Recording in progress.

Okay.

There it goes.

All right.

Here we are.

This is um Wednesday, October 15th, 2025 at six PM.

We're here in Council Chambers at City Hall, three hundred fourst Avenue in the city of Pacific Grove, California.

This is the regular meeting, and I'm calling the meeting to order at such time.

Um I will note that all council members are present except with the exception of Councilmember Rao.

Um, and so we will proceed with the Pledge of Allegiance, and I will recognize my colleague Councilmember Garfield to lead us.

And now I'll understand a motion on item one approval of the agenda.

Uh any discussion on the agenda.

Um, and before we do that, do we have a staff presentation for Mr.

Mayor?

But um, thank you real quick.

Uh, we do have two items tonight that staff was requesting to poll.

Okay.

Um, the first item would be eleven B and purchasing system and procedures ordinance.

I will bring that back at a future date.

And then the other item is item fifteen under closed session.

We've um we no longer need that item.

Okay, thank you very much.

So Councilmember Time.

Amelio, um, would you motion amended to poll item fifteen A?

Yes.

Yes.

All right, and we have a second or yes.

Oh, thank you.

So we got it motion on the second.

Um, any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Seeing none passes six zero one.

Thank you very much.

We'll now proceed with that agenda as modified.

Um, we'll move, we'll go through presentations or none tonight.

We'll move on to council and staff announcements.

Uh well recognized council members for announcements, and I will look first to the mayor per time here.

Thank you.

Um I just wanted to uh refer to the um city uh California cities we attended in Long Beach and um they had quite a few net we were able to network with a lot of city councilmen from and mayors from uh all over uh the state of California, uh, which was good, and many I saw uh who I knew.

And um they also had uh seminars in regards to reducing the lost and uh the uh general plan and um other areas they had covered also at the law at Long Beach.

Um but a couple of things I did notice.

Um I mean it was a great conference, but um I noticed near our hotel that uh on Long Beach there was a skateboard park.

And so um Sandra, could you bring that up?

It was pretty impressive.

This is a hundred fifty by 150 feet.

Well, she's bringing that up.

Um I also found out that uh Hollister and Scotts Valley and uh Marina San Cities going to start one.

Selenius is has one student second one.

These are uh let's see, she's gonna bring them up.

Yes, this is a 50 feet by 1 actually 149 feet, uh 50 feet wide, and it had different uh people on it.

Um quite quite impressive.

Uh uh could I have the next slide, please?

Mayor, this is Brian.

Um I I need to interrupt for a minute.

Um the the announcements here would with regard to the league conference.

Certainly um that's within the scope here, but this is an item that's being presented or discussed at least um that's not on the agenda.

So my advice would be if there's gonna be any further discussion on skate parks, it'd be added to a future agenda.

This was just a I saw while at Long Beach the this area, that's why I brought it up.

That's all.

Understood.

You want to call comment any further on that um okay.

Thank you very much for the report.

We'll uh go to Councilmember Garfield for this.

Thank you.

Just some additional information about the conference that um, in addition to the one that that uh council member Amelio talked about, um, reducing the cost and burden of general plan updates was really practical information on how to get a successful update of a general plan without breaking the bank or um driving anyone crazy.

Um in addition, we uh got a lot, all of us got a lot out of things like the small cities uh meeting where we met with people who also were uh governing cities of less than 35,000.

Although I will say that San City took the cake with 350 people.

Um they get the small city, small city award.

Um there was another one on how cities can communicate.

Um, and it was a city, several cities that had created a community calendar using a software called WIF.

And um they found it to be extraordinarily successful.

It it allowed um all events like what's happening with the library, what's libraries programming, what the chamber's doing, what different groups are doing, what's happening at the schools all in one spot.

Um, and it felt like it really created some community um cohesion as well, and um talked about how to make council members council meetings go better.

We had lunch with the Monterey Bay uh elected, so we got to meet our colleagues and sit down and have break bread with them.

And um it you find out that that folks everywhere have the same issues, and we're all working on solutions.

It was good to hear from them.

So um, I think anybody here who has an opportunity to go to one of those meetings should do it.

And I think this was a really good one.

Thank you very much.

Councilman Burry.

Uh I'll just add on that uh I was there at the event too, uh, it was in Long Beach.

Um as with every other conference, uh, this was also well attended.

Um, a lot of sessions to play with.

Uh uh the the thing that I particularly noted in this conference, uh, as opposed to other conferences is that uh uh it's certainly in with the times, uh, meaning AI is a is a big topic, uh kind of central team, but also this conference had uh uh topics on immigration uh items that are really what is happening right now in the US today.

And there were a lot of people attending these uh sessions to understand what a city needs to do from a public uh citizenry perspective when it comes to immigration matters and what is happening in the United States.

So I found that useful.

Uh I think uh overall uh over two days uh the conference was uh well attended.

Uh and and the final comment is we we did uh make a decision as a council board to vote on certain items uh at the end of the conference.

Um, but that voting uh session was entirely canceled because there was no agenda.

So thank you.

Yeah, I didn't get a chance to vote in the unfortunately.

