little bit more about some of our recent progress.

Okay, so the following slides document our progress towards meeting Oakland's regional housing needs allocation.

Only building permits for the construction of new housing units may be counted towards meeting the RENA.

Building permits ensure that any new construction complies with all health, safety, and building code standards.

This issuance of building permit signals that construction of a project may begin.

At the time, this the unit is considered permitted.

So 14% of Oakland's regional housing needs allocation has been met in the first three years of this housing element cycle.

We've been relatively successful at permitting very low, which is 19% of those units and low income units, which is about at 25%.

While production of moderate income units and market rate units has underperformed with only 9% of the regional housing needs allocation permitted at each affordability level.

Over the past eight years, significant shifts have occurred in the market.

In 2018, Oakland permitted record levels of market rate housing.

This major influx has helped stabilize rents in Oakland.

However, high construction costs and high interest rates have deterred market rate developers from continuing to produce units at such a high rate.

Meanwhile, the city has aimed to leverage the cooler market to produce more affordable housing.

In 2025, funding from Measure U and recent zoning changes and other factors have led to high levels of affordable housing production in the city.

Continuing a trend that started in 2023, more deed restricted affordable units than market rate units were permitted in 2025.

Fewer units were permitted in 2025 than in 2024.

These units permitted or remained below average relative to prior seven years.

This represents a 31% decline from 2024 and a 10% decline from the previous low in 2023.

In contrast to planning entitlements, housing developers typically only apply for building permits once they are ready to break ground on a project.

This means that building permit issuance is the best indicator for the current state of housing development.

In this regard, this is the state stage at which housing developers are more sensitive to high construction costs, high interest rates, and low market rate market rents.

Accordingly, the permitting activity in 2025 was largely driven by production of affordable housing.

The largest number of affordable units are being produced within housing projects that have five or more units.

Significantly more affordable housing units were proposed, entitled, permitted, and completed compared to market rate units.

There is 870 affordable units proposed, 1,283 affordable units entitled, 600 affordable units were permitted, and almost 800 affordable units were completed.

It should be noted that affordable housing that is entitled is a very strong predictor of affordable units that will be permitted in the following or upcoming years.

Given the high number of affordable units entitled in 2025, we expect these to translate pretty directly into permitted affordable units in the coming years based on funding availability.

Many of the trends we are seeing in Oakland are playing out also in pure cities, especially or specifically in San Jose, Fremont, and Sunneville.

So Oakland has permitted 14% of its RENA requirement.

This is roughly average compared to cities of San Jose, which has permitted also 14%, Fremont has permitted 12%, and Sunnyville has permitted 16% of the required units.

Notably, as you can see from the purple bars, Oakland has permitted a larger share of its very low income and low-income units than any of its pure cities.

So 19% and 25% respectively.

This represents 42% of all low-income or below units permitted in Alameda County in this housing element cycle.

Accessory dwelling units or ADUs also saw relatively stable levels of production in 2025.

So while ADU production fell across all phases of development tracked on the APR, this decrease was less significant relative to the decrease seen in multifamily development in 2025.

This relative stability of ADU production shows that even amid a financially constrained development environment, ADUs continue to be affordable by design, not just for renters, but also for homeowners that are developing them.

The city entitled 244 ADUs permitted 192 of them completed, 183 in 2025.

The number of units entitled and permitted in 2025 were still below average from the last five years.

So the permitted ADUs in 2025 represent a 9% decline from 2024 and a 34% decline from the peak of 2019.

This figure shows the trends of the production of ADUs over the last few years.

The number of ADUs entitled and permitted in 2025 were below average relative to what we saw in 2019 to 2024.

ADU production is not broken out by affordability for a few reasons.

Prior to 2023, the city of Oakland reported ADUs as market rate units to the state through the APR.

This was done because ADUs are not deed restricted.

However, recent studies on the affordability of ADU supports the idea that ADUs are an important source of housing that is affordable by design.

So the Association of Bay Area Governments or ABAG conducted an analysis of ADU affordability, included that in most jurisdictions, 30% of permitted ADUs could be counted as very low income, 30% could be counted as low income units, and 30% could be counted as moderate income units, and only 10% would be above moderate.

Therefore, beginning in 2023, the city began reporting ADUs as non-deed restricted affordable units in line with the ratios provided by ABAG.

In addition to reporting on housing production, the housing element APR also reports on Oakland's progress implementing the housing action plan.

