Good afternoon.

I'd like to call this meeting in order at 202 p.m.

Clerk, please call the roll.

Thank you, Councilmember Kaplan.

Councilmember Dickinson.

Councilmember Pleckybaum.

Councilmember Maple.

Here.

Councilmember Getta.

Councilmember Jennings.

Councilmember Vang.

Here.

Vice Mayor Talamantes.

And Mayor McCarty.

Mayor, you have a quorum.

Okay.

To the original people of this land, the Nissanam people, the Southern Maidu, Ballions Plain Me Walk, Patwin 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 an active practice of acknowledgement and appreciation for Sacramento's indigenous people's history, contributions, and lives.

Thank you.

Salute.

And to the Republic for which it stands, underground, invisible liberty, and justice for all.

So mayor, we now move to the consent calendar.

We have items one through three.

I have no public comment for any of these items.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Opposed.

Abstain.

Thank you.

Passes unanimously, nine to zero.

We move to the public hearing calendar.

We have one item and by right.

The action is to continue by staff to September 9th, 2025 pro City Council rules of procedure.

So then we now move on to council comments, ideas, questions, and AB123 reports.

Councilmember Maple.

I'm I'm happy to go at the end unless anyone else has their reports.

Okay, I will be I will be very brief, but I wanted to give an AB 1234 report on my trip to the Netherlands.

He was originally invited through his role with the California Air Resources Board, but was unable to make it and suggested that I go with my role as the vice chair of the Air District.

And so this is my first time in the Netherlands in Amsterdam.

It was wonderful.

They're very creative and innovative people.

So I'll just share briefly a couple things that we did.

So here is a photo of me actually presenting at the Dutch House of Provinces in Brussels.

So we were able to visit the European Parliament as well that day and the European Commission.

And what's really cool about that is I was able to also talk about the things that we're doing here in Sacramento.

So I don't I don't know how to move forward the slides.

Someone can advance.

Or if there's a clicker I can use.

Aha.

So I'm gonna go really, really briefly so that you uh don't be bored.

But I was able to talk about our partnerships here with um, so I actually reached out to SACOG, the Air District, Regional Transit, our incredible city staff and the public works department, um, as well as GSEC, and they all sent me about a thousand slides, um, which uh that was not gonna work, and so I was able to put it all together as uh concisely as I as I could, and so I was able to talk to them about what we're doing as a region.

Um, our delegation included representatives from the governor's office, um, from NASA, from Caltrans, and um, and from the private sector as well as the Contra Costa Transportation Authority.

Uh, and so I was like, hey, here's the cool stuff we're doing in Sacramento.

We've got a chip plant that's coming online.

Um, we've got our hydrogen projects, we've got electrification, active mobility, and our climate action plan.

I talked about some of the work we're doing at the air quality management district, including working on kind of heavy freight, um, our streets for people plan, our Del Rio trail, and our safe routes to transit.

They were very excited about a lot of that, and actually they were shocked at um the number of uh pedestrian fatalities and injuries we have in Sacramento and uh because the culture of biking there is so strong, they have very few.

Uh talked about the hydrogen hub at McClellan, um the Twin River School District had the very first all uh elect largest electric school bus fleet.

They were very impressed by that.

Talked about some of the work that we're doing on public transit, including BRT and transit-oriented development, something they were very interested in because they also, especially in Amsterdam struggle with housing availability and affordability like we do here.

They loved our ride-free program for for students.

Um they thought that that was wonderful, and they were really impressed at the increased ridership that and our hopefully long-term writers that we created.

And of course, I couldn't end without telling them to come visit Sacramento and light the beam with us.

And so um really a pleasure to go.

I think the Air District for the opportunity for um paying for my my travel too.

And that's it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I know, sharing.

Oh, yes, I forgot the most important part, and they and and gifts bestowed uh upon you from the province of North Holland, North Holland, um, which uh helped organize the trip.

Uh mayor, the King's Commissioner also gave you some special additional guests, including the hat and the bag.

So enjoy.

Okay.

Well done.

Thank you, Corin.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I see no council members punched up, so I do have one public comment for matters not on the agenda.

Mark Velasquez.

Hi, thank you.

Just one moment, please.

I think you need a mic.

That would be helpful.

Check check.

You're good, thank you.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, everybody.

Great seeing you all.

Uh, my name's Mark Velasquez.

Some of you might know me as the cemetery guy.

I'm fine with that because that lets you know what it is I'm that I'm trying to do.

Um in the end, what I'm trying to do is get a new special district, a cemetery, a public cemetery district for the city of Sacramento residents.

There's 529,000 residents, and there is one non-profit um cemetery remaining.

And what I'm getting at here is cost-effective burials.

That is what public cemetery districts do.

Uh, we have plenty of private cemeteries, but only one that's left, and that's uh Oddfellows, and they only have five years left of sales left.

So we have a need um and a demand, of course.

But what I what I really don't want to see why I'm here is I don't want to see people on the corners with cans collecting for money for funeral expenses.

I've seen that here in Sacramento.

It disgusts me.

I don't want the continuing divide between the haves and the have nots in Sacramento.

Um the have nots, I mean, what's the average income here?

I think to the last census, 49,000.

You know how much a private burial is?

10,000, 20, 30, 40,000.

So the average Sacramentian cannot afford a private cemetery.

They can only afford public cost effect effective cemeteries.

Um I've come up with the vision.

Um, one of the plans um by the city on their major um investment website, or not investment website, major products, is the 102 acres off of Meadow View.

I've come up with a vision of that, 50 acres for a public cemetery district, and the rest, of course, being either affordable housing or parks and recs and everything else that the public has indicated.

I request 30 more seconds, Mayor.

Sure, wrap it up.

Thank you.

Um so this is a vision of what we can do.

There's a need here.

I'm trying to help this city plan.

I'm here to help plan for the future, which is what we're all here to do is plan for the citizens of this city to have a cost-effective burial option.

I've been before LAFCO.

They're all teed up.

They just had a hearing on um the state of public cemeteries for the whole county, but I'm focused for this city and for the residents of this city.

In the end, I will need this council to put in application at Laugh.

Thank you for your comments.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Mayor, I have no more business to come before the council.

Okay.

So you may adjourn.

We'll adjourn to close session.