But uh I was ready, but I I'll I'm gonna um be submitting my comments on on in the report next meeting.

Any further council?

Okay.

Uh staff announcements.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

I do have a couple tonight.

Um the first one is regrettably, um, we have to you know let the the council does this, but the community is well know that uh through long hard um discussions, we were not able to come to a place with the point we know's grill where they'll they felt they could remain.

So they've they've chosen to give their notice and they will be leaving um close to the end of November here.

Um we do not want to see that building sit empty, obviously, and we want to get a uh just equally as good restaurant in there.

So we're gonna release the RFP early next week.

So um that will be open for additional vendors to to submit on.

Um so we'll most likely leave that open for our at least 30 30 days, possibly 45 days.

We'll we'll look at the calendar with the holidays and stuff, how it all lands.

Um, other thing just to let the um public and the council know.

On the um 13th of November, the planning commission is gonna be considering the housing element.

The reason this is really significant is because the city council will be seeing this on December 3rd.

And um, this has been a long road, as everybody knows to get to this point, and we're really at the finish line.

So anybody who feels like they want to get the the information again about the the housing element, the planning commission would be a great meeting to attend to listen and to learn more about it.

Um there's there's some street projects.

I'm not gonna call up uh staff tonight to talk about all these things because we want to get moving, but there are some street projects that are underway.

So as you're driving around, you know, look out for paving.

We got a sidewalk project that's kicking off also along Cinex and Congress, all the way down the lighthouse.

Uh the fall recreation programs are kicked off.

So if you have uh uh uh some children who would like to participate in our sports programs, you know, look for what's going on there.

And the last thing is um next Monday, the 20th is the annual um city training day, we call it.

So it's one day when all the staff can come together and focus on um trainings that apply to everybody.

It's like one big team building day.

So for that day, um, you know, city hall will be closed.

So just to let everybody know ahead of time.

Thank you very much.

Anything further?

All right.

Um make an announcement.

Um we did have a closed session earlier this afternoon, and um there's no reportable action in connection with that.

And I should also add that for any future closed session items you may have on the uh subject of appointment of the city attorney.

Um I won't uh since I won't be attending those.

Um if there's any announcements that should come out of those closed sessions, so need to be made by somebody else.

That's all I have.

Understood.

We'll go ahead and move to uh appreciate it.

Thank you very much, Mr.

Pierre.

We'll go ahead and move to item four general public comment dealing with matters subject to the adjustment of the city and the council that are not on tonight's agenda.

Um so I'm seeing a few people in chambers and one hand online, so we'll go ahead and take the public comment uh online.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh telephone number ending in 902.

You have the floor.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council.

Uh, from November 11th to November 16th, the Monterey Bay Aquarium will do topological mapping of the flanks and floor of the Monterey Canyon using extremely high decibel sonar equipment.

I've spoken to the city council and the public before on this harmful practice of the Monterey Bay Aquarium and the effects on ocean creatures.

As any beginning biologist or first-year biology student knows, the sides and edges of ecosystems are the most rich in wildlife.

In this case, the flanks of the canyon provide niches for fish and many species with the flow of nutrients from the depths of the canyon.

In addition, the floor will have special species that can live at those depths.

Blasting these areas with extremely high decibel sonar will destroy these ecosystems and species.

In previous surveys, Mabari was blasting Saturn 5 rocket levels, 191 to 221 decibels.

150 decibels is known to be lethal.

But let's level they were blasting at 10,000 times or more higher than known lethal levels.

The new David Packard equipment is 237 decibels, approximately 15 to a thousand times more powerful than their previous equipment, if that can be imagined.

It will tear apart creatures in the ocean, shred them by decibel level and resonance.

The aquarium is doing all this damage and harm simply for topological mapping.

They'll be doing for six days from 8 a.m.

to 5 p.m.

nine hours each day.

The Monterey B Aquarium's harmful, excuse me, I'm sorry.

Harmful actions are increasing.

This is one of several I know of.

Mabari is trying to hide behind the showpiece on Canary Row and the money it brings to local businesses.

But how long can that last?

Who will come to Pacific Grove and the Monterey Peninsula if the aquarium becomes known for its deplorable animal practices and its actions against the ocean that are killing it?

And what price can we put on the health, well-being, and future of the oceans and its creatures?

The California State Lands Commission has details and the aquarium's permit application.

A 4564.

It has a map of where they're blasting.

I requested the city council, the chamber of commerce, and the public protest the aquarium's actions and use their influence to stop it before this incomparable ecosystem is destroyed.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yes, I I want to thank the city for pulling item 15 and also for pulling the um the sc the skate park report uh for now.

It affirms for me that Pacific Crove in these instances appears to be in compliance with the Brown Act, which I appreciate.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Hansel.

My client.

Thank you.

Um one issue that I hear every time I go to the point Pinos Grill is that they're closing on November 21st.

And I I I'd like to hear more from the city council as to why this is happening.

I don't have any of the inside information.

So I hope I can find more information about why the PG golf course, the grill is closing on November 21st.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I know for the hands, Mayor.

All right, we'll go ahead and close public comment, general public comment, come back to the consent agenda.

Uh dealing with routine and non-controversial matters.