So these are just a few of the of the progress items from this past year that one is promoting healthy homes and lead safe housing, also investigating a tenant community opportunity to purchase act, right size development fees on market rate developments, adjusting or waiving city fees and paying payment timing for affordable housing development, and also implement objective design standards.

Thank you, Laura.

So the annual progress reports primarily focused on housing production numbers, but the city of Oakland also invests in affordable housing preservation.

We see here that the large majority of units this past year were counted towards the arena as production units.

Historically, those do not count for the purposes of arena credit.

However, we are looking forward to some changes in state law which will take effect.

So in future years, we do hope to get at least partial arena credit for these units as part of the city's broader affordable housing strategy.

Now, we also with this annual progress report want to look ahead.

Looking at a snapshot in time like 2025 can sometimes be illuminating, but it may also sometimes not adequately capture the full picture.

Now, one of the key priorities for housing community development in 2026 continues to be measure you implementation.

There is over a thousand units of affordable homes that have already received building permits or are expected to imminently receive building permits in the first half of 2026.

So when it looks like we maybe had a little bit of a drop in building permits in 2025, in some respects, that's a quirk of the affordable housing funding calendar on the state level as projects were awaiting the final affordable housing tax credits before they were ready to move forward to construction.

Fortunately, thanks in large part to the city's investments through Measure U and other programs, a lot of our projects were in a position to get those final awards last fall as well as the first part of this year.

Our department housing community development is also going to continue to deepen partnerships with other agencies, such as working with Alameda County on Measure W, other parts of Alameda County on tax defaulted lots and small infill developments, and also working with our regional partners, such as the Bay Area Housing Finance Authority.

There's going to be additional priorities, investing available measure U as Measure Us available in Shovel Ready Projects.

We have a robust pipeline, and we know there's a number of projects that are excited to apply for our next NOFO when available.

And we also want to ensure that our pipeline projects are positioned to compete for additional affordable housing resources, such as the upcoming states affordable housing sustainable communities funding program, the upcoming tax credit rounds, and other state funding programs.

In addition to some internal staff capacity building, we're also excited to have an increased focus on homeownership with some opportunities associated with the state's permanent local housing allocation funding program.

Some new programmatic rules should make that a better source for homeownership.

And then implementing the anti-displacement strategic action plan because we know that a lot of the work discussed in the annual progress report is focused again on our capital investments, but we also have a much broader affordable housing strategy and housing community development, which also encompasses a variety of non-capital preservation anti-displacement investments, which really created more comprehensive and complete affordable housing strategy.

So now I'll turn it over to Laura to talk a little bit about some of the exciting work planning and building has upcoming.

So the planning and building department is continuing to work on streamlining code approval and making building faster and easier, and also we're working as stated earlier on the general plan update.

We're updating our land use and transportation element, the open space conservation recreation element, our noise element, as well as a new infrastructure element.

And we anticipate bringing that to council for adoption in 2027.

And that concludes the presentation.

Excellent.

Thank you both for the comprehensive breakdown.

Any uh Councilmember Unger, you can start us off.

I just want to say it's it's pretty easy to go through these slides, and you guys are so deep in it that you don't necessarily step back.

But I just want to take a minute and acknowledge what an amazing job you've all been doing on producing housing and affordable housing in Oakland, and it is we are beating a lot of our uh cities in the region.

We are doing incredible work and it it translates to real um safety and security on the ground.

And I want to thank you all for the work you've done, and also um, you know, like like all of us, I'm worried about where the next uh you know funds come from in doing this, and that's something that we all have to put our our heads collectively together because there's still an enormous amount of work to be done.

But I I just want to I hope you all take take a moment to that yourselves on the back because you deserve it.

Yeah.

Thank you, council member.

Yeah, I definitely agree.

Um both the HCD team and planning and building with all of the just when you were running through all of the elements that you know, land use and the general plan, all of these, um, all of this takes a lot of comprehensive planning um with various teams within the city and with community stakeholders, and I we know that the job is not easy, so just really want to express my gratitude and just really uh gratitude for all of the hard work and also the HCD team, just really uh helping us be really a leader in building so much affordable housing and just all of the amazing work.

So definitely agree with Councilmember Unger's um sentiments and um council member Fife.

Thank you.

Um through the chair ditto to everything my colleagues have said.

Can we get these slides emailed to us?

I saw the report, but I the the presentation is just a lot easier to flow through.

