.

Chair, staff is ready when you are.

We are at April 14, 2025, 107 p.m. and we are starting our meeting. This meeting is

now called to order. Will the clerk please call the roll to establish a quorum?

Thank you, Chair. Commissioners, please unmute for roll. Commissioner Anderson? Absent. Commissioner

chamber? Here. Commissioner Lamelli? Here. Commissioner Martino? Here. Commissioner Ohebu?

Here. Commissioner Smith? Here. Commissioner Toccalino? Here. Commissioner Wallace? Here.

Commissioner Winnlock? Here. And chair Lovulo? Here. Thank you. We have quorum. Thank you.

I would like to remind members of the public and chambers that if you would like to speak

on an agenda item, please turn in the speaker slip when the item begins. You will have two

minutes to speak once you are called on. After the first speaker, we will no longer accept

the speaker slips. We will now proceed with today's agenda. With the land acknowledgement.

Please rise. For the opening acknowledgements and honor of Sacramento's indigenous people

and tribal lands. For the original people of this land, the Nisanan people, the southern

Maidu Valley and plains, Miwok, Putwin, Wintoon peoples and the people of the Wilton Rancheria,

Sacramento's only federally recognized tribe. May we acknowledge and honor the native people

who came before us and still walk beside us today on these ancestral lands by choosing

to gather together today in the active practice of acknowledgment and appreciation for Sacramento's

indigenous peoples, history, contributions and lives. Thank you.

We will now say the pleasure of leaving us. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United

States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible,

with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you. Our first business today is approval of the consent calendar. Actually, it's a

special presentation. Let's see here. Yes.

Thank you, Chair Lavoulo. Jason Zhang, manager of the Office of Arts and Culture. It is my

honor and privilege to call to the stage our Po-Loriates, Sacramento Po-Loriates, Andrew Defie,

from 2020 to 2024. It is my absolute joy and privilege as Andrew has just been a beacon of joy and hope

and his spirit and his essence and his words have uplifted nearly every corner of our city.

With that, I'm going to hand it over to you. As we celebrate you today, a lot of things going on

today, feel free to share what that looks like. We're also going to have a reception

right after this meeting, 330 to 430 in City Hall Room 1119. With that, Andrew.

Yeah, absolutely. Want to make sure to invite you guys tonight at the Sacramento Poetry Center,

releasing my first collection of poetry, which is a collection that was over the past five years of

being Po-Loriate. There are pieces that are that have gone around the world on poets.org and TEDx,

and there are some pieces that are unreleased journal entries that I'm very nervous about putting

out in the world. So very excited about that tonight. Yeah, and that's what that's what we're

doing. It's been a huge honor to be the Po-Loriate of Sacramento. It's been the biggest honor of my life,

and I'm very excited about what we built and what we're going to continue building

with Sacramento Poetry Week and being able to continue to build with all of you.

Yeah, individually and just connecting as far as poetry week because that's coming up in October,

so pretty soon we're going to start working on that again. Yeah, that's it. Can I leave you

guys with a poem? Is that okay? I didn't really have this plan, but the way that the world's going

right now, I feel like it's part of the job of the poets to like leave people with a little something

that helps us put our shoulders down in a world that has been kind of getting us tense, right?

This poem is called advice when fighting a war of attrition or the fire hose of falsehood needs

a less cheesy name. They're coming to confiscate your calm mornings, wage war on the way you wake up.

They want you tossing and turning. You can drown in shallow enough breath. They want you

dysregulated. You fall easier when you're unbalanced. They'll have you forgetting that you can forgive

yourself for your own sins. See these architects of unrest will rewrite the gospel of your body,

hand you a wardrobe and call it a heartbeat and tell you to march, but you were not born to be a

battlefield. Refuse to become ruins. Be both blade and balm. Let your rest be a riot. Let your breath

be a barricade. A centered mind is empire. They cannot occupy what they fear most has never been

your movement. They fear the way you plant yourself, how you sharpen stillness into sanctuary. They

have studied your fire, calculated your rage and fear how it does not beg permission. There is no

revolution without room to breathe. Rest is not retreat. You are the storm and the shelter.

Let your ease outlive them. Let your rest be relentless and your joy non-negotiable.

Let your breath be balanced. They can't budget because our movements don't need more martyrs.

We need more embers that refuse to burn out and flames that stay hot enough to strike

when the iron becomes worth bending. Thanks y'all.

Thank you so much for that and for leaving those words. They were beautiful. Thank you.