Uh does anyone online or in chambers wish to pull any items on consent?

Council members.

Wish to pull any items.

Okay.

Seeing none, go ahead and entertain a motion.

So moved.

Thank you.

Second.

Motion by Paduri, second by Emilio, and further discussion.

Hearing none, I'll take a voice vote.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Hearing none.

Passes unanimously.

Thank you very much.

We'll move on to the regular agenda.

This is item 11, 11A, public hearing.

Um, and I'll invite I'll have Mr.

Moginson present.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um, as the staff report somewhat indicates, I believe, um we uh are the last of the fire stations within the Monterey system to receive uh an emergency alerting system within the the within the the building itself upgrade that is needed.

Um so at this point, um we know in our CIP we had a budgeted hundred thousand dollars for this upgrade this year.

And again, this will just standardize this with all the other fire stations within the system.

And the idea is to to be able to react quickly to emergency calls when they come in for make sure that the firefighters get those messages quickly.

Um so the um the uh sorry, they're not the uh the contractor who doing the work for us um decided that it's been too long on the original quote, so they felt like they needed to make some adjustments due to tariffs, the raging raising wage rates and um other things.

So they give us a new update of quote, and that quote ended up being you know higher.

So we were here tonight to ask for a budget amendment to the to the original project.

And again, that original amount was 100,000, and this new amount is a little over, I believe a hundred and forty-two thousand dollars.

We do have money in our in our fire um structure fund, I believe it's called, that would cover this so we don't have an impact to the general fund.

Um, we do have fire department employees here with us tonight with assistant chief who can help speak to this if we need to.

However, I will say in the end that um this is one of those things that it you know it does have life safety implications and in there's we really should go forward most likely, but go ahead and deliver.

Is that your report?

That's my report.

Um, just one clarifying question for the public.

Uh and the Monterey, they have already going this direction, correct?

That's correct, they've already installed it in all our stations.

And we share the department.

Yes.

Okay.

Thank you very much for going to public comment on this item.

This is item of 11A.

Uhrdance amendment.

Uh Ms.

Dormer.

Thank you.

I did write you a letter, and it's like, why can't if this station was different and needed extra things?

Unfortunately, the the uh city manager did not read his full report.

He didn't read it, he just gave a kind of a synopsis and he left out that this should have been included in the other.

It's just that they didn't assess it the right way.

And oh, it's a different configuration.

So sure, we're gonna end up having to do it, but you know, prior planning and thorough planning.

Uh ends up saving money in the end, not afterthoughts and reassessments.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Yeah, for the hands, mayor.

Okay, we'll go ahead and bring it back to the council for action.

Close public comment on this item.

Uh, I will say there's not a lot to really discuss if we want to be on par with our sister fire department, or actual is our fire department.

So unfortunate rises in costs, they're coming up a lot lately.

And so we're we're just hope that we'll be ready to be prepared to deal with it.

And in this case, we are.

Yes, Councilmember Garfield.

Um, I it's nice that we've got a fund that has some money in it, but um, fund 12 is what you said have the the sufficient funds to cover this overage.

And my question is is what's fund 12 and what won't be done if we use up some of it, and if you can give me the sort of the the future of the future of fund 12.

Well, that's a great question, council members.

So fund 12 is a set aside just for the the facilities of the fire department um for upgrades and for just ongoing maintenance every year.

Uh the way that is replenished, um, I'm I would be almost certain is through certain fees that come in either over the years through the fire department or over the years that the council has budgeted money for projects that um did not get done.

Perhaps we had grants.

Um, I'm not entirely sure.

And I don't see our finance director here to help me if he knows any further about where this fund came from originally, but it's one that it doesn't have like ongoing revenues into it.

So I'm sure we would have to replenish it at some point.

But it's not like it was earmarked for something else that we won't get to do because you're taking things out of the fund.

No.

Okay.

That's thank you.

Yeah.

And I'll entertain a motion at this point if anybody wants to make one.

I'll go ahead and make a motion to approve the request.

There we go.

Okay.

Yeah, he's requesting the title.

Okay.

Um, the title of this ordinance is an ordinance of the city council of the city of Pacific Grove amending the operating and capital projects budget for fiscal year 2025-26.

And you can just make a motion now to uh uh take action uh on uh the remaining items.

I'll go ahead and take um action on the remaining items uh two, three, and four.

Thank you very much.

We have a motion to approve two recommendations.

Do I have a second?

Second by Pagoni.

Motion by Mary Portemiro, any further discussion?

Hearing that, we'll take a voice vote.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Passes unanimously.

Thank you very much, members of the moderator fire of being here tonight.

Appreciate it.

And we will move right along to 12A, I think.

We're oh, 11B is out.

Sorry, I'm just kind of slogging through here.

We're 13A.

Okay, this is the discussion on the allocation of available potable water.

Item 13A, and I'll recognize the CDD director, John Biggs.

Thank you very much, Mayor Smith, members of the city council.

Uh, we have a discussion for you this evening regarding water allocations.

This is actually one of the city council's priorities to take a look at our current allocations and then give us some direction on future allocations.

This again is just a discussion this evening.