So if we could get uh copies of the presentation, I would really appreciate that.

Um, because I want to go back to the slide where I think we were showing that there was an underperformance at nine percent for um one of our categories of housing, and I wanted to understand what the baseline is for underperformance, is performance um defined as a hundred percent of meeting the RENA goals, or is there another baseline?

Yeah, I think what we're trying to look at is you know, in order to meet the arena, you know, we're trying on average you would try to you know have this um you know because it's an eight-year arena cycle that you would try to have one eighth of the production per year, and so you know, looking at it in that regard, we are we are behind, but um most of the other cities are behind, or actually, you're seeing all the other cities are behind as well, it's just reflective of the current economy in the Bay Area right now for market or affordable or across the board.

Um, it's across the board that we are we are doing better in the affordable housing production than we are in the market rate production, and that's again relating things to measure you.

Right, which is I see a hand up behind you.

Um Timothy Green, planner three.

Um, just to clarify that nine percent under production number um is both for moderate income units and market rate units, um, and that's comparing ourselves to our peer cities.

Um if you take um if you take 100% divided by eight years, I believe that's 12.5% annually that we would need to produce of arena.

So just wanted to get those numbers.

That's math is very helpful.

Thank you for that.

Um thanks, Timothy.

And and then the market conditions that are producing this uh phenomenon across the state of California.

Is it possible that we look at other developments, products other than the way that we're building right now?

Because what is it like a million a door now for construction for new construction?

Can we look at modular our developers or builders talking about use using modular construction so we can reach those numbers?

Thank you.

Emily Weinstein, Director of Housing Community Development, uh, through the chair to Council Member Fife.

So I think there's a couple different ways to look at that information.

First, in terms of the amount of production for market rate, the city of Oakland has produced, I think it's been 14,000 units or something over the last eight years of market rate development.

And so part of what you're seeing here is the RENA cycle, and it's an arbitrary sort of date of when this RENA cycle started, and we finished the last RENA cycle.

The last RENA cycle we overshot the number of of uh required um or the goals for market rate.

So part of what what the city is facing right now is an absorption of the existing housing stock.

And so no matter what we do as a city, we're gonna be absorbing that large amount of supply, whereas other cities across the across the Bay Area across the state weren't developing all through COVID.

So that is part of why our rents have been kind of holding still while vacancies is starting to go down.

Um our rents are pretty much staying still, although they're starting to take up a little bit, but that's because of the large supply of market rate housing that came online over the last several years.

In terms of the cost of housing, uh we are not seeing yet the huge savings for modular.

So we've seen we've had a couple modular uh developments, affordable developments, um, come through, and we have not seen yet the huge change in in cost.

It really has to do with the time savings, um, but there's other costs right now associated with modular.

So, what a lot of affordable housing developers do is during the design period, they're evaluating their developments with different construction methods, modular and not, and seeing particularly with like infill, it can be difficult because there are not a lot of staging areas, and so it can be you can build up the the costs through construction.

So many developers will evaluate how to bring down the costs and modular is one potential solution, but it hasn't yet borne out really.

Outstanding, thank you for that information.

And then I guess one of the last things I wanted to add is uh what I would like to see moving forward is a process that brings in small and emerging developers into this process that can uh access the funds that we have for development projects because I know there are a lot of women, there are a lot of minority developers uh that are trying to get projects off the ground, especially for units that are less than 50 units, the smaller on the smaller end.

Um I think that would be really beneficial to the populations that we're trying to serve as well as um these developers that serve some of the marginalized communities that are so in need of of housing.

I guess I said that was the last statement.

I do have one more.

Do you want to address that?

Yeah, I can speak directly uh to that.

So as part of our funding uh processes in our NOFAs, we provide additional points for emerging developers.

So that's baked into the way that we score uh projects through our our competitive processes, and that's really across all of our um different funding programs.

Uh in addition, one of the big challenges for emerging developers is pre-development funding.

Yeah, and we know that that's the riskiest funding.

And so um, as you are aware, we applied for uh a program through HUD and success were successfully awarded for over five million, over five million dollars of HUD funds, and we developed a pre-development program, um, half a portion of which is designated for emerging developers.

We have uh had some challenges to get that program up and running, and part of it is what we came to understand is the program is designed to be um rolling funds, the original funds though come with uh what are called Baba requirements, build America by America, which adds additional costs.

So it makes those funds almost like cost prohibitive to use, particularly for emerging developers.

So we are in the process of identifying projects that already have Baba requirements because they have federal funds uh tied to them to provide the initial round of predevelopment funds, and then when those payments come back to us as as repayments, they will be circulated again to develop uh emerging developers without triggering those federal requirements.

Wow, can you share information about this BABA program?

This is so funny to me.

The term we enjoy saying it, although it is very difficult when it hits our projects.

Understood.

Um, last two things.

The success that you all have had with affordable oh, I'm sorry.

I was just gonna add also um for projects that are for market rate projects.

So, number of the um streamlining code changes that we made.

We're also trying to help smaller developers as well.

So now we have a ministerial approval or by right approval process for one to 30 units that are market rate projects, as well as um for one to four units, those projects do not have to pay affordable housing impact fees, so trying to help encourage the missing middle housing, and those were action items from our housing element as well that we have now implemented.

I remember thank you for refreshing my memory.

Um, and with the success that you all have had with getting so many units developed affordable units.

Uh, I just wanted to state that I think that underscores why we need that allocation for affordable housing in this upcoming budget.

I said when we had our our last um council meeting that I was going to try to add back the $50 million that I heard so many of our public speakers ask for, and I did that in my uh budget amendments to the mayor's budget, so I just wanted to state that for the record.

Um I heard loud and clear from the constituents that came and spoke that need in order to continue this progress.

And then my last question is with such uh a robust introduction of affordable units on the in our system.

What does that do for the property taxes that like some of our nonprofit developers and other uh developers don't pay into the city of Oakland?

Do you see it balancing out with people that are now of able to afford rents to be putting money into the economy a different way?

This is a completely random question, but I'm trying to figure out how does that balance out if we're not receiving those those funds that we receive from market rate projects.

Through the chair to council member Fife, uh yes, under state law, affordable housing is subject to uh a reduction in some cases waiver of property taxes and as the welfare tax exemption.

Uh we have actually done some analysis in the past quantifying this benefit and comparing it with different levels of rent savings, and I think it is uh pretty definitive the analysis we've seen so far that the benefit uh to the residents um and to the broader community far outweighs the foregone taxes in a scenario for all the city-supported projects.

Um in the past, there have been people who have proposed projects to the city that would not meet those benefit that other cities have gone for and with unusual financing models, and we said no, thank you because it didn't demonstrate that uh depth of public benefits.

So we always are very careful when it comes to safeguarding those city funds, and fortunately for our city-funded projects, there is always that very robust public benefit that significantly outweighs uh any foregone taxes under that state law.

Outstanding.

So I will make a motion to do we need to send this to the full city council or can we uh accept and receive it in committee?

I was gonna ask if you had a preference.

It does need to go to the full city council, but I believe, but I guess uh specifically, did you want to present to the full council?

Do you have a preference?

It can go on consent or non-consent.

So I'll make that motion to send this to the full city council next Tuesday on consent.

Thank you for all the answers, very thorough.

Second, and then public speakers, yeah.

Calling in the names that signed up to speak on item number five in no particular order, you can come up to the podium.

Or if you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to be easily identified.

Zach Thayer, Jeff Levin, and Asado Olabala.

Um, and Johnson Pharmaceutical uh via the state of California and Purdue via the United States and compliance of the COVID relief bill, uh 13 586 and 1380 was changed in view of myself based on the big bill.

Um, building purchases, yeah, or notices not permits.

You notice that these are all for new construction, but um through the ACAAX and the tax credit room to housing, hasn't been and is metiscously um biased uh in this administration uh for turning buildings when granted money is already liquid and capitalized and calling it steel case and just rezoning the building.

We are known for that in Simon Property, be the city of Oakland, Ladera v.

The United States, and about a half a dozen um SFR investment pool mercy housing.

This is specifically an issue with I of myself, knowing that the Sheldon Eldon Anderson estate, Ernest Williamson and Dolores Williams Estate as Computer Controller and Lotus Capital Management and Chair of the Board, as well as it in TSO Capital.

Um as the private donor of Operation Home Key, and view of the system of care, I was put into bankruptcy, and in view of Merkel via the articles of impeachment, knowing that it was my capital gains for my grandpa Sheldon, Mitchell James's who is my grandpa Jim, his son, and um my just want to remind you that uh affordable housing has uh different components, and it's not just uh the housing that you make available, the Oakland housing Authority with the vouchers.