We are looking for council direction, and once we get that direction, we will come back to you with some resolutions for you to opt to formalize the direction that we receive.

Um, it's kind of restates what I just said.

We're we're seeking some uh information for the city council on the allocations.

We're also looking to ask the council whether or not we should increase the discount on the water that is the city water right now from 30%, which is the current discount, to a new number.

Uh the recommendation by staff is 60 percent.

Uh just provide some background information.

There are two principal sources of water that we are discussing this evening.

There is the pure water monterey groundwater replenishment project.

I'll just refer to it quickly as pure water monterey, and that's the project where the water will be coming online within the next couple of months.

And then we have the local water project, which we referred to as entitlement water.

Uh, for the pure water allocation, the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District has indicated that the city will receive an allocation of 32 acre feet, and that again will be available pretty soon, and it will um depend on the uh the receipt of the operation operating permits for the project that they have completed.

And it will depend on the uh the receipt of the operation operating permits for the project that they have completed.

And then we'll have the entitlement water, the city water, and there's a little over 19 acre feet available there.

And that's the original 47 acre feet, minus an 11 and a half acre feet that was set aside for the affordable housing projects, and then minus the water that we have sold already.

So all in total, we have a little over 52 acre feet that uh is available for um allocation.

Uh for the entitlement water, the fee with the 30% discount, as it's reflected in our fee study or fee fee schedule is 183,000 per per acre foot, and a tenth of that is $18,357, which will be quite a bit more than the water cost for the uh water that will be available through the pure water program.

What I put up on the slide right now is staff's recommendations for the allocation of water, and we've recommended allocations among a variety of categories, uh, starting with the first allocation, the pure water, which is the 32 feet acre feet again for residential for residential.

We've separated out between regular residential or market rate residential and affordable housing residential.

Um, we're recommending zero acre feet of that pure water be assigned to market housing, 23 acre feet be assigned to affordable housing, and this is an incentive to um see that affordable housing gets built.

And I will just note that uh, as I mentioned in the agenda report, um, that's not anywhere near enough water to accommodate the arena that we've been assigned of a little over 1100 housing units, but we expect that that 23 acre feet of water will accommodate around 200 affordable units, and we would expect that those affordable units would be deed restricted.

Uh, for commercial, we're recommending six acre feet, and then for municipal, you know, local water projects uh sponsored by the city Pacific River, we're recommending three acre feet, and we aren't recommending anything in that pool of water for an unallocated reserve.

Um, went on to the entitlement water, the the city water for residential, we're recommending 15 acre feet, and normal we're recommending 4.25 acre feet for the unallocated reserve, and that um totals 19.2255 acre feet.

So again, what we're seeking direction from the city council on this evening is um uh the whether or not you agree with our recommendations for the allocation of the water uh and whether or not you would like to see an increase in the reduction or the discount to the entitlement water from 30% to 60%.

And again, this is to encourage development in the city in terms of achieving affordable housing units.

Plus, it's also looked at as an economic incentive, um, reducing the cost of the city water down to a lower number, not not really in competition with the pure water that's going to be available, but certainly less than what we have on the books right now.

Will it encourage development in uh the commercial realm?

Um will existing businesses be able to do improvements to those businesses or property owners have existing buildings, will they be able to do improvements to the buildings to um entice or enhance the facility so that others can look favorably towards coming to Pacific Grove to you know kind of enhance our economic development outlook and increase our tax revenues?

So that's kind of the basis why we were looking at that that reduction.

Um again, I'll mention that following your feedback this evening.

We'll come back to the city council with a resolution that memorializes your your feedback to us this evening, and we will go from there and be able to guide projects and allocate water into the future as projects come forward.

That's the end of my presentation, and I'm happy to answer questions the council has.

Thank you very much.

Go ahead and go out to the public for comment on this item.

One hand in the audience or in the online audience.

Thank you.

This local water project has been sold to us in so many different ways, and all it has done is cost us taxpayers more money every year.

It's never operated, even breaking even.

It operates at a deficit, and now you want to discount water even more so that we have no hope of ever recovering anything.

Well, okay.

I mean, I guess it's just a complete write-off from when a previous city attorney, David Laredo, was touting this as oh, it's gonna generate us five six point five million.

And what a shock it was when the state water board, when it first got completed, said, and they'd given us most of the money, said, Oh, you know, it has to go back to the river.

That's what this is for, you know, to ease up the overdraft of the Carmel River.

So this local water project has just gone through so many different iterations, and all of these problems were brought up for all these years from 2014, 15 and on what was going to happen down the road.

And here it is in spades.

And I mean that you use to do the groundbreaking.

Yes.

Anyway, um, it's just it's just an abhorrent thing.

And frankly, I think that the housing should just get first benefit of any free water that's going to be coming in, period.

Um it needs it.

And if we're going to do the housing things, Pacific Grove is a city of homes.

Yes, we have businesses, but we're not in the business of creating businesses and keeping them afloat, other than our patronage.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Uh Lisa Ciani.

Thank you.

I'd just like to understand as far as the ATC project, which the last I heard has still does not have its coastal uh commission uh uh permit.