That's a part of affordable housing, the public housing that you have in this is that's a part of affordable housing.

So when you had the report on uh the what's happening with the Oakland Housing Authority and the fact that they support 18,400 Oakland families with the contribution that they make to the possibility that you can use Section 8 vouchers for mortgage payments for housing and how how do instead of paying rent, it can be a subsidy to pay your mortgage, and then you don't take into consideration in the discussion of affordable housing, you talk about people's uh income, but the responsibility when you are buying a house when you have to pay insurance and mortgage, utility bills, and other aspects of what's involved in that contributes to your ability to have the capacity to buy a house.

I'm also concerned in the report, you make reference to the Oak No project.

That project is out of control.

That project started in 2018, and right now, if I can just say one thing about the project is what's going to happen to the Barcelona partial, which is the property that we own, because the new owners are not committed to bid uh building any affordable housing on that Oak No project.

So what's gonna happen to the Barcelona parcel is the comments.

Switching to Zoom user Jeff, you can unmute yourself and begin your comments.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Chef Levin.

Speaking for East Bay Housing Organizations.

First of all, um just wanna um thank the staff for a very comprehensive report and say that we very much appreciate the progress that the city has made in meeting its housing goals, especially for affordable housing.

Um, as the staff notes in the first three years of this housing element cycle, so far, affordable housing has actually outstripped market rate production.

We're very happy to see that.

But as has been noted, this is due to the unique confluence of two factors, um, the presence of measure U bond funds in particular and depressed market conditions that have held down market rate housing.

These conditions are not likely to persist long term.

So if we look back to the last housing element period and look at the entire fifth cycle, which goes back to 2015, we get a much different picture.

Over the last 11 years, 80% of new housing has been unrestricted market rate housing, and only 20% has been affordable housing.

So while we celebrate what we have done so far, um we also acknowledge that we have a long ways to go.

And this underscores the importance of continued local funding for affordable housing, and we are very happy to have um heard council member Fife last week speak of her support and intent to introduce uh an amendment to the budget to put $50 million of measure you uh funding into the budget, and we note that the council budget team has done so, so we look forward to seeing that become part of the adopted mid-cycle budget.

A couple things I want to mention quickly that aren't here that should be in future APRs.

One is the impact of uh suspending the affordable housing impact fees and whether that's made a difference.

Secondly, whether the zoning changes for middle housing are doing anything, and particularly whether they are in fact affirmatively furthering fair housing, and lastly, just want to note that the downtown Oakland specific plan requires annual reports here.

Thank you for your comments, Chair.

That concludes all speakers on this item, and we do have a motion made by Councilmember Fife, seconded by Chair Brown to receive and forward this informational report to the June 16th City Council agenda on rule, Council members five, Ramachandran, Unger and Chair Brown, aye.

Thank you.

Item number five passes with four eyes to be forwarded to the June 16th City Council agenda on consent.

Moving on to open forum, calling in the names that signed up to speak on open forum Zach Thayer and McLean.

I love doing it this way.

Ken Slade.

Ken Slade.

I want to make sure you understand.

I need um I need to get a tusk, you know.

Ken Slade.

Are we ready to be understood on?

Yeah a little bit of the application.

Ackman Nuremberg orders um get specific.

Um the nice little Queen Marinel um the as a prisoner of war um the definition for UN Order 26921 and UN order eleven eighty four thirty two puts into theater by the week of nine eleven the ability to order six isothermic atomic weapons against the state thank you for your comments switching to Zoom user Ann, you can unmute yourself and begin your one minute comment.

I have submitted a packet of photos for the 35th Avenue corridor properties.

We do not need any of the so-called services offered by the Laurel Business Improvement District.

We already pay annual assessments to the city of Oakland for the same services we are being double cessed and want to be removed from the business district during the July window of opportunity the Laurel BID took in over 2500 in assessments during this last year.

The Laurel looks like a slum for the 10 year period 2015 to 2025 the Laura took in more than two million in assessments and when I submitted photos last July the Laurel still looked like looked like a slum.

We court our properties which include 61 rent control departments are essentially being double taxed for the services that we do not want or need we keep up our properties we derive no benefit from being in a laurel we want to be removed from the business district during the July window of opportunity as a minority we were never heard by the CED committee and before city council the executive director of thank you for your comments your time is up chair at this time all names have been called excellent thank you so much this meeting is adjourned