Um, but whether the water for that project is going to come out of this commercial six-acre feet per year, or if it's already been set aside, um, or what the situation is on that.

Thank you.

No further hands, Mayor.

Thank you very much.

All right, we're going back to the council uh for discussion.

I think just to frame up the discussion, I think there were a couple just a couple of things on the chart.

Uh Mr.

Biggs, please help me if I'm not right on target on this.

But it's looking like you're wanting a recommendation of the the pure water Monterey water.

And then are we going to change what we're currently doing with the local water project water?

That's correct.

We um I can go and show you uh the chart up on the screen that kind of breaks it down into the pure water allocations, what we recommended in uh at the staff level in that first column, and then the second component of that is the entitlement water and what we're recommending there for council consideration.

And so the numbers won't change as far as the total.

So, like the total, just so I I had to ask about this.

That's why I'm saying it for the benefit of all of us.

But um, the the 32-acre feet, that's what we're gonna get from pure water.

That is correct, and then the 19.2551 is what we have.

That's correct.

Okay, got it.

Sorry, allocating amongst that.

So, given all that your comments.

Oh, yes, Mr.

Morgan, go ahead.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

If I just I think I'll take 30 seconds to maybe address a couple things we heard in public comments.

Okay.

First one is um, you know, what this uh allocation discussion tonight is really not about the the water project that we have.

Um, that project is, you know, we've been working with the golf course.

You'll be seeing a new lease contract soon.

That the goal was to make us whole when it comes to water at the golf course and to pay off the debt for that facility.

So that really is a separate thing.

Yeah, what we're faced with today is the fact that we're getting a bunch of free water.

How should that water be allocated?

Should it be allocated to things that are bigger purpose for the city at this point, and we retain the water still that need that we can sell under entitlement water and receive as much funds as we can out of that to help again buoy some of the costs that were brought up, or do we not want to?

That's part of the discussion.

The other part about the ATC.

So um the ATC, I was not here doing the full planning of it, but I you know, do know that there was no water credits or demands needed for the ATC.

They had they had enough water on site already for that project.

Thank you very much.

That's a good clarification on the first item, the first item in that you know, this is just we're allocating it.

We're not talking about the the red and the black on the on the project itself tonight.

It's not agendized.

So I'll take a comment uh councilman Garfield.

Thank you.

Um, I'm particularly interested if if we have any inkling of what the pent-up demand is on the commercial side or on the residential side of people wanting water but not yet buying it.

Um, to know if if we lower the price, will we get more buyers?

That's that's a good good question.

I we don't really I mean right now when people need water for a project, they're able to buy it from our um uh entitlement water.

So there really isn't a pent up demand.

However, with free water becoming available, we expect that we might get more applications for that water, especially if it's going to be allocated to an affordable housing project, all of a sudden the cost for developing that project is going down because they're not buying the city's entitlement water.

So we we haven't heard anyone knock on the door and say, oh, this entitlement water or this um pure water is becoming available and when is it gonna be ready and you know when can we submit our application?

So um not a lot of interest right now, but I think once it does once the water um the the permits, the operating permits are issued, I think more people will realize that this is a done deal, the water is available, let's do what we can to get our project.

One of the reasons I ask is that it doesn't do us any good to have vacant spaces downtown.

Um it's not good for anybody to have a building line fallow.

So if there are water constraints for revitalizing um some of our old banks, uh a question for you is how much water does it take to put in a uh a kitchen to make a space that was a bank into a restaurant?

Use is based on a there's a a factor on this based on the square footage where a restaurant is based on the number of seats in the restaurant.

So it's gonna depend a little bit on how many seats someone moves forward in um developing a restaurant, but um with the the water becoming available through the pure water project, you know, there's certainly going to be um less initial investment needed to make the get to get that water and be able to do something like that.

Is it is it like a half an acre foot?

Is it a tenth of an acre foot?

Is it three acres?

It's like point zero zero zero seven or um for for per square foot and for seats.

But but it's it's like that makes a difference in how we allocate is how many how many can we get out of that um six acre feet?

I I get what you're saying, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

For a restaurant, it's 0.038 per seat.

So um a little water demand for a bank use or retail use, a little higher water demand for a restaurant use.

Okay.

And let me just jump in.

Um, so another question that I want to put up for all of us to think about is you know, this idea of um aside from assigning the categories, which I think I'm pretty much okay with staff's rec on on these things, but maybe we could you know play with that a little bit.

But um, I'm definitely okay with the entitlement water because we're still selling that water to people, and I'm signing the entitlements on a weekly basis, about 15 acre feet.

Still signing those, and people are still doing they're still moving.

So on that question, just kind of a bifurcate this out a little bit.

Um, and I agree, I think there's a reason to have some reserve on a allocated, have some keep some reserve on hand of our own water.

Um so as we're selling these and we're actively selling them, there was a question on here of whether we should discount further.

Can you speak to how you came up with 60% as a as a different uh number than 30 than we're at?

Yes.

Uh we uh I I think right around there's a um forgive me if I misstate the term, but there's something's called a a water fee calculation at the water management district.

And when the um the calculation is done, the water that you pay for their water and this Pier 1 water coming forward would be in the range of 36,000.

Uh, even with a 60% discount, that drops our price down to a little over a hundred thousand dollars.

So we were trying to make it in the range of more affordable.

Um, it's still not affordable compared to what they'd be able to get through the pure water project, but we thought at least this is a starting point for discussion, and maybe people knowing that there's an opportunity for this discount, and maybe it maybe it's for the short term, or maybe we say it should be for areas like our downtown or forest hill, that might be an incentive to get people to come forward and and act on acquiring that water.

Okay.

It is pretty complex.

It's going to cost a lot to buy our water, basically.

So have any thoughts.

I I'm pretty much in line with the staff recommendation, but Mayor Proto.

Yeah, I'm also uh aligned with the water allocation uh which you've generated.

But I just uh just to reiterate uh the mayor's question about you know 30 to 60 percent.

And you kind of explained it, Mr.

Biggs, that when we buy water, it's we can either get it for 60% off, is it what you're saying?

Yes, the water that we the city water that we have for sale, uh I think in our fee schedule it's right around 236,000 dollars per acre foot.

So it would be a 60% discount on that to not make it super competitive with the water from pure water, but make it more competitive with that water nice city.

Um and then um I correct on the I'm just gonna bring up ADU units.

If someone wishes to place an AD unit, uh, do we still split the water meter?

Uh if I remember right, to uh if someone wants to put an uh ADU unit behind their house, they split that water heat meter to get to the other that's correct.

They're right now they are having to buy the city's water for their ADU because it's a demand for additional water, and then they're able to um kind of submeter the water from the main to the ADU unit.

So they're able to do that.

It's but the difficulty comes in if they want to install a brand new meter on a vacant site, or if they were let's say had a lot that could be subdivided and the ADU would have to have its own separate meter, that will be permitted based on the rules at the water management district and the um uh the Catalan.

Yeah, I know this isn't well dealing with the water.

I'm just wondering if someone wants to put an AD unit behind their house, they split the water meter.

Uh, do you if it's a let's say it's 600 square foot uh ADU and it does do you know about approximately that might cost the person that um I think it would probably just quick calculations in my at the back of my head for the pure water, it would probably be in the range of maybe $10,000 by the time they pay for the the water, plus they pay for the permitting cost through the water management district, sort of in that neighborhood, versus buying the city water, that would be you know, probably three times that amount for an ADO.

I'm I I want to hear if anybody else has anything to say.

I'm I'm okay with that.

But you're good with the staff and 60%.

Um yes, okay.

Laurie.

Um, yeah, I think it's I I appreciate what you've done to do the breakdown so that there's the bigger discounts for the affordable housing because it's gonna be very important for us starting to work towards achieving our arena goals to have water available, and one of the biggest challenges with the affordable housing is of course being able to pencil out the cost of doing that.

And I think this will make that uh much more viable for us to actually have some projects occur for a similar reason.

I think the same is true for the ADUs.

If it can be very cost prohibitive for somebody to build an ADU for renting it out if they know what it's gonna cost, not only for all the materials to build it, but then to have the water and support of it.

So um anything that um you're recommending that would support the things that help us achieve our goals, which are also requirements from the state, I think that that definitely benefits us.

Um regarding the percentage, I know on the surface it sounds like why do we want to give our water away cheaper?

But the reality is going to be that as the water becomes cheaper from Pure Matter Pure Water Monterey, it's going to be harder for people to be able to justify spending a higher rate with us.

So I think it does make sense to reduce it so it's not sitting there unused and incentivize people maybe proceeding with a project that they've been holding off on because of additional costs in all areas of the market.

So if it if it allows us to better utilize the water we do have available and make some money off of that in ways that benefit the community, because while we definitely need to support our housing, there is also a benefit that comes from not having vacant buildings that could be bringing in revenue for the city to then help us further support other projects.

So I think that it's it's definitely kind of reciprocal loop, but that we we we support the homes and also by supporting the businesses, that is in a in an integral way, you know, supporting the the people in those homes as well.

So I think that the recommendations are good, and I appreciate that.

Um we've left the affordable housing ones with most of the new water that will be coming free to really allow us to get off basically get started on our needs to get that done.

So I I appreciate you bringing this forward, and um I would support the recommendation.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh obviously, with uh even with the discount, you you can't compete with free.

Uh I wouldn't want to even try and do that, but it looks like what we can do is uh uh limit the options of different individuals, which it looks like we've done.

I'm trying to understand this right here, or to confirm with you.

Uh we are reserving the uh the pure water water credits for certain groups' activities, affordable housing, uh commercial municipal.

Uh we are leaving out a uh a reserve and uh residential.

So from what I understand, residential people just current houses that are out there right now, would not be um uh able to purchase these uh uh uh the pure water credits.

Is that correct?

That is correct, yes.

And so residential would necessarily have to, if they're making purchases, they're purchasing through our entitlement water program.

That's correct.

Okay, so we could do that with any group.

True.

Okay.

Um just really thinking this all through before we do a vote.

The uh 60% discount.

If we go with that, that's not just on is that on these uh remaining 15 uh acre feet, or is that on everything that's been out that that uh is currently in process right now?

That would apply to that uh entitlement water, that entire 19 point two five five one acre feet with the four unallocated in reserve, yes.

Okay, and just that okay, all right.

I'm good.

Thank you very much.

You're very welcome.

Thank you.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

Uh thank you for um bring this to forward.

Uh, I think this is a timely discussion, as everybody pointed out.

Uh I I did have some questions.

Um, and I I think I may defer from some whatever the council is thinking in some manner here.

Uh so first of all, I I wanted to understand um it's just a good practical scenario that's if uh pure water monterey is here and we have our city entitlement water too.

Can we give priority to whoever is asking to say buy this water or this water?

Is that something that we can control?

Is that legally possible?

You're asking, is it legal for us to separate the water in these categories so that say residential has to buy the water versus other ones get access to the free?

Although it's not free, you still buy it from Monterey One, but or from the water district.

Uh so we we did have a meeting with with the staff at the Monterey Peninsula Water District, and they had no issue with us allocating water this in this way if the council chooses to tonight.

So we can effectively we are controlling which water anybody can purchase or procure, essentially through the city.

That's what we were doing here.

Residential.

It's also commercial, right?

Right.

But you I'm sorry, can I just clarify?

So um the when you asked that, the way we did that is putting zero on the pure water and 15 on the entitlement.

I don't know if you okay.

That's that's why that's how we're controlling it.

Right, right.

So, but effectively we're controlling it.

Um and the other thing that I noticed from the agenda item is um even with all of those like controlling everything to get put together, this is not going to serve the 120 plus acre feet of water that is required through through Rena for the housing element and all the housing that we put together, it's still far low.

So that's that's that's a point that I want to make.

I mean, after everything put together.

So um, so the the I wanted to clarify this is truly existing waters, right?

So there's a there's no way somebody's going to get a new water meter.

This is all we're still talking about existing water meters only, correct?

This water would be available for use by sites within the city that currently have a water meter that um need to add plumbing fixtures to their home, or if there's a change in business, if they need a new water meter to accommodate that, like a vacant lot, this water would not be available to them.

If they need a new water meter to accommodate that, like a vacant lot, this water would not be available to them.

Okay, and and uh the definition of how much water somebody can get is also I mean, I would say definition, or how much water can somebody actually request for there's a limit to it.

You cannot, even if you have an existing water meter, somebody can just say give me one acre feet of water.

You're controlled by by certain definitions, correct?

Yeah, it's tied to for commercial uses, it's tied to the type of use, and there's a variety of different factors.

We use the example of a retailer or bank space where it's based on the square footage of the building versus a restaurant where it's based on the there's a water factor per seat for residential units, each type of plumbing fixture someone can have in their home is assigned what they call a fixture unit value.

And um, we total up those fixture unit values, and that's the water that they get.

They can't ask for, oh, you know, I'm gonna be adding a bathroom and need you know five fixture units, but give me an extra seven.

Uh, that wouldn't be permitted.

It's just they're just getting the water that they need to have to accommodate the project that they want to finish.

Okay.

Um, I think the the last one is uh just from a question standpoint is um, so we're we can the restrictions, right?

Like as you're detailed out, I just wanted to make sure that we can as we move along, we can the can somebody's from a commercial standpoint request that I want uh what has been allocated for entitlement water, and I also want something that is allocated from pure water.

Can they mix and match here?

Um it's it's possible.

I'm I'm thinking that we may run into that scenario if we have a housing project that includes affordable units plus market rate units, the water for the affordable units would be coming from pure water, and then they would have to buy our entitlement water for the market rate units.

So, yes, it's possible that there could be a project that's drawing from both sources.

Okay.

Um, all right.

So then um my my view has uh I mean it's not changed, and which is that to be honest, I I don't I don't well like to get into this discussion where we're saying commercial needs to have so much, residential needs to have so much.

All that I need is like people to have water whenever they want it.

That's really like fundamentally drawing the line, saying I want water, I need it.

And I mean it's a fundamental right typically to get water, and and the fact that we're discussing this and can trying to allocate something here is is somewhat like crazy, but it is what it is.

So I I did uh to me, it appears that it uh the 32 acre feet of water is something that they're they're holding good right now, but tomorrow it could be 60 acre feet of water, tomorrow it could be 25 acre feet of water.

I don't know what the future holds, it could be either way, it depends on on a lot of things that that can happen, uh drought included, uh, or a lot of rainfall.

Um, so the with with that being said, my my view is that we don't I personally don't like this exact categorization, say 23, 6, 5, etc.

When I looked at the in the past, when I uh examined the housing element, how the city has progressed, we've always um not been able to meet the numbers which are very low income to low income to moderate above moderate is always like an open-ended field, so we're always able to meet that number, but those three other categories we've never been able to meet.

So my view is that within the arena within those three buckets, we just allocate 60 percent of like pure water to those three buckets and the 40 percent to everything else.

Uh and the reason for the percentage is if in the future this 32 changes for whatever reason, then we don't have to come back to the drawing board again to to do whatever, and it's the same concept that you can apply to the entitlement water too, is residential 60 percent and and like unallocated like 40 percent that gives you some uh I would say some discretion to kind of like apply it to some use cases, which probably all of us are not thinking about and which may present themselves in in the future.

But to be honest, I I don't want to get into this like number discussion, but I'm supportive of like a 30 percent to 60 percent because to be uh we we do need to get rid of rid of in some sense the entitlement water as soon as we can.

So, whatever we can do to to get to that point.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um council Garfield.

Thank you.

Yeah, so I'm I'm gonna follow up on Councilman Paduri's point about getting rid of the entitlement.

Like, we're not gonna sit on it, let's not save it because it's not gonna get easier to sell.

Um so I'm wondering if we moved the reserve out of entitlement and put all 19 in residential and had the reserve under pure water by carving a little bit off of the ones that are there, so that reserve isn't available for affordable housing, should it be needed.

I'm just wondering why we're reserving expensive water.

But that was just that's the question.

Why did we make that number?

We wanted to make sure that the council had some flexibility to address a situation that we haven't foreseen in the future, and having um, you know, and this is a recommendation.

You can certainly change that amount around, but we thought that would be a good starting point uh for discussion purposes and knowing that you know that could accommodate if you wanted to in the future, allocating that to affordable housing projects.

That would, you know, not you know, maybe 25 additional units or so, but or whatever use that we can't foresee.

And and we could set the price accordingly.

We don't have to set the price now.

Suppose we wanted 20 additional units of affordable housing, we could use that reserve and match the price of the pure water so that we can incent affordable housing down the road.

So you could do that, yes.

You have that discretion.

Okay.

But I just wanted to know why that was over there and why we were holding on to it.

Right.

We should be getting rid of it.

Fair.

Okay.

Council Mayor Pratem, sorry, I didn't see what you look for.

Um the question is okay.

So we we approve this.

It sounds like it will might happen.

Um, but if we come back, would you come back to us and say, oh, we actually need uh um you know, um residential units, we need more in the residential units.

I mean, do we have to come?

Do you have to come back here or will you be able to do that uh in-house?

Well, this is um these allocations would be adopted by council through resolution, and if there is a need in the future to adjust those, we would come back to council with a revised resolution to address whatever demand in the future is needed.

So it's it's uh it's not like we would have to create an ordinance where we you know do the introduction and the the adoption and wait 30 days.

This is a much more efficient process for making changes.

Okay, and then I was gonna say, um, I'm trying to think of um uh a memory I had in my first term.

I thought we had uh it was originally 30 percent, and then we were gonna go to 60.

And I'm just wondering if that 30 was um an amendment or whatever, but I I don't know.

I I can't remember, but I remember us talking 30 percent.

Yeah, I think we just put a discount in to get the water moving.

Yeah, which has helped, I would say.

Okay, because I we've been signing, I've been signing them since I started.

I know Bill used to, I know Bill Peak used to sign them.

The water's moving, it's not super fast, but it is going.

But uh I'm sorry, yeah.

No, no, no, uh, that's all I have recognized.

Council member Tonald too.

Yeah, thank you.

Yeah, oh, sorry, yeah.

And that was actually gonna be my point too.

I think the advantage here is we're we're trying to find a solution with the anticipation of what they've told us they'll be allocating, which is the 32.

So looking at what is the best way for us to allocate this initial run of it, but then my point was gonna be too clarifying because it's resolution.

When we have more water, we can come back and do a future resolution to decide how we want to allocate that.

Maybe percentage will make sense at that point too.

Um, and so it seems like I would assume that this has been kind of based on maybe some need you're seeing or past patterns.

Um, that this might be a good um allocation to start with.

And and I really do appreciate that we have the large amount for the affordable housing because that's that's gonna be the hardest thing to get penciled out to actually getting us moving towards having a project.

And so I really appreciate that this discussion and this resolution will actually help us to get moving in that direction.

Then I'll entertain a motion.

I my comment will be in in endorsing that would be uh that we it is important to this water policy allocation or this water allocation policy is important to allocate the different to the different needs that we feel or we are prioritizing as a council.

Um, and so the only way to do that is to separate the categories, and I think you know, staff's done as good of a job as any could do on it.

I mean, it's fairly close to 6040.

If I can't some back of the envelope math, but on on the first one.

Um, and that number probably won't change much.

There, you know, they don't give out allocations freely like that without doing a lot of research and at the district and things like that.

They're pretty exact.

Um, and we know ours.

We know our number 19.2551.

So that's not changing either.

So I think we just need to get this a starting point.

So anyone want to make the motion.

Otherwise, I'll make the motion.

A staff plus 60 recommendation for a resolution.

If that passes muster with the city attorney, I'll be able to do that.

Yeah, that is fine.

Okay.

This is we're gonna vote on uh any discussion further discussion on that.

All right, uh, we're gonna vote on the staffable 60 recommendation.

Um, all in favor say aye.

Aye, aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, passes unanimously 601.

And that ladies and gentlemen, it's 7 p.m.

and we are at the close of our agenda tonight.

I appreciate everyone coming out tonight.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for being online and watching.

And um, this meeting is adjourned.